The politics of American revivalism. posted by Richard Seymour

US imperialists have had this problem ever since they became aware that they would supplant European colonial power. They so wanted everyone to believe they were different. Even when they colonised the Philippines or Haiti, they would have had the subjects believe that the US intended nothing more sinister than their own welfare and the development of market societies with liberal states. Indeed, what is usually referred to as Wilsonian idealism made a virtue of this what with the fourteen points and the self-determination of nations and the 'open door' policy. They were firm with the Europeans - it's tutelary power, Mandate-style, or it's nothing (compromise was reached by Jan Smuts of the British delegation to the Paris Conference of 1919 - there would be Mandates for nations on the verge of civilisation, and there would be prolonged dominion for nations almost solely populated by 'barbarians' - thus appeasing arch-imperialists in Africa). Meanwhile, the US worked to cultivate their own tutelary power in their hemisphere and in South Asia and the Middle East, supporting 'national' elites against the old colonial powers. They would have gotten away with it too, if it hadn't been for those meddling communists.

Even where merely reform-minded, the communists denounced US power as simply an update on the old communism. They were, wherever they attained power or fought for it, unwilling to be the pliable patsies that the Americans required. Whereas the US elite had thought that the rise of colonial nationalisms combined with their economic dominance would allow them to lay networks of patronage and control in which 'open markets' would inevitably conduce to their commercial ascendancy, it transpired that even their well-armed placemen often couldn't keep the rabble down. Precisely at the moment where they emerged as the world's foremost military and economic power, they were discovering its limits - in China and Vietnam, then in Iran, and Lebanon. Apparently successful revolutions took place in Mozambique, Angola, Ethiopia - the Iranians were stirring it up in Saudi Arabia of all places, while the very fact of the Islamic Republic had removed on of their three main supports in the Middle East. When the Arabs had been acting up over the oil prices, they had planned to invade and secure the oil-fields, but when you're busy bombing Cambodians and coping with fragging in Vietnam, and when you're broke, and Japanese competition is making itself felt, and there's a coup to mount in Chile and lots of little insurgencies to contain and leftist movements across Europe to worry about - Empire can be a harsh and gruelling business. They had used military suppression, genocide even - and still the bastards wouldn't comply.

On the other hand, they and their capitalist allies contained the leftist threat where it mattered most - in Europe, and for the most part in Latin America, and for the most part in Africa. The 'Afghan trap' helped finish off the Russians, while empowering the guys who would later fill in for the Russians as official enemy number one. Sponsoring Iraq helped keep the Iranians down, while arming the Iranians ensured that it wouldn't weaken and succumb to the serenading of the Soviets. A few cyclones of murder, torture and rape across Central America knocked several threats to capital on the head, and many of these 'communist' states - damnedest thing! - were opening themselves up to capitalism. Why, even the most independent Middle Eastern and Maghrebi states were opening themselves up to the IMF. Iraq was destroyed and made into a dependency and after a few years of terror, Aristide and his supporters (the bulk of the Haitian populace) learned to behave themselves. Israel was casually reducing Palestine to a few wards and ghettos presided over by some well-bribed guards, and local ruling classes were too busy containing the Islamist movements that they too had patronised to do anything about it - and those movements, too, were more or less washed up by 1997.

And yet, and yet... a pregnant pause and a wistful sigh... it wouldn't last forever. The Chinese were coming next.

So, this is where the revivalists come in. They had been through the era of sometimes quite catastrophic defeats, especially Dick and Don, they were tough, and they had cultivated along with well-placed media associates an extreme ideology that would reassert US power. They paid much lip service to a couple of revered ancient texts (bible and constitution) and the Four Rightly Guided Caliphs - sorry, Founding Fathers - but were essentially ultra-nationalists preparing for an all-out state-led offensive to assert a Global Capitaliphate with the US guarding the holy cities and, through their servile ulema, propagating the Law of the Market and the Holy Profit. They usurped some of the unctuous 'idealism' of liberal internationalism and paired it with classic realpolitik - no more self-determination, the Dollar-Wall Street regime will be forcibly extended and deepened. They have a megalomaniacal view of their capacities, and of their rights over other human beings, which amount to those of a global dictatorship. Unlike many revivalist ideologies, this was principally an elite affair and the best its adherents could do to broaden its appeal was conjoin their ideals in an amorphous and nebulous association with those of the devout middle class, as well as a slender layer of Zionist fanatics whose aims are broadly contiguous with theirs.

Clinton had been too much of a status-quo conservative for them (albeit he did expand the economic dominion of the US and entrench neoliberalism as a divine and holy writ), and Bush looked too weak initially - but what's this? "Looks like a terrorist attack, Dick." "Did you see that coming, Don?" "Hell no." "Well, fuck, we've got to invade Iraq!" "Got to!" "We'll get the sumbitch now." "We'll get all the sumbitches!"

Having 'got' Iraq, the problem of Iran persisted. You might have noticed that the Iranian bazaari class had been pushing for more privatisation and neoliberalism and closer relations with the US since at least the late 1980s. What had been known as the 'Islamic Left' in the majles had abandoned radical positions and become liberal reformers, often in coalition with centrists and the 'Modern Right' (represented by Rafsanjani). Substantial sectors of industry had been liberalised and, following Khatami's election on a reform ticket in 1997, the US released most of its embargo on the country. Khatami introduced a neoliberal five year development plan starting in 2000, in collegiance with the IMF Prior to Ahmadinejad's election in August 2005, had been seeking entry into the World Trade Organisation. Iran's conservative faction had successfully outmanouevred some of Khatami's political liberalisation, but were fine with economic liberalisation provided it was compatible with their continued privilege (as it invariably was). Having barred several candidates in the 2005 election and used police, Parasdan and 'hezbollahs' against protesters and the opposition, they had assumed I think that Rafsanjani would win it and govern as a moderate rightist.

Trouble is that although Bush had made grateful use of Iran during the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, and although the US had been obliged to pragmatically seek Iran's help over Iraq, the sabre-rattling which had been particularly prominent in the early 1990s, with Secretary of State Warren Christopher in the US and Rabin in Israel referring to Iran's alleged terrorism in supporting Hamas (which was actually mainly funded by US allies Kuwait and Saudi Arabia) and nuke-seeking, had been reintroduced big time with the Axis of Evil speech. The continued weather of blustery rhetoric and threats had included attempts to impose sanctions, while neoconservatives were urging attacks on Iran, North Korea, an invasion of Iraq and so on. They were creaming their pants over the possibilities. For this reason, and also because of popular opposition to privatisation which had involved many student protests and clashes with the police, Ahmadinejad won. On the one hand, a better enemy of the month than Khatami - on the other hand, How Dare They Sass Us?

Fanatical American revivalists are thus prepared, whenever and however they can get away with it, for military strikes on Iran. They have devoted large sums of money to a disinformation campaign, used their immense power within international organisations to put pressure on the country, and have an unrealistic and cultish appreciation of their ability to, as one spokesman put it, 'create our own reality'. Their position in the executive branch of the US government, despite some knocks, remains strong. They continue to have a well-paid Greek Chorus in the media. The elite 'opposition' agrees with the bulk of what they stand for, so far being unable to exercise themselves to much opposition over strategic differences, and they certainly don't care to articulate the views of the working class and middle class whom they appeal to for votes from time to time.

Yet, the revivalists keep stumbling upon the same limits as more secular predecessors have: Haiti won't submit, Iraq won't submit, the Palestinians won't give in, Venezuela and Bolivia are teaming up against them, Iran has more or less told them to fuck off, OPEC countries are looking at switching to the euro (as Saddam did in 2000) which could mean a catastrophic decline in the dollar, global oppositional movements are being reconstituted, their allies in Egypt and Saudi Arabia are experiencing 'domestic difficulties', South Korea is turning on them, they've even lost their people-boiling dictator in Uzbekistan to the Russians.

Call it the wishful thinking of a Leninist moderate, but I sort of feel that this racist, supremacist ideology reached its apex in mid-2003. Their callousness, bigotry, fanaticism, brutality and extreme fecklessness even on their own terms has generated a backlash within the US ruling class while consolidating anti-imperialist alliances and movements. Market fundamentalism has experienced serious defeats, even in Europe. We may yet survive.