Carrol Cox wrote:
>
> the ongoing "conspiracy in the open" that characterizes imperialist policy.
Let's take as an example the incident that every conspiracy theorist regales us with -- the Tonkin Bay Incident.
We know now that this incident did not happen. Suppose that back in 1966 or 1967 the anti-war movement would have obtained proof-positive that it did not happen, that it was a hoax. Would we have been correct to make that part of our agitation?
Absolutely Not. The crucial point about the Tonkin Bay Incident is that _even if it were true_ it would still have been an outrage for the U.S. to intervene. North Vietnam had a perfect right to sink any destroyer in the Tonkin Bay. That right is what we needed to defend, not waste our time proving that the U.S. government was lying for the nth time. That is what an anti-imperialist movement must bring to ever larger sectors of the u.s. working class: the open, the legal, the above-board process of u.s. diplomatic and military policy are crimes. We must _not_ clutter this crucial point.
Everyone knew that Pinochet's coup was supported and even engendered by U.S. imperialism, just as everyone knew that the overthrow of Mossedegh was engineered by the U.S. It was and would be superfluous in both cases to pile up information about cia shenanigans. They are irrelevant. Fundamental U.S. policy is the threat, and it operates in the open -- but the media make sure that no _understands_ the facts that they more or less know as facts. Our task is not to add to the factual overload but to point out the significance of the known -- of the conpsiracy in the open which is the mode of existence of u.s. capitalism.
Carrol