A review of "The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and America’s Future"

Peter Dale Scott, emeritus professor of English at the University of California, Berkeley, has written numerous books over the years examining what he calls the “deep state” of American politics. His newest book The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and America’s Future, looks at the current crisis in the United States manifested through the current War on Terror, but with a thorough discussion of the roots of Islamic fundamentalism, the role of the deep state in supporting the growth of extremism, and how these relationships have served to “explode back” in the United States. Even this, however, helps further the plans of the deep state, albeit always at the expense of the public state.

The book provides an overview of how hidden elements in the American government, for the last thirty years at least, have continuously supported short-term oil or security interests at the expense of the long-term interests of the public (and their own). own). Scott’s 423-page book is almost half-filled with endnotes, giving the reader plenty of other avenues for study, because the book itself is densely packed with information. An important aspect of the book is that, like other studies he has done, Scott does not name specific parties as guilty of one crime or another, he blames the US government to reach his conclusions. As the book puts it, “This book makes a more general argument that bureaucratic paranoia within the American deep state, undisciplined by the available wisdom of the public state, helped create al Qaeda years ago and then created the circumstances in which, Almost inevitably, al Qaeda elements would turn against the United States.” Throughout the work, he meticulously connects the dots between the very actors, institutions, and concepts that have so influenced American foreign and domestic policy.

First, however, any reader of this book should quickly come to understand Scott’s distinction between the public state of politics and the deep state. The book examines “the direct or indirect control of certain specific domains of government by the top 1 percent, beginning in the 1940s with the creation of the CIA… Those parts of government that respond to their influence I call the ‘state deep (if covert).” ) or “security state” (if military).” Once the reader understands the fundamental difference between the public and the deep state, superficial distinctions (such as Republican or Democrat) disappear, as the hidden elite work together behind the scenes for their shared interests. more often than not they work against each other for the good of the public.

The erasing of these superficialities is evident when Scott examines the three presidencies of Ford, Carter, and Reagan. Gerald Ford’s brief stint in the Oval Office is considered the seminal administration in recent American history, bringing the team of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld to the forefront of American politics in the White House and George HW Bush as Director of Intelligence. Central. But even more, Scott sees this presidency as the defining moment in the deep state battle between the old conservatives (influenced by the Rockefellers and the Council on Foreign Relations) and the neocons (influenced by the American Enterprise Institute).

Although Ford was replaced by Jimmy Carter, the foreign policy ideas of the previous administration were continued by the new National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski. It was under Carter that aid was given to Islamic militants in Afghanistan for the first time, even before the Soviet Union invaded the country in 1979. Brzezinski’s goal was to drag the Russians into their own Vietnam war, returning to popular opinion. against the USSR, bankrupting the Soviet Union. nation, and destabilizing the Soviet Union in general. This policy of support for the Afghan mujahideen continued under the Reagan administration, primarily under the direction of CIA director William Casey.

Scott also examines many other connections and backgrounds to the War in Afghanistan. He examines the often overlooked role of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International, as well as the increasing flow of heroin from Afghanistan to the United States during this period (and after). One of the most illuminating parts of the book is a chapter called “The Al-Kifah Center, Al Qaeda, and the US Government, 1988-1998,” which examines various relationships between the government, the support of institutions heavily influenced by Islamic extremism. in the United States, and the growth of al Qaeda throughout the world. Scott also examines the role of the FBI and CIA in briefing Ali Mohamed, “a close ally of Osama bin Laden,” and the connections between the Saudi establishment, the US establishment, and Al Qaeda.

However, some of the most revealing information in the book concerns the plans for Continuity of Government (COG), which Cheney and Rumsfeld worked on and which were originally unveiled during the Iran-Contra affair. According to Scott, the COG plan “called for the ‘suspension of the Constitution, the surrender of control of government to FEMA, the emergency appointment of military commanders to lead state and local governments, and the declaration of martial law during a crisis. national’. The plan also gave the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which had been involved in drafting it, sweeping powers, including internment.” Ominously, the same team that worked on the COG plans was brought back together in May 2001 by President George W. Bush to establish a task force on terrorism.In addition, the attacks of September 11, 2001 resulted in the first implementation of COG plans.

Another connection the book points to is that the same team, led by Cheney and Rumsfeld, had been part of the Project for a New American Century, which advocated greater military involvement in the Middle East. In effect, the events of 9/11 allowed this team to implement the two plans they had been working on since the 1980s: wars in two Middle Eastern countries and various parts of COG planning, including warrantless arrests. and illegal wiretapping without a court order. As Scott asks, “Were these practices decided upon after 9/11, as the Bush administration maintains? Or were they already being prepared as part of the COG planning revived by Cheney and FEMA in May 2001?”

In the final chapters, Scott examines how Cheney implemented COG on 9/11 and the failures of the 9/11 Commission to discuss this issue in detail, covering up Cheney’s actions that day. The omissions from the 9/11 Commission Report point to what may actually have happened on that day, and the chapter is quite revealing. It is also an in-depth discussion that must be read in its entirety so that Scott’s arguments are fully followed.

In the end, however, The road to September 11 points out how influences in the deep state of American politics have served various interests of the country’s establishment and elite, while putting the public at greater risk of attacks against those the government is supposed to protect. Furthermore, the catastrophic attacks of September 11 have led to the implementation of two relevant plans that the top brass of the administration currently in power have been working on for years, in some cases decades. Whether or not these plans were in the public interest after such an event, the fundamental problem for Scott lies in the fact that this deep state has taken such extensive control of the government, reducing the public state to little influence. Scott sums up his book by stating that “for the last half century, the open politics and representative institutions of the United States public res (the public state) have been progressively subordinated to a private thing (a tightly controlled place of top-down decision-making in the deep state).”

The final pages of the book discuss various ways in which the public can begin to reclaim its power, and provide hope for all work on the public state in the face of the urgency of combating the influences of the deep state. It will be a people-by-people understanding that will bridge the civilization gap between the United States and the Islamic world, without continued military involvement, and only through the free exchange of information and ideas, through the Internet and other non-state means. or corporate-controlled means that this exchange can take place, and the true role of the public in restraining the private state and creating a multinational civil society can be restored.