Enter the dragon?

Meanwhile the West backs its genocidal beachhead in the Middle East and US warships threaten Venezuela on bogus pretext. At the very least Washington is doubling down on the Monroe Doctrine in the face of rising Chinese and Russian commercial presence in its back yard.

Road to WW3. Part 4: ‘Only Connect’

Two flawed but fascinating podcasts, both invoking China, caught my eye yesterday. The first is by Jeffrey Sachs, who has earned my respect even as I contest on grounds set out a week ago his belief that Israel dictates US foreign policy. Here though my objection is to the lesser crime, uncharacteristic in his case, of heavy-handed repetitiveness. Since I’ve long admired the man’s clarity and absence of both the prolix and the tub-thumping, I’m a tad surprised but inclined to leniency.

The more so when his core argument – that yet again policies designed to shore up America’s waning ability to bully the planet, in this case Venezuela, are having the opposite effect – can be grasped in the first ten minutes. Indeed, in pretty much any ten minutes picked at random from its 37:27 entirety. On this basis I recommend it without further reservation.

Then there’s Mehdi Hasan, another highly intelligent and articulate voice with whom, as stated in my previous post featuring Owen Jones, I have differences. One being the same belief, that Israel drives US foreign policy. But whereas in Jeffrey’s case I mention it in passing, since it has no obvious bearing on the question of Venezuela, in Mehdi’s it’s the unstated backdrop to all he says here. He is right to see Netanyahu’s malevolent intent in levelling, as is his wont, evidence-free accusations in this case at China. Right too in stressing how dangerous and despicable the path thus opened up for humanity at large.

But what makes him so sure this is a case of Bibi dragging in the United States? As opposed to the United States using Israel – again – as attack dog of choice in its determination to remain the global hegemon?

Provided we keep that alternative and ultimately more convincing interpretation in mind, what Mehdi is saying merits our full attention. Why? Because the self-quote I opened with houses the first two sentences of a paragraph whose last two go like this:

Some say WW3 has begun. Some look to the eve of WW1 for parallels, some to ancient Rome for object lessons in how overextended empires behave – their Gods having first made them mad – though neither Rome nor its challengers had nukes.

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