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The Ehtisham Review-Neo-Imperialism-3-Occupation

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The Ehtisham Review-Neo-Imperialism-3-Occupation 

The two world wars, especially the second one,
weakened the grip of colonial powers. Britain sought an honorable way out
and managed it to some extent. The Dutch tried to hang on to Indonesia,
but were driven away. The French, unable to hang on to Vietnam, let the
Domino theory oriented U.S. to fight and end up in a humiliating defeat.
The French struggled in Algeria too, but De Gaulle came to rescue.  Most
of the rest of the colonies went the same way. 

Colonialism has been replaced by occupation of abstract space, under which
International Financial Institutions (IFI) and
MNCs function. The Third World countries have been granted sovereignty on
paper. The West controls over 80% of the resources of the world.  (39).
              The US initiated the process in Cuba in the late
nineteenth century when it drove Spain out of Cuba. Though the country had
its own flag, constitution, currency and an army, all major foreign policy
decisions were made by the U.S. The US also kept in its hands sugar,
tobacco, tourism and nearly all foreign trade. (40).            
  The newly sovereign states did enjoy legitimacy among its people. But
the governments which tried to wrest control of its resources were
subjected to military coups-Iran, Indonesia and many other countries.
South Africa was able to overthrow the dictatorship of the minority, but
had to let the minority have continued control of business, finance and
industry.(41).              The leaders were allowed revolutionary
slogans as long as they did not act on them and collaborated with
Neo-imperialism.               The leaders of the new nations may
voice revolutionary slogans, yet they find themselves locked into the
Global Capitalist Orbit, cooperating perforce with the First World nations
for investment, trade, and aid. So we witnessed the curious phenomenon of
leaders of newly independent Third World nations denouncing imperialism as
the source of their countries' ills, while dissidents in these countries
denounced these same leaders as collaborators of imperialism.

Independence was allowed in most instances when a comprador
class had been created, which would collaborate with the colonial power in
turning the country into a client state.  

Most of the Third World consists of client states in which Foreign Direct
Investment (FDI) is permitted on terms favorable to investors.
Corporations get cheap labor, subsidies and raw material. In a client
state, corporate investors enjoy direct subsidies and land grants, access
to raw materials and cheap labor, low, if any taxes, and subservient labor
unions, no occupational safety measures, no minimum wage, no restriction
on child labor and no consumer or environmental safety measures.  (42). 

The Third World offers the life to capitalists what
colonies did to rulers in the nineteenth century. The collaborators enjoy
opportunities to line their pockets with the foreign aid sent by the West.
Security forces are armed and trained by the United States in the latest
technologies of terror and repression.  But independence even though only
on paper, kindles the aspiration to real independence. Once in a while
emerges a national leader, as in Venezuela or Bolivia, who manages to
extract power from corporate rulers. But more often, they lose their life
viz Allende of Chile. (43).
 Bibliography and
References:1.      http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-wallechinsky/what-is-the-real-reason-g_b_11116.html .2.     Porter, Donald
Clayton   “The Sachem (The Colonization of America, Book IV)” (New
York, NY: Bantam, 1981).3.   Abernethy, David. "The Dynamics of Global
Dominance, European Overseas Empires 1415–1980". (New Haven, CT :Yale
University Press,
2000).4.   http://foreigndispatches.typepad.com/dispatches/2004/10/slav_an_etymolo.html  5.   Davies,
Norman – “Europe : A History” (New York, NY, Oxford University
Press, 1996)6.    Mazower, Mark- "Hitler's Empire: Nazi Rule in
Occupied Europe". (London: Allen Lane,2008).7.    Frieden, Jeffry
A.  “The Modern Capitalist World Economy: A Historical Overview”
“http://www.academia.edu/3081847/THE_MODERN_CAPITALIST_WORLD_ECONOMY_A_HISTORICAL_OVERVIEW8.     Lens,
Sidney; Zinn, Howard: “The Forging of the American Empire.” (London:
Pluto Press. 2003)  9.  Hudson, Michael:”Super Imperialism: The
Origin And Fundamentals of U.S. World Dominance” (London, UK. Pluto
Press, 2003).10.  Obrinsky, Mark. "Profit Theory and Capitalism".
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press,
1983).11. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/index.htm 12.   https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2004/02/wome-f25.html13. http://www.clickrally.com/deforestation-in-borneo-its-impact-on-indigenous-societies-and-implications-for-development/14. http://www.michaelparenti.org/Imperialism101.html15.
Parenti, Michael – “Against Empire” San Francisco, CA, City Lights
       Publishing, 1998.16.
Ibid17. http://www.odsg.org/Said_Edward(1977)_Orientalism.pdf18. Ferro,
Marc-“Colonization: A Global History” (Abingdon, UK: Taylor & Francis,
1997).  19. Murray Gordon, "Slavery in the Arab World", (New York ,
USA New Amsterdam Press,  1989.).   20. ibid 17  21. Backman,
Clifford R. “The Worlds of Medieval Europe”. (Oxford, UK: Oxford
University Press, 2003).   22.   Romila Thapar, “A History of
India “,( New York , USA. Penguin Books. 1966).    23. Robinson,
Chase “Islamic Historiography.” (New York: Cambridge University Press
2003).  24. Frances Moore Lappe and Rachel Schurman’s article “The
Population Puzzle” published in the magazine “Caring For Families”
(IC #21) published in Spring 1989.  25. Rorabacher, John Albert –
“Hunger and Poverty in South Asia” (New Delhi, India. Gyan Publishing
House, 2010). Page 486, featuring “Albertini, Rudolph von, and Wirz,
Albert. European Colonial Rule, 1880-1914: The Impact of the West on
India, South East Asia and Africa    26.  Fanon, Frantz, "The
Wretched of the Earth," Maspero Publishing house, Pref. by Jean-Paul
Sartre. Translated by Constance Farrington. (London : Penguin Book,
2001). 27. Marx & Engels on Ireland and the Irish
Question. Progress Press Transcribed: Einde O’Callaghan and Andy
Blunden. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/subject/ireland/ 28. Henderson,
John S. “The World of the Ancient Maya”.  (Ithaca,  N.Y. Cornell
University Press. 1981). 29. Miller, Jonathan D. “Infrastructure 2013:
Global Priorities, Global Insights”. Washington, D.C . Urban Land
Institute and Ernst & Young,
2013.30. http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Parenti/Imperialism101_AE.html 31. http://www.globalexchange.org/resources/wto/agriculture 32. statisticbrain.co/world-poverty-statistics/  33. ibid
15 34. http://www.unicef.org/pon95/chil0016.html 35. ibid 15 36. ibid
15  37. Easterly, William “The White Man's Burden: Why the West's
Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good” (New
York, NY. Oxford University Press,
2007). 38. http://www.globalissues.org/article/57/corporations-and-workers-rights39. Stiglitz,
Joseph E, "Globalization and Its Discontents," (New York: W.W. Norton and
Co Inc, 2002).40. Moruzzi, Peter “Havana Before Castro: When Cuba was a
Tropical Playground” (Layton, UT. Publisher Gibbs Smith,
2008).41. http://thinkafricapress.com/south-africa/white-elite-dog-doesnt-bark-bee-who-rules-south-africa.42. http://www.independent.org/publications/working_papers/article.asp?id=1369
43. Harmer, Tanya “ Allende's Chile and the Inter-American Cold
War” (Greensboro, NC. University of North Carolina Press, 2011).


Dr. S. Akhtar Ehtisham
Blog syedehtisham.blogspot.com
All religions try to take over the establishment and if they fail, they
collaborate with it, be it feudal or capitalist.
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Afghanistan: In midwinter attacks, a brutal Pakistani reply to Trump – CSMonitor.com

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This article describes the change of US policy under president Trump as it relates to Afghanistan and Pakistan.  US policy now authorizes local commanders the authority to undertake local action unlike the established policvy under president Obama who had to sanction actions, particularly attacks in Pakistani territory.  The Trump administration has further put a hold on military and financial aid to Pakistan and is openly encouraging India to get more involved in ther regional conflict.  The complex situation has many ramifications for the future of the region.  According to US sources the recent bloody attacks in Afghanistan are Pakistan’s response by supposedly activating the militants in the tribal areas it controls.  No one knows the truth but conspiracy theories and their after effects will continue to bleed the region for the forseeable future.
Nasik Elahi
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2018/0209/Afghanistan-In-midwinter-attacks-a-brutal-Pakistani-reply-to-Trump


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“Justice & Vengeance” By Kenan Malik

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A fascinating article by Kenan Malik comparing verdict by Judge Aquilina on Larry Nassar case about sexually abusing young Olympic gymnastic girls and Darren Osborne who mowed down Muslim worshipers in London and killing one and injuring many worshipers. F. Sheikh.

Two court cases last week, on either side of the Atlantic, helped illuminate the tensions in our thinking about justice. The first was the harrowing trial of Larry Nassar, the American doctor who, over decades, had abused dozens of gymnasts, mainly young girls, in his care. In the final week, 156 women gave personal statements, testimonies that were both distressing and inspiring.

In her summing-up, Judge Rosemarie Aquilina observed that ‘our constitution does not allow for cruel and unusual punishment’. If it did, she would have allowed ‘many people to do to him what he did to others’. She then sentenced Nassar for to up to 175 years in prison.

The second trial was that of Darren Osborne, accused of mowing down Muslim worshippers in Finsbury Park, north London, in a van last year. One man was killed, many others seriously injured. Osborne, who denies charges of murder and attempted murder, allegedly tried to flee the scene, but was set upon by the crowd. Mohammed Mahmoud, an imam,intervened. ‘I shouted, “No one touch him”’, he told the jury at Woolwich crown court. Osborne ‘should answer for his crime in a court such as this and not in a court in the street’.

Where Aquilina would have imposed an ‘eye for an eye’ punishment, if she could have, Mahmoud insisted that such retribution had no place in justice. There is no direct comparison between the two cases. They pose different moral questions and create different emotions. Had Aquilina been in Finsbury Park that night, she would probably have protected Osborne too. Nevertheless, expressed in Aquilina’s words and in Mahmoud’s actions are two very different conceptions of the relationship between justice and vengeance. For one, justice requires a measure of vengeance; for the other, the two are incompatible.

More than two millennia ago, the Greek playwright Aeschylus explored these very tensions in his magnificent Oresteiatrilogy. Written in the fifth century BCE, it remains one of the most profound studies of the meaning of justice.

Aeschylus’s Oresteia begins where Homer’s Iliad ends. The Iliad tells the story of the Trojan War, in which Greek warriors, led by Agamemnon, avenge the kidnapping of Helen by the Trojan prince Paris. In Oresteia, the war is over and the warriors are returning home. In the opening play of the trilogy, Agamemnon’s wife, Clytemnestra, brutally murders her husband on his homecoming. It is an act of furious revenge for his having sacrificed their daughter, Iphigenia, 10 years previously on the eve of the war to placate the gods.

In The Choephori, the second of the plays, Orestes, son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, is faced with a terrible dilemma: murder his mother or leave his father unavenged. He kills Clytemnestra.

In the final play, The Eumenides, Orestes is pursued by the Furies, deities whose role is to exact vengeance for sins such as the shedding of kindred blood. He finds refuge in Athens where, in the Acropolis, the goddess Athena convenes a jury to try Orestes. The jury is split. Athena casts her vote in favour of acquittal.

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Arab Leadership Quagmire

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Arab Leadership Quagmire – What are They Fighting For

Mahboob A Khawaja, PhD.

The contemporary Arab world is fraught with animosities. Common sense stops at various levels to reflect on the real problems. Revitalization of historic ignorance, authoritarian greed of power, sectarian hatred and missing sense of moral and intellectual visionary leadership to deal with the contemporary problems of political transformation.

American-led warfare has ruptured the Arab world’s integrity and unity on several fronts. Most recently, President Trump has challenged the global consciousness on the status of Jerusalem. Jerusalem belongs to the humanity – to Jews, Christians and Muslims alike and is not the capital of Israel. One finds irrationality and trade-in of human rights, justice and freedom in Trump’s declaration to move the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Americans are not born with a national cause, the political elite invents the cause to maintain control over the masses. All nations want to be seen as relevant and influential- nothing wrong there. But to pick on Jerusalem and make it a deliberate historic blunder mocks the human nature and facts of history. The Arab leaders knew for long, it was coming-up for change. Yet they were sitting motionless and did nothing to challenge the absurdity of the current US administration. Do the Arab societies have intelligent leaders and enlightened scholars to speak out on this vital issue?  Why do the Arab leaders buy several billions worth of armaments from the US? Are the Arab leaders stupid and ignorant of the facts of prevalent global affairs?
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