From State And State Power To Man And Social - National ...

and technologies. As a market, the Arab Gulf is very important because its merchandise importsadd up to nearly the same as those of Russia and India combined. Arab Gulf’s ports and airportsalso play strategic role in giving America access to Central and South-East Asia. Indeed, theAmerican government found its bases and other facilities in the Arab Gulf indispensable in itsfight against the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. Besides, the Arabs of the Gulf region playa crucial part in American and European capital markets: they hold an estimated US$1.3 trillionin overseas investments, “including perhaps $400 billion worth of American shares”.Furthermore, the American government wishes to guarantee, for itself, and for Europe, as well asEgypt, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Syria, India, Bangladesh and the Philippines – mostly its allies – thejob security of eleven million expatriate workers which the Arab Gulf states and companiesemploy and who send home US$25 billion in remittances every year.[The Economist, March 23,2002: “A Survey of the Gulf”:1-28]What available empirical evidence reveals, therefore, is that globalization is the ideology ofcapitalist states of Europe and America which they employ as a fig leaf to mask the interests ofthe ruling class in each of their countries. For these capitalist states, especially the United Statesof America, under George W. Bush, national interest is often conflated and confused withcorporate interest. In 2002, I contended that “the impending great power war on Iraq is a war indefence of capitalist globalization”. Today, I stand by that argument.Those that control state power in the United States of America utilize it to promote and defendthe corporate world, partly because several of the American political leaders, themselves, arealso part of the profit-seeking business world. In the Stupid White Men, Michael Moore providesbackground information on some of the closest associates of the American President, George W.Bush. According to Moore, Dick Cheney, the U. S. Vice-President, was chief executive officerof Halliburton Industries, an oil services company. Halliburton, he asserts, had “dealings” withregimes in Burma and Iraq, and two subsidiaries of Halliburton were, by 2001, doing businesswith Iraq. Paul O’Neil, appointed U. S. Secretary of the Treasurer by George W. Bushimmediately he became President, had served as president and chief executive officer of Alcoa,before joining the Bush administration. Alcoa is said to be the world’s largest manufacturer ofaluminum. The man appointed Secretary of Commerce by Bush when he assumed office, DonEvans, was chairman and chief executive officer of Tom Brown, Inc., US$1.2 billion oil and gascompany. The former U.S. Secretary of Defence, Don Rumsfeld, who also served under GeorgeW. Bush was chief executive officer of G.D.Searle pharmaceutical company and GeneralInstrument. Before joining the administration of Bush, he had served on the board of Kellogg,Sears, Allstate, and the Tribune Company. The former U.S. National Security Adviser andcurrent U.S. Secretary of State under Bush, Condoleezza Rice, had served on the board ofdirectors of Chevron, and had a 130,000 ton oil tanker named after her. “She was also a directorat Charles Schwarb and Transamerica, and [had] served as an adviser to J.P. Morgan”.[Moore,2001:17-25]Considering this interesting composition of the American government under Bush, between 2001and 2004, it is easy to understand why the American state had to be dragged into war in Iraq, andis kept there still. The fact is that the interests of the American political leadership coincide with38