A common misconception among Americans is that because our constitution grants us freedom of speech and freedom of the press, our country must therefore promote that abroad.
Therefore to disagree with America in any way is to hate freedom. “So if you don’t like that, go ahead and leave!”
The fact is, however, America has one of the worst histories in the entire world for crushing freedom abroad on every continent. The US has interfered in elections, from election fraud to military coups and regime changes, in at least 85 countries from 1946-2000.
Let’s cover just a small handful of examples of America’s oppression.
The Atlantic Slave Trade: Not much to be said here. We’re aware of the barbaric and Satanic elements of Western chattel slavery. Here’s a good link for further reading on Western vs Eastern slavery: https://yaqeeninstitute.org/jonathan-brown/slavery-and-islam-what-is-slavery/
The Philippines and The Kiram-Bates Treaty: America defeated Spain in the Spanish-America War and thus began it’s war against the Filipinos to subjugate them in the Philippine-American War. To keep the Sulu Sultanate in the south out of the war, they signed the Kiram-Bates Treaty with the sultan, guaranteeing their freedom. After defeating the revolutionaries in northern Luzon, America then betrayed the Sulu Muslims to the south and proceeded to invade them, as well. Thus continued the conflict in Mindanao, though Duterte seems to be handling it well by ignoring the US.
Vietnam: France’s conquest of Vietnam started in 1858 under Napoleon to force Christianity on them. In WWII Japan took Vietnam and tolerated the French presence. After fighting off the Japanese, the familiar Ho Chi Minh sent a telegram to US President Truman declaring Vietnam’s freedom and independence and a new constitution based on America’s. He requested Truman to halt French invasion and conquest. Truman, in standard American double-face, ignored him. Thus began the invasion of France, yet again, and the turning of Ho Chi Minh to communism… the rest is well-known history.
Here’s the telegram on US government archives: https://www.archives.gov/historical-docs/todays-doc/?dod-date=228
El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Chile, Haiti…basically all of Latin America: This is a long topic to cover entirely. Basically, the US installed brutal fascist dictators all over the place, committed genocide in Guatemala, armed many gangsters and nutjobs like in El Salvador who committed war crimes, uprooted economies and seized farmland for US agribusinesses to grow cash crops for export without paying the oppressed locals. It’s a double-punch of stealing their natural resources, killing local agriculture so they’re dependent on USAID, and installing dictators all over the place to squelch any complaints. “We’re taking your stuff. Don’t like it? You’ll be tortured and killed.”
The most important read on this is Susan George’s book, “How the Other Half Dies,” which she published for free online. The attacks on “communist” governments and labor organizers had little to do with communism, but rather naked capitalism that seeks maximum profit at the expense of abusing Latin Americans. The elites have labeled anyone who is pro workers’ rights an anarchist, or a communist, or a socialist, or an insurgent, or rebel as this masks the truth of what is actually being done.
Instead, it may have been better to address the core complaints: stealing their resources and crushing their economies to fatten the wallets of America’s rich. Will we learn from the past or perpetuate its injustice? As lay folks, we can educate ourselves and buy fair trade.
https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2015/01/24/exporting-fascism-us-imperialism-in-latin-america/
https://medium.com/s/story/timeline-us-intervention-central-america-a9bea9ebc148
https://www.thenation.com/article/border-patrol-refugees-guatemala-cia-war-crimes/
Afghanistan: After the brutal invasion of the Soviets, America radicalized an entire generation by designing wackjob school curriculums in Peshawar, Pakistan and sending off the youth to war. These radicalized folks, after defeating the Soviets, then turned into a bunch of warlords, some of them child molesters. Mullah Omar, a Quran teacher, finally had enough after two kids were kidnapped in his village and he took his taliban (students) and rescued the kids from the local warlord. His movement turned into the Taliban we know today. Then came 9/11 and OBL used Pashtunwali to ask for shelter in Afghanistan. The Taliban were debating how to ask him to leave. They proposed having a trial in a neutral country. America said turn him over now or die, but before they could even answer, America invaded. The Taliban were defeated… but America, in brash ignorance, propped up criminal gangsters all over Afghanistan and arrested their enemies on false intel, some of them actual allies of Kharzai, to be tortured in Guantanamo. Kharzai’s soldiers are also known for extortion–if you don’t pay the impossible fines, they’ll torture you in a brutal prison until your family pays. This created an unstable environment where no matter what you do, you’re guilty and liable to be killed by Americans, Kharzai’s corrupt government, or warlord gangsters backed & funded by the Americans. Thus the Taliban returned, the only viable option for many.
Anand Gopal’s book is a must-read for understanding Afghanistan.
Iran: Britain pitched a “great idea” to the US in the 50s: Let’s take out Iran’s democratic republic and install a dictator who will give us their oil for free. The US agreed and thus we have operation Ajax in 1953, starting the reign of the dictator king (Shah). The dictator king named Iranian streets after US presidents and forced Western culture on his people. Thousands of protesters were killed. Finally the people rose up and overthrew him in 1979.
Iraq: Saddam Hussein and the Ba’ath party (an Arab offshoot of Communism started by a Syrian Christian) rose to power on “a CIA train,” as Ali Saleh Sa’adi, the Minister of the Interior, said. He then started a brutal war with Iran after their revolution, backed by the US, that killed about a million people. The CIA helped him get WMDs and supported his Anfal campaign (genocide). The disastrous arms-for-hostages policy, which came to be known as the Iran- Contra affair, convinced Iraqis rightly that the United States was trying to play both sides of the conflict.
Then came his invasion of Kuwait after America’s ambassador inadvertently gave him the greenlight, but then America (again) changed its mind and decided to fight him. America then illegally bombed Iraq’s water treatment plants, against international law, and killed ~400,000 children via disease as a result. Then America decided to invade Iraq entirely in 2003, and turned the country over to the Shias who sided with Iran and have been oppressing everyone else to this day and pushing Sunnis out of Baghdad. Not to mention the Evangelical missionaries who went in with the invasion troops to try to convert Iraqis.
As a result of these shenanigans and Bush Jr’s rejection of negotiating with Iran, Iran chose to get the Bomb.
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/lessons-from-americas-first-war-with-iran/
Israel: The biggest web of lies on Earth surrounds Israel due to censorship of dissident voices and brutality against journalists, despite America calling them a “beacon of democracy” (a “democracy” where most Arabs aren’t citizens and can’t vote). They recently declared themselves a Jewish theocracy. The rest of the world sees Israel as a Western colony on Palestinian land, American Evangelicals see it as a step in triggering the Second Coming of Jesus… though I doubt he’ll be happy with those oppressors whenever he returns. Life is made as difficult as possible for Palestinians, everything is tightly controlled, abuse is the norm, children are tortured, farmland destroyed, Palestinians continually expelled, and settlements continue to be built. The police rarely help non-Jews and are often complicit in crimes against Palestinians, even burning children alive and celebrating. Only 7% of Jerusalem building permits go to Palestinians, while Israelis break their doors and windows then seize their homes if they repair them. Israel is an apartheid state where freedoms are only given to Jews and world condemnation culminating into dozens of UN resolutions against them are all vetoed by the US.
Read more: Here’s what I found out when I spent the day with Israel’s most controversial journalist, Gideon Levy
Syria: The CIA took out Shukri al-Quwatli, because he was neutral, to get a pipeline built through Syria. Then Shukri came back and got elected again, and the CIA yet again tried to take him out, but (thank God) failed. He then expelled the US embassy for conspiring against him twice (fool me once, shame on you…).
https://ecowatch.com/syria-another-pipeline-war-1882180532.html (good read on the Middle East in general)
And we haven’t even discussed the abuses all over Africa. Stolen land, stolen natural resources, puppet dictators, and every decent leader winds up dead in a European coup, like Thomas Sankara. Let’s end with the CIA collusion with South African apartheid and the tip-off on Mandela’s location to turn him over to apartheid forces. White supremacy, alive and well…
A great review of this topic is John Perkins’ book:
What Next?
So apparently, as long as our Constitution is somewhat in place here (despite the unconstitutional anti-BDS legislation) to give us our freedoms, we could care less about freedom for the rest of the world… or are we just ignorant about the sins of our government?
To people of God-consciousness and morality, to let a bully continue down the path of crushing freedom is in fact equatable to hating freedom. The first step is getting educated and educating others, then demanding responsibility from our government and not allowing these shenanigans to happen again. Do what you can to right the wrongs and injustices that have been committed. Your purchasing power is a part of that, like supporting Fair Trade for Latin America. And pray for America’s guidance.
The true American dream is not screwing over as many people as possible in business. Rather, it’s making a profit in a manner of win-win, where both sides respect one another’s sovereignty. No matter how you cut it, immorality will always come back to bite you. Cue the migrant crisis in Europe or the border problems in the United States. Both of these issues are their own doing, from decades and centuries of abuses abroad. Only by doing the right thing will we heal these lands and bring stability to ourselves and the world.
Halaqa 
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