US intervention: Why Liberia, Why now?

By Daniesha Laquandria, Melbourne Indymedia, Sunday 6 July 2003 at 05:55 PM

The tactics of this administration are radically unpredictable. Many have asked, when and where will the next military adventure take place? Will it be Iran, as accusations fly to and fro concerning its development of nuclear power? Will it be North Korea, which already appears to have developed nuclear bombs? Or will it be Syria, which is being denounced in both the US and Britain for developing biological and chemical weapons, for harboring Iraqi Baathists, and for funding anti-Israeli jihadists?

On the far right, some pundits have said the US should go after Saudi Arabia next. But who in their wildest imaginings could have told us last week that the US was preparing to send troops to West Africa?

So the question must be asked: Why Liberia, and why now?

I tend to favor the following theory: this administration follows a policy of world domination which manufactures pretexts for an ever expanding series of military deployments. There is little doubt that the US seeks geo strategic supremacy, as Rome did in the first and second centuries B.C. That is to say, the US, like ancient Rome, looks for trouble spots, and then inserts itself, under the pretext that it is fostering some transcendent goal: world peace, stability, democracy, humanitarianism. Its real goal is to create bases, and launch pads for further expansion. More on the comparison with Rome further on.

In the case of Liberia, we have the pretext: Charles Taylor is a bad man who needs to be removed. Mainstream media are already comparing Taylor with Saddam Hussein. US troops, we are told, need to be sent to Liberia to stabilize the situation after Taylor is thrown out.

Many questions need to be asked. Is Taylor really worse than the warlords he was trying to suppress? Is the civil war in Liberia solely the fault of Charles Taylor, or is it equally due to the interference of its neighbors—Ivory Coast, Guinea, and Sierra Leone—in its internal affairs? All three of these nations have aided rebel factions in Liberia, a fact omitted in US corporate coverage of the crisis.

Cable news correspondents speak of huge crowds in Monrovia, the Liberian capital, calling for direct US intervention, and praising Bush. In one CNN report, broadcast Thursday, the protesters were shown, but the signs they carried displayed slogans such as Charles Taylor Out. Not a single sign was shown calling for a US troop presence. The French media outlet, RFI (Radio France International) reported that both pro- and anti-Taylor protesters were out in force, something which US media outlets have also neglected to point out.

The French have troops in Ivory Coast and in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Congo-Kinshasa). Must the US extend its own power and influence by putting American troops in an area which has traditionally been under French influence? (Two of three nations bordering Liberia, Guinea and Ivory Coast, are French speaking former colonies).

What are the economic stakes in this conflict? Diamonds and gold are abundant in Liberia and neighboring Sierra Leone. Does the current US administration have allies or campaign donors who have an interest in Liberian diamonds and gold? Yes, none other than Pat Robertson and his Christian Coalition. Greg Palast reported in a recent C-Span interview that Pat Robertson is rarely seen praying off camera. However, he notes one exception. During a trip to Liberia, he told one group, before journeying to one of his mines, Lets pray for diamonds. Robertsons ties to the Bush administration and his interest in Liberian diamonds and gold have been well documented. So the question arises: What role has the Christian Coalition played in the Bush decision to send troops to Liberia at this time? Is the current instability in Liberia jeopardizing the Christian Coalitions diamond holdings? Does the instability threaten a major Bush campaign funding source?

Whatever the proximate causes of the US move to send troops to Liberia, the event must be seen as part of the overall strategy, the so called Plan for an American Century, according to which the US seeks total world dominance.

Comparison with first and second century Rome sheds light on the current US strategy. By 200 B.C. Republican Rome had defeated, though not completely destroyed its primary enemy, Carthage (as the US has apparently subdued Russia). Nothing stood in its way. Greece was still independent, though Romans began intervention there to prevent other less democratic powers—Macedonia and Syria—in their attempts to gain control over eastern Europe. The ideological conquests were as significant as the military ones. Under the consul Flamininus, Greece was granted its liberty, as Rome drove out all would be undemocratic conquerors. Rome was hailed amongst the Greek City states as a nation which unselfishly crossed seas in order to free others. That was the public message, given out by the liberators and the liberated.

But when Romans spoke to Romans, what was the message? One can see a great resemblance in the following speech, given to Roman soldiers by Porcius Cato, to some of Wolfowitzs behind closed door presentations:

You are not simply fighting for the independence of Greece, though that would be a fine enterprise. After [defeating Macedonia] you will open up to Roman domination Asia, Syria, and all the wealthy kingdoms stretching as far as the rising sun. How far then will we be from having our Empire stretch from [Portugal] to the Red Sea, limited only by the Ocean that embraces the world? How far from having the entire human race revere the Roman name only after the Gods?

This speech was given at a time when Rome was still a representative Republic, and far from dominating the whole of the known Western World, well before the rise of the Imperial Caesars. Cato spoke at a time when it could be credibly argued that Rome was a beneficent power, which fought for the freedom of others, against tyrants and kings. Yet fifty years later, democratic Greece was completely subdued, and their richest city, Corinth, was burned to the ground to stifle Greek competition with Roman merchants.

So when the question arises—Why Liberia, and why now?—we will be given all sorts of phony replies: We have an historical relationship with Liberia, because it was founded by former US slaves; terrorists are involved in the Liberian diamond trade; the US has a humanitarian duty to keep the peace in an unstable West Africa; Charles Taylor is a bad man, just like Saddam Hussein.

Will journalists point out that when Liberia was founded, former US slaves were sent to conquer the surrounding peoples, and create an elite class of Americo-Liberians, which has governed the nation until the present day? Will they point out that the ethnic strife in Liberia is a direct result of Western meddling? Will US journalists point to a terrorist connection with the diamond trade, while neglecting to examine the role of the Christian Coalition in that same trade? Will a phony humanitarianism be put on the table as a just reason for intervening, while all geo-strategic, military, and financial motivations are ignored? And finally, will Charles Taylor be demonized, in spite of the fact that he won the last election with 75% of the vote, in what are regarded to have been free and fair elections?