February 12, 2007
The 'Bush Doctrine' and Weapons in Space
"The dangerous patriot: "The one who drifts into
chauvinism and exhibits blind enthusiasm for military actions. He is a defender
of militarism and its ideals of war and glory. Chauvinism is a proud and
bellicose form of patriotism . . . which identifies numerous enemies who can
only be dealt with through military power and which equates the national honor
with military victory."
James
A. Donovan, Colonel, US Marine Corps
"Where you have a concentration of
power in a few hands, all too frequently men with the mentality of gangsters
get control."
Lord
Acton (1834-1902)
"If you want war, nourish a doctrine. Doctrines are
the most frightful tyrants to which men ever are subject... "
William Graham Sumner
On September 20, 2002, George W.
Bush, in conformity with the path that Cheney-Rumsfeld-Wolfowitz-Rice and Co.
had traced for him, adopted a hegemonic foreign
policy and issued the famous hubristic "Bush Doctrine". His then
Security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, and her assistant, Philip
D. Zelikow, drafted much of the 2002 report titled “The National Security Strategy of the
United States”, which has come to be
known as the "Bush Doctrine" of pre-emptive wars and of American
assertive military hegemony around the world.
Eight months before, in his January 29, 2002 first State of the Union
Address, Bush, inspired by his neocon and theologian speech writers,
had singled out three disparate countries as belonging to an "axis of
evil" (Iran, Iraq, and North Korea), even though two of these countries
had been at war at each other for years (Iraq and Iran) and the third (North
Korea) had no visible political ties to the first two. Bush also expressed his
intention that the United States
control both the Earth and Outer Space, no matter what the other 191 countries
of the world think and no matter what international law and international
treaties call for.
On Earth, the neocon Bush-Cheney
administration's goal was to invest so much in military gear, and to take military actions if
necessary, that no other country would ever challenge
its status as the world's sole military superpower.
The intention was to establish a military
New American Empire for the 21st Century, along the lines of the British
Empire in the 19th Century.
In Space, the administration
asserted the "far out" claim that the United States has the right to
control Outer Space and to deny access to space to any country not in sync with
U.S. interests. Bush's then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, in the
so-called report on "Counterspace Operations Doctrine" (2004), even stated that the U.S. should not refrain from using
such tactics as "cover, concealment, and deception" and "satellite jamming" to control Outer Space. —The
chairman of the U.S. joint chiefs of staff, General Peter Pace, said that
(Donald) Rumsfeld must truly be 'inspired by God!' This hairy policy was revisited and signed into law by
President George W. Bush, on October 18, 2006, thus initiating a new and
dangerous Space arms race.
The U.S. already has a 'Air Force Space Command', which was created on September 1, 1982, by the Reagan administration.
But to indicate that nothing is off-limits, the U.S. Air Force also announced,
on November 2, 2006, that it was setting up what could become a new four-star
command to fight in cyberspace, where officials say the United States has
already come under attack from China, among others. In the words of Air Force Secretary Michael
Wynne, "The aim
is to develop a major command that stands alongside Air Force Space Command and
Air Combat Command as the provider of forces that the President, combatant
commanders and the American people can rely on for preserving the freedom of
access and commerce, in air, space and now cyberspace."
However, the goal of preserving free access to Space
and cyberspace is paramount. Worldwide, most people believe that Space should
not be militarized. The underlying principle here is
that Space, Outer Space and celestial resources, such as the Moon or the
planets, are the common heritage of humanity as a whole and should not be
appropriated by any one country or any nation in particular, through military
means or otherwise. Besides, any attempt by one nation to militarize
Space, and even to take control of cyberspace, would be in violation of the
spirit of the 1967 “Outer Space Treaty” (OST). This fundamental treaty has been signed by 125 countries and ratified
by 98, and it solemnly bars participating nations from placing nuclear weapons
or any other weapons of mass destruction in orbit of Earth, installing them on
the Moon or any other celestial body, or to otherwise station them in Outer
Space.
That is why the world entered into a new
era when China, on January 11 (2007), launched a missile strike against one of
its old orbiting weather satellites, 800 kilometers above Earth. The Chinese
government also announced that the deployment of its anti-satellite (ASAT)
weapon was a move to demonstrate the danger of having weapons in Space, and
that its objective was to encourage the Bush-Cheney administration to enter
into talks aiming at abolishing weapons in Space. Unfortunately, the current administreation had already announced that it
opposes the development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that would
seek to prohibit or limit access to, or use of, Space. —It acts like it would welcome a new arms race in Space and
possibly would like to start a new 'Cold War' with China and Russia.
The issue of weapons in Space is not new. In
1981, the old Soviet Union developed an ASAT system consisting of a
bomb-carrying satellite, which was positioned next to a target satellite to be
destroyed. During the same period, the United States developed an ASAT system,
whereby an F-15 fighter would carry a two-stage missile to a high altitude and
let the missile tracking system guide it to a target missile set to be
destroyed. Since Congress voted a moratorium on the development of ASAT
systems, in 1985, the United States has not tested any new ASAT system.
However, the Chinese demonstration and the
Bush-Cheney avowed policy of taking military control of Space indicate that
urgent action is required on this issue, if Space is to be kept demilitarized.
A U.N. agency tailored along the International Atomic Energy
Agency should have the responsibility to inspect any
rocket launch to make sure that it does not carry armaments into Space. That
may be the only way to make sure that no national government place armaments
into Space.
Therefore, it would seem appropriate that the
United Nations, under its new leadership, convene an international conference
and adopt necessary measures to reinforce the Outer Space Treaty and make sure
that no single nation-state can dominate Space
or could ever claim that Space belongs to it.
_____________________________________________________________
Rodrigue
Tremblay lives in Montreal and can be reached at rodrigue.tremblay@yahoo.com
Also
visit his blog site at www.thenewamericanempire.com/blog.
Author's
Website: www.thenewamericanempire.com
Check Dr. Tremblay's coming book
"The Code for Global Ethics" at: http://www.MoralityWithoutReligion.com
_______________________________________________
Posted,
February 12, 2007, at 5:30 am
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