[lbo-talk] Developments in the world economy and the concept offoreign ownership

[Carl Remick]

>From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
>
>... It makes me wonder who really drove all
>that inter-imperialist war in the 19th and early 20th centuries. My
>pal who's doing a diss on the City of London says the City didn't
>want WW I - the politicians did. The City was making too much money
>floating securities for Germany. More recently, I don't think it was
>even the oil industry that pushed for the invasion of Iraq; that came
>from politicians and right-wing intellectuals. Now they may have a
>"better" grasp of the long-term interest of capital than the
>capitalists themselves, but a lot of capitalists just prefer the
>status quo to something as risky as war.

I think the stereotypical image of there being a strong affinity between 
capitalists and militarists is way off the mark.  Wheeler-dealers are 
classic appeasers -- witness Joe Kennedy Sr.  They believe in the power of 
the dollar, not the gun, and figure why use violence when you can cut a deal 
-- there's plenty in it for everyone.  That's why I think it's ludicrous to 
propose the Iraq invasion was "about oil."  The major US oil companies did 
just fine for decades in the Mideast by brandishing dollars not armored 
artillery -- what strategic sense did it make for them to get rid of the 
smooth, discreet, no-risk, low-cost, dollar-diplomacy that had successfully 
powered the global oil trade for generations, in favor of the high-cost, 
reckless, smash-and-grab approach to oil sourcing represented by the Iraq 
invasion?  Business people might like military metaphors, but they do not 
like military methods.

Carl

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