Non-Aligned nations rising to the call

September 17th, 2006 at 10:15 Björn Hallberg

In what is starting to resemble an “anti-U.S.” manifesto Non-Aligned nations come together, offering a blistering criticism and a greater unity.

Washington’s biggest enemies, from communist Cuba to North Korea, called on developing nations on Saturday to challenge U.S. dominance through a revived Non-Aligned Movement labelled a Cold War relic by critics.

More than 50 heads of state and leaders from over 100 Third World countries, among them Iran and Venezuela, rejected U.S. use of the “axis of evil” label and supported Tehran’s right to nuclear technology for peaceful use.

“American imperialism is in decline. A new, bi-polar world is emerging,” Venezuela’s leftist President Hugo Chavez said.

Well, seeing as the U.S. kept all its “relics”, including its foreign bases and NATO, this seems perfectly reasonable. Though a pipe dream at the moment, the Non-Aligned Movement could do a lot of damage to the American Empire project in the long run.

HOWEVER, the article skews history and the current agenda. Take the use of “relic” for instance. It does inevitably bring to mind U.S. cold war relics as noted. You’d think that would hold scathing criticism somewhere, but it gets the U.S. off the hook since it assumes the cold war was necessary and that everything the U.S. did — the countless millions it killed, the 50 or so states it invaded and the 30 or so progressive movements it crushed — well, according to this view they all happened because of the cold war. Not because the U.S. is / was a monstrous empire, much like its Soviet counterpart, and one that needed to be brought down, but because of circumstances. You know, one of those situational explanations that never fly in the individualistic temple that is America in any other context but foreign policy.
And it goes without saying that if one does not appreciate the callousness of the U.S. during the cold war, and its effect on the world, one can not appreciate why people would distrust the U.S. across the board and as such anti-US rhetoric becomes an empty shell of “banter”. It sure is easy to throw off meaningful criticism when you sit at the top of the hegemony, weaving the very fabric of reality and the limits of sanctioned discourse.

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