In his December
1 speech in Halifax, U.S.
President George W. Bush stated that he is interested in strengthening
international institutions such as the United Nations and in building a new
multilateral consensus in the “war on terror”.However, he immediately made it clear that he was not talking about
making concessions to the European Union, Canada
or others who have been critical of the unilateralism
of his regime, especially in regard to the U.S.
invasion of Iraq.
Rather, he expects his critics to drop their criticisms and line up behind his
decisions. So, George Bush’s “multilateralism” is
indistinguishable from his unilateralism. It is the
kind of multilateralism practiced by Roman emperors
who enlisted conquered peoples in the conquest of yet more territories and
peoples.
There were many
pundits who suggested that Bush would “mellow” in his second term in order to
concentrate on his “legacy”. They seem to have missed the point that the only
legacy that Bush seems to care about is empire-building. His cabinet has been
purged of any dissenting voices and it is clear from Bush’s statements in Halifax
that he has no intention of altering his course on any front. The U.S.
war against the people of Iraq
is being pursued with a renewed vengeance and the U.S.
is trying to foment a civil war in Ukraine
in order to weaken its Russian “allies”.
The unilateralism of the U.S.
under George W. Bush is not an anomaly, nor is itsomething which has emerged out of his
personal psychology. Rather, it is a consequence of the sharpening
contradictions between the big imperialist powers over which will reap the
lion’s share of the profits generated by the intensified exploitation of the
world’s people. The U.S.
followed a policy of multilateralism when its Western
European allies were so weak and afraid of the Soviet Union
that they were forced to agree with whatever policies Washington
decided upon. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the growing economic might
of Germany, France and Japan and the slipping American economy, the U.S. is no
longer in a position to dictate to its “multilateral” allies. Therefore, it has
dropped the charade of multilateralism and openly
defies the international community when it serves its needs to do so. At the
same time, the U.S.
is genuinely interested in restoring the kind of multilateralism
that it practiced in the past where it calls the shots and its allies fall into
line. So, a so-called new interest in “consensus-building” and strengthening of
the UN should not be construed as a change in direction of the Bush regime. It
is merely an indication that U.S.
imperialism is using everything at its disposal to shore up its shaky empire.