The Inauguration Speech: Consolidating the Empire

The Inauguration Speech: Consolidating the Empire
Phyllis Bennis
Institute for Policy Studies, 20 January 2005

• Bush's speech demonstrated that the US drive towards empire will be strengthened,
  focusing on "freedom" and "liberty" as the key rationale.
• The claim that US foreign policy is based on support for freedom and liberty
  is a lie, and represents the worst kind of hypocrisy and double standards.
• Bush's speech signals that the rest of the world had better toe the US line
  or face US wrath.
• Future US military attacks will be justified as necessary to protect American
  freedom and liberty, and explained as bringing freedom and liberty to oppressed
  people around the world.

Bush's second inaugural speech was designed to signal to the US and to the
rest of the world that the drive towards empire that shaped his first four years
will be consolidated and strengthened in the second term, driven by a new focus
on "the force of human freedom." While never mentioning the word, the catastrophic
Iraq war was recast as an unstoppable drive towards "freedom."

The claim that Bush's foreign policy is or will be based on support for real
freedom and liberty is a lie, and represents the worst kind of hypocrisy and
double standards. The fact is that the second Bush term will almost certainly
reflect the same narrow standards for defining "freedom" and defining repressive
governments as the first. When the US sees an opportunity to use elections
to bring a pro-Western government to power (Ukraine) or to claim that "freedom"
and "democracy" are on the rise (Iraq) it will support elections. But elections
are a tactic; real freedom and real liberty are not on Washington's agenda.
This gap between rhetoric and reality is not new - Bush also claimed to be against
torture. There is new evidence supporting the allegation that Bush's top symbol
of freedom and democracy in Iraq, US-installed prime minister Ayad Allawi,
did in fact murder six unarmed, bound prisoners in the courtyard of a Baghdad
prison in 2003.

As a result, the next four years are as unlikely to see serious diplomatic or
economic (let alone military) pressure on such repressive allies as Saudi Arabia,
Israel, Egypt, Uzbekistan, Pakistan as were the last four. Among other things,
these countries continue to provide valuable torture venues for the "rendition"
of US prisoners. It does mean that military threats against governments deemed
"outlaw regimes" (which according to Condoleezza Rice include Cuba, Myanmar,
Iran, North Korea, Belarus and Zimbabwe) or those judged "oppressors" will have
an easier, automatic justification: liberty and freedom. Non-military attacks
will likely rise as well, including the withholding of economic aid to poor countries
the Bush White House deems insufficiently free and democratic.

While Bush's rhetorical reference to the "untamed fire of freedom" will likely
be the headline and centerpiece of press attention, probably the most important
single line in his speech was his statement that "division among free nations
is a goal of freedom's enemies." The statement is the second-term version of
his infamous "you're either with us or with the terrorists" line, signaling that
his global coalition of the coerced had better toe the US line.

We can anticipate that references to "freedom" and "liberty" will provide both
the chosen rationale and the claimed result of military attacks, invasions and
occupations in the next four years. Bush will continue to link "liberty" for
Americans at home with "the success of liberty in other lands," justifying unilateral
military aggression as legitimate because its aim is to insure "the success of
liberty in our land."

The crusader-style absolutism of the Bush administration's claim of righteousness
has grown even stronger. Bush spoke in words of absolute certainty: "oppression
is always wrong; freedom is eternally right." But who is oppressed, what is
freedom, what to do about the lack of freedom - are all subjects for the White
House, not for global citizens. The Bush definition takes no account of the
actual views of those living somewhere he deems subject to his "goal of ending
tyranny in our world." The view of increasing number of Iraqis, for instance
- that their violent, impoverished, repressive, socially corrosive world of US
military occupation actually makes their lives less secure, more dangerous and
generally worse than their lives under Saddam Hussein - has no place in Bush's
manichean world.

Bush's speech described a world of endless military intervention against "outlaw
regimes" and in support of "all who live in tyranny and hopelessness." The US
"will not excuse oppressors," he said, and addressing himself to those who live
under oppression, "when you stand for liberty we stand with you." Bush invoked
the model of the US military as a heroic global Spiderman, with the 82nd Airborne
webswinging across the globe wherever brave men and women "stand for liberty."
The reality, of course, is far different. The US occupation of Iraq, with
all its horrors, is a much better example of what US military intervention
leads to.

The peace movement - both in the US and globally - now faces the obligation
of reclaiming the fight for freedom and liberty as our own. If the Bush administration
really stood for freedom we would stand with them - but it doesn't. WE are the
ones who support real freedom and real liberty. We must redefine those concepts
away from Bush's xenophobic rhetoric aimed at justifying invasion and occupation,
and instead return the goals of real freedom and real liberty - our goals - to
their place at the heart of our struggle for peace and justice.