Is New World Order Leading to New World Fear? (Page 1 of 2)

Headlines these days: Explosions in Iraq; Cease-fire, Tenuous at Best, in Southern Lebanon; Three U.S. Soldiers Killed in Afghanistan; Threats of Airline Terrorism...

Anybody out there remember the New World Order?

That was the catchphrase floated by the first President Bush, wasn’t it, after the disintegration of the Soviet Union threw the old order into chaos. The phrase didn’t have a terribly long public life, I think because it had a worrisome undertone. It suggested a realignment of global power dynamics in a new One-Superpower World. Outside the U.S., and in a few places inside it, that image caused a little discomfort.

It’s been more than 15 years since we started the big change. Too early, maybe, for a final judgment, but not too early to pause and take stock. How’s it all shaking out, this New World Order?

Don’t be fooled by the silence of the media lambs—while the phrase fell out of public favor, the idea has been carefully nurtured in the power circles that Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld run in. They’ve made plans, plotted strategies, taken actions, even launched a war, all in service of U.S. global power.

The U.S. Space Command, for instance, a branch of the Air Force, issued its strategic vision in a document called “Vision 2010”. It was a bold expression of the New World Order, filled with language like “full spectrum dominance” and graphics showing U.S. lasers prepared to blast “enemy” communication satellites out of the sky. It suggested we would one day control all access to space from a military base on the moon and noted that the U.S. would reserve the right to determine what constitutes a “military target.”

Those creative Space Command boys foresaw a day when the United States of America would rule the globe unchallenged. China, India, and other global power wanna-bes would be forced to stay in our good favor or learn to live without cell phones, international communications, GPS systems, or modern technology.

In the years since the Space Command released that visionary document, it has been busy putting the pieces of its plan in place. I think of it every time I hear a story about NASA’s determination to get the shuttle back in flight (it now has a failure rate of less than 1-in-120, meaning one of every 120 flights result in mission failure; few of us would take those kind of odds with the morning carpool) or the battle for funding for a space probe to anywhere. Why, with so many human needs going begging, would the government, with so little discussion, continue to invest billions in exploring Mars? Just for the thrill of exploring the unknown or is there a hidden hand, perhaps, at the end of the sleeve of a military uniform, operating here? Are we still in a space race—not to claim development rights on Jupiter, but to make sure the militarization of space takes place under the Stars and Stripes?

It’s all part of the New World Order, about which I think there are at least two questions worth asking. The first is the incumbent’s question: How are we doing? The second is more personal: How do we feel about it?

How are we doing? After George I declared the New World Order, his first plunge into the nitty gritty was the first Gulf War. He marshalled support from political leaders around the globe for a military mission to drive Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. He even showed some restraint—and military wisdom—by stopping his war when he accomplished that mission. At the time, I opposed the Gulf War on principle and also because it seemed that a violent response would, down the road, come back to haunt us.

Now we have a Middle East in utter chaos. Iraq is in a bloody civil war with more than 20,000 dead—most innocents, more than 2,500 our sons and daughters and 10 times that many wounded. Open threats to Iran and Syria, coupled with a sit-on-our-hands policy toward Israel’s Gaza operations, have strengthened Hamas and re-awakened Hezbollah. Threatened and embarrassed by kidnappings, Israel—surely with U.S. permission—overreacted. Hundreds are dead, mostly victims of cross-fire: children, women, people minding their own business on both sides of the border.