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Acknowledgment:
This paper is partly based on Prof. Dr. Ola Tunander’s “Securitization, Dual State and US-European Geopolitical Divide or The Use of Terrorism to Construct World Order,” a paper presented at the Fifth Pan-European International Relations Conference, The Netherlands Congress Center, The Hague, 9-11 September 2004. Its revised version now available online is entitled “Democratic State vs. Deep State (PRIO, 2008) [1]
“In any state, certain areas are ‘securitized’ and by definition removed from the democratic political process. In an emergency situation – in short of war or terrorist attacks – the security sphere ‘invades’ the sphere of democratic politics. An autocratic security force or ‘security state’ appears to act in parallel to the regular democratic state, and this duality or ‘dual state’ was described by Hans Morgenthau already in 1955. After September 11, terrorism has become an instrument to ‘securitize’ what used to be public and tilt the ‘dual state’-balance in favour of the ‘security state’. The US ‘security state’ with its intelligence hegemony enters the scene as global protector that defines the world order in terms of a Pax Americana.
Terrorism is used to construct a new world order. This development has been followed by mutual transatlantic accusations between European critiques and US neo-conservatives. According to the critiques, the Strategy of Tension, as we know it from Cold War Europe, has received a global dimension. During the Cold War, the US ‘dual security structure’ – with its specifically tasked units masquerading as ‘enemy forces’ – was developed by the US ‘security state’ in order to keep the political strength and the readiness and capability of the Western defences. Now, this structure has seemingly been made into a self-propelled mechanism that is able to transform the world order into a Pax Americana.” — Prof. Dr. Ola Tunander [2], Abstract of “Securitization, Dual State and US-European Geopolitical Divide or The Use of Terrorism to Construct World Order” [3]
Introduction
The “deep state” is a concept that necessarily connects with the power structure of the United States of America (USA). It stands in parallel with the legitimate government of the US and whose main function is to “securitize” the democratic foundation of the government as well as the institutions that represent and strengthen that government. It is, therefore, the fundamental responsibility of the “deep state” to protect the US government from both internal and external attacks aimed to undermine and destroy its “democratic” underpinning. It is precisely the reason why the “deep state” is more technically known as the “security state”.
The world, in general, has been conditioned to believe that the legitimate US government is the leading paragon of democracy. Hence it is principally construed that any attack against the US government is tantamount to an assault on democracy. This mental programming has created a condition that weaves the fiber of democracy with that of the US government. In literary critical analysis, we call it “telescoping”. In telescoping events, the characteristics and properties unique to each event are blurred and rendered insignificant to the point of unifying such events and hence making them identical. Expressing such a situation in the formal logical propositional pattern, “There is an x such that if x then y,” yields the following substantial statement:
“If the US government is democracy, then an attack against the US government is an attack against democracy.”
And to prevent such an attack against the US government or to defend the US government from such an attack, as the case may be, the “security state” which, under normal circumstances stands at par with the “legitimate democratic state,” takes control of the present abnormal situation using its autocratic power. In other words, when circumstances are normal, power is tilted on the side of the legitimate democratic state while in an emergency situation, it is on the side of the autocratic security state.
This condition is theoretically deemed as a matter of exigency and therefore temporary. By and large, the essential dynamic that constitutes this state of affairs is drawn from the non-negotiable importance of “securitization” to defend and protect the “genuine” bearer of the ideals of democracy which is the United States of America.
Nevertheless, what we simply see at the moment is the epidermal surface that projects the finest and the best of what this “prime model” of “democracy” exudes. Yet, there is more than meets the eye. Under the superficial configuration is a more complex network of hidden infrastructure reckoned to be more crucial and paramount than any of those located overboard and visible to the naked eye. Like in the case of an iceberg, what we see is just the diminutive tip but the bulk of its solid form is deep underneath. And this is precisely comparable to how the security state operates to which we give the alternative epithet, “deep state.”
What the deep state/security state is concerned about is more than the democratic state of the US government. It is more concerned about the massive business industries comprising the multiplex cogs of US economic enterprises that dominate the globe. These are the machines that are in full control of the US government.
In other words, the latter doesn’t possess the power inherent in itself but draws its strength from these colossal industrial establishments of global magnitude. In this connection, what we see is a government beholden to big business industrial conglomerates and whose decisions and actions are incontrovertibly at the behest of such business industrial giants. These are the “omnipotent” gods that the deep state/security state defends and protects.
The whole gamut of this arrangement leads us to a confirmation of the reality that the socio-political fabric of the United States of America is just a semblance of democracy – a counterfeit democracy. Its government, contrary to the Lincoln formulation presented in the Gettysburg Address, is not “of the people, by the people, for the people.”
The US government is of the big business industries, by the big business industries, and for the big business industries. What its citizens get are just the bread crumbs that fall from the dining tables of their “all-powerful” gods – the industry tycoons who own the machines that run the US economy. These are the mighty economic dictators who walk the corridors of power and are actively defended and closely protected by the deep state/security state.
The deep state/security state’s clout goes beyond the geographical location of its protected and defended “land of the free and home of the brave.”
Its power is felt in every country where the US foreign policy reigns supreme.
It dominates the western European region through its proxy known as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
In Southeast Asia, it lords over the member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Its aggressive posture has been tremendously exerted in the Middle East as it creates all forms of destabilization campaigns mostly by way of wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Yemen with the able assistance of its destructive allies, Wahabbist Saudi Arabia and Zionist Israel.
To promote and protect its economic interest in the Eastern European region, it has made all possible aggressive efforts to hold Russia at bay with veneer threats of violent confrontation if Russia reacts with an air of hostility.
In South America, it has been fueling destabilization in Venezuela to topple the democratically elected government of Nicolas Maduro and take full control of the country’s petroleum industry. In the most recent developments, it has been challenging Iran into a nuclear war which, on the basis of certain honest-to-goodness assessments made by experts in the field of geopolitics, is nothing but a hot-air provocation, i.e., an empty bluff.
Focusing on what’s been happening in the Middle East, the main goal of the deep state/security state is to take full control of the entire region to effect the final success of the Greater Israel Project wherein Zionist Israel is considered to be the sole political power extension of the US dominating over all the Arab nations around its illegitimate territory stolen from the Palestinians.
This project which puts Zionist Israel at the central hegemonic position of power consistently sustains the theory that the deep state/security state is not only a league of powerful American big business industrial tycoons but also a Zionist-influenced cabal whose dual allegiance is to Zionism and the US global supremacy.
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Prof. Ruel F. Pepa is a Filipino philosopher based in Madrid, Spain. A retired academic (Associate Professor IV), he taught Philosophy and Social Sciences at Trinity University of Asia, an Anglican university in the Philippines. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research and Asia Pacific Research.
Notes
[1] https://es.scribd.com/document/209132312/Ola-Tunander-Democratic-State-v-Deep-State-PRIO-2008
[2] https://www.prio.org/People/Person/?x=5044
[3] https://www.prio.org/Publications/Publication/?x=3214
