A conversation with William Blum

Last week, al-Qaida spiritual leader Osama bin Laden released his first communiqué in over a year, in which the alleged Sept. 11 mastermind once again warned the United States about its foreign policy and leadership. In his message, bin Laden calls George W. Bush a liar and recommends that US citizens read author William Blum's book Rogue State: A Guide To The World's Only Superpower for a better understanding of what's happening in the world today and why. Until 1967 Blum worked for the US State Department. He resigned, disillusioned by the US war in Vietnam and then became one of the founders and editors of the Washington Free Press. Since then, Blum has toiled away in relative obscurity, cataloguing the lesser-known exploits and motives of US foreign policy while earning praise from the likes of Gore Vidal and Noam Chomsky. Prior to bin Laden's statement, Rogue State was ranked at 209,000 on Amazon's sales list. In a few days, it was number 12. While confronting his incredibly strange and sudden, staggering notoriety in the international spotlight, Blum found some time to speak with AGR. AGR: This past week you were quoted as saying that Sept. 11 was an "understandable reaction to US foreign policy" and that you "would not say that bin Laden has been any less moral than Washington has been." Can you explain this moral equation? William Blum: Well, people accuse bin Laden of killing 3,000 innocent people in New York and Virginia. George Bush in the past three years has killed well over 100,000 people in Afghanistan and Iraq, just as innocent as [those] people, in fact, maybe even more so than those at the Pentagon. So why is one a moral outrage and the other one is "fighting for freedom and democracy?" That's my question. AGR: In your book, you actually go even further. You've written that "a study of US interventions shows clearly that the engine of US foreign policy has been fueled not by a devotion to any kind of morality, nor even simple decency," but by four basic imperatives. Could you elaborate? Blum: One of the main imperatives is that any country that's rising with an attempt to [form] a new kind of society which the US sees as possibly a good example of an alternative to the capitalist model–that is a great threat in Washington. That's the reason why Cuba has been so harassed by the US for so many years. I think the Cuban model–even though our oppression of Cuba has kept it from being as much as it could be–still has inspired many people and nations all over the world. That's the crime of Cuba in Washington's eyes. AGR: There is a popular tendency among many leftwing critics of US foreign policy to merely attribute their frustrations to recent events and the Bush presidency. Your books suggest, however, that US imperialism has long been a bipartisan project. Could you speak more about that? Blum: I think that there's almost nothing done by the Bush administration in the past few years in its foreign policy that cannot find it's parallel in prior Democratic administrations again and again–including the invasion of countries for no legal or moral reason. The bombing of Yugoslavia [is an example]. I think the main difference between the current administration and past ones is that the Bush people broadcast very proudly what they are doing and what they intend to do. They're super-arrogant. It's almost remarkable how unashamed they are. They put it in writing. The government and associated think-tanks issue policy papers which tell the world that we are not going to accept any challenge to our sovereignty as the only superpower. And they name countries who are on the list for intervention by the US if they don't behave themselves. They're very open [about it]. In the past, such behavior was kept more covert. That is one big difference between the present and the past. But the actual policies are very similar. I think the one reason that so many people today can't stand Bush isn't simply that he's worse than any of his predecessors. I think it has a lot to do with his personality and character. If he was not such an ignorant, uneducated and uncharming person, I think people would be willing to accept a lot more from him. Like with Clinton. Clinton was pretty bad in his foreign policy, but he was very articulate and fairly educated. He could express himself very, very well and he could charm people. Bush can't do that. And that, I think, is one important reason why he is looked upon as so much worse than anyone else before him. AGR: You've called Bill Clinton a "war criminal." Blum: Right. Mainly because of what he did to Yugoslavia. The book of mine which is currently in the news, Rogue State, was inspired by that. We were told that the American bombing in 1999 was an act of humanitarianism. That inspired me to sit down and write this book, which is, in effect, a mini-encyclopedia of the many types of un-humanitarian US foreign policies. I have chapters on torture, interventions and overthrowing governments and interfering in elections and the use of chemical and biological weapons–one very immoral thing after another which make up our foreign policy. AGR: Torture has been in the news a lot these days, with much of the media treating US involvement in torture as a recent development. Your books amply demonstrate that far from being an invention of the Bush administration, torture has been routinely exported by the US for decades. Tell us about it. Blum: On that point I must say that its worse under the Bushes. Now American soldiers and the CIA are directly carrying out the torture. In the past it was mainly the US directing other people in the third world to use the torture methods. So that's a difference. AGR: Your books fly in the face of the idea that the US is a champion of democracy, exporting it throughout the world. What's the United States really up to then? Blum: Many people, even in the anti-war movement, I think accept the idea that the US government is actually campaigning around the world to install democracy here and there. But the question that must be asked is "what kind of democracy?" What does the White House think democracy is? I say their idea of democracy is largely a society which is open and receptive to the multinationals and to the globalization of the IMF, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization. AGR: You're saying that it's more about corporate expropriation. Blum: Right. That's what Washington leaders call an "open and free society." The corporation can go into a third world country and have as many legal rights as any native company. That's free market and that's "freedom and democracy." And of course we know how this impoverishes native businesses. That's a major part of what the US means by "democracy." They also don't include any element of what I would call "economic democracy." There's no attempt to bridge the gap between those for whom too much is not enough and those who are living in abject poverty. That's the last thing any of these policies aim at–closing that gap. And I maintain, as many people do, that you cannot talk about a society being democratic when you have this incredible gap between the rich and the poor. AGR: In Rogue State you also pay attention to what's happening domestically here. In an obscure tidbit, but one that I find fascinating, you say that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) "is keeping up-to-date its list of aliens, radicals and other undesirables who will be rounded up and detained in times of 'national emergency.'" How do you know this? Blum: That came about during [the] Iran-Contra [hearings]. That's in my last chapter, which I call "How Does the US Get Away With It?" I maintain it's because the world, as well as Americans, are enamored with this mystique of America–the idea that America is the beacon of freedom and hope for the world. And it's been that way for a long, long time. It's hard to convince people to change their thinking about US foreign policy as long as they hold onto that belief. In this chapter I give about 30 or 40 pages [documenting] very often savage happenings in the US itself–actions carried out by our government agencies. [The newest edition released two months ago] has been unchanged from what I wrote in the first edition back in 2000. It would be even worse now after the PATRIOT Act, Homeland Security and 9/11. When I speak to college students, one of the main points I hammer home is that they will never begin to understand what their government is doing abroad as long as they cling to the belief that it means well. And that is a great, deeply buried hang-up people have here: no matter how horrible it looks, we do mean well. AGR: I think you define it as being the result of a "slick public relations operation." Blum: Yes. If one were to define "brainwashing" as the gap between what a people believe about their society and the actual facts of that society, by that definition you would find that the American people are the most brainwashed in the world. AGR: Would you say that fascism has taken root in the US today? Blum: I think "fascism" is a word used too loosely on the left as a pejorative. I tend to use it in a more narrow sense, as it arose in Germany and Italy in the '30s. It's where the working class become so powerful that the corporations–the corporate leaders–have no choice but to suppress them rudely, kill the unions and imprison people as much as possible. In America, we haven't got a working class which is that advanced or that powerful. So that wouldn't fit into that definition. People use the word "fascism" simply to mean "oppressive." And our government certainly is oppressive. AGR: At the risk of provoking a treasonous conversation, what do you think about overthrowing the government? It seems like an obvious conclusion after reading your books. Blum: Well, it depends on who does it and for what reason and what outcome. I'm not opposed to this government falling by the wayside and being replaced by something else. But it will never happen through force. They have all the force. So that's why I'm part of a movement which is committed to educating the public as much as possible and hoping that eventually our numbers will reach a critical mass. And that's why I'm so glad about this so-called endorsement from bin Laden. He's gotten me in the mass media, where I never would have otherwise been. And it's purely for political reasons that I say that. On the one hand, I totally despise religious fundamentalism and the kinds of society spawned by it, like the Taliban in Afghanistan. On the other hand, like I said, I'm a part of this movement which needs the mass media to reach the American public. And so I'm very glad about that.