The Most Dangerous Game in the World: Oil, War, and U.S. Global Hegemony

The attacks on September 11 and following American operations in Afghanistan have raised a host of questions, and touched a broad array of ongoing structural and conflictual developments about world politics. There is a fairly widespread consensus that “everything changed” on the day four airliners were hijacked and nearly 5000 people murdered. It has been claimed that “the attacks on the United States ¼ have incalculable consequences for domestic politics and world affairs” with “profound effects on the US economy as well as the world”. 1 It was described as “a wake-up call against the background of a period of indolence and self-satisfaction”.2 “The new world order”, we were told, “is at war and everything is changed utterly – borders, cultures, powers, America, Middle East, Asia, China, Australia”.