Sovereign states and protectorates
Giorgio Agamben, Quodlibet, January 17, 2024
The discourses of those who speak in the media about foreign policy issues in Italy are devoid of any foundations, because they pretend to ignore that Italy is not a sovereign nation, but a protectorate. According to international law, a nation that hosts on its territory a number of bases (some of which are secret and full of atomic bombs) equal to that which the United States holds in Italy, does not have sovereignty over its foreign policy, but only over its internal policy; it is, i.e., technically a protectorate.
This explains why the new government, which, calling itself right-wing, should first of all have claimed a status of full sovereignty, simply conformed, with respect to the war in Ukraine, to the directives of the protector State. Let us leave to whoever wants to imagine what would happen, in fact, to a head of state who opened a dispute over the presence of United States bases on our territory. Yet the issue goes well far beyond a problem of sovereignty, since it implies that, in the case of a new world war, Italy would be the first country to suffer a nuclear bombardment that would destroy it entirely. Alas! It is useless to hope that journalists paid by the so far still dominant power pose to themselves this kind of problems.
Giorgio Agamben, Quodlibet, January 17, 2024
The discourses of those who speak in the media about foreign policy issues in Italy are devoid of any foundations, because they pretend to ignore that Italy is not a sovereign nation, but a protectorate. According to international law, a nation that hosts on its territory a number of bases (some of which are secret and full of atomic bombs) equal to that which the United States holds in Italy, does not have sovereignty over its foreign policy, but only over its internal policy; it is, i.e., technically a protectorate.
This explains why the new government, which, calling itself right-wing, should first of all have claimed a status of full sovereignty, simply conformed, with respect to the war in Ukraine, to the directives of the protector State. Let us leave to whoever wants to imagine what would happen, in fact, to a head of state who opened a dispute over the presence of United States bases on our territory. Yet the issue goes well far beyond a problem of sovereignty, since it implies that, in the case of a new world war, Italy would be the first country to suffer a nuclear bombardment that would destroy it entirely. Alas! It is useless to hope that journalists paid by the so far still dominant power pose to themselves this kind of problems.
(English translation by I, Robot)
Sliman Mansour, Absent Presence, 2018. Courtesy of WikiArt.
I agree, but I wouldn't be so sure that Italy (or any other EU country except the UK) has full sovereignty in their internal policy.
ReplyDeleteFrogot to put my name on that comment.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you. And I dare not think what would happen if EU countries were to lose another war.
ReplyDelete