🚩 Lies, Lies, and War Lies!

By Rob C.

Art by Morten Morland

TL;DR: The American tradition of lying our way into foreign wars for corporate profit has reached its inevitable, orange-tinted climax. From the 1953 coup in Iran to the 2003 oil-grab in Iraq, the U.S. has a track record of 93 military operations designed to install corporate-friendly puppets under the guise of “spreading democracy.” Now, our “Donroe Doctrine” President has dropped the mask, openly admitting that his illegal kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro is a resource heist. He promised “America First” and an end to foreign wars, but it turns out he’s just the newest CEO-in-Chief for the Neo-Con oil lobby.

There is a certain comfort in the familiar, and nothing is more familiar to the American psyche than a well-crafted war lie. For decades, our “Department of Defense”—a name that is itself a masterclass in irony—has operated as the world’s most violent collection agency for the Fortune 500. According to research, the United States has engaged in at least 93 different military operations to assassinate, overthrow, or destabilize foreign governments deemed “unfriendly.” In Washington-speak, “unfriendly” doesn’t mean they hate our freedom; it means they won’t let a U.S. corporation strip-mine their country for pennies on the dollar.

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We saw it in 1953 in Iran, when we toppled Mohammad Mossadegh because he dared to think Iranian oil should benefit Iranians instead of British Petroleum. We saw it in 1954 in Guatemala, where the CIA overthrew a democratically elected president because the United Fruit Company didn’t want to pay taxes on their banana plantations. In 1964, we backed a coup in Brazil to ensure “stability” for American investors, and in 1989, we flattened neighborhoods in Panama to remove Manuel Noriega, a man who had been on our payroll until he stopped being a useful tool for the Canal’s corporate interests.

The crown jewel of this legacy, of course, was Iraq in 2003. We were fed a steady diet of “weapons of mass destruction” and “mushroom clouds,” while in the back rooms, Dick Cheney’s energy task force had already divided up the Iraqi oil fields into neat little parcels for Exxon and Shell two years before the first bomb fell. The list of our “interventions” is a global map of corporate greed, stretching through Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Indonesia, Bolivia, Greece, South Korea, the Congo, and Chile. In every instance, the “freedom” we delivered looked suspiciously like a boardroom contract. Now, we have our very own” Julius Squeezer” at the helm, and he has done something truly revolutionary: he’s stopped pretending. Trump’s invasion of Venezuela and the kidnapping of Maduro isn’t being sold as a mission for “democracy.” Instead, he’s standing at a podium at Mar-a-Lago telling us that we are “taking our oil back.” It’s a fascinating claim, given that Venezuela is not, in fact, the 51st state, nor is it a gated community owned by the Trump Organization. He claims Maduro “stole” the resources, ignoring the fact that Hugo Chávez nationalized the industry to fund social programs for his own people—a move that is apparently the highest form of treason in the eyes of the American Corporate State.

It is deeply solemn to realize that the man who campaigned on “ending endless wars” is now being handled by the same Neo-Con ghouls like Marco Rubio who have been thirsting for a Caribbean oil war for twenty years. Trump’s “America First” slogan was the ultimate bait-and-switch; it was never about bringing the troops home, it was about using those troops as a private security force for the oil majors. We are watching 100+ civilians die in illegal boat strikes while the President brags about “running” a sovereign nation like it’s one of his failed casino. The lies haven’t changed, only the salesman has, and as usual, the American people are the ones being sold a bill of goods while the planet pays the price.

Please like, share and subscribe to help us expose the corporate war machine and keep the good trouble coming! 🛢️⚔️🚩

— Robert Cain, author of Democracy for Sale: How Corporate Greed Is Corrupting Democracy and Endangering the Planet.