Tomgram

The question of empire

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Recently, the New York Times Magazine published a long, confused imperial apologia by Michael Ignatieff on its cover, entitled “The American Empire,” with a striking parenthetical phrase added, “(Get Used to It).” The implication somehow was that it was all over — the empire, which hardly a year ago in papers like the Times would never have existed, was now there, full-blown, a given in the world. Get used to it, guy. Look reality in the face.

But I think it’s reasonable to ask, get used to what exactly? Are we, as Anatol Lieven of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace suggests below, essentially just another colonial empire, policing the frontiers the way so many have done before — but with an exaggerated sense of our own exceptionalism?

And is it true, as historian Gabriel Kolko suggests, that, though following an imperial path with its roots in the early Cold War, the Bush administration will never come close to its ideal of “world order”? If we are the last empire, then how resistant will the world prove? This is a question on the minds of many worldwide, including, for instance, the Communist Chinese regime. A friend, Moss Roberts, sends on the following excerpt from an article, “Why Does the World Remain Unstable, hegemony and terrorism constitute the major factors affecting world peace” from the January 16, 2003 English edition of the Beijing Review with his own brief, explanatory head notes:

[The article uses interesting terms from earlier periods: “hegemony,” “sphere of
influence,” and “Brezhnev Doctrine.” “Sphere of influence” suggests that the US
is operating in a late 19th century colonial mode when Western nations and
Japan held separate spheres in China; the “Brezhnev Doctrine” justified using Soviet armed force to intervene in the USSR’s spheres of influence to defend the Soviet system, as Mao (unfazed as usual by doctrines called Brezhnev or Truman) denounced the USSR as a “social-imperialist country.”
]

“The [US] anti-terrorist campaign has focused on attacking and smashing
terrorist organizations and eliminating terrorists, rather than studying
and eradicating the roots of terror. . . . After George W. Bush took
office, the hawkish segment of the U.S. Government became more vocal. The
September 11 attacks were severe, but provided an opportunity for the
United States. It waved the banner of anti-terrorism and commanded the
world under the pretext, attempting to add more of the world to its sphere
of influence. . . . But while stressing its own absolute security, the
United States seemed to forget the peace and general development of the
world as a whole. . . . The preemptive theory reminded people of the
Brezhnev Doctrine in the Soviet period. . . . The United States is finding
that it is not so easy to control the world all by itself. Not all small
countries will listen to it, neither will the major powers, who have their
own stances, principles, and interests. . . . and the UN will not allow
itself to be transformed into the United States.”

I’ve been eyeing some of the many pieces on empire to wander across my computer screen and hope, from time to time, in the coming weeks to highlight the question of empire — or rather the question not of what are we (get used to it), but of what are we becoming (and what might be done about it). My own fears don’t run toward a hundred year or thousand year American empire, not with the present plunderers in control, but toward a world in rubble, in ruins. Tom

The Dilemma of Sustaining an American Empire
By Anatol Lieven
Financial Times
January 2, 2003

I’ve been eyeing some of the many pieces on empire to wander across my computer screen and hope, from time to time, in the coming weeks to highlight the question of empire — or rather the question not of what are we (get used to it), but of what are we becoming (and what might be done about it). My own fears don’t run toward a hundred year or thousand year American empire, not with the present plunderers in control, but toward a world in rubble, in ruins. Tom

The Dilemma of Sustaining an American Empire
By Anatol Lieven
Financial Times
January 2, 2003

Since September 11 2001 and the expansion of US military power that followed, Americans have begun to feel more comfortable with the idea of their country as an empire – something that previously most would have fervently denied. Talk of America as the “new Rome” is common on comment pages. At the same time, Americans have always been anxious to believe that theirs is a new kind of empire and uniquely beneficial.

In the words of Elihu Root, secretary of war, “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”. Root was speaking in 1899 but one could imagine his words in the mouth of George W. Bush

The reviewer is a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

To read more Lieven click here

The Perils of Pax Americana
By Garbriel Kolko
The Australian
January 13, 2003

POLICIES virtually identical to President George W. Bush’s national security strategy paper of last September, with its ambitious military, economic and political goals, have been produced since the late 1940s.

After all, the US has attempted to define the contours of politics in every part of the world for the past half-century. Its many alliances, from NATO to SEATO, were intended to consolidate its global hegemony. And Washington rationalised its hundreds of interventions – which have taken every form, from sending its fleet to show the flag, to the direct use of US soldiers – as forestalling the spread of communism. But that ogre has all but disappeared and US armed forces are more powerful and active than ever.

Gabriel Kolko, research professor emeritus at York University in Toronto, is author, most recently, of Another Century of War? (The New Press, 2002).

To read more Kolko click here