Clinton didn't miss an opportunity to dress down her nation's client Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh - "This must be a partnership if it is to have a successful outcome" - for his failure to adequately "protect human rights, advance gender equity, build democratic institutions and the rule of law." The U.S. may extend its Afghanistan-Pakistan war into the Arabian Peninsula and the Horn of Africa [3] in nominal support of the Yemeni head of state and his Somali counterpart President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed, but they and their like - Afghanistan's Hamid Karzai and Pakistan's Asif Ali Zardari - should not for a minute forget who is in charge and who makes the rules.
The secretary of state had nothing to say about the condition of human rights, gender equality and so forth in Saudi Arabia and America's other military vassals in the Persian Gulf. Medieval monarchies and hereditary autocracies that host American military bases, buy billions of dollars of advanced weapons from Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman and are home to the U.S. 5th Fleet are not subjected to homilies on human rights and "democratic institutions."
On the day of the London conference on Afghanistan Clinton, flanked by the foreign ministers of Africa's two former major colonial masters, Britain's David Miliband and France's Bernard Kouchner, also delivered a lecture to the government of Nigeria, ordering it to address "electoral reform, post-amnesty programs in the Niger Delta, economic development, inter-faith discord and transparency." [4]
At the January 28 International Conference on Afghanistan, attended by the foreign ministers of all 28 NATO member states and dozens of NATO partnership underlings with troops in the South Asian war zone - the "international community" as the West defines it - Clinton complemented the Pentagon's allies and satraps:
"I think that what we have seen is a global challenge that is being met with a global response. I especially thank the countries that have committed additional troops, leading with our host country, the United Kingdom, but including Italy, Germany, Romania." [5]
She will need yet more troops in the near future for a far larger conflict than those the U.S. and NATO are currently involved with in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia if the following comments contribute to the results they appear to intend:
"I also had a chance to discuss Iran's refusal to engage with the international community on its nuclear program. They continue to violate IAEA and Security Council requirements.
"The revelation of Iran's secret nuclear facility at Qom has raised further questions about Iran's intentions. And in response to these questions, the Iranian Government has provided a continuous stream of threats to intensify its violation of international nuclear norms. Iran's approach leaves us with little choice but to work with our partners to apply greater pressure...."
Washington and its main NATO partners Britain, France and Germany along with miscellaneous allies around the world - "rogue" nuclear powers India, Israel and Pakistan among them (who know who to align with and purchase arms from) - dictate the terms on matters ranging from the proper holding of elections to which nation can develop a civilian nuclear power program. Any country outside the "Euro-Atlantic" and "international" communities faces censure, threats, "greater pressure" and ultimately military attack.
The U.S. has a population of 300 million and the European Union of 500 million, combined well under one-eighth that of the world. Yet the two, whose military wing is NATO, hold "international conferences" on Asia, the Middle East and other parts of the world and presume to deliver ultimatums to all other nations.
To cite a recent example, the New York Times reported that "Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned China on [January 29] that it would face economic insecurity and diplomatic isolation if it did not sign on to tough new sanctions against Iran for its nuclear program, seeking to raise the pressure on Beijing to fall in line with an American-led campaign." [6] On the same day "The Obama administration notified Congress on Friday of its plans to proceed with five arms sales transactions with Taiwan worth a total of $6.4 billion. The arms deals include 60 Black Hawk helicopters, Patriot interceptor missiles, advanced Harpoon missiles that can be used against land or ship targets and two refurbished minesweepers." [7]
Clinton has joined in the U.S. chorus of hectoring of China since she took up her current post last year, in May even raising the specter of Chinese penetration of Latin America.
China is not Afghanistan or Yemen. It is not even Iran. The last generation's foreign policy hubris and megalomania of the West, epitomized by its wars in Southeast Europe and South Asia and the Middle East, may be headed into far more dangerous territory.
Grandiosity, arrogance and perceived impunity blind those afflicted with them, whether individuals or nations.
No clearer example exists than Secretary Clinton's remarks in Paris on January 29.
To demonstrate the worldview of those she represents - that the United States and Europe are the incontestable metropolises and rulers by right of the planet - early in her address Clinton said "I appreciate the opportunity to discuss a matter of great consequence to the United States, France, and every country on this continent and far beyond the borders: the future of European security." [8]
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