The foreign policy of the Bush administration

[DrSmellThis]

(...just passing on an enlightening article and website link I got through an e-mail list,

about the actual, stated foreign policy of the current administration and its origins. To me its a must read, since

the information is so fundamental. It's meaty stuff you deserve to know but won't find on Fox News (I think the

broken links can be accessed through the homepage).) All links are to the government or conservative site.



"In 1997 a Washington DC "think tank" whose goal is to
promote American global leadership was born.


http://www.newamericancentury.org/
It was a non-profit

organization devised to discuss and strategize both domestic and foreign policy. The members were mostly men from

past American Presidential cabinets, US Military and Media.

http://www.newamericancentury.org/statemen...fprinciples.htm[/u

] (http://www.newamericancentury.org/statemen...fprinciples.htm)
In 1998 this organization sent a letter to President Bill Clinton asking for

the US to begin a pre-emptive war with Iraq. They requested an increase in defense spending and to challenge regimes

hostile to our interests. Bill Clinton refused them.

[u]http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqclin...intonletter.htm[/u

] (http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqclin...intonletter.htm)
In Sept. 2000 this group published a document called Rebuilding America’s

Defenses. An 89-page document that reads like a blueprint for pre-emptive war on many nations. The first of the wars

to be with Iraq followed by Iran, Syria and many other Middle Eastern states to in their own words "control their

resources" for America. Additionally the document outlines plans for China’s "looming threat". It reads in some

respects remarkably like "Mein Kampf." The document makes such sweeping statements as:
- The United

States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in Gulf regional security. While the unresolved conflict

with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf

transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein
- Iran is perhaps a far greater threat to U.S.

oil hegemony
- Fight and decisively win multiple, simultaneous major theater wars to establish

American dominance for all to see
- The United States will require bases and stations within and

beyond Western Europe and Northeast Asia
- Demand American political leadership rather than that of

the United Nations
- Advanced forms of biological warfare that can 'target' specific genotypes may

transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool
- The need to

provoke terrorists to attack in American cities
- Use of fear to rally the American

people
- And finally, "The process of [military] transformation, even if it brings revolutionary

change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event -- like a new Pearl Harbor." On

September 11th, 2001 the PNAC saw their "New Pearl Harbor", a door of opportunity that opened and they stormed right

through it.

[u]http://www.newamericancentury.org/Rebuildi...casDefenses.pdf[/u

] (http://www.newamericancentury.org/Rebuildi...casDefenses.pdf)
On September 20th 2001, NINEdays after 911 the National Security Strategy of

the United States of America also known as the Bush Doctrine.was released by President George W. Bush. It is an

ideological match to the PNAC's Rebuilding America's Defenses report issued a year earlier. In many places, it

uses exactly the same language to describe America's new place in the world.

[u]http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.pdf (http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.pdf)
When Bush assumed the

Presidency, the men who created and nurtured the imperial dreams of PNAC became the men who run the Pentagon, the

Defense Department and the White House. PNAC's "Rebuilding America's Defenses" report is the institutionalization

of plans and ideologies that have been formulated for decades by the men currently running American government. The

PNAC Statement of Principles is signed by: Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, I. Libby, as well as by Eliot Abrams, Jeb

Bush, Bush's special envoy to Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad, and many others. William Kristol, famed conservative

writer for the Weekly Standard, is also a co-founder of the group. The Weekly Standard is owned by Ruppert Murdoch,

who also owns international media giant Fox News."

[a.k.a.]

Thanks for this post. I posted a

link to this site back before the Iraq invasion and got some amusing

reactions.

http://pherolibrary.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5891

It’s a shame so many people

relly on TV for their information when there is such a wealth of resources on the web.

I hope you don’t

mind me posting a link to the more well known, and highly prestegious, Council for Foreign Relations, which is

heavily represented in John Kerry’s campaign. (Members include Kerry himself, his wife, a number of his fundraisers,

and most of his economic and foreign policy advisors — including current CFR directors Robert Rubin and George

Soros.)

http://cfr.org/

These guys have been around since the 1920’s and have had a

big hand in shaping foreign and domestic policy since the post WWII reconstruction. Membership is by invitation

only. But if you are a represenative of one of the top 200 US corporations you get to participate in special

programs and forums sponsored by the organization.
When C. Wright Mills wrote “The Power Elite”, these must

have been the people he had in mind.
If you check out the content you’ll see that the tone is a lot more

scholarly and a lot less ideological than the Project for a New American Century. But the bottom line, US

predominance in a corporate world order, is the same.
The New American Century neo-cons appear to be a

spin-off organization; since 17 of the original 25 founding members are also CFR members (most notably Eliott

Abrams, Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Cheney — who was a former director).

For a sense of how

influencial this organization might be in a Kerry administration, check out this recent article, posted on the CFR

website, and compare it to Kerry’s position on Iraq:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/17103

[belgareth]

AKA,

Not sure if I should

thank you for posting such an interesting link or grumble about something else I really should study.

Great

link!

[DrSmellThis]

Thanks for the post, AKA. It

is a valuable resource, along with the NAC and whitehouse ones I posted (hope you didn't miss the whitehouse one).

The article on exiting Iraq is a great read, though not exactly uplifting.

[DrSmellThis]

In light of the Iran situation

this deserves a bump.

[DrSmellThis]

http://www.newamericancentury.org/defense-20050128.ht

m (http://www.newamericancentury.org/defense-20050128.htm)

[a.k.a.]

"Article 1, Section 8 of the

Constitution places the power and the duty to raise and support the military forces of the United States in the

hands of the Congress. "

In other words, they're calling for a draft.

[DrSmellThis]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/02/03/rice/ind

ex.html (http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/02/03/rice/index.html)

Damn, Condi knows how to follow orders, doesn't she?



http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/02/

02/foreign.policy/index.html (http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/02/02/foreign.policy/index.html)

[DrSmellThis]

February 5th, 2005

6:05 am
We're not building a bomb
By Kamal Kharrazi /

Intern

ational Herald Tribune (http://www.iht.com/bin/print_ipub.php?file=/articles/2005/02/04/opinion/edkharrazi.html)

An extremist and unilateralist approach is at work in Washington's effort

to undermine the recent constructive diplomacy to resolve misunderstandings over Iran's nuclear program. By

insisting on referring the case to the UN Security Council and dismissing valuable efforts by the Europeans, the

U.S. government is instead trying to settle its own scores with Iran.

This persists despite the latest

developments that show Iran's readiness to go to extra lengths to prove that its nuclear program is peaceful and to

do whatever it takes to build confidence with the entire world. In its last resolution, the board of governors of

the International Atomic Energy Agency said it "welcomes the fact that Iran has decided to continue and extend its

suspension of all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities." At the same time, it recognizes that the

suspension "is a voluntary confidence-building measure, not a legal obligation."

Despite the difficulties and

misgivings on the domestic scene, the agreement we reached with Britain, France, Germany and other EU countries on

Nov. 14 - suspension of any efforts to produce or convert uranium and to manufacture or test centrifuges - paved the

way for a reasonable outcome to this crisis.

That same week, the nuclear agency confirmed that inspectors had

uncovered no evidence of concealed nuclear activities or an atomic weapons program in Iran. Its report specifies

that "all the declared material in Iran has been accounted for, and therefore such material is not diverted to

prohibited activities."

Iran is fully committed to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and wants to strengthen

its safeguards. At the same time, we are unwavering in our refusal to succumb to those who may wish to deprive us of

our rights under the treaty to pursue the peaceful use of nuclear energy. Aside from economic and environmental

justifications, the national consensus on this issue is based on the fact that all economic sectors would thrive

upon the technological achievement of nuclear-grade standards.

Iran's commitment to the nonproliferation treaty

stems not only from security considerations and its obligations as a signatory, but also from religious and ethical

considerations. Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has reiterated on several occasions a fatwa

prohibiting the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons. He repeated his fatwa most recently on Nov. 25.

Given the importance of the fatwa in Shiite Islam, the significance of this should not be underestimated.

In

addition to the agreement on uranium converstion and centrifuges, Iran's effort to strengthen the safeguards regime

of the nonproliferation treaty have also included the Dec. 18, 2003, signing of and immediate implementation of the

Additional Protocol to the treaty; the voluntary suspension of enrichment and reprocessing activities; and active

cooperation with the nuclear agency in providing information, making people available for interviews and letting the

agency carry out environmental sampling wherever it sought to do so.

The only way to counter the challenges

related to the proliferation of nuclear weapons is to strengthen the relevant international instruments through

multilateral, comprehensive and nondiscriminatory efforts. The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty is the cornerstone of

international efforts to achieve complete nuclear disarmament.

But the treaty's effectiveness lies in full

compliance by all parties. The selective approach by a few states to its provisions - the refusal to address nuclear

disarmament - undermines full implementation. Such a selective approach impairs the treaty's credibility and its

effectiveness to address the challenges at hand.

America's extremist approach toward Iran's peaceful nuclear

program, as well as toward nonproliferation issues in general - including double standards such as its tacit

acceptance of Israel's undeclared nuclear weapons program - has increased mistrust across the globe, not only

within the Muslim world.

We must allay such mutual suspicion. But, given the depth of mistrust, drastic action

is required. Otherwise the gulf between the moderate mainstream in both the Islamic world and the West could widen,

and the bleak notion of a clash of civilizations might prevail.