Saturday, August 27, 2005

A Man With Two Faces, Faces Eviction

The Americans thought it might be a good idea to have a military station in Uzbekistan, a former member state of the US Cold War foe, the USSR. Its miliary presence would serve several purposes – (1) maintain a military presence in the oil-rich Central Asian region as part of the neo-cons strategy for American dominance of the world’s energy resource areas, (2) form part of the strategy of encircling China, which the US has identified as its future rival, (3) monitor Islamist activities in the region including those of Iran’s, (4) provide a handy transit and logistic support for its Afghan operations.

The double standards of this strategy is that the Americans have their Monroe Doctrine yet are pretty brazen and two face about placing their military nosiness in other people’s backyards. I suppose at that time, when one is the world’s sole superpower, one thinks one can get away with everything and anything.

Simply enunciated the Monroe Doctrine has been the US way of telling non-Americans, particularly Europeans, to butt out of its New World backyard, and that any interferefence would constitute a casus belli.

The most famous evokation of the Doctrine was during the Cuban Crisis, but the deliberate ignoring of the same Doctrine was sheer hypocrisy when the USA supported Britian’s Falklands War against an American nation, Argentina.

White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) mateship overrides the American ‘hemispheric defense’ doctrine signed under the Rio Treaty. It's no wonder that Mexico referred to the case of the Falklands War as a reason for pulling out of the Rio Treaty. The Latinos can't trust nor rely on the USA.

Anyway – back to Uzbekistan.

With concerted campaigning, economic aid, and political support from China and Russia under the aegis of the Shanghai Cooperatiive Organization (SCO) the Uzbeks have decided to evict the Americans.

Its Senate has given final approval on Friday to an order evicting US military forces from the country.

Then cheekily, its lawmakers have demanded financial compensation from the USA for cost of building infrastructure to support US military presence and consequential workers health and environmental damage to the country.

Uzbek Senator Muriddin Zayniddinov said of the eviction, "A man with two faces cannot be a friend of Uzbekistan."

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