US Foreign Policy in a Nutshell

The president of the United States, who put the essence of his country's foreign policy in a nutshell

"If we see that Germany is winning the war, we ought to help Russia, and if Russia is winning, we ought to help Germany, and that way let them kill as many as possible. . ."

Harry S. Truman, 1941

see  www.colnect.com

died on December 26, 40 years ago. To the honor of this war criminal, the Republic of Liberia, released a 5-Dollar coin. Liberia was founded by repatriated black American slaves who established an apartheid state in order to suppress and exploit the manpower of the local black population - in a similar manner as they had experienced slavery in the US previously.

www.colnect.com

Oh, How We Love Our Oriental Rulers!

"If you want them to be tortured, you send them to Syria.  If you want someone to disappear—never to see them again—you send them to Egypt", Robert Baer once said.

Now, the West loves brutal dictators - as long as they keep their cruelties secret and as long they play by the rules - OUR rules, or - to be more precise - the rules of big business. We loved when crazy Gaddafi  resided in a tent on Donald Trump's property in New York and was eager to supply oil, we loved when the Trabelsi Clan provided us with cheap labor slaves and hotels to serve us Western tourists on Tunesia's golden beaches; we loved the outsourcing, the money laundering and the weapon deals with the Mubarak Clan in Egypt, we loved Yemen's Saleh and offered him refuge just as we liked the Shah of Persia and Saddam, and we still love the Gulf states - especially Saudi Arabia - because we can make such a good business with them and they really manage to keep their fellow citizens down and torture in the dark. And we all know: Syria is next. Assad was good, but he couldn't keep his people effectively under control. So don't wonder why "Obama authorized covert support for Syrian rebels"! This is just the "Syrian war of lies and hypocrisy" as one of the last remaining journalists said. Don't you worry, we'll find another dictator for Syria and then we apply democracy there!

What "Going to the Mountains" Really Means in the North Caucasus

http://wikitravel.org/en/North_Caucasus#b

In 2009, I met young people from Russia's Caucasus Mountains who told me about their situation. They have been long-term unemployed and desperate since they could hardly provide their families with foods. They had lost hope of political solutions. So they were entertaining the idea of "going to the mountains" - which meant nothing less then going up there and joining the Islamistic militants terrorizing the Russian population, especially Russian authorities and people linked to them. What they expected from "going to the mountains" was to get some money from the jihadists. In return, they would receive some combat training and perform one or the other assassination. The jihadists are said to be sponsored by the long-term U.S. ally Saudi-Arabia. I was also told that the Wahhabi's determined goal is to establish a caliphate (or emirate) across the whole Caucasus region. 

Mosque in Mahatchkala, capital of the Republic of Dagestan, Russia

Wahhabism (a form of extreme fundamentalist Salafism) is relatively new in the Caucasus region and skeptically viewed by old local Sunnis. Whether Wahhabi money also directly flows into the building of mosques and Qur'anic schools is hard to tell. But it can be assumed that even less radical local Sunni Muslims will not look a gift horse in the mouth - thereby indirectly supporting the Wahhabi agenda to strengthen and spread their cultural and political hegemony over the Caucasus region.

Qur'anic school opposite to Mosque in Mahatchkala, Dagestan

But the guys I have met were neither extremists, nor did they support the extreme fundamentalist Muslim agenda. They were strong and stubborn believers, no doubt, but didn't even attend Friday prayers on a regular basis. They were rather muslims by tradition than fundamentalists. They couldn't speak or understand Arabic and were not really interested in translations either (maybe due to the influence of Sufism in the Caucasus; some Sufis say that it is better just to view the Arabic letters of the Qur'an than to read a (bad) translation). Though some people I met told me they attended Arabic lessons in the Qur'anic school, their knowledge of the language appeared to be very restricted.

Mahatchkala at the Caspian Sea: Filthy beach section
where once used to be a city beach during the Soviet Union

During my travel from Mahatchkala to Derbent (further to the south) I was once present during a discussion between young Dagestani and a native Arabic speaker. At times he amusedly corrected their use of the Arabic language when it came to religious topics. At some point he felt obliged to lecture them on a topic concerning the Qur'an. The Dagestani politely listened to him (via translation) until he was finished and then continued by totally ignoring of what he had said. Afterwards he told me those guys had no idea of the Arabic language and dubious knowledge of the Qur'an. When they asked me about my belief, I answered "agnostic", suppressing the fact that I'm an infidel towards the book religions I got acquainted with. Those guys were very quick at hand with some religious verses bashing agnostics and depicting them even less favorable than atheists (something which you can hear also in the Bible Belt). 

Mahatchkala at the Caspian Sea, view from the foot of the Caucasus Mountains I

Stubborn resistance: not even the anti-religious suppression during the Soviet Union could annihilate the multi-ethnic Caucasian population's adherence to Muslim belief which had arrived there in the late 8th century AD. Under the Soviets, religious practice in public was forbidden. After the collapse of the Soviet Union the Dagestani threw out all Russians but later invited them to come back after they had realized that nothing goes without them (long story short!). There was no one left running the infrastructure, hospitals, universities, ...

Mahatchkala at the Caspian Sea, view from the foot of the Caucasus Mountains I I

It would be an oversimplification to think young people in the Caucaus were peaceful in principle and only forced by bad economical and political conditions to join the Wahhabi terrorists. The situation is much more complicated. I assume though that they wouldn't voluntarily "go to the mountains" if they'd see other possibilities. But here's the problem: they don't have much choice, if you try to see it their way. Why?

Down south through the Caucasian foothills, on the road to Derbent

First, there is the strong archaic-patriarchal structure of the tribes. I think it's justified to speak of tribes or clans here, because if you ask the people, they can name the patriarch of their family and his possible successors, and these families are big; marriages are often arranged between cousins in order to strengthen the ties between families; possible genetic disorders are totally ignored; weddings take three days and can be crowded with thousands of people (depending on the size of the involved clans); women have no desirable status there: their value is measured by their fertility; they can be easily divorced and a divorced woman is a pariah - it would be the best for her to flee the Republic; I was always feeling very bored spending hours in the living room with men only, while women and girls had fun in the kitchen from which they would show up at times serving us the meals; nevertheless, these archaic-patriarchal family structures are often softened by several factors, e.g. it appeared to me that the gender separation was less important when no other member of the clan was watching. Coming back to the question of choice: most notably in cities, men are supposed not to have an "unmanly" profession - a doctor, a professor at the university, a lawyer, a technician, not to speak of gardeners, shoemakers or cooks - these are not "manly" professions, these are for slaves, girlies or foreigners; the choices for a "real man" are restricted to either "business men" (including all sorts of businesses) or "fighter" (including "manly sports", the military and the police); Now, since a country cannot be run by business men and fighters only, they need "guest workers" like Russians and folks from other regions of the former Soviet Empire who do the skilled, the "dirty" and the "unmanly" jobs for them. And - by the way - this is no exaggeration. In Chechnya, this Caucasian Machismo is even stronger. (Craftsmanship is acceptable in the countryside though, where you can't do without it.)

View from Naryn-Kala citadel (Цитадель Нарын-кала) over Derbent at the Caspian Sea

Second, the market for business and fighter jobs is naturally constantly saturated, young folks from the North Caucasus either stay unemployed, "go to the mountains" or leave the Republic. Now, "going to the mountains" is the last option, I assume. This leaves emigration the only way out. Now, there is the problem with education, especially with foreign languages. Mostly they don't know any other "foreign" language than Russian. (In fact, Russian is the only common language they have and is obligatory in schools. If they hadn't Russian, the tribes couldn't even communicate with each other.) This is why many young people from the region go to Russia or other neighboring countries where Russian is still spoken. But in Russia the people from the south are uniformly called "the blacks", viewed as possible terrorists and not very welcomed. Since they cannot accept "unmanly" job offers, they are subject to the same restrictions as at home. So this often leaves them with the hard option to study at a Russian university - a challenge for which they are hardly prepared because of the bad education at home. Only a small percentage, I guess, will master this rocky road. Another small percentage will choose the "unmanly" way of staying at home, studying or buying some academic degree and working as a doctor or the like. (I would not recommend consulting a dentist in this region.)

Garden on top of Naryn-Kala citadel, Derbent  

Third, there is an atmosphere of hopelessness regarding the political situation, especially the high level of corruption. In Chechnya there is Dr. Ramzan Akhmadovich Kadyrov, a ruthless vassal by the grace of Moscow. He's Muslim. Nevertheless, he and his henchmen are doing the dirty work to keep the Republic quiet and clean from the Wahhabi terrorists (who allegedly tried to kill him in 2009). Consequently, the Islamists more and more flee from Chechnya to Dagestan or Ingushetia. Whistle blowers have been assassinated by Kadyrov's gang even outside of Russia, so in Dubai, Istanbul and in Vienna. If anyone comes nearer to Sasha Baron Cohen's figure in The Dictator than the Saudi princes, it must be Kadyrov. In Dagestan the situation is different. In contrast to Chechnya, Dagestan is a melting pot of different ethnicities and historically these have been much more loyal to Russia than Chechens. Putin continued the old Soviet style strategy to appoint members of the local elite as vassals: Kadyrov in Chechnya and Magomedsalam Magomedov in Dagestan. The latter is an ethnic Dargin. Now, whatever his merits might be, there we have already a severe problem, since the Dargins are just one out of a wide range of ethnic groups each of which is a closed society, dominated by clan mentality. Under such conditions, problems are bound to occur. Even Dagestani told me that it would have been a much better idea to appoint an ethnic Russian - provided he is capable of forcing back corruption - the hardest problem in the region.

An old Soviet slogan on top of the building: "Long Live the Defenders of Dagestan" (going back to  WW2)

At the same time corruption is a general problem in Russia, not only in the Caucasus region. Take for instance streets and highways: often you see new streets which have been obviously designed to have two or more lanes but in fact there is only the minimum of one prepared to go. Sometimes you drive along a new street and it suddenly stops in the middle of nowhere. Road signs are rare. Here's how it works with Russian public funds: a full-blown project for a public building or street is sent to Moscow, everything's included, no flaw. After being approved in the Russian capital, the money is sent to the local authorities. Now, here's a simplified scheme: the first quarter of the money stays in Moscow, the second gets lost somehow on the way and when half of the money arrives in Dagestan, the third quarter of the estimated sum disappears into some local's pocket. The poor rest is finally spent for the construction of the street or building, provided the raw materials or construction machines are not stolen during the process. This distribution scheme of public wealth goes under the name "sharing". "Sharing" is an important concept in Russia. If you want your business to survive, you've got to "share". If you ask Russians why oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky is imprisoned, they often simply comment "he didn't want to share".
Nevertheless, there are some republics and districts in Russia where you can observe improvements, where new housing space is created, tolerable infrastructure and public buildings like schools, baths and sport centers are built. There you can see that corruption is not a destiny - not even in Russia. But in the Caucasus region it's still a plague and a job-killer. Ask the locals and they will name you the exact prices in $ for all kinds of governmental posts, licenses and academic degrees. It is more than obvious that most young people are not bound to participate in that system. They are marginalized.

Note also that the Wahhabi hunt declared by Moscow much too often affects the wrong people, i.e. the moderate Muslims instead of the extremists. In addition, conditions in Russian prisons are so inhumane that even moderate young Muslims, arbitrarily imprisoned, are put odds with Russian politics which again turns out counter productive and playing into the hands of Islamist.

If you put it all together, what are the root causes for young people in the Caucasus to "go to the mountains"? It's a combination of corruption on all levels, failed policy of the Russian Federation, the archaic-patriarchal mindset of the Caucasian tribes, the hegemonic ambitions of Saudi-Arabia based Islamists and, last but not least, the devastating influence of a religion whose holy scriptures are open to violent interpretations whenever desired.

In particular, the archaic-patriarchal mindset of the closed tribal societies restrict young people to only a narrow set of possible ways to earn their living; this causes per se tight job market conditions (in major cities); political and economic corruption further tighten these conditions which also erode social life in the region; the archaic-patriarchal structures also imply that violent conflict resolution is socially acceptable; unfortunately, this traditional cultural readiness to use violence meets here with  militant adherents of possible violent interpretations of the Qur'an, financially sponsored from certain groups abroad, especially from Saudi-Arabia; Moscow's failed politics of vassals and Wahhabi hunt further creates resistance and causes a spiral of violence: in Chechnya, the Russians are lying in bed with the devil and in Dagestan they just don't stop taking counter productive measures.

Further readings:
Russia’s Dagestan: Conflict Causes (recommended!)
Islam in the North Caucasus (Uwe Halbach)

Some more impressions from Mahatchkala:

Young Dagestani school girls in front of a statue of Lenin

another house of prayer

at the bazar

inside the market hall

governmental building

Warum die Siegermächte des Zweiten Weltkriegs immer noch diktieren

Kennen sie die "Small Five" oder "S5"? So wird die aus den fünf Kleinstaaten Schweiz, Costa Rica, Singapur, Jordanien und Liechtenstein Gruppe bezeichnet. Kürzlich wagte diese einen Mini-Aufstand gegen das anachronistische Regime der Siegermächte des Zweiten Weltkriegs im U.N. Sicherheitsrat. Dabei waren die Forderungen der Gruppe minimal.


Weltmächte lassen Kleinstaaten auflaufen
Die Schweiz und vier Verbündete müssen Uno-Initiative begraben

Mit ein bißchen Logik erfolgreich gegen den Krieg

Lang' hat's gedauert! Hier die erste vernünftige Darstellung der Iran-Israel Problematik im deutschsprachigen Infotainment, erschienen im österreichischen Standard:

Eric Frey: Israel - Iran: Komplexe Logik

Ergänzt man diesen Artikel mit "Die Illusion von der Bombe, die Israel bedroht", so erhält man eine hinreichend schlüssige Argumentationshilfe gegen die allgegenwärtige Kriegstreiberei bezüglich dieses Konflikts.

Im Prinzip fehlt jetzt nur noch eine Liste von Hypothesen, warum dieses Säbelgerassel seit nun mehr über 10 Jahren überhaupt stattfindet.

Abseits des deutschen Infotainments

"Die Existenz Israels wird aber nicht durch die (potentielle) iranische Atombombe bedroht – es gibt keinen Grund anzunehmen, dass der Mullah-Staat sie gegen Israel einsetzen würde, wenn er nicht das Risiko eingehen möchte, innerhalb weniger Tage selbst in Schutt und Asche gelegt zu werden." Moshe Zuckermann

"Sowohl die USA als auch Israel vertreten hier kurzsichtig ihre Interessen, und die EU spielt leider mit. Die USA wollen im ölreichen Nahen Osten nur wohlgesinnte Regimes – und sie möchten den Fehler wettmachen, dass sie mit ihrem Irak-Krieg dem Iran mehr Einfluss verschafften. Aber was ist am Iran schlechter als an Pakistan oder Saudi-Arabien? Hat der Iran kein Recht auf ökonomische und politische Entfaltung? Ahmadinedschads Rechtfertigung für seine verbalen Ausfälle ist die schwärende Wunde des Unrechts Israels: 1948 Vertreibung der Palästinenser, ihre Enteignung und gewaltsame Verhinderung ihrer Rückkehr, heute ihre Diskriminierung in Israel, ihre Rechtlosigkeit in der Westbank, ihre Einkesselung in Gaza. Israel möchte von diesem Unrecht nicht reden und setzt sich stattdessen als Opfer einer hypothetischen künftigen iranischen Atombombe in Szene. Ist dieser Themenwechsel nicht sehr willkommen?" Rolf Verleger

"Wann wird Deutschland aufwachen und verstehen, dass es diesmal bedeutet, „auf der Seite der Juden zu stehen“, jene zu unterstützen, die gegen Israels Regierung kämpfen."  Yonatan Shapira

Weitere Kommentare: http://www.hintergrund.de

Aufgepaßt, Deutsche! Die Amerikaner mögen Euch!

Und Ihr mögt die Amerikaner und ihren Präsidenten, habt Ihr das gewußt? Der Online-Spiegel schaltet wieder einmal eine ungekennzeichnete Werbung, und so liest man heute in seinen Headlines: 

Umfrage in den USA - Amerikaner mögen die Deutschen

Dabei handelt es sich um eine Replik auf die letztes Jahr erschienene Anbiederung des umtriebigen GMF

Amerika-Bild - Deutsche wünschen sich starke USA

Aufgepaßt, man achte auf die vielsagenden Fragestellungen in beiden Umfragen! Das Beste an diesen Werbeschaltungen sind ohnehin die Leserkommentare ...

Die Illusion von der Bombe, die Israel bedroht

Man braucht nicht mehr als drei Annahmen um plausibel zu machen, daß die Idee eines nuklearen Angriffs auf Israel pure Illusion ist.

Nehmen wir an, daß

1) Wenn zwei verfeindete Staaten über einsatzbereite, hinreichend gefährliche Nuklearbewaffnung sowie die Fähigkeit zu einem effektiven nuklearen Zweitschlag verfügen, werden sie keinen Erstschlag mit diesen Waffen gegeneinander führen. (Prinzip der nuklearen Abschreckung)

2) Israel verfügt über einsatzbereite, hinreichend gefährliche Nuklearbewaffnung sowie die Fähigkeit zu einem effektiven nuklearen Zweitschlag (zu Wasser und zu Lande).

3) Iran verfügt über einsatzbereite, hinreichend gefährliche Nuklearbewaffnung sowie die Fähigkeit zu einem effektiven nuklearen Zweitschlag (zu Wasser und zu Lande).

Daraus können wir schließen, daß, selbst wenn der Iran eines Tages über nukleare Bewaffnung verfügen sollte, die beiden Staaten Israel und Iran sich unter den genannten Voraussetzungen nicht gegenseitig mit Nuklearwaffen attackieren werden. Mit anderen Worten, solange das Prinzip der nuklearen Abschreckung angenommen wird - und es ist schwer zu sehen, warum es im mittleren Osten nicht anwendbar sein sollte - wird Israel von überhaupt niemandem in Reichweite seiner atomaren Sprengköpfe angegriffen werden. Schon allein aufgrund dieses simplen Arguments erscheint ein nuklearer Angriff auf Israel unwahrscheinlich.

Warum sollte also das Atomprogramm des Iran für Israel eine existenzielle Bedrohung darstellen, wie hartnäckig und monoton behauptet wird?

Werfen wir einen Blick auf eine Verschärfung der Situation und nehmen wir an, daß 2) nicht der Fall wäre, daß also Israel entweder über keine nukleare Bewaffnung oder nicht über die Kapazität für einen Zweitschlag verfügte. In diesem Fall käme die Logik des kalten Krieges 1) nicht mehr zur Anwendung, da einer der verfeindeten Staaten nicht über die vorausgesetzte nukleare Bewaffnung verfügt. Nehmen wir weiterhin 3) an, und zusätzlich, daß der Iran tatsächlich einen Angriff mit nuklearen Massenvernichtungswaffen auf Israel durchführt.

Was würde passieren?

Man sollte sich zunächst einmal darüber klar werden, daß dieses Szenario in sich völlig unplausibel ist. Wenn man voraussetzt, daß der Grund für einen Angriff auf das Land (die Fläche) Israel das von den iranischen Mullahs immer wieder bedrohlich kritisierte "zionistische Regime" Israels ist, das - so Teheran - eine Apartheids- und Expansionspolitik gegenüber den Palästinensern forciert, dann wird es letzteren wenig helfen, wenn das Land, das sie für sich beanspruchen (teilweise) nuklear verseucht wird. (Welchen Sinn sollte das haben? Man muß sich an dieser Stelle wirklich die Frage stellen, wie die Leute, die in der Öffentlichkeit die Angst vor einem Nuklearschlag verbreiten, sich diesen denn vorstellen? Eine "Megabombe", die Israel (und nicht auch gleich seine Nachbarn) tatsächlich von Landkarte radiert? Mini-Nukes? Ein "chirurgischer Nuklearangriff", der die Feinde tötet, aber die anwesenden (oder benachbarten) Freunde am Leben läßt? Der Jerusalem zerstört, aber alle sog. "heiligen moslemische Stätte" unversehrt läßt? Alles Fantastereien - wenn man nur einmal versuchen würde sich das genauer auszumalen.)

Ferner, warum sollten die schiitischen Mullahs, allesamt wohlhabende Geschäftsmänner mit Frauen und Kindern, ihr eigenes Wohlergehen und das ihres Landes aufs Spiel setzen? Für die sunnitischen Palästinenser? Wohl kaum. 

Abgesehen von der geringen Plausibilität eines iranischen Angriffs, was würde passieren? Der Iran wäre dem Untergang geweiht. Zwar haben wir hier vorausgesetzt, daß der Iran über die Fähigkeit des nuklearen Zweitschlages verfügt, die er neben Israel auch gegen andere Staaten einsetzen könnte, doch im Falle eines erfolgten Angriffes auf Israel, käme eine andere einfache Regel ins Spiel, nämlich die der Überzahl: der Iran, der jetzt schon - insbesondere in seiner unmittelbaren Nachbarschaft - weitgehend isoliert ist, sähe sich einer Überzahl an Feinden gegenüber, insbesondere der NATO, geführt von den USA und Europa. Schon für unvergleichlich geringere "Vergehen" wie solch einer hypothetischen Tragödie wurden Staaten von den USA heimgesucht, allein im letzten Jahrzehnt Afghanistan und der Irak, beides Länder, in denen bis heute das Chaos herrscht.

Ein nuklearer Angriff Irans auf Israel ist höchst unplausibel in einem Szenario, in welchem das Prinzip der nuklearen Abschreckung angewendet werden kann. Doch sogar wenn die Logik des kalten Krieges nicht angewendet wird und man dem Iran die Herstellung von nuklearen Waffen frei unterstellt - obwohl die klerikalen Führer des Iran dies aus religiösen dezidiert ausgeschlossen haben und es genauso viele Hinweise auf ein Atomwaffenprogramm gibt, wie im Irak dazumal (nämlich keine), selbst dann kann das Gerede von der Bedrohung der Existenz Israels durch einen nuklearen Iran nicht aufrechterhalten werden und schon gar nicht mit dem Hinweis auf den "Wipe off the map"-Sager eines Präsidenten, der nicht viel zu sagen hat im Regime der schiitischen Würdenträger.

Es ist sicherlich immer wieder frappierend zu sehen mit welcher Zähigkeit die Idee der iranischen Bombe im internationalen Massenmedien Infotainment unwidersprochen am Leben erhalten wird. Die viel plausibleren - geostrategischen, wirtschaftlichen und hegemonialen - Gründe in den Iran einzumarschieren gehen dabei unter. Zu diesen gehört auch der Einwand, das Zulassen der Produktion von nuklearen Sprengköpfen seitens des Irans könnte ein allgemeines Wettrüsten im ohnehin spannungsgeladenen mittleren Osten hervorrufen. Aber dieser Einwand hat zunächst einmal rein gar nichts mit der von allen Seiten beschworenen Bedrohung Israels durch den Iran zu tun. Das Problem der Verbreitung von Atomwaffen gibt es seit es Atomwaffen gibt und es beschäftigt vor allem jene Staaten, die sie schon im Besitz haben. 

Gibt es irgendeine Erklärung, warum diese Illusion von der Bombe immer weiter genährt wird?

Ja, es gibt eine durchaus einsichtige psychologische Erklärung. Die Logik der nuklearen Abschreckung kann nämlich suspendiert werden, indem man einen der Kontrahenten als Verrückten ansieht, als gefährlichen Irren, dem man keinesfalls so eine gefährliche Waffe wie die Bombe in die Hand geben darf. Das Prinzip der nuklearen Abschreckung setzt "rational agents" voraus. Irre sind aber nicht "rational agents".

Haben Sie sich selbst schon dabei ertappt, daß sie sich vorstellten, wie die "bärtigen Irren von Theheran" nervös mit der Bombe herumfuchteln? Wenn ja, woher kommt das? Zweifellos hat die nun schon jahrzehntelang andauernde Verunglimpfung der "Araber" (oder "Moslems") als unberechenbare, wilde, unzivilisierte und verschlagene Hinterwäldler dazu beigetragen, zusammen mit dem fast ununterbrochenen Strom an (echten und gefälschten) Meldungen über Anschläge des sog.  internationalen Terrorismus bishin zu den steinewerfenden Kindern der Intifada. All das suggeriert dem Gehirn das Bild von primitiven Kreaturen, denen es unmöglich ist mit einer Atomwaffe "ordnungsgemäß" umzugehen. Zusätzlich eignet sich Achmadinedschad nun wirklich vorzüglich für die Rolle des "Teufel vom Dienst" in einem an Kriegspropaganda so reichem Theaterstück (siehe Morellis Prinzipien der Kriegspropaganda). Dies sind die Ingredienzen der psychologischen Einflußnahme, die selbst jene, die diese Islamophobie kreiert haben und unermüdlich vorantreiben, schließlich dazu bringen an ihre eigenen Propagandalügen zu glauben.

If the Iranians Really Want Something from Israel, What Is It exactly?

(50:00)

"Let's talk about the neo-cons. Who has done more damage to Israel than the neo-cons?"

(52:45)

"The American way is always "We don't talk to them!". You take the French on the other hand who have a back-channel to Teheran  right now as we speak. They always talk to their enemies, figure out what they want, see if they can give it and then - once they have decided on a policy in secret - they make it public. And that's what we need to do to Teheran. We really need to find out what they want, how far they're going on this nuclear bomb and what they need from Israel: is it the settlements in the West Bank, is it Israel's nuclear program, is it Lebanon? All these things can be worked out, I think, with the Iranians."

(54:00)

"They [Iran] are not a radical expanding power. They are a traditional state power which wants to be predominant in the Gulf. And they want to be predominant in the Gulf because they believe they have the biggest army, the rim of the Gulf is 90% Shia and they got certain demands."

(48:00)

"I think that we can look at the Iranians and look at the way they have acted in Iraq [...] - they are not suicidal. They're not Al'Qaeda, they don't wanna kill themselves, they could have done an enormous damage to us [...] but they didn't. We have to look at their recent record. We have to look at their record in Lebanon: in spite of the 2006 war they have stepped back from confrontation. They have stepped back from confrontation in Gaza [...]. So I see them as much more accommodating to a grand bargain than I would for instance the Taliban or Al'Qaeda or even huge parts of Saudi-Arabia - they just don't like us - there is a clash of civilizations there - there isn't with Iran. The Iranians are the only country in the Middle-East that really like us ... the Iranian people, not the regime."

These quotations of ex-CIA case officer in the Middle-East Robert Baer stem from a conversation in 2009, at a time when demonstrations against the clerical government took place in Teheran. Much of what Baer says represents a refreshing antidote to the world-wide mass media infotainment and war propaganda currently poisoning international politics. One of the striking questions asked in the video below is simply "What exactly do the Iranians want from Israel?" Note that this question is rarely asked in public debates and practically never by folks blinded by the notorious "wipe off the map" phrase and its endless repetitions.

Note also that in this video, Baer conjectures (at 46:25) that Iran's clerical regime might deliberately goad Israel into an attack on Iran in order to produce an "external threat/enemy", strengthening and confirming the Mullah's dominion inside Iran's not so stable power structure. This possibility has been only recently considered by others: see Former CIA Officials Say Iran’s Clerics Want to Goad Israel Into an Attack. (Sounds too adventurous though and too self-destructive)

see also: The Illusion of the Bomb Threatening the Existence of Israel

Vier Mythen zum iranischen Atomwaffenprogramm

Lesenswert und verbreitungswürdig: eine Analyse des Bonn International Center for Conversion (BICC) zur sog. Bedrohung durch das iranische Atomprogramm: pdf

Mythos Nummer eins: „Iran strebt nach Atomwaffen“ 

Mythos Nummer zwei: „Die Zeit wird knapp“

Mythos Nummer drei: „Wenn der Iran die Bombe hat, ist Israel existenziell bedroht“

Mythos Nummer vier: „Mit Isolierung und Sanktionen kann man den Iran zur Aufgabe der Urananreicherung zwingen“

Ignoring, Replacing and Killing Obama ...

And the story goes on: After the weird suggestion to assassinate U.S. President Obama, the next one (former Israeli ambassador) proposed to "replace" Obama (whatever that exactly means): "Former Israeli Envoy to US: Replace Obama"

Besides, if Israel starts an attack against Iran, they will "punish" him by informing him not earlier than 12 hours before: "Israel to Give Obama 12 Hours Notice on Attacking Iran"

Meanwhile for his part, Obama is starting his re-election campaign with a most painfully grovelling video containing lots of old (outdated) scenes with Israeli politicians and including a repetition of the notorious "wipe of the map" saying: "America and Israel: An Unbreakable Bond"

According to this video, the U.S. of America appears to be like a state with limited sovereignty (Limited State).

Cheerleaders of War

You may think about Putin what you want, but let's be honest, the whole world has reason to thank him for his news channel "Russia Today" - bravely counterbalancing the US-biased media landscape all around. Take for instance the following report on the "war is inevitable"- cheerleaders in the country of exceptionalists, constantly promoting the next U.S. invasion:

ElBaradei - Another Saint of the Western Media

Much ado around ElBaradei quitting the Egyptian Presidential race. In practically every newspaper around the world there are reports and sophisticated political analyses on the Nobel Prize winner going home (wherever that is). But in fact, reality is different. The man is a big fat zero in his country just as Gorbatchov - another Nobelist - in Russia. In contrast to the latter, ElBaradei is probably not that hated figure, but rather insignificant, unnoticed by the Egyptian people. Gorbatchov didn't even reach 1% in the Presidential elections 1996 and ElBaradei would probably not receive more than 2%, as polls in last July showed. We can conclude that the Western Media like more to celebrate their prize-winning stars than to look at the harsh reality, where Salafists and other bearded fanatics are taking over Egypt. But mourning over an unimportant figure does not bring light into the more interesting and decisive processes going on, like the flow of millions of dollars from U.S. allied countries Qatar and Kuwait (and other anti-democratic gulf states) into the cash boxes of Islamistic parties in Egypt. 

German: Karim El-Gawhary - "Wer sind die Salafisten"

Nice Try, Though!

"our foreign policy will change eventually, as Rome's did, when

 all budgetary and monetary tricks to fund it are exhausted"

Ron Paul*

In the US they call Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul "isolationist", for many of the rest of the world he's the only serious person at the GOP's parade of clowns, the only one obviously willing to cut into the hegemonic cycle. But, honestly, how naive must people be to believe that only a fraction of the problematic US policy grievances named and shamed in the following ad could be changed by an elected Ron Paul?

Too good to be true. (*For the full transcript click here) Note that the prospect of the USA not dominating the world through destructive power politics might even appear strange and unfamiliar to Ron Paul followers who think it necessary to sell the congressman as one of "misfits" and "troublemakers", like in this rather dubious ad:

Nevertheless, it might be helpful to introduce a broader American audience to the thought of reintegrating into the international community at eye level. It must be feared though that a considerable number of US Americans have already internalized the concept of American Exceptionalism up to a degree virtually excluding any acceptance of the kind of foreign policy Paul is promoting. It is more than likely that all that will remain in the American voter's mind will be the box labelled "extremist" into which Paul has been already  put, at home and abroad: "there is no reason to allow Paul to pretend he is anything but an extremist who is far outside of the mainstream, especially when it comes to issues concerning the U.S.-Israel alliance" (Haaretz).

But eventually, Ron Paul will be proved right when the empire has burned out itself.

Déjà Vu: Saleh in the US to Drink the Waters

Field Marshal Ali Abdullah Saleh, Yemen's dictator since 1978, will visit his US friends - officially to have medical treatment. Any associations? Ah, yes, on 22 October 1979, at the request of David Rockefeller and Henry Kissinger, President Jimmy Carter invited the notorious Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, Shah of Iran, to the US for a treatment, after he had been chased out by the Iranian people. (He had been in power there since 1941, so it somehow looks like that being a long time proconsul for the US may really pay off, provided you play by the rules.)

Do you remember Noam Chomsky on the Ongoing Arab Spring?

Tibet 1950 - an Unanswered Question Still

"The Chinese People's Liberation Army must enter Tibet, liberate the Tibetan people, and defend the frontiers of China."

From the Chinese Government's letter of 30 October and 16 November 1950 to the Indian government

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"Liberate? From Whom?

Jawaharlal Nehru's respond

Cf. Craig, Mary: Kundun.Harper Collins Publishers, 1997, p.130.

What is American Exceptionalism?

So what is this "American Exceptionalism" after all? Is it just an expression of uniqueness which you can trivially apply to every thing or being? Or is it an announcement of vanity, patriotism or hubris? Is it a justification for acting like an international outlaw whenever suitable? Or is it a pseudo-religious belief? Wikipedia's definition: "Exceptionalism is the perception that a country, society, institution, movement, or time period is "exceptional" (i.e., unusual or extraordinary) in some way and thus does not need to conform to normal rules or general principles." Does it apply to American Exceptionalism?

Let's, for starters, take a look at a short video summarizing recent contributions and where Ronald Reagan's son puts it in a nutshell: whatever it is, we have to sell it! 

Michael Reagan: "Because I travel around the world myself, you know, people come up to me all the time and say "America can't fail. The world cannot afford America to fail". We are an exceptional exceptional country and we have to sell that!"

Is 'American Exceptionalism' Becoming Passé? - CBN.com, 30-03-2011

Is 'American Exceptionalism' Becoming Passé? -... von cbnonline

This post is subsequently divided into the following paragraphs:
1. Some Scholarly Views on American Exceptionalism
2. Some Recent Video and Audio Contributions
Enjoy!


1. Some Scholarly Views on American Exceptionalism

Let's now study some scholarly views and approaches. The following selection of quotes is rather accidental and ranges from historical perspectives to USA-EU comparisons.

"American political culture is tied up with American exceptionalism, the view that American society and culture are exceptional in comparison with other advanced industrial democracies. In a sense this is true of all societies and cultures, but supporters of this view suggest that there are several features peculiar to US politics and society that distinguish the country from other Western democracies. It was the Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville, who first wrote of ‘American exceptionalism’, back in 1835. He saw the United States as ‘a society uniquely different from the more traditional societies and status-bound nations of the Old World’. It was ‘qualitively different in its organising principles and political and religious institutions from . . . other western societies’, some of its distinguishing features being a relatively high level of social egalitarianism and social mobility, enthusiasm for religion, love of country, and ethnic and racial diversity." Watts, Duncan: Understanding US/UK Government and Politics. A Comparative Guide. Manchester University Press, Manchester, New York, 2003.

Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859)

American exceptionalism

"The idea that the United States has a unique, relatively homogeneous society and culture, based upon ideas of liberty, individualism and populism. Scholars and politicians alike have used this notion of exceptionalism to explain various aspects of American history: the failure, for example, of this country to develop deeper social fault lines between the interests of capital and labour. This perceived exceptionalism has prompted many Americans to believe they have a superior culture to others around the world. Most Americans certainly consider the US to be a unique bastion of freedom, while many contend the values of this exceptionalism should be exported abroad." Thomson, Alex: A Glossary of US Politics and Government. Edinburgh University Press Ltd, Edinburgh, 2007.

GEORGE BANCROFT AND AMERICAN EXCEPTIONALISM

(1800-1891)

"In his belief that America’s historical development fulfilled a divine purpose and his belief that the Revolution represented a turning point in human history, Bancroft articulated two of the central assumptions of American exceptionalism. The Revolution was, for Bancroft, a turning point because it had brought about the realization of America’s destiny to advance the cause of liberty. Structuring his analysis around the development of liberty in America, Bancroft dated this development back to the Reformation and began his history with the colonial era. Bancroft emphasized the role of the New England Puritans in developing and transplanting the principles of democracy and liberty to America, for, as he put it, Puritanism was “religion struggling for the People”.
This account of the origins of liberty served political and social purposes. An ardent Jacksonian, Bancroft gave historical legitimacy to the democratic principles he espoused by tracing their roots in the past. Bancroft’s emphasis on the Puritan contribution to democracy reflected his own sectional loyalties: by locating the roots of democracy in New England, Bancroft asserted the primacy of his own region in American development and defined the nation in terms of New England. At the same time Bancroft’s history also served nationalist purposes. Recognizing that Puritanism was just one of the many strands that contributed to American independence, Bancroft gave credit to victims of Puritan persecution, like Roger Williams, and to William Penn and the settlers of Virginia for instituting the principles of liberty in their respective regions. Bancroft thus sought to instill national unity by giving each section a role in the advance of democracy. The other major theme of Bancroft’s history was the development of union in America.
With the Revolution, Bancroft believed, America had embarked on a process of continual progress. While the principles of the Revolution did not require a dramatic change in the nation’s social or political system, the vitality of the principles themselves made them a source of continual renovation and reform for Bancroft. In his belief that the nation could remain indefinitely in a state of revolution without undergoing fundamental change, Bancroft summed up the exceptionalist vision of America as a nation that was exempt from the normal processes of historical change and decay. In this vision, by virtue of its closeness to nature, the United States could remain in a state of perpetual innocence and simplicity, untouched by the social forces that had corrupted the Old World."Gabler-Hover, Janet & Sattelmeyer, Robert (eds.): American History through Literature (1820-1870). Thomson Gale, Detroit, New York, 2006.

PROTESTANTISM
[...]
PROTESTANT BEGINNINGS

"The story of Protestantism in nineteenth-century America begins with events that unfolded three centuries earlier. The first recorded use of the term “Protestant” in English dates to 1539, when it was applied specifically to those German princes and their subjects who protested the Roman Catholic Church’s efforts to silence Martin Luther and bring an end to the Reformation. Initially, the word “Protestant” applied only to Lutherans in Germany, whereas the Swiss and French followers of John Calvin called themselves “Reformed.” By the early seventeenth century, however, the term had come to be applied to all Western Christians who repudiated papal authority and Catholic doctrine. For a complex set of reasons, it was to be Protestants who undertook the colonization of North America in earnest, as Dutch Calvinists settled along the Hudson River, Anglicans moved to the mid-Atlantic coast, and Puritans followed two decades later to Massachusetts Bay. The Massachusetts Bay Colony would have an enduring significance out of all proportion to its initial size and stature. Many of the most dynamic Protestant influences in American life stemmed from the belief system and cultural practices of this group of several hundred settlers. Long after most Americans had let go of the bracing theology of the Puritans, they continued to embrace a form of the Puritan vision of American destiny. The first governor of the Massachusetts colony, John Winthrop (1588–1649), famously outlined that vision in a sermon written before or during the 1630 voyage that brought his group to the New World. Winthrop titled his sermon “A Model of Christian Charity” and in it elaborated the covenantal understanding at the heart of Puritan theology. For these Calvinists, the covenant was a legal agreement between God and his chosen people: “We have entered into Covenant with Him for this Work, we have taken out a Commission, the Lord hath given us leave to draw our own Articles.” If the Puritan colonists kept the terms of the covenant, God would make them “a praise and glory,” and all other plantations in the New World would declare, “Make [us] like that of New England.” This small band of emigrants at the edge of the known world would become “a City upon a Hill,” with “the eyes of all people” upon them. By settling in New England, these Protestants would not be pursuing their own destiny, but, as God’s representatives, they would be carving out of the wilderness the kingdom of God. Although it was only one among the many voices clamoring to be heard in the colonies, Puritanism would come to direct the cultural conversation of America in a number of surprising ways. Early on, for example, it developed an interpretive discipline that involved an exceptionally close reading of personal experience and natural phenomena, as these Protestants scoured their souls and searched their world for signs of God’s coming kingdom. Even when Puritanism eventually fell out of favor, the interpretive habits it had inspired continued to thrive in new and different forms, whether in the prose of Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) or the poetry of Emily Dickinson (1830–1886) and Robert Frost, in the fiction of Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804–1864), Herman Melville (1819–1891), and William Faulkner, or in the late-twentieth and early-twenty-first-century essays of Barry Lopez and Wendell Berry. Over several centuries, the Puritan practice of closely reading nature and experience consistently demonstrated a remarkable tenacity. Like other elements of the Puritan vision, it was compelling enough in its content and flexible enough in its form to adapt to changing cultural tastes. Later scholars, however, intensely debated the nature and extent of that Puritan cultural influence. Some argued that the claims made on behalf of Puritanism by Perry Miller, Sacvan Bercovitch, and others obscured the vital contributions of other religious traditions to American literature and culture. At the same time, other observers questioned the very notion of American exceptionalism that lies behind the argument of Protestant influence. Spanish Catholics were here long before the English arrived, this line of reasoning goes, and native peoples lived on the land for thousands of years before the first European settlers set foot on North American soil. Since Roman Catholics and Anabaptists, freethinkers and tribal worshippers all played crucial roles in American religious history, on what grounds do we
single out the efforts of a small band of Protestants from northwestern Europe?
     In the end, such questions can be answered only by carefully charting influence in the many instances where it can be traced. As a case in point, seventeenth century New England churches stressed individual experience in a manner that was to shape the larger culture profoundly. The Puritans conceived of the church as a gathering of freely consenting individuals. They made it a requirement that to become a member of the church, each man and woman had to undergo a harrowing conversion, which involved turning away from sin and breaking with the past. If you were a Puritan, in other words, you could not receive your faith from your parents but had to achieve it on your own. Whereas for centuries birth had determined membership in the Roman Catholic Church and many early Protestant denominations, in New England conversion and consent were required before a church could be called into being.
The Puritan practice of establishing “gathered churches” led to the creation of what the sociologist Robert Bellah, the philosopher Charles Taylor, and others have called an American cultural tradition of “leaving home.” Like their Puritan ancestors struggling to establish their own distinct relationship with God, countless later Americans would take it as a given that they had to make their own way in the world, free of the determining influence of parents and past. Thus we find established in American culture a paradoxical tradition of leaving tradition behind, or, to put it another way, our social expectation is for individuals to grow and prosper without paying heed to social expectations. In America, Jews and Christians, Muslims and pagans all adopt this tradition of abandoning tradition, and had it not been for the seeds sown by the early Protestant settlers, it is hard to imagine that such a tradition would have taken root so deeply in the soil of American culture."Gabler-Hover, Janet & Sattelmeyer, Robert (eds.): American History through Literature (1820-1870). Thomson Gale, Detroit, New York, 2006.

PURITANISM

"The influence of American Puritanism is pervasive in the literature of the nineteenth century. The uniquely American Puritan vision of the seventeenth century arose from the English Puritanism that engendered it. Indeed many first-generation American Puritans, such as John Cotton (1584–1652) and John Winthrop (1588–1649), were emigrants from England who sought religious freedom in the New World. First-, second-, and third-generation American Puritans developed and refined a special vision of Calvinist theology that has continued to influence American self-definition into the present. When Ronald Reagan argued in his 1980 presidential campaign that the United States had lost much of its former glory and should return to its position of past leadership in the world, he quoted John Winthrop’s sermon “A Model of Christian Charity” (1630), delivered 350 years earlier during the sea voyage that ended in establishment of the Massachusetts Bay Colony:

He shall make us a praise and glory, that men shall

say of succeeding plantations: “The Lord make it

like that of New England.” For we must consider

that we shall be as a city upon a hill, the eyes of all

people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely

with our God in this work we have under-taken,

and so cause Him to withdraw His present help

from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word

through the world: we shall open the mouths of

enemies to speak evil of the ways of God and all

professors for God’s sake; we shall shame the faces

of many of God’s worthy servants, and cause their

prayers to be turned into curses upon us, till we be

consumed out of the good land whither we are going.

This declaration succinctly articulates what has come to be known as American exceptionalism. At the root of American society and culture lie a vision of uniqueness and a sense of mission. In the introduction to her American Exceptionalism, Deborah L. Madsen states,

Nearly one hundred thousand Puritan
immigrants living in America by 1700

Exceptionalism describes the perception of Massachusetts Bay colonists that as Puritans they were charged with a special spiritual and political destiny: to create in the New World a church and a society that would provide the model for all the nations of Europe as they struggled to reform themselves (a redeemer nation). . . . Thus America and Americans are special, exceptional, because they are charged with saving the world from itself and, at the same time, America and Americans must sustain a high level of spiritual, political and moral commitment to this exceptional destiny— America must be as “a city upon a hill” exposed to the eyes of the world.
This Puritan notion of election, divine sanction, and high purpose has pervaded American identity, politics, and culture ever since, although it has evolved over several centuries from a specifically religious vision into a much more secular one: rather than exemplifying a pure church America’s mission became exemplifying a free, egalitarian, democratic society."Gabler-Hover, Janet & Sattelmeyer, Robert (eds.): American History through Literature (1820-1870). Thomson Gale, Detroit, New York, 2006.

MANIFEST DESTINY

"Another prominent nineteenth-century American theme closely associated with the “city upon a hill” and American exceptionalism is the idea of Manifest Destiny. In 1845 a journalist named John O’Sullivan (1813–1895) first used the term in an editorial for the United States Magazine and Democratic Review, in which he advocates the annexation of Texas, declaring that it is America’s “manifest destiny to overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions”. It has been an important by-word of American development and progress ever since. Manifest Destiny was easy to understand as God’s divine intention for America to expand westward, sanctioning the removal of Indians from their lands and the war with Mexico that resulted in America’s acquisition of Texas and much of what is now New Mexico and southern California. The ideology of Manifest Destiny inherited by nineteenth-century writers from the canonical literature of the preceding centuries, captured the imagination of Americans as their frontiers expanded westward, from the Lewis and Clark expedition of 1804–1806 to the linking of east and west in the transcontinental railroad in 1869. Walt Whitman (1819–1892) was only one of many American writers who embraced the idea of divine progress in the expansion of the United States." Gabler-Hover, Janet & Sattelmeyer, Robert (eds.): American History through Literature (1820-1870). Thomson Gale, Detroit, New York, 2006.

John Gast: American Progress

Sociology of Education

"The highly selective review of empirical studies that follows focuses on the two key questions in contemporary American sociology of education: (1) How is education involved in the distribution of life chances? (2) How are family status and school characteristics connected to educational attainment and/or academic achievement? With few exceptions, analyses of education in other countries are not considered. The field is dominated by American research, and American sociologists have engaged in relatively little comparative research. Baker (1994) speculates that this lack of a comparative research tradition in the United States reflects both a belief in American ‘‘exceptionalism’’ (for instance, an extreme emphasis on mass access) and a strong focus on micro-level issues that do not necessarily call for comparative research designs." Borgatta, Edgar F. &  Montgomery, Rhonda J. V. (eds.):  Encyclopedia of Sociology (2nd ed.) Vol.5. Macmillan Reference USA, New York.

Doing the History of United States

"To study U.S. foreign relations is not to assume that the United States has been responsible for every change or problem in the world, that U.S. power is unlimited, or that weaker nations do not possess countervailing power. We need to be aware of the reception issue – how influences from the United States have been received and often altered by recipient nations or groups. Foreign relations history has come a long way since the days of the “nationalist” school of Samuel Flagg Bemis, whose 1961 presidential address to the American Historical Association assumed that the United States was exceptional, for the growth of the American empire extended the “blessings of liberty.” According to Bemis, whites migrated through an “empty continent,” a metaphor that masked the harsh removal of American Indians and the expansion of African American slavery. Although written history has become more inclusive, the grand narrative of American exceptionalism still prevails in public discussions of the past and, more subtly, in some historical scholarship. A grand or master narrative is a foundational story, widely told and retold, that shapes the overall framework in which most history is written and remembered, and that makes only some evidence (in Bemis’s formulation, the liberty of white males) seem relevant. The grand narrative of American exceptionalism assumes, first, that the “rise” of the United States to global power resulted from preeminence descending upon “America,” a divinely favored nation with unique freedoms. Like a Horatio Alger tale,  American exceptionalism is a rags-to-riches story that focuses on the luck and pluck and not on the stealing and killing entailed in becoming a continental and then a global empire. According to this compelling arrative, the United States, despite some mistakes, generally uses its power for benign purposes, a belief that has made it easier to cover up some foreign policy scandals. Another premise is that most people in the world appreciate, or should appreciate, U.S. beneficence. Related assumptions are that U.S.-style capitalism multiplies wealth and opportunity for nearly all; that human progress and happiness are best measured by such wealth and opportunity; that U.S.-style democracy enables the best “man” to be elected, as Woodrow Wilson put it; that U.S. influence is directed toward global peace, prosperity, and democracy; and finally, that the triumph over communism and ascendancy of global markets might mean the “end of history.”
      This grand narrative is told and retold in schools, in most of the media, in churches, and by public authorities. Like a myth, the story of American exceptionalism does have partial validity. The key point, however, is that because this narrative is so satisfying to many people, and because this narrative is retold by such powerful institutions, that partial validity often becomes accepted as the whole story. A master of persuasive narrative, the commentator and novelist Joan Didion acknowledges that constructing narratives requires many “tacit agreements, small and large, to overlook the observable in the interests of obtaining a dramatic story line.” U.S. grand narratives have relied on similar “tacit agreements” to secure dramatic, self-congratulatory story lines. The historian Michael Adas notes that American exceptionalism is not only “more comprehensive and extreme than its counterparts elsewhere,” but it “has also proven a good deal more impervious than most other national variants of divinely inspired mission to the unsettling excesses of human folly and cruelty that have abounded in the twentieth century.” Too few foreign policy makers have followed John Quincy Adams, who balanced his commitment to that “divinely inspired mission” with his understanding that going “abroad, in search of monsters to destroy” would endanger the nation’s freedoms. Instead, many leaders have won at least initial domestic support by couching foreign intervention in terms of the grand narrative. Most foreign conflicts have largely been remembered and recorded in ways that embellish the story. Although cynicism, dissent, criticism, and revisionism have persisted among the general public, counter narratives have generally remained as fragments or as conspiracy myths.

       Inconsistencies in the story, such as the dictatorship and poverty in Guatemala following the U.S. intervention in 1954, or the economic breakdown in Russia following the “shock therapy” of U.S. private and governmental advisers after 1991, have largely been ignored, or explained as necessary or inevitable “transitions” by most U.S. observers. Although triumphalists have argued that the supposed U.S. “victory” in the ColdWar affirmed the grand narrative, other scholars have countered that the Cold War ended because of largely autonomous changes in the Soviet Union. Historians who have analyzed specific aspects of U.S. relations with, say, Guatemala or Russia, have pointed to the holes in the master story." Costigliola, Frank & Paterson Thomas G.: "Defining and Doing the History of United States" in Paterson Thomas G. & Hogan, Michael J. Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press, New York, 2004.

"Internationally, the renewed influence of religious actors coincided with a growing willingness of U.S. foreign policy elites, mainly secular in orientation, to privilege force over diplomacy and unilateral over multilateral action—a trend most evident in Washington’s declaration in September 2001 of the War on Terror and the U.S. invasion of Iraq in March 2003. It would be a mistake to reduce the influence of religion in U.S. foreign policy to the G. W. Bush presidency and its immediate predecessors. The historical roots of that influence go far deeper. An expansive scholarly literature explores the origins and manifestations of a deep strain of religious messianism that runs through the master narrative of America’s claims of exceptionalism as a nation-state. From the founding myth of Puritan settlement of the New World as a struggle for religious freedom, to the articulation of the doctrine of Manifest Destiny as a rationale for America’s westward territorial expansion, to Wilsonian internationalism as a public service creed, and the definition of the cold war as a battle with atheistic communism, religion and a religious political culture have been a constant element in “the longstanding U.S. view of itself as morally superior, and therefore exceptional vis-à-vis other powers.” Prodromou, Elizabeth H.: "U.S. Foreign Policy and Global Religious Pluralism" in Banchoff, Thomas (ed.):  Religious Pluralism, Globalization, and World Politics. Oxford University Press. Oxford, New York, 2008.

EU in comparison to USA

"The Presbyterian tradition of America as “God’s chosen country” gives Americans great moral assurance. Their self-image of a “city upon the hill” provides a yardstick with which they measure other actors and distinguish between good and evil forces. In recent years religious fundamentalism has further gained in strength, especially among the conservative right. While in the 1980s President Ronald Reagan stigmatized the Soviet Union as an “evil empire” that belonged on the “ash heap of history,” President Bush has associated Iran, Iraq, and North Korea with an “axis of evil” that needs to be eradicated. From this belief springs the conviction that, if freedom and democracy were brought to the lands of darkness, their people would embrace these values enthusiastically, defeating radicalism and terrorism. The Bush administration’s interventions have been characterized as a mixture of “Wilsonianism and power,” or, in Pierre Hassner’s words, as “Wilsonianism in boots.” The rhetoric of freedom is more than a cloak for self-interest, and disappointment in Iraq has been a setback but no ground yet for changing America’s moral course. In contrast, European societies have become widely secularized though religious beliefs still influence individual behavior. The European project can be seen as a secular humanist application of the Enlightenment. Memories of two world wars and the holocaust, though, prevent most Europeans from entertaining as Manichean views as spring from American exceptionalism."Haftendorn, Helga: "EU–US Cooperation on Non-European Issues",  in Lundestad, Geir (ed.):  Just Another Major Crisis? The United States and Europe since 2000. Oxford University Press, New York, 2008

"The US public, socialized within a strong national narrative of American exceptionalism, responds to missionary concepts of global transformation. European publics, in contrast, are preoccupied with different national constraints and traditions. There is no comparable European narrative, no foundation for an instinctive European vision of global order and international role, no more than there is a European federation to balance the United States. It is part of the myth of American exceptionalism that people of reason and goodwill in other countries should share America’s view of the world.
Wallace, William: "Leadership or Partnership?" in Lundestad, Geir (ed.):  Just Another Major Crisis? The United States and Europe since 2000. Oxford University Press, New York, 2008

2. Some Recent Video and Audio Contributions

• Senator Sam Brownback speaks about American Exceptionalism

• Unknown Panelist

"I would define American exceptionalism as a belief in American uniqueness and American chosenness: that whether we are chosen by God or chosen by providence that - we collectively - have a special mission to the world and in crudest terms the mission is to remake the world in our own image based on the conviction that American principles are universal principles."

• Howard Zinn: Lecture on "The Myth of American Exceptionalism"

March 14, 2005, Running Time: 1:32:02
"sometimes [...] if you criticize the United States of America [...] you're met witht the exhortation "So why don't you go somewhere else?". [...] A friend of mine who is a comedian [...] and in his serious comedy he would very often be critical of certain things that the United States had done in the world. And if people would say "so why don't you move somewhere else", he would say "I don't wanna move somewhere else because I don't wanna become the victim of American Foreign policy"." (Howard Zinn)

• David Rieff: The Death of American Exceptionalism

"In such a situation [economy] the United States cannot exert the kind of hegemony that made the idea of American exceptionalism possible. Because the idea of American Exceptionalism and the idea of American hegemony go hand in hand.Maybe not at the beginning of the republic - you know, the shing city on the hill and all that - but in the induration that American Exceptionalism has had, certainly in the eighteen-nineties, since this creation of this informal American empire in the Philippines and in Cuba and elsewhere."

• American Exceptionalism Vs. European Socialism (radio interview, 5 parts, religious)

Dennis Prager: "You have the best description of what I call the "soullessness" Of Europe.
Charles Murray (senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute): I'm afraid that what happens is that the European system takes too much the life out of life. And by that I mean - as far as I can tell - there is among Europe's young people a spreading mentality which goes like this: human beings are collections of chemicals ... and they're activated and then, for a period of time, they're deactivated. And, the purpose of life is to while away the time as pleasently as possible between activation and deactivation. [...] Here's what bothers me about Europe: it is the most secular civilization in world history. No other civilization has tried to survive as a secular civilization the way they're trying to do ... and I don't think they can do it."

• Newt Gingrich Explains American Exceptionalism

"Despite the fact that our current president has managed to avoid explaining - at least on four occasions - that we're endowed by our creator -  that fact is what makes American Exceptionalism different is that we are the only people I know of in history who say "power comes directly from God to each one of you". You are personally a sovereign, so you are always a citizen and you're never a subject."

• What Is American Exceptionalism?

President Obama: "I believe in American exceptionalism just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British
exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism."
Newt Gingrich: "President Obama's explanation of American exceptionalism is truly alarming. President Obama did not understand the question and did not have any idea of what American exceptionalism is."

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Here's the full quote of the President's viewpoint:

"I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism. I'm enormously proud of my country and its role and history in the world. If you think about the site of this summit and what it means, I don't think America should be embarrassed to see evidence of the sacrifices of our troops, the enormous amount of resources that were put into Europe postwar, and our leadership in crafting an Alliance that ultimately led to the unification of Europe. We should take great pride in that.And if you think of our current situation, the United States remains the largest economy in the world. We have unmatched military capability. And I think that we have a core set of values that are enshrined in our Constitution, in our body of law, in our democratic practices, in our belief in free speech and equality, that, though imperfect, are exceptional.Now, the fact that I am very proud of my country and I think that we've got a whole lot to offer the world does not lessen my interest in recognizing the value and wonderful qualities of other countries, or recognizing that we're not always going to be right, or that other people may have good ideas, or that in order for us to work collectively, all parties have to compromise and that includes us.And so I see no contradiction between believing that America has a continued extraordinary role in leading the world towards peace and prosperity and recognizing that that leadership is incumbent, depends on, our ability to create partnerships because we create partnerships because we can't solve these problems alone."

• Btw, Newt Gingrich: go here http://www.CityUponAHill.com, or watch A City Upon A Hill: The Spirit Of American Exceptionalism - Official Trailer

• Russia Today CrossTalk: American Exceptionalism

• And finally, a contribution of the more refreshing style by this young American lady "cateematthews", playing the anti-hegemonic card, surely not the worst:

"A think a world without hegemony, without superpowers would be a fine one to live in and I often look forward to it. But every country more that's exceptional, every country that is developing and producing and evolving is one more for a struggling world."