[Marxism] Re "Elections have to be an Iraqi demand, not the demand of the foreign countries."

[Ralph Johansen <michele@xxxxxxxx>]

Two more things, restatements but maybe they are worth repeating:

Since the end of the nineteenth century and the plotting of the British,
French, Russians, Ottomans and Germans for control of the middle eastern
petroleum deposits, oil has been the justification for
all manner of mayhem in the region, including both world wars,
interminable lesser wars and rearrangement of spheres of influence.

Initially, it was for the control of the trade routes, sea lanes,
railways, means of warfare, all of which ran more cheaply, efficiently,
competitively and abundantly on oil than on coal.

The same struggle continues without visible end now, with ever more
dependence on that dwindling, more precious mineral.

So we can assume that the 'elections' will be rigged so the prevailing
party runs with the US on all matters involving that control of oil, one
way or another. (Nor by the way is anyone apparently privy to the slate
of candidates except the insiders.)

Elections, democracy, self-determination, exit strategy, reconstruction,
rearrangement of regional
borders, Israeli-Palestinian dispute settlement, machinations leading to
civil war, relations with all  other states, all are subordinate to that
goal. And everyone in a position of influence is all too aware of that -
French, Germans, Sheiks and Mullahs, Chinese, Russians, Al Sistani, Al
Sadr, the resistance, Israelis, Islamists, Baathists, everyone -
including some in even less position to do much of anything about it,
like those of us who blather on this list. They no doubt also know that
under the Saddam Hussein regime Iraqi oil deposits were nationalized and
for a time and to some extent locally dominated (as with Iran under
Mossadegh), much to the distress of the primary appropriators.

So my second point is that, short of the type of resistance we see going
on now, what hope is there that this struggle among the dominant powers,
against the interests of those under whose land the oil flows, is
halted, unless that resistance is so overpowering, here and elsewhere,
and the determination to take back and hold onto what's left of what
belongs there, for the benefit of the people who live there (for
starters), is so strong that the cost in materiel and legitimation of
the powerful and the cost in lives of those who invade on behalf of the
predators is finally unacceptable?

And no resistance will get far unless it overcomes the imperative of
accumulation and the varied formulae for divide and rule, and unless we
figure out how to re-create the ancient concept of the common wealth, on
a global scale this time.

I can remember how profoundly moved I was when that Buddhist monk sat on
the road and set fire to himself in Vietnam, conveying a depth of
feeling and sacrifice, before the whole world and its cameras and TV
sets, that somehow was capable of expressing the inexpressible. (I also
remember wondering, even at a time when I knew much less about how the
world works, about the war in Vietnam and its relationship to the oil
wealth in the South China Sea and in the Indonesian archipelago. which
of course is still effectively in the control of the Americans.)

Now we have come to the point where suicide bombers, initially in
Palestine and now at an appalling rate in Iraq, still in their profound
agony and self-sacrifice do not penetrate the by-now grossly thickened
sensibilities of those of us in the US and the so-called 'developed'
world. We can cynically ignore them on the grounds that they are
religious 'fanatics', gulled by religious leaders into wasting their
young, untried lives in a false expectation of reward in another
dimension. (Do we consider how what motivates US and British invading
troops differs, other than the better odds of survival in an
overwhelmingly powerful military force)?

So the cost of self-sacrifice is very likely raised in untold ways for
the resistance as well. But is that sacrifice and sense of outrage lost
on enough Iraqis and on us to negate the struggle? I do not know enough
about what is on Iraqi TV and in people's minds, for one thing. Much as
I hope, I fear for the victims.

Ralph


Fred Feldman/ [Marxism] "Elections have to be an Iraqi demand,not the
demand of the foreign countries."
<http://www.columbia.edu/%7Elnp3/msg59297.html>, Fred Feldman, Sat, 8
Jan 2005 11:17:35 -0500 (EST)/  wrote:

Before the news article, which includes an excellent statement by a
Sunni figure on the elections and a very defensive-sounding statement by
a Shia leader, I want to make some comments on the discussion of Iraq.

What I have been submitting to the list are, in a sense, drafts of an
article I am writing for the Canadian based Socialist Voice.  So
everybody's comments have been very helpful.





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