A cura di Walter Snyder, Swiss Financial Consulting
The US Congress is set to approve a defense spending bill of epic proportions to fund operations and “build up” the military. The House version is presently at $717 billion. It is obvious that a good bit of that money will be used for “offense” and to maintain the over 800 overseas bases. Geopolitical considerations should be based on the assumption that US influence will continue to be exercised in compliance with the neo-conservative meme of global hegemony. Fighting terrorism is the password that justifies the outlay while exporting democracy is a hypocritical excuse for pursuing regime change.
The únipolar world envisioned by US politicians, however, is countered by the reality of two great nuclear powers that do not intend to bend to America`s will, namely, China and Russia. This can be seen most clearly in the strife currently playing out in the oil-rich Middle East.
The American plan for regime change in Syria has become a mess, involving not only the Assad government and various rebel groups and Kurds, but also China, France, Iraq, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the U.K. and even the Palestinians. All of them have their own goals.
The Kurds saw their opportunity to gain some degree of independence and joined the fight against Assad, which brought the Turks into the fray in order to stem the Kurdish wave. At the same time the US started building more bases in Syria itself and invited the British and French to make their contribution of troop contingents. Meanwhile the Iraqis have continued pursuing the remnants of IS, sometimes straying into Syria to bomb jihadists.
As if that was not enough, China is now planning to buy Iranian oil with renminbi thanks to the Shanghai oil futures market and thus evade US sanctions on Tehran. One should also mention Israel and its intention to annex the Golan Heights and Southern Lebanon while the MSM sees only Gaza and smoke from burning tires. What with the false flag chemical weapons attacks in Syria and American retaliation for the alleged attacks, the scene is set for further fighting as the US military now has enough money to continue dropping bombs as they did in Korea. They bombed and bombed until no targets were left standing.
Despite Trump`s asseveration during the 2016 electoral campaign that the US should pull out of the Middle East, it looks like the Americans are going to stay in Syria and implement Plan B, the dismemberment of the country. Another oil-rich candidate for US intervention is Venezuela. There are also others.