Globalization Advocates Were Wrong: The US-NATO Alliance is the Heart of Imperialism
by Danny Haiphong
“The post-Soviet era has been characterized by the forced subjugation of exploited peoples all over the world.”
After the Soviet Union was dismembered in the early 90's, Western academics worked tirelessly on behalf of finance capital to promote what they called "globalization." Globalization was defined as the integration of corporations, nation-states, and cultures. Integration in a "globalized" world was presented by the financial oligarchy as highly beneficial for humanity despite the devastating wealth concentration capitalism was leaving in its wake. The concept of globalization developed out of the need for the ruling class to brand the murderous nature of monopoly capitalism in a positive light.
A "globalized" world supposedly provided the world's people with information and technology from the lucrative investments of imperialism. Most importantly, globalization was going to create conditions where nation-state governments would no longer be necessary to foster political, economic, and cultural relationships between individuals and societies. In the 21st Century, globalization has been dropped from mainstream discourse. Imperialism is in permanent crisis and can only be maintained by the war-making capabilities of nation-state alliances.
With this realization, Wall Street's rag-tag team of intellectuals intentionally branded the expansion of imperialism with a humanitarian face. The theory of globalization was inherently deceptive, but it wasn't completely false. After the demise of the Soviet Union, Western capital opened Eastern Europe and much of the planet up for plunder. Neo-colonial nations accepted the theft of the World Bank, IMF, and World Trade Organization. When the Wall Street crisis became permanent in 2008, many Western nations, including the US, forced both its citizens and exploited neo-colonies to transfer trillions of public wealth straight to the ruling class in an attempt to stabilize the crisis.
“Imperialism is permanently busted.”
This policy of robbery failed to bring stability. The ruling class failed to realize that imperialism's crisis of over production is no longer subject to a boom and bust cycle. Imperialism is permanently busted. Productive forces can no longer sustain profit accumulation. Financial capital can only respond to falling rates of profit and waning influence with wealth extraction. Bloated Wall Street profits are dependent more so on the theft of the people's wealth than on surplus value extraction at the root of capitalism. And it takes constant war to ensure the bloated profits of the imperialist ruling class are accumulated another day.
The US-NATO summit proved once again that nation-states are necessary structures for imperialism to survive. This alliance of imperialist nation-states views any form of political and economic sovereignty as a threat to the interests of monopoly capital. Contrary to the bankrupt theory of globalization, NATO integration strengthens the influence and importance of nation-states in the maintenance of imperialism. At the summit, the US is led the way in building a foundation for war against Russia. Additionally, the US sought the alliance's support for airstrikes on Syrian territory to supposedly curb the spread of the Islamic State.
The overarching plan of the NATO summit was the destabilization of nation-states that oppose the global dominance of US imperialism. Globalization theorists have consistently fallen silent on the importance of the NATO alliance toward this end. It was NATO that provided the military cover for Libya's decimation in 2011. Without the assistance of NATO states during the occupation of Iraq, the US would have been unable to maintain a direct military presence as long as it did.
As the leader of NATO, US imperialism's objective is to weaken the growing influence of China and Russia. NATO is complicity working with the US-Japan imperial strategy of Chinese containment, otherwise termed the "Asia Pivot." The US and the West are also pushing for Ukraine to join NATO after backing the neo-Nazi-led coup last winter. These recent geopolitical maneuvers are clear indications of NATO's leading role in paving a warpath to Russia and China on behalf of US imperialism and its lackeys.
NATO is also instrumental to the imperial objectives of non-NATO states, especially those of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Israel. Since at least 2011, talks of independent pipeline development between Russia, Iraq, Iran and Syria have threatened the hegemony of Israel and the Gulf monarchies. These states responded by using NATO aid to unleash a jihadist nightmare on Syria and Iraq. The jihadist insurgency plaguing the region represents another chapter of a decade’s long policy of the Saudi and Qatari establishment to maintain its hegemony in the region as vassal states for the West. For the Gulf Monarchies and Israel alike, the primary objective of the jihadist proxy war is to neutralize Iran's sovereign influence in the region.
“US imperialism's objective is to weaken the growing influence of China and Russia.”
Additionally, the US-NATO alliance is a powerful cover for Zionism. NATO's strategic relations with Israel have aided the Zionist entity in its ultimate mission of creating sectarian strife in the Middle East and North Africa. Israel is the least named player in the imperial chess match being played in the region between the imperialist states. However, the Zionist entity's plans for expansion are behind each and every imperialist war in the region, with the US-NATO alliance providing front-line support. Israel’s desire to eliminate independent states in the region aligns perfectly with the hundreds of millions of dollars being spent by the US-NATO alliance to engineer regime change in Syria and Iraq, two of Israel’s long time “enemies.”
NATO's role in the global crisis of imperialism exposes the true nature of globalization. Globalization advocates believe that nation-states wither away in a planet dominated by corporate enterprise and finance. However, the capitalist ruling class has found it impossible to shed its dependence on nation-states to maintain hegemony. The majority of the world's people have been forced into a life and death struggle against the US-NATO alliance and its allies. Imperialism cannot be revolutionized until this is given proper recognition.
For the working class and exploited peoples in the US, the recent $8.7 billion cut in food stamps was implemented by the same government using NATO to wage war around the planet. This is the same US government that militarizes local police departments and allows law enforcement to occupy the Black community. Globalization has thus shown little to prove that it is a force for mutual integration and exchange between peoples and cultures. Rather, the post-Soviet era has been characterized by the forced subjugation of exploited peoples all over the world under the military and economic gun of US imperialism. Imperialism’s ruling class all out war on oppressed people is sustained by the bloody hands of the state machinery’s most dangerous form: the US-NATO alliance.
Danny Haiphong is an activist and case manager in the Greater Boston Area. Danny can be reached at [email protected].
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