Paul wrote: Jim writes that one motive for Iraq was the strategic help it gives Israel.
I am not a big fan of the overall "motive" debates for Iraq (it mostly distracts from the work at hand), - - - - I've engated in the same spectator sport myself, but I would agree with Paul that the effort is probably fruitless. Note that all hypotheses begin with a prior assumption: that the motive for the action coincides with the "interests" of the Administration or the U.S. Ruling Class or with some faction within that class. But this in turn presupposes (a) that the agents involved _know_ their own interests and (b) that the analyst's identification of those interests are the same as that of the assumed agents (Bush, Presidential Advisors, Ruling Class, Whatever or Whoever). But "they" might not know their 'true' interests and thus cannot act from them, or 'they' may have a different set of 'true' interests in mind than the outside analyst does, etc etc etc. MOREOVER -- If someone on the outside can hypothesize a possible motive (e.g. defend the dollar), it is possible that some other set of agents might _also_ arrive at that conclusion, and also possible that they won't (regardless of how much or how little "objective sense" the hypothesized motive makes or doesn't make. So it's always possible that the silliest notion one can dream up and defend is the real motive (the administration can be as silly as the analyst) or that the most rational-sounding motive is utterly irrelevant because no one in the Administration came to that conclusion. And so on. Now the general theories (whether they are right or wrong) of Lenin, Luxemburg, Baran, Magdoff, Wood are not subject to the same kind of criticism as are the various specific explanations offered for the actions of the Bush Administration. However different their details, all these theories hold imperialism (in one form or another) to be intrinsic to capitalism, but none pretends to to predict the particular policies a given imperialist power will follow under different specific conditions. - - - - but I think this angle sheds light on how sweeping are the changes implied by the Bush agenda in a one superpower world. [LARGE CLIP] For sure the Wolfowitz\Pearl crowd don't see it this way, at least in their discourse. Assuming they are not being Straussian (or just telling themselves that the gain in Israel's security is worth the loss in its status since the US will ALWAYS be faithful to its friends), I don't see why their subjective views are decisive on this point. Even the ubermensch crowd keep their human blinders, no? - - - - Indeed. Paul offers an account of what the results of the Iraq action will be _regardless_ of Bush motives. As a basis for planning the strategy and tactics of the anti-interventionist movement, this approach makes far more sense than do efforts to identify those "subjective views." If someone sets fire to the bulding we live in, his/her motives are quite irrelevant to our rasponses to the fire. Carrol (I always remember John Adams's claim that one could never trust the British government to act in its own interests -- i.e., to know its own interests. I would say the same for any hegemonic imperial power.)
