Shedding Light On American Society's Myths About U.S. History

In "Society Must Be Defended", Michel Foucault wrote that the winners of a social struggle or armed conflict use their political dominance to suppress a defeated adversary's version of historical events in favour of their own propaganda.  It is likely the basis of the expression “history is written by the victor” (which has frequently been attributed to Winston Churchill).  This history is then perpetuated through what is taught in schools and, in the modern era, through portrayals of historical events on TV, in film and the mass media.

One of the countries that has done a remarkable job at writing history from the victor’s perspective is the United States, especially as it concerns the events encompassing the period between World War II and the present -- the period which has seen the creation of the "American Empire".  Some of the popularly held beliefs of history from a U.S. perspective are that: the Americans have been the “good guys” in any international conflict; atom bombs had to be dropped on Japan to save American lives; and the U.S. is an example to the world of a free and democratic society that values civil liberties and human rights.

Lifting the veil from many of these and other popularly held beliefs about U.S. actions in the historical events of the past 70 years seems to be the intent of a new documentary by Academy Award-winning film-maker Oliver Stone and historian Peter Kuznick.  The 10-part series called Oliver Stone’s Untold History of the United States is being broadcast by the U.S. cable channel Showtime.  The series challenges the basic narrative about the place of the U.S. in the world that have come to be accepted by most Americans.

Drawing on archival findings, old movie clips and recently declassified documents, the film-makers critically examine U.S. history, from the atomic bombing of Japan to the Cold War, to the fall of communism, and continuing all the way through to the Obama administration.  Much of what is challenged is regularly taught in American schools and has become part of the national mythology of the United States.  During the making of the series the film-makers discovered that the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were militarily unnecessary and morally indefensible.  They also propose that the Soviet Union, not the U.S., was ultimately responsible for defeating the Germans in World War II.  And, they assert that the United States, not the Soviet Union, bore the lion’s share of responsibility for perpetuating the Cold War.  In addition, the documentary found that U.S. presidents have frequently trampled on the Constitution and international law, especially in wartime, and they note the United States has brought the world dangerously close to nuclear war repeatedly by brandishing nuclear threats.

In addition, Stone and Kuznick produced a 750-page book, The Untold History of the United States as a companion to the documentary.  Together, the two works are meant to "challenge the basic and commonly held narratives about U.S. history . . . of American altruism, benevolence, devotion to liberty and justice."  All myths which, Stone says, are comforting to most Americans but are actually "harmful, noxious and polluted", and leave Americans in the dark about the truth of their nation’s history and its place in the world. 

Reaction to the documentary has been mixed.  Glen Greenwald, a journalist with The Guardian highly recommended the series and book describing it as "riveting", "provocative" and "worthwhile".  Former President of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev wrote approvingly of the book stating that, “Such a perspective is indispensable at a time when decisions are being taken that will shape America's role in the global world of the twenty-first century. At stake is whether the United States will choose to be the policeman of a "Pax Americana", which is a recipe for disaster, or partner with other nations on the way to a safer, more just and sustainable future." 

In November 2012 Ronald Radosh, an adjunct fellow historian with the conservative Hudson Institute, lambasted the documentary as "mendacious" Cold War revisionism and "mindless recycling of Stalin's propaganda.”  And journalist Michael C. Moynihan criticized the book for "moral equivalence between the policies of the psychotically brutal Soviet Union and the frequently flawed policy of the United States."

The first three episodes of the documentary series premiered at the New York Film Festival on October 6, 2012.   The series premiered on the Showtime cable channel on November 12, 2012.

For anyone who does not accept the sanitized, censored and rosy version of America's role in the key historical events of the last 70+ years, a version that has been constantly presented to the U.S. population through the American school system, by the corporate media, Hollywood, and the U.S. government, then this is a documentary that comes highly recommended.

To watch an interview about the series with the Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick, click here.

Related Articles & References:
*  Pax Americana and the Weaponization of Space (Video)
* Oliver Stone: America is an “outlaw nation”
* The End of Pax Americana: How Western Decline Became Inevitable
* A People's History of the United States
* The sun never sets on the American Empire
* Goodbye, Pax Americana
* Preserving Pax Americana: Defence Reform for the Unipolar Moment
* The Story of American Revisionism (Excerpted from Why American History Is Not What They Say: An Introduction to Revisionism)
* The American Empire Project
* Could Oliver Stone's Exposé of the American Empire Help Press the UN to End Haiti Cholera?
* How America Became an Empire
* 7 Chomsky quotes that expose the American empire
* 8 striking parallels between the U.S. and the Roman Empire

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Global Political Chaos and War Possible from Massive Climate Change

February 19, 2013 -- What if the effects of global warming resulted in the unthinkable happening? What if massive climate change caused by global warming resulted in the deaths of hundreds of millions of people due to mega-droughts, global famine, water and energy shortages, and nations used nuclear weapons to protect their dwindling resources?

It is a scenario that is more plausible than not.  It is so plausible that the Office of Net Assessment – the Pentagon’s highly respected internal think-tank – commissioned a report to explore the national security impacts of rapid climate change and how the United States should prepare militarily for this scenario.  In addition to the military option, the report’s authors call for ways to offset abrupt cooling.

The report – An Abrupt Climate Change Scenario and Its Implications for United States National Security – was completed in October 2003 but was not publicly acknowledged by Pentagon officials until its key findings were leaked and published in some European newspapers in February 2004.  One of the key conclusions of the report was that within as little as five years, the world-wide security threat from climate change would be greater than that of terrorism.  Therefore, the United States needs to plan for a time when a fortress mentality will be the only answer to protecting its territory and its resources..

Related:
*  US intelligence community warns of rising climate security threat

*  A Blueprint for the Department of Defense’s Strategic Assessment of Climate Change

The predictions contained in the report were based on research examining pre-historic weather patterns and studies of the ocean’s thermohaline conveyor which is responsible for controlling the world’s weather patterns.  Furthermore, this system of oceanic currents keeps the world’s warm and cold currents circulating and regulates the ocean’s salinity.

According to this research the rapid melting of the polar regions due to global warming would release massive amounts of fresh water into the oceans thus affecting ocean currents, ocean salinity, and raising sea levels.  This would cause the thermohaline conveyor to slow down thereby changing weather patterns world-wide.

An early climatic outcome would be massive and violent ocean storms ravaging sea coasts around the world, and making many coastal cities uninhabitable.  A projected 4°C drop in world-wide average annual temperatures would result in Siberia-like winters in Europe and North America, along with droughts and severely shortened growing seasons in the world’s food growing regions.  In the “have not” regions of the world tens of millions would die due to wars and famine in nations where resources are already scarce.  And as millions of migrants from Africa, Asia and South America try to find refuge in Europe, Japan, Australia and North America (regions better able to cope with these calamities) these regions would become virtual fortresses to keep them out.  These weather changes would also lead to nuclear proliferation as have not countries with the technical capability develop nuclear weapons to protect themselves from their neighbours, and to blackmail the “have” countries for assistance.

So how can we as individuals and nations plan for this global chaos?  To start with we need to increase pressure on our governments to implement the Kyoto Accords as a first step.  The next step is to work with the international community to convince the United States government (the world’s biggest consumer of energy) that it is in their political, economic and military interests to take the scientific evidence seriously, and also implement policies to mitigate climate change. 

Related:

*  What is Climate Change?

*  Looming Crisis of Climate Chaos

*  Pentagon to rank global warming as destabilising force 

*  Global Warming Is Just the Tip of the Iceberg 

*  Climate change ‘will spark global conflict’

*  Global Warming “Irreversible,” Warns Scientific Body

*  Global Warming Destroying World Coral Reefs, Costing Economy Billions

*  Extreme Weather Events The "New Normal"

*  Climate War: The United States and China

© The View From Here.  All Rights Reserved.

Long Ago Dreams of a "New World Order"

February 13, 2013 -- I recently came across this map of the world that was created to illustrate what the "new world order" would look like after the end of World War II.  The map was actually completed before the Japanese attack onPearl Harbor and published on February 25, 1942.

It shows a proposed political division of the world after World War II in the event of an Allied victory in which the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union would rule. The map includes a manifesto describing a "New World Moral Order", along with quotes from U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt's Four Freedoms speech.

While there are many points from the policies of the New World Moral Order that are fodder for endless debate, the following three points should be of particular note: 

• To reduce the burden and criminal waste of armaments expenditures everywhere in the world, the U.S.A., with the cooperation of Latin-America, the British Commonwealth of Nations, and the U.S.S.R. shall undertake to guarantee peace to the nations which will be permanently disarmed and demilitarized after the conclusion of the present war.
•  A World Court with punitive powers of absolute boycott, quarantine, blockade and occupation by international police, against lawbreakers of international morality shall be organized.
• In the New World Moral Order which we seek to establish, besides the essential political freedoms, the following fundamental economic changes are imperative:

 (a)   Nationalization of all natural resources and equitable distribution of same to all nations…everywhere in the world;

 (b)   Nationalization of international banking, foreign investments, railroads and power plants….everywhere in the world;

 (c)   Nationalization of all armaments producing establishments by all military powers;

 (d)   Federal control of foreign commerce and shipping;

 (e)   The establishment of a world common monetary system;

 (f)    World wide limitations of interest rates to a maximum of two percent.

This vision of a new world would have seen political domination by three major powers which would have been problematic to say the least.  However, in hindsight the goals of demilitarization, equitable sharing of the world's natural resources among all nations, regulation of international banking and commerce, and nationalization of the arms industry would have been welcomed (whoever was in control) considering what occurred geo-politically and economically in the decades following WW II, and the political and economic state of the world today.

Instead of the political, economic and social benefits that would have been enjoyed had this manifesto been implemented we have today a world which is more militarized, more economically selfish and politically inequitable then any time since World War II.  Today we have a world where 5% of the world's companies control 80% of the planet's economy and resources, and where the profits of corporations are placed ahead of the needs of people.  We have a world where international banking and commerce has become increasingly unregulated over the past several decades resulting in the world-wide economic crisis of 2008.  We have a world where the sale of armaments and military hardware is looked at in terms of its potential for job creation for the countries doing the selling rather then in terms of its potential for inflicting deathand destruction, encouraging militarism and causing political instability in various regions of the world.

Related: Who really contols the world? 

Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "When evil men plot, good men must plan . . .When evil men would seek to perpetuate an unjust status quo, good men must seek to bring into being a real order of justice."  Looking at the state of society and the world today one has to wonder if "evil men" are the ones who have taken control of the world.

There is no guarantee that the New World Moral Order would have resulted in a world free of political, economic and social injustices.  The world doesn't work that way given the general falibility and self-serving character of humans.  However, the fact that it was an idea that was discussed at the highest levels, and its details recorded, shows that at one time there were leaders in the world who had a grand vision of a humanity and a world that was less selfish, less greedy and more altruistic then the world which we live in today.

One can only wonder what sort of world it might have been had those plans become reality.

© The View From Here.  All Rights Reserved.

Alternative / Independent Media: The Answer to Democratic Decay Or Just Some More Voices In The Crowd?

Last updated August 30, 2013 5:38 PM
 

February 12, 2013 -- I don't know why I've hesitated about blogging in the past since I find myself often commenting on various issues on Facebook which, in some cases, are accessible to the public.  But, for the most part, those comments are only visible to the people on my friends list, and I would like some of the thoughts I have put down to be heard beyond that limited circle.

I published my first blog last week as a result of a course I'm taking on alternative media and politics.  The blog was part of the assignment for that course.

So I will repost that blog here and l look forward to any thoughts or comments that I might receive.

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Alternative / Independent Media: The Answer To Democratic Decay Or Just Some More Voices In The Crowd?

In a world filled with media alternatives the choice of alternative / independent media (AIM) is so wide-ranging as to be overwhelming.  From magazines to newsletters to websites to TV and radio, one could spend weeks glued to a computer screen reading, watching and listening to all the alternative voices speaking about all the issues and viewpoints which are not covered adequately by the mainstream corporate media, or not at all.  To demonstrate how pervasive AIM has become plug the phrase "alternative media" or “independent media” into Google search and it returns over 9.2 million results combined.

Among the multitude of AIM voices on the internet is the website Truthout.

Truthout is a non-profit journalism organization dedicated to providing independent news and commentary on a daily basis. It is affiliated with the Freedom of the Press Foundation, an American organization whose goal is to “help promote and fund aggressive, public-interest journalism focused on exposing mismanagement, corruption, and law-breaking in government.”

According to their website, Truthout’s investigative reporting “has focused on issues such as government secrecy surrounding the Guantanamo Bay prison, the militarization of law enforcement on the U.S. border, and the growth of the U.S. national security budget in the past decade.”  They work to spark action by "revealing systemic injustice" and "providing a platform for transformative ideas", through in-depth investigative reporting and critical analysis.

However, unlike many other AIM media sites Truthout claims not to advocate a political agenda.  They state that their aim is to “remain free of bias and adhere to high editorial standards.”  Notwithstanding this claim, if you examine the articles listed on their main page they cover many issues that would be at home on other progressive leaning alternative media sites, and they cover the issues in a manner that is consistent with a counter-hegemonic, anti-corporate narrative.

With the exception of their claim to being free of bias, Truthout has adopted an operational / administrative model similar to many other alternative media outlets.  They accept no advertising or corporate backing but instead depend entirely on readers to support their work.

So why the need for AIM sites like Truthout?  Although the issue has been discussed at length in academia, the short answer would be that mainstream corporate media is no longer the independent voice it once was, it no longer adequately plays the role of guarding democracy, and thus no longer truly represents the interests of the majority.  Whether it is in Canada, the United States or elsewhere in the democratic world, the historical role of a free and independent media has been a key factor in the establishment and growth of democratic societies and institutions.  In fact it is the only profession that is specifically mentioned in constitutions of various democratic nations, including Canada, the United States, the European Union and its member states.

However, for at least the past two decades barriers have been placed in the path of the democratic evolution of nations due to the increasing concentration of media ownership among small numbers of corporately owned and controlled media empires.  For example, in both Canada and the U.S. the mainstream media is controlled by an oligopoly of corporate media empires who cater to the power and corporate elites and help to maintain the status quo in support of their interests (Atton).  Europe also faces a similar situation despite the fact that their media markets are fragmented by the various languages spoken on that continent.

The goal of these corporate media conglomerates is to create passive and uninformed consumers / voters who will make irrational choices that are counter to their personal / democratic interests.  And to accomplish this goal these corporations are willing to spend huge amounts of money and resources.

While the concentration of mainstream media has been the catalyst for the birth (rebirth?) of independent media in the modern era, the multiplicity of voices, despite their best efforts, continue to be eclipsed by the reach of mainstream media.  Or, to put it another way, despite the efforts and successes of AIM sites and organizations like Truthout, which intend to offer an alternative or oppositional perspective, they are still unable to challenge the macro impact of mainstream media sources.  Which begs the question, is the shift to a democratic and participatory process of production the best option in response to preventing the further decay of democracy if distribution of the information is limited, and if you become just another faint voice in a crowd?

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