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!

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?

Brot und Spiele und Militär

Die US-Hegemonisten unter Friedensnobelpreisträger Obama intensivieren ihre militärischen Angriffe und arbeiten fleißig an der Installation der nächsten freundlich gesinnten Regierung im Jemen, berichtet die New York Times Online. Unumwunden wird von den US-Radikalen zugegeben, „daß das Ausmaß des amerikanischen Krieges im Jemen zu den bestgehütetsten Geheimnissen der Obama-Regierung zählte und sich „offizielle Stellen“ deshalb Sorgen machten, daß die Neuigkeit der „unilateralen Operationen“ den geschwächten Status des Präsidenten Saleh unterminieren könnte. Saleh hatte ab 2009 den USA beschränkte Militäreinsätze gestattet.

"The extent of America’s war in Yemen has been among the Obama administration’s most closely guarded secrets, as officials worried that news of unilateral American operations could undermine Mr. Saleh’s tenuous grip on power. Mr. Saleh authorized American missions in Yemen in 2009, but placed limits on their scope and has said publicly that all military operations had been conducted by his own troops."

Das derzeitige Chaos im Jemen kommt den Amerikanern sehr entgegen, heißt es doch, daß es den Spielraum der USA dort vergrößert.

“But as things get more and more chaotic in Yemen, the space for the Americans to operate in gets bigger”

Siehe: NY Times: "U.S. Is Intensifying a Secret Campaign of Yemen Airstrikes"

Immerhin können sich die Amerikaner im Kampf um den Jemen der Unterstützung ihres langjährigen Alliierten, des Gottesstaates Saudi-Arabien erfreuen. Dort wiederum versucht man sich vor der Bevölkerung zu schützen, indem man Almosen verteilt. Der NY Times zufolge gönnt König Abdullah seinen Beamten zwei zusätzliche Monatsgehälter und kümmert sich rührend um den Wohnbau für Niedriglohnrezipienten (70 Milliarden US$ immerhin). Die 200 Millionen zum Stillhalten des islamischen Klerus gehören da nur zu den Standardüberweisungen.

“But the first line of defense in this case was the public aid package. King Abdullah paid an extra two months’ salary to government employees and spent $70 billion alone for 500,000 units of low-income housing. As a reward to the religious establishment, he allocated about $200 million to their organizations, including the religious police. Clerics opposed to democratic changes crowed that they had won a great victory over liberal intellectuals.”

Bei weitem mehr wird der König allerdings für den erfolgreichen Kampf gegen Demokratiebestrebungen in seinem Hinterhof ausgeben müssen - Bahrain, Oman, oder die Vereinigten Arabischen Emirate.

“Saudi Arabia, a close ally of the United States, has struggled to preserve what remains of a regional dynamic upended by the Arab Spring — buttressing monarchies and blocking Iran from gaining influence.
While the United States has pressed other Arab nations to embrace democratic changes, it has remained largely silent on Saudi Arabia and the kingdom’s efforts to squelch popular revolts in neighboring Bahrain and Oman.”

Siehe NY Times: “In Saudi Arabia, Royal Funds Buy Peace for Now”

Zum Beispiel erinnert man sich in den Vereinigten Arabischen Emiraten daran, daß es hieß „Brot UND Spiele“. Durch gründliches Studium der in diesem Jahr vorausgegangenen Revolten erkannte man, daß sich die Leute ja keine Törtchen mehr leisten konnten und dachte sich, ein voller Bauch müsse doch nicht demonstrieren gehen – wogegen auch?

Siehe Spiegel: „Mit Billig-Koriander gegen die Revolution“ 

So kompliziert ist die Logik des Machterhalts ja nun doch nicht.