President Donald Trump truly knows how to prop up his country’s arms industry at all costs, literally. If only he would do that without dragging all of us along with him.
Comedian George Carlin had a curious take on his country’s belligerence: "We like war, because we are good at it because we (had) a lot of practice".
He was commenting on the 1990 to1991 Persian Gulf War against Saddam Hussein who had invaded Kuwait. The US wanted its oil but hoodwinked more than 35 allies to support its Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm; a $60billion escapade with deadly toys that went "poof!".
Trump looks set to follow suit. His high priest, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, claims to have access to about 100 000 documents proving that Iran welched on its 2015 deal with the Obama administration to use nuclear technology responsibly.
Netanyahu’s assertions emboldened Trump to withdraw from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) recently because it is "so poorly negotiated that even if Iran fully complies, the regime can still be on the verge of a nuclear breakout in just a short period of time".
His divorce papers left the partners of the US in JCPOA, namely China, France, Germany, Russia and Britain, scurrying for a salvage plan.
Trump is giving ultimatums to anyone doing business with Iran to choose his side or run for their economic life. That is where South Africa and the continent come in. African multinationals, such as MTN, are heavily invested in Iran.
David Meyer, writing for Fortune, identified six companies that "have a lot to fear from Trump’s Iran sanctions". They are Airbus, Boeing, General Electric, Total, Volkswagen and PSA (the maker of Peugeots and Citroens); all American or French corporations, except for Volkswagen.
Every time the US wants to go to war, it does so to strengthen its arms industry. Otherwise, what is the point of building all the arms if nobody is going to use them? Without compunction, the US does not mind supporting two countries at war with each other, as it did in the Iran-Iraq war. To do so, however, it needs the right propaganda.
In order to take out Hussein, the US government relied on unsubstantiated reports by New York Times reporter Judith Miller, among others. Miller wrote in September 2002 that Iraq had "stepped up its quest for nuclear weapons and embarked on a worldwide hunt for materials to make an atomic bomb".
President George W Bush used this to lead that profitable wild goose chase, euphemistically termed the war on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD); finally finishing what his father, George HW Bush, had started. He took Tony Blair and company with him.
When Hussein was captured in 2003, the CIA’s John Nixon interrogated him to determine the veracity of the WMD claims. Nixon's conclusion in the negative disappointed Washington, which he never got invited to brief until 2008 - two years after Hussein’s execution.
Miller has morphed into Netanyahu. Trump lapped up this excuse to act even as his decision crumbles under elementary scrutiny. Sadly, his threats of sanctions against anyone doing business with Iran are rippling beyond the US and the First World.
With the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act carrot, he can easily cow African countries into abandoning Iraq. Africa’s largest cellphone operator, MTN, might have to walk away from more than 10million subscribers to appease Trump; or rather to protect the growth in his country’s arms trade.
Since his ascent to power in January last year, says the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, the global arms trade reached "$374.8billion and posted the first increase since 2010, lifted in part by increased sales of the F-35 stealth fighter by Lockheed Martin".
This, the report continues, "helped the US increase its overall share of the arms market to nearly 58%". Nothing can sustain this trend better than rumours of war.
African countries had better not get sucked into this senseless US state-sponsored arms sales binge.
* Kgomoeswana, Author of Africa is Open for Business, is a media commentator and public speaker on African business affairs, and a columnist for Destiny Man.
@VictorAfrica