A Plea for Passive Aggressivity

While I was reading an essay and trying to remember the twists and turns vis a vie dialectical gymnastics in order to comprehend what Slavoj Zizek was arguing about* it became clear when I heard on KPFA (Bernstein’s program) that the former Prime minister Imran Khan of Pakistan had been arrested and was in jail. A coup that was induced by the US State and CIA, Blinken and others. Kahn a former Prime Minister was described by an American professor teaching in Lahore: “He is a “pacifist” he did not want to align with the US or Russia” in the immediate current proxy war the US is spending a billion a month to sustain its aggressive war

I heard the news and wondered wasn’t this exactly what Zizek had written about in 2006?

Here was the Empire acting like a bully once again. Pakistan’s moderate pacifism in US war time could potentially spread to other nations who do not want to take sides and obviously disagree with the Empires hubris and militaristic policy.

As long as Pakistan maintains distance and is not engaged in warmongering they have to be coaxed into supporting the US in its attempt to reduce Russia and China into vassal states. Japan for example in the middle of the recent anniversary of the US atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki it seems incongruous to insist the Japanese state join in the US Imperial overreach to prepare for an invasion by China?

Imran Kahn of Pakistan has been jailed because the US apparently can’t abide any dissident faction even a pacifist one. Thousands of Pakistani’s have filled streets to protest.

It’s fascinating that US, with internal Pakistanis, had to jail this pacifist ex-Prime Minster. Mahatma Gandhi was not even a Pakistani. Why is it essential that the US coax, pay off, threaten and overthrow any regime that remains outside the Imperialist demands of the nation that has sanctions all over the world – these are not UN sponsored.

Anomalies and contradiction are in “broad daylight.” The US Empire brings democracy to the poor down trodden women and oppressed in other countries while it supports the extreme Zionists in Israel in their repression and decimation of Palestinians. That unity of similarities is repeated every time a few million US dollars goes to Israeli settlements. The US stands with Israel Defense Forces and “there right to exist.” Of course the rights of the Palestinian are neglected just as the right to remain neutral or pacifist when the US is on the warpath.

In the Ukraine proxy war against Russia the USA is also trying to figure out what can be done to challenge Chinas’ ability to trade outside the US Federal Reserve the banking system IMF and World Bank. In capitalist democracies it’s part of the structure of the nation’s function to create competition and enemies. Stockbrokers understand the object is to win, win, win i.e. gain. In geopolitical matters if we don’t win, then other nationals must be transformed into enemies and have to be challenged weakened or destroyed. The economic component justifies the war expenditure.

Vietnam was about to be liberated from 70 years of French occupation when the US assumed the role of the responsible Western Empire and replaced the French taking up where they left off. After all the ‘frogs” couldn’t do what the US military could. Much like Afghanistan and Iraq millions and billions spent to eventually pull out!

These machinations, should we say these Machiavellian modes of the US policy becomes clear when one of the nations like Pakistan without communist or socialist mass movements is taken apart and refitted to US foreign policy . Astounding brazenness.

Zizek in his essay on “ A Plea for Passive Aggressivity” notes that in geopolitical international relations there are two options either join up or oppose. No middle ground allowed: Keep off the Grass!

In this matter power is at stake. Mentioning Hannah Arendt’s insights “between political power and the mere exercise of (social) violence organizations….”.. Zizek brings up the problematic of

“ Power must aways rely on an obscene stain of violence, political space is thus never ‘pure’, but always involves some kind of reliance on pre-political violence. Of course the relationship between political Power and pre-political violence is one of mutual implications, not only is violence the necessary supplement to Power, but pro (political) Power is itself always already present at the core of every ‘non-political’ social bond. The accepted violence and direct relationship of subordination in the army , church ,family and other ‘nonpolitical; social forms are themselves simply the reified expression of certain ethical-political struggles – the task of critical analysis is to discern the hidden political. Processes that sustain these ‘non’ or ‘pre-political’ forms . In human society , the political is the encompassing structuring principle, so that every neutralization of some partial social content as ‘non-political is itself a political gesture par excellence.: (218)

The Biden administration fulfills the grossness of Trump with the historical expansionist of Teddy Roosevelt, the Bushes, the Clintons and all previous Presidents united in bipartisan foreign policy. Pacifism although limp becomes a threat when billions are spent on military equipment so too “passive aggressivity” demands international repression.

A medicinal side effect, could be termed “blowback” as the internal constant internal gun violence at children, teachers, random people, some “116 people are killed in the USA per day” due to gun violence. This is more than “the chickens come home to roost” it’s become a habit, part of the freedom and consumerism of the market. You have a choice, either get a gun for protection or become a victim of a weird retaliatory shooting. Could it be that the militarization of US foreign policy with 870 billions for weapons and warfare has influenced internal ‘shoot em’ ups’?

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by R. G. Davis.

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