March 2, 2003
Turkish Parliament Rejects US Troops
In another popular uprising against the Bush conquest of Iraq, the Turkish parliament defied Turkey's prime minister and defeated the measure to allow US troops to be deployed from Turkish territory in the invasion of Iraq. (See Associated Press. Later, the vote was nullified, see CNN. What's next?)Putting its massive economic power to work, US power seemed undefeatable. The US offer of $15 billion was mighty persuasive. And the threat of what can happen to anyone who defies US power is being demonstrated to the world in the dramatic destruction of Iraq that is being prepared.
But against all that conventional political logic, the Turkish parliament has rejected US demands. The Turkish parliamentarians are all facing scathing opposition from their constituents to US troops on their soil.
The administration also hit a setback on its plan to send troops to the Philippines when it could not come to an agreement over rules of the operation that would conform to the Philippines constitution. (See The New York Times.)
What we are witnessing seems to be a snowballing of international popular resistance to the Bush clique, the most powerful political faction in the world, and one which has up to now seemed practically invincible. It has behaved as though it can do whatever it wants anywhere no matter what anyone thinks about it. Up to now, it has rolled over all opposition. Even as resistance to its unprovoked attack on Iraq has continued to grow, the administration has been determined to maintain the aura of invincability, and to give the impression that nothing will stop it. But the momentum of resistance continues to build. It is not giving up and it is not backing down.
The ultimate confrontation between corporate fascist power and international popular will may be sooner rather than later. Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rove and Bush are not the type to back down. All this resistance makes them ever more determined to show the world that they cannot be stopped. Their message to the world is that resistance is futile: we are going to rule no matter what, so you might as well get used to it. But the situation is volatile. There are elements that cannot be quantified.
By the regime's formula, it is undefeatable. By selective application of force, the Bushoids can keep the entire world under their giant thumb. Rumsfeld has bragged that the US can fight as many countries as they want all at once. But what if they finally went so far, pushed their arrogance so far that all the countries that they intend to dominate resist at once? What if instead of allowing the bully to pick them off one by one, they all rise up at the same time? We are not dealing anymore with formulas of simple mathematics, we are dealing with the much more complex and volatile formulas of political chemistry.
Even the most perfect formulas are sometimes overthrown. And there is something in the human spirit that will defy the presumption of invincability. Everyone longs to knock the chip off the shoulder of the bully. Dostoevsky described it well in "Notes from Underground."
...Man has always and everywhere -- whoever he may be -- preferred to do as he chose, and not in the least as his reason or advantage dictated; and one may choose to do something even if it is against one's own advantage, and sometimes one positively should (that is my idea).
One's own free, unfettered choice, one's own caprice, however wild it may be, one's own fancy worked up at times to frenzy -- is that very "most advantageous advantage" which we have overlooked, which comes under no classification and against which all systems and theories are continually being shattered to atoms. And how do these wiseacres know that man wants a normal, a virtuous choice? What has made them conceive that man must want a rationally advantageous choice? What man wants is simply independent choice, whatever that independence may cost and wherever it may lead...
If this war against Iraq -- and the whole Rumsfeld-Wolfowitz plan for world domination -- is defeated, it will be a miracle. But who knows?