Herland Report: Hanne Nabintu Herland: Many hoped for peace when Barack Obama won the USA election in 2008. In Europe, everyone was satisfied by USA’s progressive choice and thrilled to be rid of Republican George Bush.
It definitely added to the thrill that Obama was a man of color, which led to Obama being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize the following year.
The award was given during USA’s largest ever military offensive in Afghanistan and light years away from Nobel testament’ intent.
And Obama used his Nobel speech to defend the USA’s military actions and war philosophy. To these tenets he has been extraordinarily faithful.
Article first published in 2016.
Under Obama’s famous Cairo speech in June 2009 he expressed a desire to contribute to a new and better relationship between the United States and Muslim nations.
According to CNN, Obama has since then attacked more countries than any other American president before him. Bush is a Sunday School boy in comparison.
The list is long: Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Yemen, Pakistan and most recently, Syria. According to Global Research Obama has spent more money on military rearmament than any other president.
At the same time Obama, according to Infowars, is the most race-oriented president the USA has ever had.
Under his reign racial conflicts have exploded in riots, racial hatred and a level of conflict between black and white that the USA has not experienced for many years. In addition, the gap between the rich and the poor has increased under Obama, compared to conditions under Bush, according to a new survey from the University of California, Berkeley.
Obama is today considered one of the most anti-Christian presidents the USA has ever had, making statements on numerous occasions like “the United States is no longer a Christian nation” and “The Muslim call to prayer at sunset is one of the most beautiful sounds on earth.”
Obama has gone much farther than Bush to help the ultra-rich and greedy banks escape the consequences of their abuse of economic power.
Obama has slammed whistleblowers attempting to expose the government´s abuse of power harder than any other president before him.
He has taken the surveillance of US citizens to significantly higher levels and classified far more state documents as top secret. Under Obama the massive and controversial use of drones has become commonplace.
Especially in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen and Somalia drones have killed thousands of people, and a high proportion of these were civilians. According to The Washington Post, studies show that in Yemen alone 57 of 82 killed were civilians.
The USA we knew in days of yore, characterized by the struggle for individual freedom and progress, civil rights and equality between ethnic groups, as well as a decentralized federal power, is in a serious state of atrophy.
Noam Chomsky, one of America’s leading intellectuals and a highly cited researcher, has argued that the USA is no longer a democracy.
It is in fact a one-party state — an oligarchy where elites from both the left and the right govern on behalf of, and often contrary to, the interests of the general population.
A recent study from Princeton University arrives at the same conclusion. Public Policy Polling indicates that 74% of Americans are against a new war in the Middle East.
Nevertheless, Obama went to war in both Syria and Iraq. The will of the people apparently means frighteningly little in today´s USA.
Obama is now the least popular president since the Second World War. In the entire history of the USA, Obama is clearly the president that has started the most wars.
Obama’s attacks in Syria have occurred both without NATO support and without a UN Security Council mandate, in addition to being unconstitutional and without a congressional approval.
That terrorist groups like ISIS should be opposed, is obvious.
Even so, as Law Professor Bruce Ackerman of Yale University notes in the September 13th issue of Gulf News, an act of war against ISIS in Syria without congressional approval is unconstitutional.
The authorization for military actions against the “9.11 assassination” only applied to action against groups and their allies who had participated in the planning of 9.11.
Ackerman points out that nothing George Bush did is comparable with Obama in terms of absolutist, imperialist, elitist arrogance. Bush sought congressional approval for both the war in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Obama has not even published a memo attempting to justify his conviction that he has the authority necessary to engage the nation in a new war.
US attacks in Yemen and Somalia are also unconstitutional, as well as conditions surrounding the bombing of Libya, according to Ackerman.
Obama´s disrespect for the United States Constitution represents a dramatic break with former US traditions.
The Washington Post reports that Obama has also arranged to obtain elevated privileges, beyond normal military regulations, to personally authorize attacks in Syria without the consent required from military leadership.
As if this were not enough, the USA has violated international law by attacking a nation such as Syria with neither the consent of nor a dialog with the nation´s government.
The fact that alawittiske Bashar al Assad has been democratically elected, that he in fact received over 88.7% of the votes in the last election, apparently does not matter to the USA.
NATO’s own figures show that prior to the summer elections over 70% of Syrians already backed Assad. The processes inside Syria have been remarkable.
Many of Assad’s former political opponents — who initially supported the rebellion against him — have now joined Assad after seeing how Sunni-Jihadists over the past three years ruthlessly slaughtered minorities in Syria.
Israel too, according to The Times of London, agrees that it is better to keep the secular and highly fallible Assad in place rather than give Islamist groups like the barbaric ISIS control in Syria.
In Libya the USA maintained that the “regime´s” head of state was the root of all evil. Today, following the NATO attacks, the country is in a state of abject ruin.
The US has no respect for the sovereignty of nations and UN International Law. Charges that Assad has used chemical weapons have never been verified.
In Kissinger´s latest book, World Order, he points out that American politics have been mesmerized by an ideological belief that “the introduction of democracy and human rights” would solve the Middle East’s challenges.
Without respect for realities on the ground, the USA engaged in an idealistic crusade.
The result of the USA´s contribution to regime changes is that situations have seriously deteriorated with horrible humanitarian situations and millions of refugees.
It may be wise to follow Kissinger´s recommendation for a reorientation towards political realism as a premise for re-stabilizing recent threats to world peace.
