“Hopes and Prospects” by Noam Chomsky

Chomsky talking about the founding of the USA:

The United States is, I suppose, the only country that was founded as an “infant empire” in the words of the father of the country.  After liberation from England, George Washington observed that “the gradual extension of our settlements will as certainly cause the savage, as the wolf, to retire; both being beasts of prey, though they differ in shape.”  We must “induce [the Aborigines] to relinquish our Territories and to remove into the illimitable regions of the West” – which we were to “induce” them to leave later on, for heaven.  The Territories became “ours” by right of conquest as the “Aborigines” were regularly instructed. 

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Chomsky on Iraq, prior to the 1990 invasion of Kuwait:

Well after Iraq’s war with Iran, the United States continued to support Saddam, even to expedite his development of weapons of mass destruction.  Nuclear weapons specialist Gary Milhollin testified to Congress in 1992 that “if you look at the nuclear weapon program, you can see that if Saddam Hussein had not invaded Kuwait [in August 1990], Iraq would be very close to making a bomb today with American machine tools, American instruments for controlling the quality of nuclear weapon material, American computers for nuclear design, and Iraqi scientists trained in America in the techniques of nuclear detonation [in 1989, well after the end of the Iraq-Iran war].  Also the UN found American equipment at chemical and ballistic missile sites.  The UN early this year sent the US State Department a confidential list of American equipment that had turned up in chemical and ballistic missile programs.”  In April 1990, President Bush I even sent a high-level congressional delegation, led by Senate majority leader Bob Dole, to convey his personal greetings to his good friend and to assure him that he should disregard criticisms by “the haughty and pampered press” who are out of control. 

A few months later Saddam defied or misunderstood orders, and shifted from admired friend to the embodiment of evil.  All such matters have been consigned to the usual repository of unwelcome fact.

Photo:  USA today.... March 20, 2011 at Quantico Marine base.