3) preventing the rise of any society that might serve as a successful example of an alternative to the capitalist model

4) extending political, economic and military hegemony over as much of the globe as possible, to prevent the rise of any regional power that might challenge American supremacy, and to create a world order in Americas image, as befits the worlds only superpower.

To American policymakers, these ends have justified the means, and all means have been available.31

In the wake of the 1973 military coup in Chile, which overthrew the socialist government of Salvador Allende, the Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs, Jack Kubisch, was hard pressed to counter charges that the United States had been involved. It was not in our interest to have the military take over in Chile, he insisted. It would have been better had Allende served his entire term, taking the nation and the Chilean people into complete and total ruin. Only then would the full discrediting of socialism have taken place. The military takeover and bloodshed has confused the issue. 32

Though based on a falsehood made up for the occasion-that Allendes polices were leading Chile to ruin-Kubischs remark inadvertently expressed his governments strong fealty to the third imperative stated above.

During the Cold War, US foreign policy was carried out under the waving banner of fighting a moral crusade against what cold warriors persuaded the American people, most of the world, and usually themselves, was the existence of a malevolent International Communist Conspiracy. But it was always a fraud; there was never any such animal as the International Communist Conspiracy. There were, as there still are, people living in misery, rising up in protest against their condition, against an oppressive government, a government likely supported by the United States. To Washington, this was proof that the Soviet Union (or Cuba or Nicaragua, etc., functioning as Moscows surrogate) was again acting as the proverbial outside agitator .

In the final analysis, this must be wondered: What kind of omnipresent, omnipotent, monolithic, evil international conspiracy bent on world domination would allow its empire to completely fall apart, like the proverbial house of cards, without bringing any military force to bear upon its satellites to prevent their escaping? And without an invasion from abroad holding a knife to the empires throat?

Enemies without number, threats without end

Now, of course, Washington spinmeisters cant cry The Russians are coming, and theyre ten feet tall! as a pretext for intervention, so they have to regularly come up with new enemies. America cherishes her enemies. Without enemies, she is a nation without purpose and direction. The various components of the National Security State need enemies to justify their swollen budgets, to aggrandize their work, to protect their jobs, to

give themselves a mission in the aftermath of the Soviet Union; ultimately, to reinvent themselves. And they understand this only too well, even painfully. Presented here is Col. Dennis Long, speaking in 1992, two years after the end of the Cold War, when he was director of total armor force readiness at Fort Knox:

For 50 years, we equipped our football team, practiced five days a week and never played a game. We had a clear enemy with demonstrable qualities, and we had scouted them out. [Now] we will have to practice day in and day out without knowing anything about the other team. We wont have his playbook, we wont know where the stadium is, or how many guys he will have on the field. That is very distressing to the military establishment, especially when you are trying to justify the existence of your organization and your systems.33

The United States had postponed such a distressing situation for as long as it could. A series of Soviet requests during the Cold War to establish a direct dialogue with senior NATO officials were rejected as inappropriate and potentially divisive. Longstanding and repeated Soviet offers to dissolve the Warsaw Pact if NATO would do the same were ignored. After one such offer was spurned, the Los Angeles Times commented that the offer increases the difficulty faced by U.S. policy-makers in persuading Western public opinion to continue expensive and often unpopular military programs. 34

In 1991, Colin Powell touched upon the irony of the profound world changes in cautioning his fellow military professionals: We must not...hope that it [the changes] will disappear and let us return to comforting thoughts about a resolute and evil enemy. 35

But the thoughts are indeed comforting to the military professionals and their civilian counterparts. So one month the new resolute and evil enemy is North Korea, the next month the big threat is Libya, then China, or Iraq, or Iran, or Sudan, or Afghanistan, or Serbia, or that old reliable demon, Cuba-countries each led by a Hitler-of-the-month, or at least a madman or mad dog, a degree of demonizing fit more for a theocratic society than a democratic one.

And in place of the International Communist Conspiracy, Washington now tells us, on one day or another, its fighting a War Against Drugs, or military or industrial spying, or the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction , or organized crime, or on behalf of human rights, or, most particularly, against terrorism. And they dearly want the American public to believe this. Here, for your terrorist-threat collection, are some of the headlines appearing in the Washington Post and New York Times in one 7-week period in early

1999:

Jan. 22: Clinton Describes Terrorism Threat for 21st Century

Jan. 23: President Steps Up War on New Terrorism

Jan. 23: Thwarting Tomorrows Terrors

Jan. 29: Anti-Terrorism Powers Grow

Feb. 1: Pentagon Plans Domestic Terrorism Team

Feb. 1: The Man Who Protects America From Terrorism

Feb. 2: U.S. Targeting Terrorism With More Funds

Feb. 16: Anti-Terrorism Military Drills Take Parts of Texas by Surprise

Feb. 17: Has the U.S. Blunted Bin Laden?

Feb. 19: Spending to Avert Embassy Attacks Assailed as Timid: Terrorist Threat Looms

Feb. 19: Bangladesh: Bin Ladens Next Target?

Feb. 23: Preparing for Invisible Killers

Mar. 7: Muslim Militants Threaten American Lives

Mar. 8: Reagan Building Vulnerable to Attack

Mar. 14: 2 Groups Appeal U.S. Designation as Terror Organizations

Mar. 16: Clinton Plans Training for Firefighters on Terrorism

And on January 20, Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen-a man who has written an ode to the F-15 fighter jet, literally36- announced that $6.6 billion was to be spent on a national missile defense system, a revival of President Reagans Star Wars system. In explaining this expenditure, Mr. Cohen cited only one threat-from North Korea. North Korea! A country that cant feed its own people is going to wage a missile attack upon the United States? What possible reason-other than an overpowering, irresistible yearning for mass national suicide-could North Korea have for launching such an attack? Yet the average American, reading Cohens announcement, must have found it very difficult to believe that one of their leaders could just step forward and publicly proclaim a crazy tale. They assume there must be something to what the man is saying.

Thats how the man gets away with it.

Does the man believe it himself? No more likely than that President Clinton believes it. In 1993, while in South Korea, Clinton declared: It is pointless for them [North Korea] to develop nuclear weapons. Because if they ever use them it would be the end of their country. This burst of honesty and common sense, which visits politicians occasionally, was prompted in this instance by a journalists question about how likely it was that North Korea would comply with the Non-Proliferation Treaty.37 Oddly enough, less than a year later, a survey showed that six times as many young South Koreans feared the United States as feared North Korea.38

Returning to 1999 and its new threats -in August a new National Security Council global strategy paper for the next century declared that the nation is facing its biggest espionage threat in history. 39

A remarkable statement. Whatever happened to the KGB? Any Americans now past 30 had it drilled into their heads from the cradle on that there was a perpetual Soviet dagger aimed at our collective heart in the hand of the spy next door. Thousands lost their jobs and careers because of their alleged association with this threat, hundreds were imprisoned or deported, two were executed. Surely Senator Joe McCarthy and J. Edgar Hoover are turning over in their graves.