William Engdahl

William Engdahl is the author of Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order.

He was interviewed in early July 2009 by the promising new independent news service: the Real News Network.

This wide-ranging interview is recommended viewing.

Full Spectrum Dominance was published by Third Millennium Press in May 2009. The book summary explains (emphasis added):

For the faction controlling the Pentagon, the military industry, and the oil industry, the Cold War never ended. They engineered an incredible plan to grab total control of the planet, of land, sea, air, space, outer space and cyberspace. Continuing ‘below the radar,’ they created a global network of military bases and conflicts to advance the long-term goal of Full Spectrum Dominance. Methods included control of propaganda, use of NGOs for regime change, Color Revolutions to advance NATO eastwards, and a vast array of psychological and economic warfare techniques. They even used ‘save the gorilla’ organizations in Africa to secretly run arms in to create wars for raw materials. It was all part of a Revolution in Military Affairs, as they termed it. The events of September 11, 2001 would allow an American President to declare a worldwide War on Terror, on an enemy who was everywhere, and nowhere. 9/11 justified the Patriot Act, the very act that destroyed Americans’ Constitutional freedoms in the name of security. This book gives a disturbing look at the strategy of Full Spectrum Dominance, at what is behind a strategy that could lead us into a horrific nuclear war in the very near future, and at the very least, to a world at continuous war.

William Engdahl has written extensively on geopolitics and global economics over several decades, beginning with a look at the first ‘oil shock’ in the 1970s. He has unorthodox views on subject s as diverse as GMOs and the origins of oil. Engdahl also shares the view that well-connected factions within the west orchestrated the fall of the Shah of Iran in the late 1970s.

He is pessimistic about the prospects for a prompt American economic recovery.

Not a day goes by without someone being accused of being an ‘anti-Semite’.

The consequence of such an accusation is often to derail free speech and squelch open debate.

Typically, the subject of this complaint feels obliged to explain that they are not, in fact, an  ‘anti-Semite’ (perish the thought!)

Israeli soldier confronts an anti-Semite

A conversation, which might start out about Gaza, Israeli settlements on occupied territory, mistreatment of Palestinians, Israeli spy-rings, World War Two, 9-11 or the attack on the USS Liberty, quickly degenerates into a slanging match about whether or not one or more of the participants is an ‘anti-Semite’.

Suspicious folk have concluded that levying this dreaded accusation is merely a trick to divert attention away from the substantive underlying issues. I must say I’ve thought that myself.

Accusations of ‘anti-Semitism’ are somewhat special. It’s one thing to be accused of being a rapist, child molester, mass murderer or something else that’s really tangible. We all know what a mass murderer is. He/she turns people into dead bodies before their time. If accused of this, without basis, it may be able to sue for damages.

But what’s an ‘anti-Semite’?

Intelligent discussions on this interesting subject are already available – along with vast amounts of dross. On this occasion, I won’t try to compete with the former – and I don’t want to add to the latter. Today I’ll try a different tack.

The definition of 'anti-Semitism'

I am one of those who believes the term ‘anti-Semitism’, a rather recent invention dating only from the late 19^th century, has no substantive meaning whatsoever. It’s an exercise in ‘branding’ (in the advertising sense of the term), nothing more.

It creates a false category (people who don’t like ‘Semites’).

The definition of 'Semite'

Unless referring to antiquity, the word ‘Semite’ has only a linguistic meaning and refers to someone who speaks a Semitic language.

No-one I have ever met or heard of dislikes people simply because they speak a Semitic language (a major linguistic family that includes Arabic, Aramaic, Hebrew and numerous other languages, both extant and no longer spoken).

This does not stop those who use the term ‘anti-Semite’ from loading it up with whatever they want. Since the branding exercise began in the late 19^th Century, the term ‘anti-Semite’ has mainly been used to level accusations of irrational anti-Jewish attitudes. Contemporary dictionaries define the term along these lines – but this is on the basis of common usage, not etymology. I think it’s time to get back to roots.

I don’t believe the term ‘anti-Semite’ is either meaningful or useful. It only adds to confusion and clarifies nothing. Consequently, I don’t use the term myself except within inverted commas. Like ‘Ethnic Cleansing’ and ‘Hate Speech’, it’s a term I use only to critique. It’s not part of my everyday language. It’s part of everyday discourse that I despise – discussion that’s imprecise, inaccurate and biased.

One might therefore quite reasonably say that I am an ‘anti-anti-Semite’. That’s a label I’ll wear proudly.

A logician might object that one does not usually include the double negative in a term. For instance, an ‘anti-anti-Republican’ is not usually described as such. He/she is simply called a ‘Republican’.

I therefore conclude that I am, at root, a ‘Semite’.

It’s true I don’t speak Arabic, Hebrew or any other Semitic tongue. In that regard, I’m more of an Indo-European. But in my staunch and radical opposition to ‘anti-Semitism’, I’ve spawned a new identity.

I had no idea it was so easy to become a ‘Semite’.

I’m sure it takes longer to learn English.