Noam Chomsky Interview

Tom Murphy Interviews Noam Chomsky

Partial Transcript - Update Soon

TOM MURPHY: In your book, Hegemony or Survival, you mention threats to human survival and I saw a speech where you talked about nuclear misfires and things like that. ... 1995 we came pretty close to an accident.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Many times, many times. Take the Cuban missile crisis, it literally came a word away from firing of a nuclear tipped torpedo which could have had a - probably would have had a nuclear response which could have set off a chain reaction to a nuclear war. A Russian submarine commander countermanded an order to fire nuclear tipped torpedoes at a time when Russian submarines were under attack by U.S. destroyers and the commanders thought there was a nuclear war going on. One commander countermanded the order which is why it didn’t happen.
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TOM MURPHY: ... when people talk about the destruction of Israel - if all the Jews and non-Jews in Israel lived totally equally, the way let's say hopefully like in America, that would be, by definition, the destruction of Israel. Right?

NOAM CHOMSKY: Look, Israel by High Court - there's nothing secret about this - I mean, the High Court, this is the supreme court, decision back in 1960's, it's kinda part of the Basic Law, is that Israel is, I'm quoting, "sovereign state of the Jewish people," that means Israel and the diaspora, not a state of its citizens. A major issue in Israel, a major issue, is what's called the demographic problem - means not enough Jews, too many Palestinians. I mean, that's the leading public issue in the country. That's why they pulled out of Gaza. You know, they're worried about the demographic problem. They want to draw the boundaries so that there'll be a Jewish majority, big Jewish majority. In Jerusalem, all the gerrymandering of boarders and so on, is openly described, openly, as an effort to make sure that the Jewish population of whatever they're going to call Jerusalem some big area around what used to be called Jerusalem, will have about 70% Jewish population. I mean, there's nothing to discuss, it's perfectly open in the public.
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TOM MURPHY: I agree with you that - or is this what you're saying that, is it economic reasons ...

NOAM CHOMSKY: Strategic reasons. I mean, economic and strategic, which are impossible to distinguish. But since the Second World War, I'll quote the State Department, the Middle East oil producing regions have been regarded, I'll quote the words, "a stupendous source of strategic power." George Kennan, State Department, head of the planning section said control, not access, control over the Middle East oil gives us "veto power" over what our rivals might do, other industrial powers. You control the spigot, have your hand on the spigot, you have a lot of world control. It's not even access to oil. The first, roughly, 30 years after the Second World War, the U.S. was - North America was the major oil producer. It wasn't using Middle East oil, never the less we had to keep an iron hand of control on Middle East oil and if the U.S. were to go to solar energy, they'd still want to control Middle East oil because that's a lever of world control. Everyone understands it but we're not allowed to think about it.
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