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Rogue States
The Rule of Force in World Affairs
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by Noam Chomsky
South End Press
Due/Published
September 2000, 150 pages,
paper
ISBN
0896086119
Rogue States is the latest of Chomsky's efforts to measure the world's superpowers by their own professed standards and to hold them responsible for the indefensible actions they commit in the name of democracy and human rights. The United States and its allies come in for particular scrutiny for their numerous recent violations of the very international laws they claim to uphold, making them the real "rogue states" in the world today. In analyzing the recent war in the Balkans, Chomsky challenges the legal and humanitarian arguments in favor of NATO's aggression, instead calling attention to the West's failure to support democratic movements in the region. Chomsky also turns his penetrating gaze toward U.S. involvement in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Central America, relying on both historical context and recently released government documents to trace the paths of self-interest and domination that fueled these violent regional conflicts. Throughout, Chomsky reveals the United States’ increasingly open dismissal of the United Nations and international legal precedent in justifying its motives and actions. As his analysis of U.S. statecraft reveals, the rule of law has been reduced to a mere nuisance.
"Noam Chomsky is like a medic attempting to cure a national epidemic of selective amnesia. . . . Through shrewd analysis of internal documents and play-by-play accounts of the State Department's strategic moves, he reveals, for instance, that the American government supports state terror in Colombia . . . Rogue States best serves the converted as a reference manual while giving others a timely guide to the tactics that the powerful employ to keep power concentrated and people compliant. Although it takes a dedicated reader to plow through the mountains of information, Chomsky's work is crucial at a time when our empire perpetually disguises its pursuit of power under the banners of 'aid,' 'humanitarian intervention,' and now 'globalization.' Americans have to begin deciphering the rhetoric. Chomsky's a good place to start."--The Village Voice |
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