Tibet, Palestine, and Kissinger:  Further Ramifications

by Dr. Robert D. Crane

  Uri Avnery’s profound article on the lack of self-determination as a principle in American thinking on foreign policy explains the odd contradiction between its support of the March 2008 uprising in Tibet and its disinterest in many similar conflicts between states and nations.

  He omits the critical point, however, that this support of the Buddhists in Tibet has an ulterior motive, as do most foreign policies on most issues in every country.  Specifically, China is matching France’s decision to establish a military post within easy missile range from Iran by establishing a Chinese military post in Iran, perhaps with advanced defense capabilities, in order to deter an American attack.  Uri Avnery mentions CIA support for the uprising in Tibet, but does not address this as part of covert bargaining to make China withdraw and avoid an armed confrontation. 

  China is embarrassing the United States by daring us to attack their new military outpost, and we are supporting the Tibetans in order to embarrass China during the run-up to the Olympic Games this August.  We both want to be each other’s good friend for mutual benefits.  There is absolutely no reason for any military response by either China or the United States to each other’s perceived vital interests. Unfortunately, however, the United States is now part of a new Axis of Evil, which remarkably now includes even France, so China correctly perceives that it must be principled in defending Iran if it wants to win the battle for the future of civilization. 

  General Petraeus’s testimony before Congress on Tuesday, April 8, no longer relies on Al Qa’ida to justify our occupation of Iraq, but now marshals intelligence to justify continued American occupation of Iraq as essential in order to confront the Iranian threat not only to U.S. forces in Iraq but to the political “stability” of the entire Middle East.  The clear message is that those who are serious in wanting U.S. forces to withdraw from Iraq must now support an attack on Iran. 

  Meanwhile the Russians must be happy as a bug in a rug at the goodies that a holocaust could provide for them, such as blocking the global expansion of NATO, replacing the United States as the governing hegemon in the Middle East, and establishing a condominium with the Chinese to rule the world, a vision that the old “Sino-Soviet Bloc” once had under the Communists but might be revived under the rubric of global fascism.

  In Monday’s Washington Post, April 7, 2008, Kissinger published a long position paper postulating that three revolutions, all relating to the future of the sovereign state, will determine the future of the world.  The first is the decline of the state and its replacement by a federal union in Europe, which emasculates Europe as an ally of the United States.  The second is the “Islamist” opposition to any sovereign state in principle, which makes interstate politics and a balance of power impossible.  The third is the continued rise of the sovereign state as a global actor in the Far East, which poses a threat to U.S. global governance since it is now backed by a global economic rival, China. 

  In the early decades of his career, Kissinger supported a balance of power as the secret to global stability, first a bipolar balance until 1990 and than a multipolar balance orchestrated by the United States thereafter.  He abandoned the concept of balance, however, on August 12, 2002, in favor of imposing a new international law of American unilateralism as the real reason for invading Iraq.  Now he appears to be flummoxed by a world apparently spinning out of unilateral control.  He appears to have no answers other than doing more of the same.

  He views these three developments in the role of the state in international affairs as threats to American power and world civilization, but he does not consider that a foreign policy designed to empower everyone rather than merely ourselves could channel all three forces into a synergism of global pluralism that would benefit all peoples.  From his perspective of stability and power as the only goals, with no consideration for justice and human economic and political rights, he is condemned to fight for American domination and thereby undermine the only goals that he thinks are worthy of pursuit.  As a professional long-range global forecaster, it constantly amazes me at how adept we are at painting ourselves into a corner?