Otherwise, we might be deceived by a new article at Covert Action Magazine which does a superb job of documenting a series of outrageous, deliberate, and mostly successful attempts by the CIA to interfere with the democratically elected governments of two Southern Hemisphere nations which most of the world would consider "friends and allies" of the United States.
The nations to which I refer are Australia and New Zealand, both of which supported Great Britain, the US, and their allies in both World Wars, and suffered horribly in the process.
And the article in question was written by Murray Horton, who provides more than enough links and photographs to make his presentation utterly compelling.
In other words, it is strong enough to convince all but the unflinchingly patriotic, outrageously smart readers who come to this cold blog seeking refuge from the "fake news" which crept in around the edges some time ago, and now has us nearly surrounded.
Murray Horton himself is introduced as "organizer of the Campaign Against Foreign Control of Aotearoa (CAFCA)", "Aotearoa" being the indigenous (Maori) name of the country we would otherwise call "New Zealand". In other words, he's biased!
He's also described as "an advocate of a range of progressive causes for the past four decades", and it's not difficult to imagine that foreign intelligence services meddling in domestic politics may have been one of those causes for most (or even all) of those decades, because the reseach represented here is exhaustive and extremely detailed.
It's just too bad for him that we're all too smart to believe any of it.
~~~
I see only one problem with this article, and it's the same problem I've seen in every book or article I've ever read which documents U.S. meddling in a foreign country and was written by a foreigner: They don't appreciate it. They don't like anything about it.
According to my expert patriotic analysis, there are two reasons for this. First: they always write from their own point of view. And second: they don't know anything.
In particular, they don't know how many noble clandestine agents of the world's only indispensable nation have sacrificed their lives (and in some cases their honor), bravely destabilizing foreign societies in a process they call "stabilization", valiantly overthrowing democratically elected governments as a means of "spreading democracy", and occasionally reducing large sections of major cities to rubble, in the sincerest form of "nation-building", sometimes also called "shock and awe".
The recipients of these selfless gifts will never know how many noble clandestine agents were involved in the giving, and of course nobody can tell them, because the noble clandestine agents were clandestine.
Still, there's a powerful lesson in all that generosity. It says to the rest of the world,
There is nothing the U.S. wouldn't do to help you.But where's the gratitude? No gratitude. Crickets.
There is no moral or ethical boundary the U.S. wouldn't cross to assist you.
No action is so horrible that the U.S. would refrain from doing it to you, on your behalf.
~~~
The problem with being a democratic ally of the United States is simple to state, but difficult to solve. Allies of the United States are expected to do whatever the United States wants them to do. This is almost never in the interests of the domestic population, and therefore the position is usually an unpopular one. In a non-democracy, who cares? People who object too strongly just disappear. But in a democracy, the popularity of a national position matters a little bit, sometimes.
Politicians, under the delusion that they represent the people who elected them, may feel pressured to move the national posture away from one of subservience to the United States, and if they do so, it brings them into conflict with the basic fact of international relations: Subservience to the United States is the one thing required of all U.S. allies.
Friends and allies who refuse to lick the proper boots -- who insist on establishing their own policies, domestic and/or foreign -- are routinely re-educated in the gentlest and subtlest of ways: think of Iraq if you will, or Chile, or Venezuela ... or any of a hundred other former friends and allies who started to have their own ideas, and who had to be destroyed in order to save them.
In other words, it was charming and heart-warming and adorable and warm and fuzzy with the peaceniks of New Zealand rose up and told the U.S.
"We don't like nuclear warships in our harbors."But then they kept going and going and going ... and before long it was
"We don't want any nuclear weapons stationed in our country!"OK, fine! How would they like a few dropped on their cities? Did they ever think of that? It could have been arranged quite easily. But cooler heads prevailed!
Instead, the gentle masters of American diplomacy whipped up shady investment deals to create domestic scandals which were then amplified by moles who had already infiltrated their society (just in case something like this happened to happen).
When they reached "critical mass", so to speak, these scandals were used to destabilize governments and sow racial animostiy, and provided the platform for the usual array of divide-and-conquer tactics which patriotic and very bright Americans have come to love when their shining city on the hill uses them in defense of a friend.
What were the alternatives? God forbid they should have to nuke Aukland! At least not while yachts are racing in the harbor. Rich Boats Matter, remember?
As all our great leaders will tell you in their rare moments of honesty, all they want to do is spread American-style democracy, so that every nation on Earth can have a legitimately elected democratic government which is fully sympathetic to "American interests".
Of course this is problematic because "American interests" are vague, and hegemonic tendencies show themselves with alarming frequency. It's not difficult for foreign observers to suspect that the people who define "American interests" would like to control both the sovereign independent democratic nations (which they call friends) and the sovereign independent non-democratic ones (which they call enemies).
So the domestic pressure on foreign democratic governments continues to build, and when those goverments react to the pressure and get out of line, as they always do, friends get shady investment deals, back-room scandals, subtle and mysterious shifts in their political climate, fresh injections of racism and other polarizing influences, and possibly several thousand disappearances. Enemies get the full force of the U.S. military.
We've seen this over and over. The United States is indespensible because it's the only nation that can do such things for its friends, let alone its enemies.
And Murray Horton forgot to be grateful. Oh well; he's not the only one. They all forget to be grateful.
As I was saying, I'm grateful that you and I are both far too smart and too patriotic to believe any of this.
Nonetheless, I urge you to click the link, if you haven't already done so, and read "How the CIA Tried to Overthrow New Zealand’s Progressive Labor Government by Stoking White Racial Rage Against the Indigenous Māori Population".
In my view, it is essential for all of us to know the history that our great nation has been trying to hide from us -- even if we're too smart to believe it!