It was with this belief that William Blum, a US citizen, began working in the US-State Department. He soon realised that the US itself does what it accuses others of doing and portrays as evil and to be fought: Overthrowing democratic governments, supporting dictators, assassinating political opponents, including those abroad. This is what Western politicians and media have always described as typically communist and something to be fought against. After leaving the State Department, Blum made it his life's work to publicise the actions of US politicians that were contrary to international law; based on the sources accessible to him in the USA. He described how US politicians - usually through their secret service CIA - intervened in 70 states by extreme means. He understood the principles of US great power politics which are still valid today and which give us a good understanding of the driving forces of US politics: 1.) Secure the world for the scope of action of US corporations. 2.) Increase sales for domestic defence contractors, who in turn generously support members of parliament in return. 3.) Prevent the emergence of a successful non-capitalist model by all means. 4.) Expanding its own global political and economic domains as much as possible. In his book "Killing Hope", he showed concretely and in relation to individual countries how US policy destroyed "killed" hopes for progress in these countries in its own interest. In his book "Schurkenstaat" (Rogue State), he worked out that the accusations made by the USA against states it defamed as rogue states first applied to the USA itself. People in the West, however, find this difficult to understand, because they believe that when the West criticises torture in other countries, for example, it is not doing this itself, but is generally in favour of the prohibition of torture, when it accuses others of wiretapping, that it is not doing this itself.
But Blum has courageously revealed to us that he does all this himself and that this can therefore not be an argument for hostility and war against other states. Thank you William, you can be a great example to us that standing up for human rights is more important than blindly standing up for one's own nation, but that one must stand up against one's own state when it breaks human rights even in other countries. What the USA did after 1945, however, is not typically American. When the European states ruled the world, they used the same evil methods. They are still doing so today where they still have power or in cooperation with the USA. And other great powers, like Russia, China or India, or emerging ones like Rwanda?
Wolfgang Lieberknecht
Opmerkingen