ANTIPODES: BIBLICAL PRINCIPLES OF FOREIGN RELATIONS & U.S. PETRODOLLAR GEOPOLITICS

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ANTIPODES:

BIBLICAL PRINCIPLES OF FOREIGN RELATIONS
& U.S. PETRODOLLAR GEOPOLITICS

Textbooks stumble at American international affairs because, unlike Biblical principles, they seldom follow the money, namely:

WELFARE-STATE DEFICITS HOLD U.S. ARMED FORCES HOSTAGE TO DEFENDING THE EVER-INFLATING DOLLAR'S MONOPOLY AS WORLD RESERVE CURRENCY.
Only Biblical principles of foreign relations transcend discrepant interpretations and synthesize a coherent perspective, because …
… they are pessimistic on human nature, to which they deny economic sovereignty, true to Christ's deity and Trinitarianism.*

The entrance of thy words [O Lord] giveth light. – Psalm 119:130

BIBLICAL PRINCIPLES OF FOREIGN RELATIONS			U.S. PETRODOLLAR GEOPOLITICS
	NO government inflation	Government must not inflate the money supply (Deut. 17:17), which would steal domestic and international private purchasing power and wrongly aggrandize the state. Free-market supply and demand should set the amount of money in circulation. No political sovereignty over monetary policy, due to pessimism on human nature, logically implies Christ's deity and Trinitarianism.*	The dollar's monopoly since 1944 as world reserve currency internationalized the impact of U.S. monetary inflation, cutting other nations' purchasing power and living standards. In 1971, rising inflation (whose optimism on human nature denies Christ's deity and Trinitarianism*) forced the U.S. – vexed by an unsustainable gold outflow – to stop redeeming dollars in gold in foreign trade.	Chronic government inflation
	NO entangling alliances	A free national economy in international trade should be mildly deflationary, with a relatively stable hard-money supply, greatly accelerating productivity, very restricted personal debt levels, and independence from foreign regimes' alien self-interests or dysfunctional humanistic supranational schemes for one-world government. (Deut. 17:17; 28:1-5,8,11-12; Lev. 26:3-5,9-10; Ex. 21:2)	To sustain and enhance world demand for dollars as the sole reserve currency in which to settle international trade balances, after ending the dollar's gold backing in 1971, the U.S. in 1973 agreed with Arab states that they would accept only dollars in payment for oil ("petrodollars"), while the U.S. would guarantee them military aid and protection from their foes, such as Israel.	Many entangling alliances
	NO standing army in peacetime	Freedom means no standing peacetime army (1 Samuel 8:11-18). This does not forbid a standing peacetime navy and/or air force which, unlike an army, rulers cannot use to oppress citizens; nor does it prohibit a trained and ready national guard, or citizens' right to bear arms. (The Anglo-American constitutional historical analog to it is "no standing army in peacetime without consent.")	Since 1973 the American military has upheld the fiat dollar against threats to its hegemony as world reserve currency – loss of which would be very disruptive in the U.S. – by nations whom its infinite inflation victimizes. But U.S. dumping of the international gold standard has opened more holes in the dike against mutiny over the unbacked dollar's privileged status than the U.S. has fingers to plug.	Large standing army in peacetime
	NO inflation, zero risk	A free nation will be an international creditor. Indebtedness to outsiders enslaves a people. (Deut. 28:12-13, 43-45; Proverbs 22:7) Greatly accelerating productivity protects against other nations' gaining favorable international trade balances by inflating their currencies. Economic control as international money-lender insures national security without a standing army in peacetime.	The U.S. attacked Libya and Iraq for bucking petrodollar supremacy, not North Korea or Pakistan for atomic weaponry. Iran's bypassing the petrodollar, not its nuclear program, most urgently concerns the U.S. Moscow's anti-petrodollar market initiatives explain American adventures seeking precautionary retaliatory chokeholds on Russian natural gas delivery to Europe through Syria and western Ukraine.	Much inflation, high risk

* The connection between pessimism on human nature and Trinitarianism is that because corrupt man cannot self-redeem, Christ must be divine to atone for man's sin; and conversely, Christ's deity implies man's depravity, in that only a divine Savior can regenerate man, who cannot self-regenerate.