News Link • Iran
Iran Is Not My Enemy
• https://www.fff.org, by Jacob G. HornbergerBut that doesn't make one whit of difference to me. Iran is still not my enemy, especially since the U.S. (and Israeli) war is immoral, illegal, and unconstitutional.
My enemy continues to be the U.S. government, specifically the U.S. national-security state and its deadly and destructive policy of foreign interventionism, which are responsible for bringing about this deadly, destructive, immoral, illegal, and unconstitutional war.
I remind myself of what one of my heroes, Muhammad Ali, stated when the Pentagon tried to seize him and train him to kill or die in the national-security state's intervention into Vietnam's civil war. He said, "I ain't got no quarrel with them Viet Cong. No Viet Cong ever called me [the n-word]."
His statement, needless to say, was considered heresy by those who had come to view the national-security state (i.e., the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA) as their god. It would have been considered bad enough if a white man had said that. He would have been blasted for being disloyal and unpatriotic, accused of hating America, and accused of loving the Reds. The fact that it was a black man publicly making such a heretical statement made it significantly worse. Blacks were expected to be silent, supportive, and obedient. Moreover, blacks were expected to simply ignore the fact that the "freedom" they were expected to kill and die for in Vietnam was the "freedom" to live in a segregated society here at home. While U.S. officials saw no problem with that situation, lots of blacks, including Ali, certainly did.
Well, to paraphrase Mohammad Ali, I ain't got no quarrel with them Iranians. No Iranian has ever destroyed my freedom. Unfortunately, the same can't be said of the U.S. government. It has, in fact, destroyed my freedom, including through the national-security state and its policy of foreign interventionism (not to mention the drug war, the immigration police state, the socialism of the welfare state, and others).
Throughout all the hoopla surrounding these foreign interventions, when statists go through their periodic paroxysms of joy and glee over invasions, occupations, killings, torture, death, and destruction — and, in the process, rally 'round the flag in loyalty and patriotism — I maintain my focus on my enemy.
You see, when the U.S. national-security state succeeds in getting Americans to focus on the glorious military battles in Iran, Venezuela, Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam, Korea, or other places around the world, it knows that people will avoid focusing on what their government is doing to further the destruction of liberty here at home, including, in fact, through its policy of foreign interventions. That's exactly the way they want it.



