The end of the Second World War had led Britain and France to lose their colonies and the United States to become hegemonic power , with picking up aggressive policies that former imperial countries had used for long term, while the Soviet Union was second superpower to providing strong resistance to US imperialism. In 1991, the Socialist block and the Soviet Union collapsed, and it resulted in converting the US only superpower, thus bolstering its influence and spreading it into the all areas of the world. Washington, by comprehensively using tools, including diplomacy, economic, cultural, technological and military tools, has been striving to frustrate traditional systems opposed to it and generate its global establishment in order to retain continents under the umbrella of its imperialism. Eurasia among continents holds highest pillar in the Washington-dominated global policy. Zbigniew Brzezinski said: “If one country could take over Eurasia, it will lead it to take over Africa and Oceania”. That is why Eurasian region is most significant continent in the eyes of the United States.
Dennis Etler an expert on China gave an exclusive interview to Eurasia Diary regarding the global imperialism of the United States. Mr Etler holds a doctorate in anthropology from the University of California, Berkley. He conducted archaeological and anthropological research in China throughout the 1980s and 1990s and taught at the college and university level for over 35 years.
-The United States of America has been a superpower country since the end of the Second World War that it has spread its influence across the world by promoting political, economic and military maneuvers. The collapse of the Soviet Union has led Washington to become the only politically and economically powerful center. In your view, what are main priorities in the imperialistic policy of the US over the global world, especially in the Eurasian region?
After the end of the Second World War, the US took up the mantle of Nazi Germany in Europe and the Japanese Empire in the Asian-Pacific. Like the Nazis, the US saw the Soviet Union as its main enemy as it was the only force standing in its way of total global hegemony, and like the Japanese, it took on the task of trying to isolate and reconquer China under the imprimatur of “who lost China?” which became a rallying cry for the McCarthy era attacks on any American who promoted friendship with the emerging socialist bloc and quest for peace. The end of the Second World War also saw the unraveling of the British and other colonial empires with the US picking up their cudgel of genocidal oppression of their former colonies. In that sense, the US was also the inheritor of the English and French empires. Taking over the British empire's posts overseas and assuming the French fight against its former colonies in Southeast Asia who were seeking national liberation. and Ever since the US has been pursuing a policy of containing the spread of socialism, combatting the struggles for national liberation and consolidating its hold on global hegemony. With the demise of the Soviet Union, the US thought it had gained the upper hand in its quest for global domination. It proclaimed the “end of history” and gloated over the defeat of the people’s struggles the world over. Seeking to exploit the isolation of China from the global economic system, it sought to use Chinese labor to garner superprofits for it corporations which shifted much of industrial production to China. But the US gave China enough rope to hang itself with. Unexpectedly for the US, China turned around and used the competitive advantages of socialism to become an industrial powerhouse such as the world has never seen, challenging the economic might of the US-dominated global capitalist system. At the same time, Russia began to reassert its prerogatives, throwing off the stranglehold Western neo-liberalism had over the remnants of the former Soviet Union. All this led to great consternation in Washington which initiated a campaign to roll back the gains of both China and Russia in an attempt to regain the initiative and vanquish its emerging rivals. The US has tried to outflank and isolate Russia in Eastern Europe and the Middle East and to do the same to China in South and Southeast Asia and the Asian Pacific region. US contention with both China and Russia has thus become the modus operandi of US imperialism and the linchpin of its foreign policy in Eurasia ever since the demise of the Soviet Union and the rise of China.
-The United States has an interesting foreign policy in its attempt to keep states under control around the world, with promoting not only political, economic and military means but also cultural diplomacy. What is the necessity of cultural diplomacy in the global policy of the US?
Cultural diplomacy, i.e. the deployment of soft power is the means by which the US attempts to spread its ideological influence in order to undermine the national identities of the countries it wishes to dominate. By subverting the traditional cultures of its intended victims and substituting them with decadent Western cultural values the US hopes to convert their people into willing accomplices and servants of Western corporate capitalism, as they become its consumers. In this way, the US seeks to combat the struggle for national liberation and socialism wherever it arises.
-Please explain us, why the US is interested in dividing multinational countries around the world?
The US has been employing the imperial policy of divide and rule for its entire history. What better way to create havoc and fish in troubled waters?
This policy has been extremely effective over the last thirty years since the collapse of the Soviet Union. No matter what problems the Soviet model of socialism may have had, its stated goal of multinational unity and its opposition to revanchist nationalism kept ethnic animosities and rivalries in check.
The destruction of Yugoslavia was a testing ground for the imperialist policy of divide and rule through the promotion of sectarianism and separatism, destroying Yugoslav statehood and replacing it with a process of Balkinization that resulted in rump states more easily dominated and controlled and exploited by Western finance capital.
This model was also applied in Iraq. Prior to the war and US occupation, Sunnis and Shiites lived cheek by jowl, intermarrying and occupying a unified secular space. Other religious minorities also lived without fear of persecution. Not that it was idyllic, but look what the US wrought in its stead, inter-communal strife, ethnic cleansing, and genocide all in the service of increasing its hegemonic control of the region. This model is still being implemented. A divided Middle East with its people fighting among themselves only serves the interest of US imperialism, Israeli Zionism and Saudi Arabian Wahhabism.
-The United States, along with its European and some Gulf allies had conducted military activities in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz after attacks on Saudi vessels in last year. The US and Saudi Arabia were claiming that the main organizer of attacks was Iran. From your opinion, why have these two territorial waters for a long time been so important for the strategic interests of the United States?
Both the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz are major conduits for the transport of oil from the Middle East to the US and its allies. Lose of control of either would place access and control of a major strategic asset, oil, in jeopardy. It will therefore do all in its power to maintain its influence in the region. The US presence in the region also serves as a staging ground for its assaults against the people of the Middle East.
-Do you think that China, Russia, and Iran are only great powers to bring down the imperialistic power of the US and in restoring peace and stability in Eurasia?
Yes, the emerging alliance of China, Russia, and Iran is an important bulwark against the continued attacks of US imperialism. The US has been using the same tactics of economic warfare against all three with the same objective in mind, undermine their national security and defenses so that forces within them friendly to the US can gain power and influence.
-You are basically an expert who is focusing on China and constantly writing articles about its geopolitical position. My last question is about Coronavirus disease in China. According to some news circulated by various media outlets, this terrible disease is a deliberated policy referred to weaken the global economic power of China. What can you say about this?
There is insufficient evidence as yet to accuse the US of conducting a biological warfare assault against China. Nonetheless, the coronavirus outbreak plays into its hands. If naturally occurring, which we must assume until proven otherwise, it has been a fortuitous turn of events in the eyes of the imperialists. The US is using China’s misfortune to pursue its own imperialist objectives of isolating China and damaging its reputation and economy. It promotes fear and loathing of China and all things Chinese and has stoked racial animosity towards the Chinese people. It has used the situation to advance its geopolitical ambition while feigning concern for their welfare.
