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Michael Hudson 2026, 伊朗的挑戰：重塑地區格局
邁克爾·哈德森 2026年3月11日
https://michael-hudson.com/2026/03/irans-challenge-rewire-the-region/
思考不可思議之事：伊朗終結美國在中東存在的宏偉計劃
伊朗和唐納德·特朗普都曾解釋過，如果不將當前的戰爭進行到底，隻會導致新一輪的相互攻擊。特朗普在3月6日宣布，“除了無條件投降，不會與伊朗達成任何協議”，並表示他必須在任命或至少批準伊朗新領導人方麵擁有發言權，就像他剛剛在委內瑞拉所做的那樣。 “如果美國軍方必須徹底擊敗伊朗並實現政權更迭，否則‘你經曆這一切，五年後你會發現你扶植上來的人也好不到哪裏去’。”美國至少需要這麽長時間才能補充被消耗殆盡的武器裝備，重建雷達及相關設施，並發動一場新的戰爭。
伊朗官員同樣認識到，除非美國被逐出中東，否則美國的襲擊將會不斷重複。去年六月，當以色列和美國在該地區反導防禦係統被削弱時，伊朗沒有乘勝追擊，而是同意停火。伊朗意識到，一旦美國能夠重新武裝其盟友和軍事基地，戰爭就會再次爆發，雙方都認為這是一場旨在尋求某種最終解決方案的戰爭。
2月28日爆發的這場戰爭實際上可以被視為第三次世界大戰的正式開端，因為問題的關鍵在於全世界購買石油和天然氣的條件。他們能否從出口國那裏購買這些能源？除了美元之外，俄羅斯和伊朗（以及直到最近還有委內瑞拉）還有哪些貨幣？美國目前要求控製國際石油貿易，這是否會迫使石油出口國以美元計價，甚至將出口收入和國民儲蓄重新投入美國政府證券、債券和股票？
這種石油美元的循環利用一直是美國將世界石油貿易金融化和武器化的基礎，也是其孤立那些不願服從美國統治秩序（沒有真正的規則，隻有美國臨時提出的要求）的國家的帝國主義戰略的基礎。因此，問題的關鍵不僅在於美國在中東的軍事存在——以及其兩支代理軍隊：以色列和“伊斯蘭國”/基地組織。美國和以色列聲稱伊朗擁有大規模殺傷性核武器的說法，與2003年對伊拉克的指控一樣，都是虛構的。問題的關鍵在於終結中東的經濟。與美國的聯盟關係，以及其石油出口收入是否會繼續以美元結算，以此作為美國國際收支平衡的支撐，並用於支付其在全球各地的軍事基地開支，這些問題都懸而未決。
伊朗已宣布，它將戰鬥到底，直至實現三個目標，以防止未來戰爭的爆發。首先，也是最重要的，美國必須從其在中東的所有軍事基地撤軍。伊朗已經摧毀了約旦、卡塔爾、阿聯酋和巴林境內雷達預警係統、防空和導彈防禦設施的核心部分，使其無法引導美國或以色列的導彈襲擊或攻擊伊朗。如果這些基地或設施不被放棄，阿拉伯國家將遭到轟炸。
伊朗提出的接下來兩項要求似乎過於激進，西方難以想象。阿拉伯歐佩克國家必須切斷與美國的緊密經濟聯係，首先要切斷亞馬遜、微軟和穀歌在美國運營的數據中心。而且，他們不僅必須停止以美元計價其石油和天然氣價格，但要撤回其現有的石油美元持有量，這些持有量來自美國投資，自1974年為獲得美國允許將其石油出口價格提高四倍而達成的協議以來，這些投資一直在補貼美國的國際收支平衡。
這三項要求將終結美國對歐佩克國家的經濟影響力，從而顛覆世界石油貿易。其結果將是世界石油貿易去美元化，並重新轉向亞洲和全球多數國家。伊朗的計劃不僅意味著美國在軍事和經濟上的失敗，還意味著近東附庸君主製國家及其與什葉派公民關係的終結。
第一步：將美國驅逐出其在中東的軍事基地
伊拉克議會持續要求美軍撤離該國，並停止竊取其石油（其中大部分輸送給以色列）。議會剛剛再次通過立法，指示美軍撤離伊拉克。與伊拉克內政部長的高級顧問及其隨行軍官會麵。上周一（3月2日），伊朗代表團在德黑蘭表示，伊朗準將阿裏·阿卜杜拉希重申了伊朗過去五年來一直提出的要求，自唐納德·特朗普第一屆政府卸任以來，伊朗就一直堅持這一要求。
2020年1月3日，特朗普下令暗殺伊朗和伊拉克兩位頂級反恐談判代表——卡西姆·蘇萊曼尼和阿布·馬赫迪·穆罕迪斯，他們當時正試圖避免全麵戰爭。鑒於特朗普如今仍在延續同樣的政策，這位伊朗指揮官表示：“驅逐美國是恢複該地區安全與穩定的最重要一步。”
然而，所有阿拉伯王國都設有美國軍事基地。伊朗已宣布，任何允許美國飛機或其他軍事力量使用這些基地的國家都將麵臨立即摧毀這些基地的風險。科威特、巴林和阿聯酋已經遭到攻擊，沙特阿拉伯也因此向伊朗承諾，不會允許美軍在其領土上進行任何軍事行動。
西班牙已禁止美國使用其機場支持其對伊朗的戰爭。但當西班牙首相佩德羅·桑切斯禁止美國使用這些基地時，特朗普總統在橢圓形辦公室的新聞發布會上指出，西班牙實際上無法阻止美國空軍使用位於西班牙南部、由美西兩國共有的羅塔和莫龍空軍基地，盡管這些基地仍由西班牙指揮。“現在西班牙竟然說我們不能使用他們的基地。沒關係，我們不想用。如果我們想用，我們當然可以用。我們可以直接飛過去用，沒人會阻止我們。” 西班牙究竟會怎麽做來阻止呢？擊落美國飛機嗎？
如果阿拉伯君主國試圖阻止美國使用其境內的基地和領空來對抗伊朗，它們將麵臨同樣的問題。它們能做什麽？
或者更確切地說，它們願意做什麽？伊朗堅持要求卡塔爾、阿拉伯聯合共和國、巴林、科威特、沙特阿拉伯、約旦和其他近東君主製國家關閉其境內所有美軍基地，並禁止美國使用其領空和機場，以此作為不轟炸這些國家並將戰爭擴大到這些君主製政權本身的條件。
如果這些國家拒絕——或無力阻止美國在其境內使用軍事基地——伊朗將迫使其政權更迭。在巴勒斯坦人占勞動力很大比例的國家，例如約旦，這將最容易實現。伊朗呼籲約旦和其他近東國家的什葉派民眾推翻君主製，以擺脫美國的控製。有傳言稱巴林國王已離開該國。
第二步：切斷中東與美國的商業和金融聯係
阿拉伯君主國正麵臨更大的壓力，不得不滿足伊朗的最終要求，即使其經濟與美國脫鉤。自1974年以來，它們一直將自身經濟與美國緊密相連。最近，巴林、阿聯酋和沙特阿拉伯試圖利用其能源資源吸引計算機數據中心，包括星鏈（Starlink）和其他與美國政權更迭和對伊朗的軍事打擊有關的係統。
伊朗反對美國將其非石油部門與阿拉伯歐佩克中東地區緊密整合的計劃，並宣布這些設施是其將美國驅逐出該地區的“合法目標”。一位雲計算經理表示，伊朗對亞馬遜數據中心的AWS攻擊是出於軍事目的，就像星鏈（阿聯酋有意為其提供資金）在今年2月被用於美國煽動民眾抗議伊朗政府一樣。
第三步：停止將歐佩克石油出口轉化為美元
伊朗最激進的要求是要求其阿拉伯鄰國實現經濟去美元化。這是防止美國企業主導其經濟乃至政府的關鍵。一位伊朗官員告訴CNN，伊朗指責購買美國國債和投資美國國債的公司是其反美戰爭的同謀，因為伊朗認為這些公司是這場戰爭的資助者。“德黑蘭認為這些公司及其在該地區的管理人員是合法的打擊目標。這些人已被警告盡快宣布撤資。”
沙特阿拉伯、阿聯酋、科威特和卡塔爾確實正在討論撤回對美國和其他國家的投資，因為伊朗封鎖霍爾木茲海峽導致這些國家的石油和液化天然氣生產能力已達上限，不得不停止生產。它們來自能源、航運和旅遊業的收入也已中斷。海灣國家將於3月8日（周日）舉行會議，討論撤回其在中東地區高達2萬億美元的美元投資（主要來自沙特阿拉伯）。此舉被視為歐佩克投資擺脫美元依賴的第一步。
如果美國放棄其在中東的軍事基地，與美元脫鉤將大大削弱美國對中東石油的控製，從而削弱其利用石油貿易作為主要咽喉要道來脅迫其他國家的戰略。
迫使各國遵守特朗普“美國優先”的統治者主導的秩序（這完全取決於他個人的意願，沒有任何明確的規則）。
對於君主製國家而言，伊朗要求結束美國對中東的戰爭所帶來的改變，其影響將類似於第一次世界大戰之後的情況：許多阿拉伯國家的君主製政權將不複存在，這些國家的經濟和政治聯盟都建立在與美國的聯盟之上。首先，沙特阿拉伯、卡塔爾、埃及、約旦、巴林、科威特和阿聯酋等已同意加入特朗普“和平委員會”的國家正麵臨壓力。
擁有世界最多伊斯蘭人口的印度尼西亞剛剛撤回了此前向特朗普“加沙和平計劃”派遣8000名士兵的提議，伊朗正在向阿拉伯君主製國家施壓，要求它們效仿，以抗議美國的政策。它們會這樣做嗎？終止美國在其領土上的軍事基地使用權，可能會導致美國沒收其美元儲備，迫使其改變主意。但如果伊朗試圖避免得罪美國，則可能麵臨伊朗的指責，認為其並非真正反對戰爭。
其他一些政策可能會加劇伊朗對美國放棄《聯合國憲章》國際法規則和文明戰爭法的挑戰。各國可能會向國際刑事法院提起訴訟，指控特朗普發動對伊朗的未宣戰戰爭、襲擊並殺害伊朗領導人以及轟炸平民中心（例如首批襲擊目標之一的女子學校）犯有戰爭罪。
伊朗將美國逐出中東的目標所帶來的附帶影響
追求伊朗的目標意味著一場曠日持久的戰爭。隨著以色列和美國軍方防空和導彈防禦係統的消耗殆盡，局勢將進一步升級，伊朗將得以發動規模遠超去年六月同意停火時所達到的嚴重攻擊。未來幾周，伊朗將開始使用其最先進的導彈攻擊以色列和其他美國代理人。
由於伊朗已封鎖霍爾木茲海峽，除其自身船隻外禁止其他船隻通行，而這些船隻大多運載著運往中國的石油，因此新增石油產量無處安放。由於倫敦勞合社拒絕簽發保險，甚至沒有船隻試圖靠近海峽。
美國軍方近期擊沉或扣押了運載石油的俄羅斯船隻，但由於油價飆升，為了抑製全球通脹，美國允許此類石油運輸。財政部長斯科特·貝森特表示，財政部正在研究是否可以將更多受製裁的俄羅斯原油投放市場。“我們可能會解除對其他俄羅斯石油的製裁，”他說道。 “海上滯留著數億桶受製裁的原油……財政部可以通過取消製裁來創造供應。” 此前，美國決定發布一項為期30天的臨時豁免令，允許印度煉油商購買俄羅斯石油，以維持全球供應。
液化天然氣的情況則遠沒有那麽容易解決，卡塔爾是液化天然氣的主要出口國。其儲罐已滿，導致生產被迫停止。其液化天然氣工廠遭到轟炸，需要重建並恢複生產。重建需要兩周時間，之後還需要兩周時間來冷卻這些天然氣。
最近幾天，伊朗襲擊了沙特阿拉伯的兩個石油倉庫，一架無人機襲擊了巴林的一座海水淡化廠，以報複巴林境內對伊朗位於格什姆島的海水淡化廠發動的襲擊。大多數阿拉伯王國對海水淡化的依賴程度遠高於其他國家，其中沙特阿拉伯高達70%，巴林也達到60%。這使得巴林的攻擊如同住在玻璃房子裏卻用磚頭砸牆，實屬愚蠢。
在全球範圍內，不斷上漲的油氣價格將迫使各國經濟體在削減國內社會支出以償還美元債務和應對不斷上漲的石油進口成本，還是宣布暫停償還即將到期的美元債務之間做出選擇。這場戰爭正在撕裂美國/北約西方陣營與全球大多數國家之間的聯係，給日本、韓國乃至歐洲都帶來了難以承受的壓力。一種意識的轉變正在發生——而這正是各國將如何行動（或被迫如何行動）的背景。
美國的這次攻擊徹底摧毀了美國外交官賴以要求其他國家為其全球軍事開支提供補貼和特殊貢賦的敘事。這種虛構的前提是，世界需要美國的軍事支持來保護自身免受俄羅斯、中國以及如今的伊朗的威脅，仿佛這些國家對歐洲和亞洲構成了真正的威脅。
美國外交政策的偽裝是，美國通過發動當前的冷戰來保護世界其他國家。但其對伊朗的攻擊所造成的後果表明，美國實際上才是其盟友安全的最大威脅。美國對伊朗發動的戰爭，徹底粉碎了美國聲稱其正在保護世界免受俄羅斯、中國和伊朗攻擊這一說法背後的巨大謊言。美國未能保護歐佩克國家，其攻擊反而損害了日本、韓國和歐洲，這些地區的汽油價格飆升了20%，而且今天仍在繼續上漲。韓國股市在過去兩天暴跌了18%。所有這些都在轉變人們對美國解除對近東石油控製的支持。
Iran's Challenge: Rewire the Region
Thinking About the Unthinkable: Iran's Grand Plan to End U.S. Presence in the Middle East
Iran and Donald Trump have each explained why failure to fight the current war to the end would simply lead to a new set of mutual attacks. Trump announced on March 6 that “There will be no deal with Iran except unconditional surrender,” and announced that he must have a voice in naming or at least approving Iran’s new leader, as he has just done in Venezuela. “If the U.S. military must utterly defeat it and bring about a regime change, or else “you go through this, and then in five years you realize you put somebody in who’s no better.’” It will take at least that long for America to replace the weaponry that has been depleted, rebuild its radar and related installations and mount a new war.
Iranian officials likewise recognize that U.S. attacks will keep being repeated until the United States is driven out of the Middle East. Having agreed to a ceasefire last June instead of pressing its advantage when Israeli and regional U.S. anti-missile defenses were depleted, Iran realized that war will be resumed as soon as the United States is able to re-arm its allies and military bases to renew what both sides recognize is to be a fight to some kind of final solution.
The war that began on February 28 can realistically be deemed to be the formal opening of World War III because what is at issue are the terms on which the entire world will be able to buy oil and gas. Can they buy this energy from exporters in currencies other than the dollar, headed by Russia and Iran (and until recently, Venezuela)? Will the present U.S. demand to control of the international oil trade require oil-exporting countries to price it in dollars, and indeed to recycle their export earnings and national savings into investments in U.S. government securities, bonds and stocks?
That recycling of petrodollars has been the basis of America’s financialization and weaponization of the world’s oil trade, and its imperial strategy of isolating countries that resist adherence to the U.S. ruler-based order (no real rules, but simply U.S. ad hoc demands). So what is at issue is not only the U.S. military presence in the Middle East – along with its two proxy armies, Israel and ISIS/al Qaeda jihadists. And the U.S. and Israeli pretense that it is about Iran having atomic weapons of mass destruction is as fictitious an accusation as that levied against Iraq in 2003. What is at issue is ending the Middle East’s economic alliances with the United States and whether its oil-export earnings will continue to be accumulated in dollars as the buttress of the U.S. balance of payments to help pay for its military bases throughout the world.
Iran has announced that it will fight until it achieves three aims to prevent future wars. First and foremost, the United States must withdraw from al its military bases in the Middle East. Iran already has destroyed the backbone of radar warning systems and anti-aircraft and missile defense sites in Jordan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain, preventing them from guiding U.S. or Israeli missile attacks or attacking Iran. Arab countries have bases or U.S. installations will be bombed if they are not abandoned.
The next two Iranian demands seem to far-reaching that they seem unthinkable to the West. Arab OPEC countries must end their close economic ties to the United States, starting with the U.S. data centers operated by Amazon, Microsoft and Google. And they not only must stop pricing their oil and gas in U.S. dollars, but disinvest in their existing petrodollars holdings of the U.S. investments that have been subsidizing the U.S. balance of payments since the 1974 agreements that made to gain U.S. permission to quadruple their oil-export prices.
These three demands would end U.S. economic power over OPEC countries, and thus the world oil trade. The result would be to dedollarize the world’s oil trade and re-orient it toward Asia and Global Majority countries. And Iran’s plan involves not only a military and economic defeat for the United States, but an end to the political character of the Near Eastern client monarchies and their relations with their Shi’ite citizens.
Step 1: Driving the United States out of its Middle Eastern military bases
Iraq’s parliament has continued to demand that U.S. forces leave their country and stop stealing its oil (sending most of it to Israel). It has just approved legislation yet again directing that American forces to leave their country. Meeting with senior advisor to Iraq’s interior minister and his accompanying military delegation in Tehran last Monday (March 2), Iran’s Brigadier General Ali Abdollahi reiterated the demand that Iran has been making for the last five years, ever since Donald Trump closed his first administration on January 3, 2020. by ordering the treacherous assassination of the two top Iranian and Iraqi anti-terror negotiators, Qassem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, who were seeking to avoid an all-out war. Seeing that Trump is now continuing the same policy, the Iranian commander stated: “Expulsion of the United States is the most important step toward the restoration of security and stability to the region.”
But all the Arab kingdoms are hosting U.S. military bases. Iran has announced that any country permitting U.S. aircraft or other military forces to use these bases will risk immediate attack to destroy them. Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates already have come under attack, leading Saudi Arabia to promise Iran not to permit the U.S. military to use its territory for part of its war.
Spain has banned U.S. use of its airfields to support its war against Iran. But when its Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez forbade the United States from using them, President Trump pointed out at an Oval Office news conference that there was nothing that Spain really could do to prevent the U.S. air force from using the Rota and Morón installations in southern Spain that the U.S. and Spain share, but which remain under Spanish command. “And now Spain actually said we can’t use their bases. And that’s all right, we don’t want to do it. We could use the base if we want. We could just fly in and use it, nobody is going to tell us not to use it.” What would Spain do to prevent it, after all? Shoot down the U.S. aircraft?
This is the problem confronting the Arab monarchies if they try to deny U.S. access to their own U.S. bases and air space to fight Iran. What can they do?
Or more to the point, what may they be willing to do? Iran is insisting that Qatar, the United Arab Republics, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and other Near Eastern monarchies close all U.S. military bases in their kingdoms and block U.S. use of their airspace and airports as a condition for not bombing them and extending the war to the monarchic regimes themselves.
Refusal – or inability to prevent the U.S. from using bases in their countries – will lead Iran to force a regime change. This would be easiest in countries in which Palestinians are a large proportion of the labor force, as in Jordan. Iran has called for Shi’ite populations in Jordan and other Near Eastern countries to overthrow their monarchies so as to break away from U.S. control. There are rumors that Bahrain’s king has left the country.
Step #2: Ending the Middle East’s commercial and financial linkages to the U.S.
Arab monarchies are under further pressure to meet Iran’s ultimate demand that they decouple their economies from that of the United States. Ever since 1974 they have tied their economies to the United States. Most recently Bahrain, the UAE and Saudi Arabia have sought to use their energy resources to attract computer data centers, including Starlink and other systems that have been associated with U.S. regime-change and military attacks on Iran.
Opposing U.S. plans to tightly integrate its non-oil sectors with the Arab OPEC Middle East, Iran has announced that these installations are “legitimate targets” for its drive to expel America from the region. One cloud computing manager suggested that Iran’s AWS attack on Amazon’s data center was targeted because it was serving military needs, much as Starlink (which the UAE is interested in financing) was used in February in the U.S. attempt to mobilize demonstrations against Iran’s government.
Step #3: Ending the recycling of OPEC oil exports into U.S. dollar holdings
The most radical Iranian demand has been for its Arab neighbors to dedollarize their economies. That is a key to preventing U.S. businesses from dominating their economies and hence their governments. An Iranian official told CNN that Iran has accused companies that buy U.S. government debt and invest in Treasury bonds of being partners in the war against itself, because it sees them as financiers of this war. “Tehran considers these companies and their managers in the region as legitimate targets. These individuals are warned to declare their capital withdrawal as soon as possible.”
Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, and Qatar are indeed discussing withdrawing from U.S. and other investments as Iran’s blocking of Hormuz has led them to stop producing oil and LNG now that their storage capacity is full. Their income from energy, shipping and tourism has stopped. The Gulf States are meeting on Sunday, March 8, to discuss drawing down their $2 trillion in U.S. dollar investments (mainly from Saudi Arabia). The threat is that this is an initial step to diversifying OPEC investment outside of the U.S. dollar.
In conjunction with U.S. surrender of its military bases in the Middle East, such decoupling from the dollar would greatly reduce U.S. control of Middle Eastern oil, and hence the strategy to use its oil trade as a major chokepoint with which to coerce other countries into adhering to Trump’s America First ruler-based order (his own whims, with no clear rules).
For the monarchies themselves, the changes demanded by Iran to end the U.S. war against the Middle East would have an effect similar to the aftermath of World War I: the end of monarchic regimes in many of the Arab countries whose economies and political alliances have been based on an alliance with the United States. And for starters, pressure is now on Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, Kuwait and United Arab Emirates that have agreed to join Trump’s Board of Peace.
Indonesia, with the world’s largest Islamic population, has just withdrawn its earlier offer to provide 8000 troops to the Trump “peace plan” in Gaza, and Iran is pressuring Arab monarchies to follow suit by withdrawing in protest against U.S. policy. Will they? Ending U.S. access to bases in their territory runs the risk that the United States may simply seize their dollar holdings to force them to change their mind. But if they try to avoid being offensive to the United States, they will leave themselves open to Iranian accusations that they are not really opposing the war.
A number of other policies could escalate the Iranian challenge to the U.S. renunciation of the UN Charter’s rules of international law and the civilized laws of war. Countries could bring charges at the ICC against Trump for committing war crimes by starting an undeclared war against Iran, targeting and killing its leaders and bombing civilian centers such as the girls’ school that was one of the first targets?
Collateral effects of Iran’s goal to drive the United States out of the Middle East
Pursuit of Iranian aims means a long war. It will escalate as Israel and the U.S. military exhaust their supply of anti-aircraft and missile defense, enabling Iran to launch its serious attack on a scale that it stopped short of last June when it agreee to a ceasefire. In coming weeks Iran will start using its most sophisticated missiles to attack Israel and other U.S. proxies.
There’s nowhere to put additional oil production now that Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz to all but its own ships, most of which are carrying oil destined for China.. No ships are even trying to approach it, because Lloyds of London is not issuing insurance policies.
The U.S. military has recently sunk or seized Russian ships carrying oil, but the soaring oil prices have led it to permit such transfers in order to stem the world inflation. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said the Treasury Department is examining whether additional sanctioned Russian crude shipments could be released to the market. “We may unsanction other Russian oil,” he said. “There are hundreds of millions of barrels of sanctioned crude on the water … by unsanctioning them, Treasury can create supply.” His remarks follow a U.S. decision to issue a temporary 30-day waiver allowing Indian refiners to purchase Russian oil in an effort to maintain global supply.
Matters are not so easily cured for liquified natural gas, which is exported mainly by Qatar. Its storage tanks are full, forcing production to be shut down. Its LNG gas works have been bombed and will have to be rebuilt and put back on line. That will take two weeks plus an equal time to cool this gas properly.
The last few days have seen Iran attack two Saudi oil depots, and a drone hit a desalinization plant in Bahrain in response to an attack launched from its territory on Iran’s desalinization plant on Qeshm Island. Most of the Arab kingdoms depend on desalinization to a much higher degree, topped by Saudi Arabia at 70% and Bahrain at 60%. That makes Bahrain’s attack akin to the folly of fighting with bricks while living in a glass house oneself.
Throughout the world, rising oil and gas prices will force economies to choose between having to cut back domestic social spending in order to pay their dollar debts and higher oil-import prices, or declare a moratorium on servicing their dollar debts falling due. This war is splitting the US/NATO West from the Global Majority, by creating strains that Japan, Korean and even Europe can no longer afford. A change in consciousness is occurring – and that is the context for how countries will act (or be forced to act by their populations).
The effect of this U.S. attack has destroyed the narrative that has enabled U.S. diplomats to demand subsidy and tribute for its global military spending and demands for U.S. subsidy and special tribute to finance it. The predicate fiction is that the world needs U.S. military support to protect it against Russia and China – and now Iran, as if these countries pose a real threat to Europe and Asia.
The pretense of U.S. foreign policy is that the United States is protecting the rest of the world by waging the present Cold War.But the consequences of its attack on Iran show that the United States actually is the greatest threat to the security of its allies. The backwash of America’s war on Iran thus has dispelled the great enabling fiction underlying the claim that America is protecting the world from attack by Russia, China and Iran. The United States has not been able to protect the OPEC countries, and its attack has hurt Japan, South Korea and Europe, whose gas prices have soared by 20% and are now on their way further upward today. Korea’s stock market has plunged 18% in the last two days. All this is shifting support for removing U.S. control of Near Eastern oil.
