The Innocence of Power
I was thinking (again) about how nobody at the top in America is ever held accountable. For anything. CIA chief Allen Dulles got away with overthrowing democratic governments around the world and organizing (and covering up) the Kennedy assassination. The architects of the Vietnam War were never put on trial -- were never even forced to defend their fateful decisions which cost the lives of over one million Vietnamese people and over 60,000 U.S. soldiers. The trio of men who lied about WMD and went on a spree of war crimes during their "war on terror" were also allowed to peacefully retire. And many of the men and women who propagandized for the disastrous invasion of Iraq are back as TV talking heads and even Washington policymakers.
Those murderous U.S. drone strikes in Afghanistan that claimed the innocent lives of entire families? The New York Times -- when not busy whipping up war hysteria -- exposed the secret military unit responsible for the latest atrocities. But don't hold your breath -- the Pentagon won't punish anyone.
This is the hubris of the powerful. The arrogance of Empire.
As the Egyptian-Canadian novelist Omar El Akkad recently remarked, "The real engine at the heart of broken systems -- the most insidious, burrowing thing -- is not their cruelty: It's the way power obliterates consequences, the certainty that those responsible, by virtue of how deeply the game is rigged in their favor, will always get away with it."
Of course El Akkad, who was writing in the New York Times, was not talking about U.S. power. Tie Times -- like the rest of our mainstream media -- seldom if ever shines the same spotlight on our own imperial crimes. At least not strongly enough for anyone to be actually held responsible.
But our media -- and President Biden -- have been quick to label Putin's atrocities in Ukraine what they are -- war crimes. And they've suggested that the Russian leader be dragged before an international tribunal for his crimes.
The problem, as Putin himself has pointed out, is that the United States has no moral standing to level these charges. Because we ourselves have committed the same crimes -- in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, the Philippines, Central America, the Middle East... and on and on.
The United States is primarily responsible for creating the moral and legal vacuum in the world that Putin is now exploiting.
The U.S. has committed these crimes with total impunity. That's what those in power do. As El Akkad observed, it's the cruelest aspect of power -- complete unaccountability.
