"New Cold War," Same Old Imperialism

This guy is a Trotskyite, but I often agree with his analysis of capitalism and US imperialism, which is 10 First of all, he is correct that the US was an imperialist country long before the Cold War and even before there was a Soviet Union. The Monroe Doctrine, still in effect today, was an imperialist policy. The US was actually a formal imperialist power around the turn on the century, and in a way, it still is now as the US retains colonies and refuses to free them as the UN has demanded. Everything else he says is also right on.

The New “Cold War” Is The Same Old U.S. Imperialist War

by Steven Argue

Cartoon depicting the brutal and murderous U.S. colonization of the Philippines long before there was a Soviet Union. As many in the U.S. today declare that Russian opposition to U.S. aggression in Ukraine and Syria are indicators of a new “cold war”, it is important to remember what the so-called “Cold War” was in the first place during the time of the USSR. Before the so-called “war on terror” there was the Persian Gulf War, and before there even was a Soviet Union there was “the war to end all wars”, “the white man’s burden”, and “manifest destiny”. All of these were / are to justify one of the most bloodthirsty imperialist systems that has ever existed on the face of the Earth, that of U.S. imperialism. The fact that the U.S. used the existence of the Soviet Union to justify their blood thirsty imperialist wars, coups, and dictatorships in places like Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Korea, Vietnam, Laos, Indonesia, etc. simply had nothing to do with any reality of an actual war between the USSR of the time and the USA. The so-called “cold war” was nothing but a hot U.S. imperialist war against the people of the world, a war that continues under different names. Today, as usual, the USA is on a drive to overthrow every independent nation in the world. This has continued under Obama with his overthrow of elected governments of Ukraine and Honduras, putting a death squad government in power in Honduras and a murderous fascist junta in power in Kiev that includes open neo-Nazis who hate Ukraine’s national minorities, including Russians. Likewise, Obama waged a bombing and proxy war in Libya that overthrew that country’s government, a government that committed the crime of spending some its oil money on providing everyone with free housing, education, and health care. This gave the Libyan people a far higher life expectancy than other oil rich countries in Africa ruled by U.S. backed dictators. Likewise, the United States is currently trying to overthrow the elected capitalist government of Venezuela for similar “crimes” of disrupting total capitalist profit by spending oil money on the people. In Libya, the imperialists brought to power genocidal religious fanatics who committed ethnic cleansing against Black Africans, commits rampant torture and murder, and is allowing the imperialist oil companies to rob Libya of its natural resources unhindered by pesky spending on human needs. Likewise in Syria, the United States is giving weapons to genocidal religious fanatics that have slaughtered religious and ethnic minorities. Russia is in the cross-hairs of U.S. imperialism today, in part for strongly opposing U.S. imperialist intervention in Syria and Ukraine. Russia itself today is a weak capitalist country, but for the U.S. imperialists, it is not weak enough. An important adviser to the Obama administration is Brzezinski whose plans for Russia include economic isolation, regime change, and then breaking Russia into three pieces. Russia itself is not an imperialist power in any Marxist sense. Russia has more foreign direct investment coming into the country than going out. Likewise, Ukraine has had very little foreign direct investment from Russia and very large amounts coming in from the EU. U.S. and EU imperialist strategy in the region has been to force a government on Ukraine that carries out IMF austerity and isolates Russia. They got this with the February coup along with a government that is likely to be friendly to imperialist exploitation of gas reserves through environmentally devastating fracking in western Ukraine. Russia, on the other hand, is merely trying to maintain trading partners as the United States tries to isolate it and is not trying to dictate what sort of economies and austerity countries around them maintain. While United States imperialist policy is one of forcing austerity and privatization on countries, Russia has been equally capable of trading with countries that maintain planned socialist economies, to the benefit of the working class, like the planned socialist economy of Belarus. Meanwhile, such countries, like Belarus and Cuba, are under U.S.economic blockade because their planned socialist economies and independent governments prevent large amounts of foreign imperialist exploitation. To the extent that Russia is now providing a small counterweight to blood thirsty and rapacious U.S. imperialism, the imperialists are building up NATO forces, pouring on lies similar to Bush’s lies of weapons of mass destruction, and speaking as if the so-called “cold war””is back. Yet, then and now, the so-called “cold war” has never been anything but a hot U.S. imperialist war against the people of the world. – Steven Argue of the Revolutionary Tendency

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13 thoughts on “"New Cold War," Same Old Imperialism”

  1. Robert I think the Soviet Union might’ve been just as bad as US Imperialists as they vigorously relocated several ethnic groups and wiped out their cultures and languages. In Kazakhstan now more people speak Russian than Kazakh because of the Soviet Union. I’d write more but I don’t know much about this topic. Though I do know that the U.S.A. is a bad imperialist nation and when I went to Laos I saw that many people are still suffering because of the bombs dropped during the Vietnam war.

    1. The USSR allowed all of the ethnic groups to have their own languages and use them for education or even make them the co-official language of the republic along with Russian. The Soviet model allowed the Kazakh language to survive.
      Those groups that got relocated with accused of treason and siding with the enemy during WW2.
      The USSR, whatever its faults, was not an imperialist country.

  2. Say what you will about the Monroe Doctrine, if it were followed as it should have been, the US could never have intervened in either European war. That being the case, it could have served as a protector of Western Civilization from Oriental incursion on the western flank while it spread an Anglo imperialism southward and while remaining free from use as a Zionist tool of oppression. Forces inimical to authentic Western Civilization obviously captured the US political system between 1850 and April, 1917.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monroe_Doctrine
    “The Monroe Doctrine was a US foreign policy regarding Latin American countries in the early 19th century. It stated that further efforts by European nations to colonize land or interfere with states in North or South America would be viewed as acts of aggression, requiring U.S. intervention.[1] At the same time, the doctrine noted that the United States would neither interfere with existing European colonies nor meddle in the internal concerns of European countries.”

      1. R U being sarcastic? If Henry Ford, Charles Lindbergh & Norman Thomas had their way pre-World War One and World War Two, you might have a point.

  3. I suppose it would be a statement of the obvious to suggest that nations, as do people, act in their own self interests, usually at the expense of those weaker. Insofar as it would be an uncommon act of desperation or stupidity for a weaker party to attempt to dominate a stronger opponent, one might exclude that possibility from discussion at the outset.
    One might say the tendency is part of human nature, as it seems to be a facet of our existence throughout many disparate cultures over history, but even weeds practice the method when they grow faster than the fruits and flowers we plant in our gardens. Some decry it as imperialism, which seems to me as useful as whining about the blueness of sky on a warm summer’s day. The fact is – that’s the measure of life. The strong survive, the weak succumb if they have no friends.
    The United States is no different than any other country in that respect, finding itself for many decades in a position of global dominance because it has has the resources and accidents of historical precedents to be what it is. AND the U.S. has friends all over the world.
    Russia is no different in intent, though its sphere is smaller and resources more limited. Should we pretend they’re nice because at the moment that nation is weaker than its global rivals? Russia is a country in decline – in both resource availability and population – desperately clinging to days of former Soviet and Tsarist glory when it terrorized its neighbors with armies.
    Russia is not a benign victim trying to maintain trading partners vis a vis Ukraine, as much as it is a land-locked nation attempting to maintain access to the seas for its navy. Now, fait accompli. As a nation, it has not engendered much love from its former conquests, who abandoned ship at their first opportunity.
    The difference between people and weeds is that some humans are possessed of conscience and moral code – that is, a set of rules for personal conduct that predispose its strongest members from taking whole advantage of the weakest. Many other mammalian species exhibit this “selfless” behavior.
    Sometimes it does extend to communal behavior, and I would hold the United States up as an example. Despite all its shortcomings, evil-doings, and bigotry it has embraced over the several centuries that it has existed, it is still one of the few places in the world where cultures and peoples have united in harmony. Its diversity makes it strong. Other countries still look to it for guidance and assistance, because in the end, they know they won’t sacrifice too much of their own souls to get what they need.
    So much for the U.S. “war against the people of the world.” We all have to admit – if the U.S. wanted, its Stars and Stripes could fly from every capital on earth, even the Kremlin. Maybe not Bejing, though. Lord! There are so many people in China! But Americans love them, too.

    1. We have some allies, a lot of whom act just as awful as we do.
      Russia is not an imperialist country. Russia has no evil designs on any of its neighbors. Russia is not out to screw over anyone. An imperialist country would not trade with and ally with Cuba, Belarus, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina, Vietnam, Laos, China and North Korea. Russia is not out to enslave and rip off most of the world like the United Snakes is. Russia doesn’t care what sort of economic system you have.
      They have allied with many leftwing countries. They do not meddle in others’ affairs and try to overthrow leftwing governments. They do not tell other countries what to do. Russia isn’t out to hurt or screw over anyone. All she wants is trading partners and allies. Russia’s relations with other countries are like the Bolivarian trading bloc in Latin America – they are based on solidarity and mutual benefit. Russia would even like very much to be friends with Europe and the EU, but we keep threatening them with NATO.
      I am very happy that Russia is standing up to Uncle Satan in Syria, Iran and Ukraine. A unipolar world is shit. America thinks it is the dictator of the world. Russia says screw that, we are going to be a counterpoise to your bullshit, block your world dictatorship and bring back a multipolar world. I for one am very happy with that. The US and Europe have antagonized Russia for many years by expanding NATO, the sworn enemy of Holy Rus, to the point where they are now threatening Mother Russia. Russia is simply defending herself against US imperialism, a dagger aimed at the very heart of Russia.
      Russia is certainly not a nation in decline. It is doing very well lately. Putin is simply a modernizer like Peter the Great who wants to up Russians’ living standards to make Russia more like the rest of Europe.
      Russia has many friends in the surrounding region. South Ossetia and Abkhazia split off from Georgia and made a very strong alliance with Russia. Russia has great relations with Greece, Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Romania and Bulgaria. A part of Moldova also wants to break away and ally itself or join Russia. A large part of Eastern Ukraine wants to break away from Ukraine and ally itself with or even join Russia. Crimea already joined Russia.

  4. There is no real cold war, as the US has first strike capability. Nonetheless, US imperialism is as viscous as in the past. In fact, it’s even worse as there is no way to stop it.

    1. I do not agree that the US has first strike capability with Russia. Nuclear war is not winnable for either the US or Russia. Both sides have known that for a long time.

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