The real business of the war is all theatre/theater

[Paul Mackin]

On Tue, 2004-09-14 at 15:33, Otto wrote:
> >  On Mon, 2004-09-13 at 10:15, Otto wrote:
> >
> > > There's a remarkable sentence in the German Wikipedia entry on IG
> Farben:
> > >
> > > "Das Vorbild dazu waren die Firmenzusammenschlüsse zu so genannten
> > > Trusts in den USA, wie z.B. Standard Oil. Diese Trusts waren
> > > Zentralaktiengesellschaften, entstanden durch die Vereinigung mehrer
> > > Aktiengesellschaften, die zwar formell ihre Existenz behielten,
> > > tatsächlich jede Selbständigkeit aber verloren. Die Ausschaltung des
> > > Konkurrenzkampfes erlaubte eine Gewinnmaximierung und das
> > > einfachere Durchsetzen der eigenen Interessen."
> > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I.G._Farben_Industrie
> > >
> > > It says in the first sentence that the example for IG Farben has been
> > > the American Trust-system, namely Standard Oil.
> >
> >
> > This would be the general view of English-language encyclopaedias as
> > well--that the IG was patterned after the American Trusts.
> >
> 
> I just mean, if it's correct that" From its birth IG Farben had been at war
> with the rest of the world, with the United States as a main target"
> (Sasuly. Chapter 11, verse on, lines 1-2.) and if the IG was patterned after
> the American Trusts may I then conclude that Standard Oil was at war with
> the rest of the world too? 

The American Trusts in the full sense of the phrase were of an earlier
era in America. Standard oil had long since become one two three many
standard oils and no one of them would have wanted to be caught dead
scheming with the others in pursuit of a war against the rest of the
world--the Sherman and Clayton antitrust acts and all that, you know.

 
> Could it be possible that trusts generally are at
> war with the rest of the world, that it maybe is a structural element of big
> capitalist structures turning into T-Rexes biting dead reflexively
> everything around that moves? I mean, this would explain a lot.

You are assuming Bush win will the election I guess. But even with Bush
for the second term I don't think American corporations are going to
become the whole show in the near future. There will still be a fairly
strong federal govenment in the U.S. though not as strong vis a vis the
corporations as European governments tend to be. Your post in response
to malignd in which you asked if the knowledge was widespread in '73
that it was the corporations and not central governments that ruled the
world drew a very inappropriate binary opposition between the two
entities I think. But as to how much knowledge there is about how the
world of transnational business worked in the period surrounding WW II
and after I think Sasauly's book would have enlightened any interested
party on how national govenments have limited power or limited interest
in controlling national boundary crossing of business entities, of how
the Allied nations might well have wished to only  temporarily suppress
the Axis side of the arrangements to the extent  such was necessary to
the pursuit of a war it was horrendously vital to win regardless of
whether or not it was good for General Electric or General Motors even
though as everyone knows what's good for General Motors is good for
America. (last part a joke)

Anyway . . .