America’s New Nuclear Missile Endangers the World

Conn Hallinan

At a time of growing tensions between nuclear powers—Russia and NATO in Europe, and the U.S., North Korea and China in Asia—Washington has quietly upgraded its nuclear weapons arsenal to create, according to three leading American scientists, “exactly what one would expect to see, if a nuclear-armed state were planning to have the capacity to fight and win a nuclear war by disarming enemies with a surprise first strike.”

Writing in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project of the American Federation of Scientists, Matthew McKinzie of the National Resources Defense Council, and physicist and ballistic missile expert Theodore Postol, conclude that “Under the veil of an otherwise-legitimate warhead life-extension program,” the U.S. military has vastly expanded the “killing power” of its warheads such that it can “now destroy all of Russia’s ICBM silos.”

The upgrade—part of the Obama administration’s $1 trillion modernization of America’s nuclear forces—allows Washington to destroy Russia’s land-based nuclear weapons, while still retaining 80 percent of the U.S.’s warheads in reserve. If Russia chose to retaliate, it would be reduced to ash.

Any discussion of nuclear war encounters several major problems. First, it is difficult to imagine or to grasp what it would mean in real life. We have only had one conflict involving nuclear weapons—the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945—and the memory of those events has faded over the years. In any case, the two bombs that flattened the Japanese cities bear little resemblance to the killing power of modern nuclear weapons.

The Hiroshima bomb exploded with a force of 15 kilotons. The Nagasaki bomb was slightly more powerful at about 18 kt. Between them, they killed over 215,000 people. In contrast, the most common nuclear weapon in the U.S. arsenal today, the W76, has an explosive power of 100 kt. The next most common, the W88, packs a 475-kt punch.

Another problem is that most of the public thinks nuclear war is impossible because both sides would be destroyed. This is the idea behind the policy of Mutually Assured Destruction, aptly named “MAD.”

But MAD is not a U.S. military doctrine. A “first strike” attack has always been central to U.S. military planning, until recently, however, there was no guarantee that such an attack would so cripple an opponent that it would be unable—or unwilling, given the consequences of total annihilation— to retaliate.

The strategy behind a first strike—sometimes called a “counter force” attack—is not to destroy an opponent’s population centers, but to eliminate the other sides’ nuclear weapons, or at least most of them. Anti-missile systems would then intercept a weakened retaliatory strike.

The technical breakthrough that suddenly makes this a possibility is something called the “super-fuze”, which allows for a much more precise ignition of a warhead. If the aim is to blow up a city, such precision is superfluous, but taking out a reinforced missile silo requires a warhead to exert a force of at least 10,000 pounds per square inch on the target.

Up until the 2009 modernization program, the only way to do that was to use the much more powerful—but limited in numbers—W88 warhead. Fitted with the super-fuze, however, the smaller W76 can now do the job, freeing the W88 for other targets.

Traditionally, land-based missiles are more accurate than sea-based missiles, but the former are more vulnerable to a first-strike than the latter, because submarines are good at hiding. The new super-fuze does not increase the accuracy of Trident II submarine missiles, but it makes up for that with the precision of where the weapon detonates. “In the case of the 100-kt Trident II warhead,” write the three scientists, “the super-fuze triples the killing power of the nuclear force it is applied to.”

Before the super-fuze was deployed, only 20 percent of U.S. subs had the ability to destroy re-enforced missile silos. Today, all have that capacity.

Trident II missiles typically carry from four to five warheads, but can expand that up to eight. While the missile is capable of hosting as many as 12 warheads, that configuration would violate current nuclear treaties. U.S. submarines currently deploy about 890 warheads, of which 506 are W76s and 384 are W88s.

The land-based ICBMs are Minuteman III, each armed with three warheads—400 in total—ranging from 300 kt to 500 kt apiece. There are also air and sea-launched nuclear tipped missiles and bombs. The Tomahawk cruise missiles that recently struck Syria can be configured to carry a nuclear warhead.

The super-fuze also increases the possibility of an accidental nuclear conflict.

So far, the world has managed to avoid a nuclear war, although during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis it came distressingly close. There have also been several scary incidents when U.S. and Soviet forces went to full alert because of faulty radar images or a test tape that someone thought was real. While the military downplays these events, former Secretary of Defense William Perry argues that it is pure luck that we have avoided a nuclear exchange, and that the possibility of nuclear war is greater today than it was at the height of the Cold War.

In part, this is because of a technology gap between the U.S. and Russia.

In January 1995, Russian early warning radar on the Kola Peninsula picked up a rocket launch from a Norwegian island that looked as if it was targeting Russia. In fact, the rocket was headed toward the North Pole, but Russian radar tagged it as a Trident II missile coming in from the North Atlantic. The scenario was plausible. While some first strike attacks envision launching a massive number of missiles, others call for detonating a large warhead over a target at about 800 miles altitude. The massive pulse of electro-magnetic radiation that such an explosion generates would blind or cripple radar systems over a broad area. That would be followed with a first strike.

At the time, calmer heads prevailed,, and the Russians called off their alert, but for a few minutes the doomsday clock moved very close to midnight.

According to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, the 1995 crisis suggests that Russia does not have “a reliable and working global space-based satellite early warning system.” Instead, Moscow has focused on building ground-based systems that give the Russians less warning time than satellite-based ones do. What that means is that while the U.S. would have about 30 minutes warning time to investigate whether an attack was really taking place, the Russians would have 15 minutes or less.

That, according to the magazine, would likely mean that “Russian leadership would have little choice but to pre-delegate nuclear launch authority to lower levels of command,” hardly a situation that would be in the national security interests of either country.

Or, for that matter, the world.

A recent study found that a nuclear war between India and Pakistan using Hiroshima-sized weapons would generate a nuclear winter that would make it impossible to grow wheat in Russia and Canada and cut the Asian Monsoon’s rainfall by 10 percent. The result would be up to 100 million deaths by starvation. Imagine what the outcome would be if the weapons were the size used by Russia, China or the U.S.

For the Russians, the upgrading of U.S. sea-based missiles with the super-fuze would be an ominous development. By “shifting the capacity to submarines that can move to missile launch positions much closer to their targets than land-based missiles,” the three scientists conclude, “the U.S. military has achieved a significantly greater capacity to conduct a surprise first strike against Russian ICBM silos.”

The U.S. Ohio class submarine is armed with 24 Trident II missiles, carrying as many as 192 warheads. The missiles can be launched in less than a minute.

The Russians and Chinese have missile-firing submarines as well, but not as many and some are close to obsolete. The U.S. has also seeded the world’s oceans and seas with networks of sensors to keep track of those subs. In any case, would the Russians or Chinese retaliate if they knew that the U.S. still retained most of its nuclear strike force? Faced with a choice committing national suicide or holding their fire, they may well choose the former.

The other element in this modernization program that has Russia and China uneasy is the decision by the Obama administration to place anti-missile systems in Europe and Asia, and to deploy Aegis ship-based anti missile systems off the Pacific and Atlantic coasts. From Moscow’s perspective—and Beijing’s as well—those interceptors are there to absorb the few missiles that a first strike might miss.

In reality, anti-missile systems are pretty iffy. Once they migrate off the drawing boards, their lethal efficiency drops rather sharply. Indeed, most of them can’t hit the broad side of a barn. But that is not a chance the Chinese and the Russians can afford to take.

Speaking at the St. Petersburg International Forum in June 2016, Russian President Valdimir Putin charged that U.S. anti-missile systems in Poland and Rumania were not aimed at Iran, but Russia and China. “The Iranian threat does not exist, but missile defense systems continue to be positioned—a missile defense system is one element of the whole system of offensive military potential.”

The danger here is that arms agreements will begin to unravel if countries decide that they are suddenly vulnerable. For the Russians and the Chinese, the easiest solution to the American breakthrough is to build a lot more missiles and warheads, and treaties be dammed.

The new Russian cruise missile may indeed strain the Intermediate Nuclear Force Treaty, but it is also a natural response to what are, from Moscow’s view, alarming technological advances by the U.S. Had the Obama administration reversed the 2002 decision by George W. Bush’s administration to unilaterally withdraw from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the new cruise might never have been deployed.

There are a number of immediate steps that the U.S. and the Russians could take to de-escalate the current tensions. First, taking nuclear weapons off their hair-trigger status, which would immediately reduce the possibility of accidental nuclear war. That could be followed by a pledge of “no first use” of nuclear weapons.

If this does not happen, it will almost certainly result in an accelerated nuclear arms race. “I don’t know how this is all going to end,” Putin told the St. Petersburg delegates. “What I do know is that we will need to defend ourselves.”

Yemen: Effective Humanitarian Aid Depends on a Peace Accord

René Wadlow

The United Nations (UN) together with the governments of Sweden and Switzerland which have often led humanitarian issues in the UN system held a high-level pledging conference in Geneva on April 25, 2017 to again draw attention to the deepening humanitarian crisis in war-torn Yemen, currently the largest food security emergency in the world. Some 60% of the population are in a food-insecure situation.

More than 3.5 million people have been displaced in the cycle of escalating violence. “We are witnessing the starving and the crippling of an entire generation. We must act now, to save lives” said Secretary-General Antonio Guterres who presided over the conference. Realistically, he stressed that funding and humanitarian aid alone will not reverse the fortunes of the millions of people impacted. Diplomatically, he called for a cessation of hostilities and a political settlement with talks facilitated by the Special Envoy of the Secretary General, the Mauritanian diplomat Ismail Ould Chekh Ahmed.

UN officials and most diplomats are reluctant to call the armed conflict by its real name: “a war of aggression”. The aggression of the Saudi Arabia-led coalition (Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Qatar, Sudan, and the United Arab Emirates) against Yemen began on March 24, 2015.

The Saudi-led coalition is helped with arms and “intelligence” by the USA and the UK which appreciate Saudi money for arms and do not want to antagonize a large segment of the Arab world when the conflicts of Syria-Iraq-Kurds-Turkey is still “on the table.”

However, the aggression of the Saudi coalition is what has turned an internal Yemen struggle for power between the current and the former President of Yemen into a war with regional implications, now drawing Iran into the picture.

Intellectually, the “political solution” is clear. There needs to be an end to the Saudi bombing and a withdrawal of its coalition troops. Then, the different factions in Yemen can try to develop some sort of inclusive government. The Swiss Foreign Minister, a co-host of the conference, hinted to the issue in suggesting very briefly that, if asked, Switzerland could provide expertise on forms of decentralization and con-federal government.

The effort to create a centralized Yemen government has failed. The future lies in a very decentralized government with great autonomy for the regions, taking into consideration the diverse tribal configuration of the country. With intelligence and patience – always in short supply – a single, highly decentralized State might be developed.

The most difficult first-step is ending Saudi-led aggression, after which an effective humanitarian aid and development program can be put into effect.

Terrorism And Militancy: Are They Quite The Same?

S.G. Vombatkere

 Maoists (or Naxals, according to some) ambushed a 100-strong CRPF road-opening patrol (ROP) on 24 April in Chintagufa Police Station limits of Sukma District of Chhattisgarh, killing 25 CRPF personnel and wounding six. The Maoists were reportedly around 200 in strength, and they ruthlessly continued engaging the pinned-down CRPF patrol for about one hour. The killing and wounding of CRPF personnel, causing irreparable loss not merely to their families but to the CRPF as well, is both condemnable and utterly sad. The Maoists reportedly captured some weapons, but their losses will only be known later if at all, through intelligence sources.

ROP is for “sanitizing” a route, and the most important factor here is intelligence, meaning knowledge of the terrain (including precise locations where ambush is likely) and of the movements and strengths of the opposing (in this case, Maoist) force. It is only to be expected that a ROP may be ambushed, since it is necessarily on a precise route, and only the time and strength of the ROP will not be known to the Maoists unless their intelligence is exceedingly good. To be able to lay an ambush with 200 strength speaks for the Maoists’ intelligence, counter-intelligence and training.

In this hour of loss and mourning, it is still necessary to make a few points on what is not generally known to civilians. First, what is “ambush”? It is “a surprise attack by people lying in wait in a hidden position”. It is an age-old operation conducted by armies, regular forces as well as irregular forces and militants, against other armies, regular forces and irregular forces. Indeed in all armies, patrolling is an operation of war, which is studied and for which rigorous training is imparted on how to plan and conduct patrols (field intelligence, routes, drills, procedures, briefings, etc.) including planning and laying ambushes, and also practicing drills of what members of a patrol have to do when ambushed, without commands being issued. The ruling principles in patrolling and ambushing are intelligence, surprise, stealth, speed and offensive action, with the aim of inflicting maximum damage. Patrolling is risky and difficult, and ambushing is its flip side and not “cowardly” – these are the harsh realities of armed combat. Good intelligence and rigorous training can minimize casualties among a patrol which is ambushed.

The tiger always ambushes the deer, approaching it stealthily, waiting motionless in hiding until its quarry is within striking range, and then striking with deadly speed. Every infantryman is an expert in patrolling, with real-time experience. Others even though not from the infantry, like this writer, nevertheless have the knowledge and training and even some experience. None of these would ever describe an ambush as cowardly or describe the killings as murder. Indeed the use of these words assigns a sort of victimhood to the slain and detracts from learning lessons from failures. People who use the words “cowardly” and “murder” are victims of their own rhetoric.

There is no element of terror in patrolling even though there may be fear of being ambushed. A soldier may and usually does experience fear, but he is never terrorised. In fun, late Field Marshal S.H.F.J.Manekshaw, himself a decorated soldier from the Gorkha Regiment, famously said: “If a soldier says he does not know fear, he is either a liar or a Gorkha”. Team spirit and rigorous training in field craft inculcates confidence and eliminates fear.

Second, there is confusion between the terms “terrorist” and “militant”, and hence between terrorism and militancy. All terrorists are militant, but all militants are not terrorists – a person can be militant without using firearms or weapons, only using strong language or, like boys in Kashmir, pelting stones. Of course, such militants can and often do “graduate” to using firearms and explosives. Militants strike at hard targets by all sorts of means including ambush, use of deception by disguise, concealment, etc.

Terrorists on the other hand, strike deliberately at soft targets of unsuspecting, uninvolved, innocent people. By detonating a bomb in a public place, a terrorist aims at causing maximum casualties and destroying as much property as possible. A suicide attack using an explosive belt detonated amidst a crowd is another kind of terrorist attack. Terrorist attacks are certainly cowardly, and terrorists can only and must only be put down by use of all possible forceful police and/or military means and measures. Deadly force is undoubtedly the only and unequivocal answer to terrorism. However, in dealing with militancy, force is necessary but not sufficient. Force needs to be calibrated to specific situations, along with suitable political and social action, which includes diplomacy and dialogue.

Reverting to the Maoists’ ambush of the CRPF’s ROP, the reason for the large number of casualties could be some combination of intelligence failure, inadequate training and shortfall in leadership at the higher levels of command. Only an honest inquiry will reveal the causes, and it is neither necessary nor desirable to make the reasons public, although it would be vital to implement the lessons learned at all levels. As for dealing with Maoists, it needs to be recognized that they are militants who have to be tackled with a combination of force and political-social means which can only flow out of good and honest governance.

Ahead of EU Brexit summit, Merkel takes tough stance on UK

Johannes Stern

Germany and the European Union insisted on a tough stance towards the UK in the run-up to today’s special EU summit on Brexit in Brussels and the upcoming British elections on June 8. In a government statement to the German parliament (Bundestag) on Thursday, Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) spoke out sharply against London and announced there would be no concessions made in the EU-UK negotiations.

“A third country—and this will be the case with the United Kingdom—cannot and will not have the same rights and cannot expect to be treated better than a member of the European Union,” Merkel threatened. She had “to unfortunately express that clearly here” because “some in the UK still have illusions. That, however, would just be a waste of time.”

Merkel defended the EU’s position not to conduct substantive negotiations on any future relationship with London until the details of the withdrawal were clarified. The UK government is pressing to address this issue at the end of the planned two-year interim talks, but according to Merkel: “We cannot conclude these negotiations.” They are part of the most important aspects “that will be on the agenda from the very beginning.” Therefore we “can only proceed in this order and not vice versa.”

Germany and the other member states of the European Union “did not want this withdrawal,” Merkel said, stressing that it was now up to Germany and other EU member states to “define our own interests and objectives for the forthcoming negotiations.” To this end, “the European Council will take the first step on Saturday and adopt the 27 common guidelines for negotiations.”

The “Guidelines” read like a declaration of war on Britain on the part of Berlin and the European states. The Süddeutsche Zeitung published a preliminary report on the document prepared by the EU Commission under the title, “EU plans very hard Brexit negotiations.” The paper contained “a number of demands that would be regarded in London as impertinent” and run counter to the plans of the British Prime Minister Theresa May.

Among other things, the rights of EU citizens already resident in Britain are to be preserved “life-long” without any restrictions. This means that all EU citizens living in the UK would continue to enjoy equal access to the labour market and the British social system, even after Brexit. For the conservative British government such a demand is unacceptable. In the course of the Brexit campaign, the Tory right-wing agitated against EU migrants and, after leaving the EU, demanded an immediate end to all relations with Brussels.

According to the Süddeutsche Zeitung, the EU Commission is also “unrelenting” regarding financial commitments. Brussels insists that “Great Britain should pay all the costs associated with leaving the EU—in euros.” In this manner the Commission would “shift any currency risks back into the lap of the United Kingdom.”

All the costs incurred by Brexit, such as the relocation of EU institutions back to the continent, are to be “fully covered” by London. This would be the case, for example, for the European Banking supervision authority, which has so far been based in London, and also the European Medicines Agency.

Merkel left no doubt that the main motion was largely drafted in Berlin. She thanked the president of the European Council, Donald Tusk, for “a very good and balanced draft of the text, after intensive preparation, in which, of course, the German government has participated.”

In the run-up to the summit, Berlin systematically worked to create a united front of EU countries against London. Their many talks in recent weeks have shown that “there is now a great deal of agreement among the 27 Member States and the institutions on our common negotiating line with the UK,” Merkel said. One could therefore “assume that the European Council of 27 will send a strong signal of unity.”

There is one central aim behind the tough stance of the chancellor. Berlin is seeking to fuse Europe together under German domination in order to further its geo-strategic and economic interests as effectively as possible. Any concessions to London are unacceptable to the German ruling class because they would put at risk German hegemony and accelerate the break-up of the EU under conditions of growing political and economic conflicts across the continent.

A government resolution adopted by the German parliament states: “From the standpoint of the German Bundestag, the ultimate objective of the Brexit negotiations is to ensure the unity of the EU. Particular interests should not jeopardise the achievement of this long-term and overarching objective. ‘Cherry picking’ by the UK is not allowed.”

In an attempt to play the role of Europe’s “disciplinarian,” the German government can count on the country’s so-called opposition parties in the Bundestag. The chair of the Left Party fraction in the Bundestag, Sahra Wagenknecht, who spoke directly after Merkel, solidarised herself with the chancellor in her very first sentence. “Mrs. Chancellor, I agree with your criticism of the current developments in Turkey,” she said.

As a concerned representative of the ruling elite, Wagenknecht warned the government that it “put at risk the legacy of the great founding fathers of Europe” with its “strategy of deterring other potential imitators by attaching the worst possible conditions to withdrawal.” Among the “great founding fathers of Europe” to whom Wagenknecht referred was Konrad Adenauer (CDU), the arch-conservative and deeply anti-Communist first German chancellor of the post-war period.

From start to finish Wagenknecht identified herself with the EU, which is increasingly dominated by Berlin. Her handful of social phrases were intended to obscure the reactionary character of the institutions in Brussels, which are increasingly recognised by workers and youth for what they really are: instruments in the hands of a tiny hyper-wealthy financial oligarchy which has declared war on the working class, encourages extreme right-wing forces and is rearming for war at home and abroad.

US economic growth slumps to slowest pace in three years

Barry Grey

The US gross domestic product barely rose in the first three months of 2017, increasing by an annual rate of only 0.7 percent from the last quarter of 2016, according to a report released Friday by the Commerce Department. It was the slowest rate of economic growth since the first quarter of 2014.

The figure fell short of the already low consensus estimate of economists, who had predicted a 1 percent rise in the GDP. The first quarter performance was sharply lower than the final three months of 2016, when the economy grew by 2.1 percent.

The most important factor depressing economic growth was a virtual collapse in the growth of consumption, which tumbled to 0.3 percent from 3.5 percent in the previous quarter. Consumption accounts for some 70 percent of GDP in the United States. The first quarter consumption figure was the weakest since the end of 2009, when the official recovery from the severe recession that followed the 2008 Wall Street crash was just getting underway.

Just two months ago, economists were predicting that the first quarter output figure would be 2 percent, but recent months have seen a marked slowdown in consumer purchases, particularly of cars. The BBC quoted Paul Ashworth, chief US economist at Capital Economics, as saying, “Household spending was held down by a drop in motor vehicle sales from the near-record high at the end of last year and the unseasonably warm winter weather, which depressed utilities spending.”

While many economists brushed off the miserable GDP report as a fluke, the result mainly of temporary factors such as unusually warm weather, Carl R. Tannenbaum, chief economist at Northern Trust in Chicago, told the New York Times, “I have to be honest: The hard data just wasn’t very good last quarter. The retail retreat, especially in autos, was greater than many people anticipated.”

There have been other signs of stagnation, including the Labor Department’s employment report for March, which showed an expansion in payrolls of only 98,000 new jobs, less than half the pace of previous months.

The economic growth report took on added political significance coming as it did on the eve of Donald Trump’s first 100 days in office. Trump’s pledge to dramatically slash taxes for corporations and the rich, gut business regulations and launch a pro-corporate infrastructure program has fueled a euphoric rise on the stock market and a spurt in business confidence and investment, as the financial elite anticipates an enormous increase in profits and personal wealth.

But Friday’s report underscores the disconnect between the rising fortunes of the corporate oligarchy on the one hand, and the depressed state of the real economy and the fall in living standards for broad sections of the population on the other.

Just two days before the release of the Commerce Department report, Trump’s two top economic advisers, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Gary Cohn, the director of the White House National Economic Council, released an outline of the administration's plans for a multi-trillion-dollar tax cut for corporations and the rich.

The two multi-millionaire former Goldman Sachs bankers insisted that the plan would not add to the national debt and require major social cuts because it would boost the growth rate to a sustainable 3 percent from the current average of around 2 percent, adding sufficient tax revenues to offset the impact of lower tax rates.

This lie is part of the attempt to present the wholesale redistribution of wealth from the bottom to the top as a boon to workers, driven by the desire to create “American jobs.” The dismal GDP figure for the first quarter of the year has underscored the fraudulent character of these claims.

This will not in any way deter the government from implementing the demands of the financial oligarchy. On the contrary, the poor first quarter report will be cited as proof of the necessity for a tax boondoggle for the rich. As Republican Kevin Brady, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, put it, “This report underscores the urgent need for pro-growth tax reform.”

A new stage in the repudiation of international law

Mike Head

The Trump administration’s unprovoked April 7 cruise missile attack on Syria, followed closely by the dropping of the largest non-nuclear weapon in its arsenal on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, signals a new period of breakdown in international law.

Since the first Gulf War of 1990–91, the ever-greater assertion of US militarism by successive presidents—George H. Bush, Clinton, George W. Bush, Obama and Trump—has brought humanity to the point where the rules of war adopted after the massive casualties and horrors of the last world war are being nakedly flouted.

The Trump administration has made no attempt whatsoever to provide legal pretexts for its bombardments. As made explicit by the statements of President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, the primary purpose of the Syrian and Afghanistan attacks was to demonstrate that there is no limit to the level of violence that the United States is prepared to unleash, completely unilaterally, in pursuit of the interests of American imperialism.

Blatant aggression

The Pentagon’s attack on Syria clearly defied international law. The UN Charter adopted in 1945, after two world wars, provides for only two justifications for the use of military force: authorisation by the UN Security Council or self-defence after an armed attack has occurred. No Security Council resolutions sanctioned the US attacks, and Washington did not try to claim they were necessary for self-defence.

At the UN Security Council meeting called to discuss the US attack, Washington and its allies flatly dismissed the Syrian government’s denial of responsibility for the alleged use of chemical weapons, along with the fact that US-backed forces inside Syria have used such weapons in the past. Without any evidence, the US blamed the Syrian government, as in Ghouta in 2013.

Syria’s ambassador to the UN called the missile strikes a “flagrant act of aggression,” in violation “of the charter of the United Nations as well as all international norms and laws.” In response, US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley contemptuously declared: “When the international community consistently fails in its duty to act collectively, there are times when states are compelled to take their own action.”

In other words, the US insists it has the right to wage aggressive war against any country it chooses, unless the “international community” agrees carry out “its duty”—in other words, US diktats.

Article 2(4) of the UN Charter prohibits “the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.” Article 51 exempts only “the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security.”

Even then, Article 2(7) specifies: “Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorise the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state.” That would include an internal gas attack by a government, even if proven.

Marjorie Cohn, professor emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, wrote: “Syria had not attacked the United States or any other country before Trump ordered the missile strike... So, Trump committed an illegal act of aggression against Syria when he lobbed his missiles.”

Even if the Syrian government did carry out a chemical weapons attack, that would not legally justify the US missile strike. Notre Dame law professor Mary Ellen O’Connell, noted: “The use of chemical weapons within Syria is not an armed attack on the United States.”

The US president and his officials are guilty of the primary crime for which leading Nazis were tried at the Nuremberg tribunal in 1946: conducting a war of aggression. Article 6(a) of the Charter of the International Military Tribunal, upon which the Nuremberg prosecution was based, defined as “crimes against peace” the “planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression, or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances, or participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of the foregoing.”

Equally significant is the ready acceptance of the US war crimes by other imperialist powers—including Germany, France and Britain. This signals their readiness to follow the US precedent in pursuit of their own interests.

Illegal weapon

Just as illegal was dropping the 22,000-pound huge Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB) bomb (referred to by the US military as the “Mother Of All Bombs”), supposedly on tunnels built by “Islamic State forces” near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

The use of the largest explosive device America has utilised since demolishing Hiroshima and Nagasaki with atomic bombs in World War II was in blatant disregard for civilian casualties.

Under international humanitarian law (IHL), any military operations, even if sanctioned by the UN, must obey the rules of “necessity” and “proportionality.” First, the scale of the military force must be necessary to deal with the purported threat.

Second, the rule of proportionality prohibits “an attack which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated.”

Third, IHL forbids the use, or threat of use, of any weapon or tactic when the primary purpose of the operation is to terrorise the civilian population.

Clearly, the use of the MOAB was disproportionate to any threat posed by the relatively small number of ISIS fighters claimed to be in the region. It was designed to terrorise the people of Afghanistan and the world.

This is a war crime despite the fact that in Afghanistan, the US operates militarily under the cloak of the fraudulent “war on terror” that was rubberstamped by the UN in 2001 following the 9/11 terrorist attacks in America. UN Security Council resolution 1373 required states to combat terrorism “by all means,” effectively giving the US a licence to pursue its predatory bid to take control of the resource-rich and strategically vital regions of the Middle East and Central Asia.

A quarter century of criminal wars

The Trump administration’s belligerent “America First” doctrine takes to a new level the drive by US imperialism to use its global military supremacy to claw back the hegemony that it established in the wake of its victories over its main rivals—Germany and Japan—in World War II.

Over the past quarter century, in the wake of the liquidation of the Soviet Union, the US and other imperialist powers have already arrogated to themselves the so-called right to militarily attack, invade or overturn governments in other countries.

In the first Gulf War assault on Iraq, the George H. Bush administration obtained an initial fig leaf for its invasion of Iraq on the fraudulent pretext of defending “little Kuwait.” Assisted by Russia’s complicity and China’s abstention, Washington secured a UN Security Council that empowered states to use “all necessary means” to force Iraq out of Kuwait. This rapidly became a green light for a murderous assault that went far beyond that remit, leading to the partial dismemberment of Iraq by a US-led coalition.

The UN Security Council, a cabal dominated by the major imperialist powers, proved itself to be a clearinghouse for war. Nevertheless, in order to free themselves from any, even formal, legal constraints, the US and its allies brought forward two doctrines to justify overturning the post-World War II prohibition of aggressive wars: “humanitarian” interventions and “preemptive self-defence.”

During the NATO attacks in Kosovo and other parts of the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, the Clinton administration operated illegally outside the UN, via the NATO alliance. Having helped foment the breakup of Yugoslavia, the US adopted a phony “humanitarian” mask, claiming to be protecting minorities from Serbian aggression, yet was unable to push an authorising resolution through the UN Security Council.

In 2005, an attempt was made to legalise such “humanitarian” military operations and override Article 2(7) of the UN Charter banning domestic interventions. The US and its allies, notably Britain, orchestrated a UN General Assembly “responsibility to protect” resolution, nominally to prevent governments committing “genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.” However, the use of force for such purposes must still be approved by the UN Security Council.

In the latest attack in Syria, for all President Trump’s claim to be motivated by the plight of “beautiful babies,” the US acted alone, without even bothering to seek a UN rubber stamp.

The doctrine of “preemptive war,” which is explicitly excluded by the UN Charter, was promulgated by the Bush White House in 2002. The criminality of this credo was underscored in March 2003 with the invasion of Iraq, based on lies about “weapons of mass destruction.”

The Bush doctrine overturned the UN Charter’s insistence that self-defence was confined to responding to an armed attack that had already occurred. The US claimed the right to attack any state that it considered has the potential to pose a danger at some point in the future.

The invasion of Iraq resulted in the deaths of countless thousands of innocent people and set in motion catastrophic processes that have engulfed the Middle East ever since. It was conducted by the US and its closest allies (“the coalition of the willing”) in defiance of their inability to obtain a prior UN Security Council vote of authorisation. The war was launched despite the protests of millions of people, including hundreds of lawyers and legal academics who denounced it as an illegal war of aggression.

The bipartisan nature of this criminality was demonstrated by President Obama’s December 2009 speech—ironically accepting the Nobel Peace Prize—in which he embraced the Bush doctrine. Obama declared the exclusive right of the US to conduct “preventative wars” against any identified “threats” to Washington’s interests. In effect, Obama sought to enunciate a wider doctrine to sanctify wars of aggression. He declared: “Nations will continue to find the use of force not only necessary but morally justified.”

In carrying out the latest attack on Syria, the Trump administration cast aside any pretence of self-defence against a threat by the Syrian regime—either at the time or in the future—and thus did not bother to appeal to the doctrine of pre-emptive war used by Bush and Obama.

Trump’s presidency represents both a continuation and a qualitative deepening of the illegal use of military force by US imperialism. All pretences of abiding by international law have been swept aside in order to assert Washington’s untrammeled right to use its military arsenal wherever and whenever it chooses.

With the breakdown of the post-World War II legal framework, the danger of another world war is growing. The WSWS warned in a Perspective on the attack on Syria: “In the effort to reverse the long-term decline of American capitalism, the US ruling class has bombed or invaded one country after the next in regional conflicts that are rapidly developing into a confrontation with its larger rivals, including China and Russia.”

As Leon Trotsky forewarned in 1934, writing in the wake of the collapse of the UN’s predecessor, the League of Nations, the irresolvable contradictions of the global capitalist nation-state system are again “bringing humanity face to face with the volcanic eruption of American imperialism.”

Canada planning for war with North Korea

Roger Jordan

As the Trump administration continues to recklessly escalate tensions on the Korean peninsula, Canada’s Liberal government has given its strongest indication yet that Canadian troops would join a war with North Korea—a war that could result in the deaths of millions and trigger a nuclear clash between major powers.

Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan revealed April 21 that in the event of a US conflict with North Korea, Washington might well use the US-led United Nations Korea Command to mobilize troops and materiel from its allies. Korea Command, which includes Canada, was established at the onset of the 1950-53 Korean War.

While Sajjan maintained that Ottawa was focused on “diplomacy” first, he stressed that military plans for crisis situations on the Korean peninsula have been developed. According to the Canadian Press, policy documents prepared for former Defence Minister Peter MacKay in 2010 stated that if fighting broke out, the UN Command (UNC) “structure would be used as a means of force generating, and receiving and tasking any contributions that UNC sending states may choose to contribute.”

Sajjan’s remarks followed bellicose anti-North Korean remarks from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. While in France earlier this month to commemorate the Battle of Vimy Ridge, a First World War battle in which 10,000 Canadians were killed or injured, Trudeau denounced the “dangerous and unstable North Korean regime.” Siding fully with Washington’s provocative actions, which have included sending an aircraft carrier strike group to the region and the deployment of the THAAD missile defence system to South Korea, he continued, “This rogue regime in North Korea is a danger not only to the immediate region but the entire world.”

Speaking on CTV’s “Question Period” broadcast April 16, Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland refused to rule out Canadian support for a US-led military attack on North Korea under the pretext of targeting its nuclear weapons arsenal. “What I will say is we unequivocally condemn the missile testing that North Korea has done. North Korea is breaking international law and its own commitments,” she noted, echoing the Trump administration’s line.

Freeland also hailed China’s decision to abstain from a UN Security Council resolution on Syria, suggesting that this marked a shift by Beijing away from Russia. She urged China to intercede with Pyongyang to bring about a solution to the current political and military standoff.

The readiness of the Liberal government to line up squarely behind the Trump administration’s aggressive actions in Korea—which are primarily aimed at bullying China and legitimizing the further militarization of northeast Asia—is in keeping with Canada’s role as a close partner of US imperialism in all its major military-strategic offensives around the world. In the 18 months since the Trudeau government came to power, it has ramped up Canada’s support for the US Mideast war coalition, deploying more Special Forces to Iraq and military personnel, including strategic planners, to the region. Liberal-led Canada is also playing a substantial role in the strategic encirclement of Russia in Eastern Europe by extending a Canadian Armed Forces training mission in Ukraine and dispatching hundreds of troops to Latvia to lead one of four new “forward deployed” NATO battalions to be stationed on Russia’s borders.

Taken together with these aggressive steps, the Liberals’ Korea policy underscores once again the essential continuity between the Harper Conservatives and Trudeau Liberals in ruthlessly asserting Canadian imperialism’s global geopolitical interests. In 2013, in conjunction with the Obama administration’s “Pivot to Asia,” an economic, geopolitical and military strategy aimed at isolating and preparing for military conflict with China, the Harper government concluded a secret military agreement with the United States for increased collaboration in the Pacific. It included provisions for joint military operations in the Asia-Pacific region and came as Canada finalized deals with Singapore and South Korea to enable Ottawa to establish forward military bases in these two countries when needed.

The Canadian military is a frequent participant in US-led military exercises in South Korea and the Asia-Pacific, including a major naval exercise last summer. Trudeau has also agreed to closer security cooperation with Japan, Washington’s chief imperialist ally in the region.

Canada’s alliance with US imperialism in the Asia-Pacific goes back much further. During World War II, the US supplanted Britain as the Canadian ruling elite’s principal military-security partner, and by the war’s end Canada was preparing to send tens of thousands of troops and an armada of 60 ships to join the war between the US and Japan for domination of the Asia-Pacific.

Canada was an early and important US ally in the Korean War, a conflict that wrought death and destruction on a vast scale, sealed the partition of the Korean peninsula, and laid the basis for the bitter conflicts that today threaten to plunge the region into another catastrophic war.

In the wake of the 1949 Chinese Revolution and under conditions of deepening Cold War conflict with the Soviet Union, the US abandoned its commitment to unite Korea after ending nearly a half-century of Japanese colonial occupation. Instead Democrats, Republicans and the burgeoning military-intelligence apparatus came together as one in declaring that in Korea, Asia and around the world, the overriding objective of American foreign policy had to be thwarting “world communism.”

Some 26,000 Canadian military, naval and air force personnel served in the Korean War, initially under the overall command of the arch-reactionary and imperialist, General Douglas MacArthur. The Korean War pitted the armed forces of the US-sponsored South Korean state, the US, Britain, Canadian and other western and allied states against the North Korean-led Korean People’s Army and Chinese troops. Sections of the American military command demanded a much more aggressive intervention, with some, including MacArthur, advocating airstrikes on China and the use of nuclear weapons.

On 7 August, 1950, Liberal Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent announced the creation of the Canadian Army Special Force (CASF) to deploy soldiers to Korea. So as to encourage young recruits to join up for the war, the Canadian Army lowered its recruiting standards. A total of 516 Canadians died in the conflict.

Reflecting the overwhelming support within Canadian ruling circles for Washington’s drive to force North Korea to bow to US domination, even if that means provoking all-out war, the CBC article that reported Sajjan’s comments about possible Canadian participation in such a conflict prompted no debate within the corporate media. Only one other news organization, and clearly so for its own political reasons, the far right US publication the Daily Caller, saw fit to even take note of the defence minister’s comments and the revelation that Canada has been involved in planning for war in Korea.

Macdonald-Laurier Institute deputy editor, David McDonough, did however pen an April 18 article in which he described the mounting war tensions between Washington and Pyongyang as an “opportunity” to push for Canada to join the US antiballistic missile shield, hike military spending, and develop its cyberwar capabilities.

The Liberals’ readiness to align Canada with the Trump administration’s reckless military escalation in Korea demonstrates the politically criminal role played by all those political forces that, in one way or another, promoted Trudeau as a “progressive” alternative to the Conservatives in the 2015 election. The trade union bureaucracy, which is peddling ever more virulent Canadian nationalism as economic protectionism rises internationally, spent millions on “Anyone but Conservative” advertising campaigns, while the NDP announced that it was ready to form a coalition government with the Liberals.

Within days of Trudeau’s election, the Canadian Labour Congress leadership met with him to offer their support and assistance, and Unifor, Canada’s largest private sector union, gave Trudeau a rousing standing ovation at its August 2016 convention.

The Trudeau government’s warmongering, whether over Korea, in the Middle East or in Eastern Europe, has not prompted a word of criticism from these layers. This is because they are in fundamental agreement with the need to uphold the global interests of Canadian capitalism by serving up Canadian workers as cheap labour for big business, while at the same time playing them off against their class brothers and sisters internationally with the poison of Canadian nationalism.

The NDP, which has supported every Canadian imperialist military intervention since the late 1990s, has not issued a single statement on the imminent threat of war with North Korea. This is in keeping with its role in defending Canadian imperialist foreign policy interests and supporting the ruling-class agenda of austerity and war.

Obama’s $400,000 speeches: Unabashed. Shameless. Provocative.

David Walsh

Unabashed. Shameless. Provocative.

Such words perhaps begin to do justice to the decision by former president Barack Obama to accept payments of $400,000 for each of two public appearances. Two so far.

A researcher earlier this year suggested that the Obamas “could earn as much as $242.5 million from speeches, book deals and pensions.” But that modest calculation was based on an estimated $40 million in book fees for the couple and a $200,000 fee per appearance. The book deal turned out to be worth far more, $65 million, and now we see what Wall Street firms and large corporations are prepared to pay the ex-president for his dollops of wisdom.

The two speaking fees alone put the former candidate of “change” into the top one percent of income earners in the US—in fact, one of them would almost have done the trick.

It is extraordinary. An array of political elements and media outlets invested large amounts of time, energy and money into selling Obama to the American public in 2007-08 as a progressive figure, a cut well above George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, a man of compassion who would understand the average American’s pain. Of course, eight years of the actual Obama, who ruled exclusively in the interests of the financial oligarchy and the military-intelligence apparatus, disabused and disillusioned millions—thereby opening the door for Donald Trump.

But still one might think, given the appalling and reactionary character of the new administration, that Trump’s predecessor would be held—or would hold himself—in political reserve, that he retained, after all, a certain political use value as a means of confusing or disorienting the mass opposition that must emerge.

But they can’t apparently help themselves, this current crop of American politicians. They don’t merely represent enormous wealth, they are themselves enormously wealthy, they are flesh of the oligarchy’s flesh, blood of its blood. Rubbing their riches and privilege in the public’s face is a mode of existence; it comes nearly as naturally as breathing.

The New York Times, along with various Democrats and others, registered a certain nervousness about Obama’s actions. The Times attempted, impossibly, to balance the “two post-presidential Barack Obamas,” one obviously greedy as sin and the other, “civic-minded”: “Throughout his years in the White House, Mr. Obama championed the problems of the poor even as he showed an affinity for Hollywood superstars, elite artists and technology billionaires.” He never “championed” the problems of the poor; he paid occasional lip service to them, the deceitful stock in trade of the Democratic Party.

Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat from Massachusetts and “influential progressive,” according to CNN, described herself as “troubled” by Obama’s payoff. Warren has recently made the astonishing discovery that “the influence of money” in Washington is a serious issue. She told CNN that money was “a snake that slithers” through the nation’s capital and “shows up in so many different ways.”

Vermont’s Senator Bernie Sanders, the nominal “independent,” told CNN on Friday that he found Obama’s plan to receive $400,000 for speaking at a Wall Street conference “distasteful.” Tellingly, he added, “At a time when we have so much income and wealth inequality ... I think it just does not look good.”

This was also the theme of Jill Abramson’s column in the Guardian: “The optics of some of Obama’s decisions since leaving office have been damaging,” including “the vacations. … [T]he former president did deserve a holiday. But did it have to be with the Billionaires’ Club? There was a widely reported visit to Richard Branson’s place in British Virgin Islands for kitesurfing, photos of which went around the globe. In French Polynesia, this was followed by a jaunt on David Geffen’s 45ft yacht with celebrities including Tom Hanks, Oprah Winfrey and Bruce Springsteen.”

After noting that the “habitual kowtowing of senior Democrats to the billionaire class has left their party close to morally bankrupt,” Abramson argued that “Obama needs to be the leader of the Democratic party right now.” The disclosure of his personal corruption, however, runs the risk of leaving the Democrats even more exposed and vulnerable.

Farcically, in the midst of the widespread revulsion with Obama, the Nation too proposed that the former president should be the moral and intellectual leader of opposition to Trump (“Do We Need Obama in the Trump Resistance?”). Educating the public about “reinvesting in health care or climate change,” the column asserted, “would be a significant rebuke to the current administration, but not quite the outright ad hominem attack on a sitting president. Such a campaign could preserve Obama’s legacy while catapulting the liberal agenda forward.”

The International Socialist Organization and its socialistworker.org, which proclaimed Obama’s election a “transformative event” in 2008, eschewed all references to “slithering,” “kowtowing” and “catapulting.” In fact, as per usual when complicated and uncomfortable things occur, the group eschewed saying anything at all, which is the ISO’s own special brand of political complicity.

Obama had open defenders in the liberal media too, as well he should, given its current degenerate moral state. Daniel Gross at Slate had several preposterous arguments. “Speaking for money is a very large industry,” he commented. “Many of us, including me, participate in this economy. The fees range all over the place, but it’s extremely lucrative. It’s harder to make more money legally in an hour than you can giving a speech.” In other words, I’m a swine, Obama’s a swine, we’re all swine together.

Gross too was concerned about “the optics.” But “accepting speaking fees doesn’t inherently compromise your integrity, and there is no baked-in conflict between having or making money and being heavily invested in progressive causes.” Obama, he reasoned, “was the most effective populist—yes, populist—president since Lyndon B. Johnson.” Gross went on to argue, wonderfully, that because Obama will make lots of money and “take all of his earnings as ordinary income,” he will pay lots in taxes!

Michael Harriot at the Root claimed that the criticisms of Obama’s avarice were at least in part racially motivated. “Obama is black, which means his critics are like a P. Diddy remix: They can’t stop, won’t stop.”

Would taking $400,000 from Wall Street undermine “his [Obama’s] attacks on income inequality” or make him “a hypocrite,” would “large speaking fees make him inaccessible to the common American”? Harriot was not concerned. He asked rhetorically, “Should Democrats and progressives cede all influence over Wall Street to Republicans who espouse trickle-down theory and free-market principles? Speaking of the ‘free market’ … shouldn’t Obama be free to command whatever someone is willing to pay?”

Whatever miserable apologetics are thrown up, Obama’s raking in enormous fees from giant firms disgusts large numbers of people and further undermines the American economic and political system, the fenced-off domain of the fabulously wealthy.

Ruling classes condemned by history can never help themselves, that’s the nature of the beast. One rather conventional historian pointed to what was then considered a truism in a work written over a century ago on the coming of the French Revolution of 1789: “It was the luxury and extravagance of the aristocracy of the old regime and the insolent, ostentatious display of their wealth that created envy and hatred in the hearts of the common people; but the lessons of the past were unheeded by the rich and their conduct at this time only increased the general discontent.”

The American aristocracy is every bit as ostentatious and unheedful, and every bit as historically doomed.

German-Israeli relations in crisis

Peter Schwarz 

A visit to Israel by the German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel (SPD) ended Tuesday with a diplomatic scandal. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu canceled a planned meeting with Gabriel after the latter had insisted on speaking with representatives of the organisations “Breaking the Silence” and “B'Tselem”, which are critical of Israel’s settlement and occupation policy.

With a few exceptions Gabriel's conduct found broad support in the German media and from political parties. The CDU foreign policy expert, Roderich Kiesewetter, praised the foreign minister for “acting entirely correctly by keeping to his program”. Norbert Röttgen (CDU), chairman of the Bundestag's foreign affairs committee, underlined the importance of “talks embracing the entire range of politics and society”.

Under the headline “Gabriel has set the right tone in Israel”, Die Welt commented that criticism is needed “because Israel's right-wing government is preparing to give up the two-state solution without saying what should take its place." The paper continued: “There are good reasons for representatives of Western democracies “to be concerned about Israel's domestic policy development”.

The Süddeutsche Zeitung called the Israeli Prime Minister “Vladimir Tayyip Netanyahu" and accused him of: “Shaking up his country, undermining old values, endangering democracy just like Putin in Russia and Erdogan in Turkey”. Netanyahu’s refusal to meet with Gabriel was “a sensation, a scandal, a low point in German-Israeli relations”. The paper then praised Gabriel for not “backing down” and “demonstrating more courage than his predecessors”.

The taz commented that Germany “has a special responsibility for Israel”, but this does not mean “bowing down to the Israeli government, as Germany has done too long in the case of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu”. Gabriel had put an end to this policy.

The Frankfurter Rundschau criticized “Netanyahu’s affront” and demanded: “Germany should not be intimidated by this”. The paper praised Gabriel for not “kowtowing”: “An attitude which deserves respect”.

There are a number of reasons for Gabriel's behaviour—but opposition to Israel’s occupation policy and concern for Israeli democracy is clearly not one of them. Germany has been one of Israel's most important arms suppliers for decades and also works closely with Tel Aviv in the field of internal security. It has consistently supported Israel's wars against its Arab neighbours and the Palestinians, and has also tolerated its brutal occupation policy.

If the German government is now changing its attitude and is looking for conflict with the Israeli government, and German newspapers are placing the Israeli regime on a par with the Russian and Turkish governments, then this is bound up, above all, with recent geopolitical changes and Germany’s efforts to free its foreign policy from political dependence on the US in order to once again take to the world stage as a great power.

Gabriel deliberately provoked the scandal with Netanyahu. Already in February, the German government canceled regular German-Israeli government consultations planned for May. It declared that problems finding a suitable time to meet were behind the move, but the cancellation was generally understood as a rebuff to the Israeli government.

That same month, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel met with the two organisations, which have now met with Gabriel, drawing an angry response from the Israeli government. Gabriel had therefore been warned that a meeting with the NGO’s critical of the Israeli government would trigger a negative reaction from Netanyahu. These organizations, according to the Süddeutsche Zeitung, receive “considerable financing from the EU and also from the German foreign office”.

Germany’s new tone against Israel is mainly due to the election of Donald Trump in the US. The Trump government’s readiness to support the settlement policy of the Netanyahu government and depart from the so-called two-state solution collides with German interests in the region. The proposed two-state solution was never a viable option for the Palestinians, but helped Arab regimes with which the German government maintains close relations save face.

The Middle East, which was under British and French influence after World War I, and under US influence after World War II, has long been a target for German interests. Unlike other countries, Germany does not import much oil and gas from the region, but it is of great importance as a market for German products and investments. A number of Gulf regimes have also invested heavily in German DAX companies.

Despite the devastating wars in the region and low oil prices, Germany exported goods worth 47 billion euros to the countries of North Africa and the Near and Middle East (Mena) in 2016. This was just under 4 percent of German exports. Israel was Germany’s main trading partner, followed by Saudi Arabia. Other countries, however, such as Iran and Iraq, with which Germany previously maintained close economic relations, have enormous growth potential, should Western sanctions and war ever end.

Germany has been at loggerheads with the US and its ally Israel on earlier occasions, e.g. in 2003, when Berlin refused to support George W. Bush's war against Iraq. Trump’s erratic Middle East policy, ranging from cooperation with Moscow and Damascus to air raids on Syria and threats of war against Iran, is undermining German interests in the region. Berlin is responding with an increasingly aggressive foreign policy.

In 2014, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier announced at the Munich Security Conference that Germany must “be prepared to intervene earlier, more decisively and substantially in foreign and security policy.” He said Germany was “too big and too important” to restrict itself “to commenting on world politics from the sidelines”. This program has been systematically implemented since, also relying on the EU.

The policy of the government of Netanyahu, which feels strengthened by Trump’s presidency, is regarded as an obstacle by the German government. Berlin is taking advantage of the broad disgust with Netanyahu to mobilize former liberal layers behind its imperialist foreign policy. It is significant that more liberal newspapers such as taz, Frankfurter Rundschau and Süddeutsche Zeitung have been most forthright in their support for Gabriel.

In the history of the federal republic, relations with Israel were always a special case due to the Holocaust. In 2008, German Chancellor Angela Merkel still declared in a speech to the Israeli parliament: “Every federal government and every chancellor before me was committed to the special historic responsibility of Germany for the security of Israel. This historic responsibility on the part of Germany is integral to the country's raison d'État”.

In fact this is a myth. The German relationship with Israel was always guided by its own imperialist interests.

After defeat in the Second World War, good relations with Israel served above all to improve Germany’s damaged reputation. To this end, the German parliament passed a German-Israeli agreement in 1953 with votes from the Social Democrats, but with considerable resistance from the ruling conservative’s camp. The agreement obligated Germany to make reparation payments to Israel and opened up trade relations between the two countries.

The Federal Agency for Civic Education (bpb), which is under the control of Interior Ministry, frankly states why the Federal Republic benefited from the agreement: “After the barbarism of the Nazi era, the agreement sent a signal to the whole world of a new beginning paving the way for the rehabilitation of Germany”.

Nevertheless, the two countries only established diplomatic relations in 1965, 12 years later. The problem was not Tel Aviv, which had long pressed vainly for the normalization of relations, but rather the government in Bonn. The Adenauer government did not want to jeopardize its good relations with Arab states. The latter threatened to recognise East Germany diplomatically if the Federal Republic recognized Israel. West Germany would then have had to immediately break off relations with the Arab states due to its so-called Hallstein doctrine.

Despite this, mutual armament supplies and military cooperation were undertaken by Germany and Israel as early as in 1957, only two years after the founding of the Bundeswehr. German Defense Minister Franz-Josef Strauss and the Israeli Secretary of State Simon Peres had agreed on it in secret negotiations. “Tanks instead of diplomats” was their unspoken slogan. “Political interests and moral convictions seemed to have been balanced out for the next few years to the benefit of both states”, the bpb cynically notes.

Today, the relationship with Israel is once again a foreign policy bargaining chip as Germany strives for world power. To this end, the repugnant and reactionary policy of Netanyahu serves merely as a pretext.