Sometimes a 'failed policy' isn't. For example, the Gulf War, ostensibly aimed at removing Saddam Hussein, in reality just massacred the Iraqi proletariat. In this, and in many other cases, it is clear that the US government's policies succeeded in their real aims.
But there is such a thing as a failed policy. The Vietnam War failed. The bourgeoisie is conspiratorial, but not omniscient. Perhaps Pearl Harbor was really a success, because Roosevelt wanted to lure Japan into war. Perhaps. But September 11th was the most spectacular failure of a government policy in our lifetimes.
The lesson of Vietnam, for the US rulers, was "the public won't tolerate losses among our troops". Many of the opponents of the war were more concerned about one US death than a thousand Vietnamese. So the Pentagon developed a new strategy - to use technology to murder innocent civilians and reluctant conscripts in various countries, keeping American lives safe. This seemed to work. In Iraq, Palestine, Yugoslavia and other places the USA and its allies bombed, burned, killed, maimed and tortured, but US casualties were so low that an American soldier has more chance of being killed in an accident than in a war. And US civilian casualties, always low, were brought down to zero.
THAT POLICY HAS NOW COMPLETELY FAILED.
THIS is the argument which will defeat US Middle East policy - not moralistic whining, not 'hate-free zones', not complaints about ruling class hypocrisy in supporting Sharon while vilifying Saddam, etc.. However, there is one aspect of hypocrisy which is worth whining about. It goes like this: the CIA's creation, support and financing of Islamic terrorists in the war against Russia in Afghanistan, led to the massacre of September 11 and the ongoing disaster into which Bush and the rest of the stupid cowards who rule the West are plunging the world.
This may begin to sink in, despite the efforts of the media to smother the truth in sentimentality and hate. The vast majority of journalists are accomplices of mass murder, and should be treated accordingly.
Of course, it's not really 'argument' or 'opinion' which change policies, it's action. The Vietnam War was stopped by desertion, strikes, and so on.
The CIA's policy for years has been to create "rabid dogs" to fight for American corporate interests. Now one of these dogs has turned against its master. There is even a word in spook jargon for an unsavory character who bites the hand that feeds him - a "blowback". Normally, this isn't too much of a problem. More usually, it's Uncle Sam who ditches inconvenient proxies - Thieu, Noriega, Pinochet, Saddam - and they are unable to create serious problems for their ungrateful former sponsors. But the network of Afghan veterans and those they have inspired - fearless, ruthless, organized, and spread around the world - are another matter. The government claims to be looking for the 'folks who did it'. The folks who are most responsible are, unfortunately, dead, having crashed airliners into skyscrapers. There are other folks who share responsibility, and bin Laden may be one of them. But if people not directly involved can be said to be responsible, it follows, as night follows day, that the US government has the blood of September on its hands.
Weeks before the massacre, Michael Moran of MSNBC asked Senator Orrin Hatch of the Intelligence Commitee about funding Islamic fundamentalists and other illiberal elements. Senator Hatch conceded their unsavoriness, but said it was worthwhile - in this case, support for Islamic fighters in Afghanistan led to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Moran tried to ask the same question AFTER September 11, and was transferred to other duties.
One political gain the spooks are trying to make from their failure to protect us against the terrorists they created is an increase in censorship and surveillance, and a crackdown on the medium they DON'T control - the Internet. This must be resisted - opponents of US terrorism should routinely use cryptography in email, and so on.
Another political advantage the military-media complex is making out of the disaster is landing US troops in Central Asia. This has been a long term aim of NATO. It would be possible to make this strategy sound rational - Russia is quite powerful, Central Asia has a lot of oil - but this rationale could rationalize encircling half-a-dozen areas of the world. The USA doesn't need million-dollar missiles to obtain oil.
So let's not confuse George W. Bush with Nicolo Machiavelli.
Why does the USA pour so much treasure, and now, blood, into its Middle East policies? It's not oil - oil is a commodity you buy, not conquer. Why does it support Israel? The "Pro-Israel Lobby" theory only explains the mechanism, not the reason. "Don't ask me for the reason why - whoopee we're all gonna die".
The rational, Marxist explanation also leaves much to be desired. Put it this way - if all this hate and violence had the aim of dividing the working class, it has been a little too successful.
The wheel's still in spin... and there's no telling what they're dragging us into. The normal way of dealing with a "rabid dog" is to unleash a few more to keep him in line. In this case, US "strategy" - an attempt to recreate the British Empire, but with the current US administration at the helm - could provoke wars and uprisings beyond the control of the world's only "superpower". The term "Islamic world" is misleading - the media talk as though everyone from Casablanca to Kuala Lumpur is a mad mullah. There are various other currents, including secular nationalists, leftists and even revolutionaries. The "Shi'ite" uprising in Southern Iraq after the Gulf war wasn't. Kurdistan has many anti-capitalist fighters who hate Kurdish nationalism as much as Saddam. Virtually everyone in the Middle East has a problem with their rulers. The working class in the oil and service industries have a particular grudge, and potentially, the power to do something about it, to create a world where we are not enslaved and killed by technology.
In summary, the ruling class has screwed up. They've screwed up as they've never done before. As the truth slowly emerges, the anger currently directed against innocent Arabs and Afghans can be turned against the ultimate authors of the massacre of September 11, in Washington, DC and Langley, Virginia.