6-11-2012 | On Poaching

"To renew my favored metaphor, does the poacher care about six tons of dead elephant? No, the poacher kills the elephant just to get a few pounds of ivory from the tusk. The point of Iraq, from the perspective of the identifiable perpetrators who planned and executed the invasion from 2001-2003, can be seen in the balance sheets of Halliburton and KBR and the PMCs, in the career boosts to the geostrategist wankers and think-tankers who fronted the WMD lies (and later pretended to have turned against the war), in the profits extracted from the resulting added volatility to oil prices -- all peanuts in the big scheme of ultra-trillions and global crashes, but who cares? Someone profited. And they live well, they feel no threat to their persons.

There was also the demonstration to other unruly nations of what the empire is capable of doing. So what if the gamble didn't pay off in getting most of the oil concessions for US companies? Some of the guys pushing it back in 2001, like the Enron boys, ended up convicted for high-stakes gambling in other spheres. The question with these kinds of personalities is not, "why have a war," but "why not." They ask, "What's in it for me?" They don't give a shit. Plan A (neocons strewn with flowers) failed, Plan B (get them in a civil war and watch them kill each other off) brought on a new genocide and eventually gave the game to Iran. So? That's not Paul Bremer's problem. That's not Peter Galbraith's problem. The imperialist paradigm remains invincible. The same people and their proteges and associates are currently trying to pull the same trick with Iran and Syria. They just did a job on Libya. The movers already cashed in their first chips, so they're happy, and who cares if Libya eventually becomes a new Afghanistan, full of new Taliban? Where will the Cheneys and Rumsfelds and Wolfowitzes and Perles be then? Living in comfort and raking in low-tax guaranteed proceeds from accumulated wealth. Poachers start the killing for a piece of tusk. If the rotting elephant becomes a problem, it's not their problem.

-- JackRiddler