Hajnalka VINCZE is a security policy researcher specialized in European and transatlantic issues. Her analyses deal with intra-European and Euro-American power relations, with a particular emphasis on the strategic dimension
and the technological-industrial basis. She takes position in favour
of an autonomous, political Europe. Her commitment to the
preservation and promotion of the European model makes
her a long-time advocate of the core Europe concept.

"A genocide begins with the killing of one man – not for what he has done, but because of who he is." (Kofi Annan, 2000)

Publications

That is (also) America

Népszabadság Online 14 May 2004

Language of the original publication: Hungarian

“In addition, the fact that the war was wanted and provoked by the United States is one of the reasons why the ‘British problems’ – certainly far from being fairy tales for children - mentioned in the Red Cross report submitted to London authorities in February 2004 constitute merely side episodes. But the difference in appreciation is essentially justified by the acknowledgment that, in the case of America, the abuses which have been just brought into light are only small wheels in a large, well built system. A system which is like the reflection in hollow of this surrealist image of the ‘champion of justice, freedom and the democracy' that Washington claims for itself so readily. And which, once having become a conviction and put into practice, has like logical corollary such a system and such behaviours."

Because behind the various symptoms, "we find the same aberrant vision. That of American superiority. The myth of her own infallibility in a world reduced to the fight between Good and Evil. For difficult that it is to recognize, it is not on 11 September 2001 that this attitude appeared, and it does not constitute the prerogative of the neoconservatives. It was already anticipated at the end of the 19th century by then Secretary of State Eliho Root, who had observed that: ‘The American soldier is different from all other soldiers of all other countries since the world began. He is the advance guard of liberty and justice, of law and order, and of peace and happiness.’ One century later, his successor Madelaine Albright designated in the same spirit America as ‘the indispensable nation'. By adding that it is because ‘We stand tall and therefore we can see further’."

1. Not an "accident"
2. Not a "derailment"
3. Not "un-American"

For the full text in Engish, please contact the author.

(Hajnalka Vincze, That is (also) America, Népszabadság Online 14 May 2004, 12,833 characters)

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