To understand the lunacy of the problematic Islamic “threat” currently being hyped in mainstream U.S. political discourse, we need to place the concept in the historical context of Western, particularly U.S. imperialism’s collective self-image. White American identity has from the beginning defined itself in opposition a dangerous, threatening, darker “other” who had to be conquered, subdued, and/or exterminated . . .These opening and closing paragraphs from the second in a series by Richard Greeman at New Politics provides context for the frequently voiced support for military action against Iran, despite this country representing no threat to the US and its interests, and despite the insistence by Iranian opposition figures that a military strike by the US would only strengthen that regime's hold on power.
--snip--
After the 1989 collapse of Russian bureaucratic state-capitalism parading as "Communism" and with "Red" China born again as a U.S. capitalist trading partner, a new demon was needed to deflect from unrest over increasing economic and social inequality in the U.S. and around the world. The War on Drugs worked for a while. It proved useful for sending U.S. military advisors and equipment abroad to prop up pro-U.S. governments in Latin America while profitably filling the U.S. expanding US private prison system with unwilling customers from among unemployed Black and Hispanic youth. But after Osama bin Laden and his cohort pulled off the attacks of September 11, 2001, the War on Terror took precedence and "Radical Islam" was suddenly discovered as the major threat to Western Civilization. This distant threat has proven a sufficient ideological pretext for curtailing democratic freedoms and creating a security state at home while using torture, terror bombing and outright invasion in pursuit of insanely unrealistic hegemonic foreign policy goals in the oil-rich Middle East.
Even more than Iran, the general hysteria concerning the threat of terrorism needs to be reconsidered. From Greeman's first article:
But does ‘the threat’ [of coordinated Islamic terrorism] indeed exist ? And is it really ‘more important’ than catastrophic climate change, proliferating WMD’s, or the world economic crisis ? If we sincerely wish to analyze the social forces which express themselves under the various banners of what Westerners have lumped together under the heading of ‘Radical Islamism,’ perhaps we should begin by deconstructing the concept and to situating it in the context of the Orientalist ideology of Western colonialism/imperialism.Far too long have many in our Establishment found it not only expedient but necessary to express a belligerence toward other states that, if done by the targets of our potential wrath, would be met with horror by all. Just consider if Graham's comments had been made by, say, North Korea and directed at the United States. We would have a couple carrier battle groups steaming toward the Sea of Japan as well as a whole division of troops winging toward South Korea. We enjoy no immunity from judgment as too belligerent or threatening simply because we are the United States. Only here does the idea of the United States as the "lone superpower" bring comfort. For the rest of the world, a United States striding the globe ignorant of its own history and blustering toward confrontation with anyone who might raise a voice of protest might seem frightening.
Even, dare I say it, that the US is that most dangerous of rogue states.
