"A hegemon is nothing more or less than a leader with preponderant influence and authority over all others in its domain. That is America's position in the world today.... [P]eace and American security depend on American power and the will to use it... American hegemony is the only reliable defense against a breakdown of peace and international order. The appropriate goal of American foreign policy, therefore, is to preserve that hegemony as far into the future as possible."
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Lord Acton
With the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States became the sole remaining super-power. Many saw this extraordinary situation as an opportunity at last for world disarmament, a concerted attack on poverty and disease, and global harmony under a rule of international law.
Not the neo conservatives.
Instead, they announced, this was to be "The American Century" – a "benevolent global hegemony" imposed upon the world by the sole remaining super-power, the United States. In this new world order, the United States would renounce treaties and international law at will if they were found to be contrary to the interests of the "hegemon." Military action by the super power would be taken "preventatively" if there was a perceived possibility that an upstart nation might resist the "order" with force. Aggressive initiatives would be taken to assure that no rival super power would arise to challenge the global hegemony.
The United States would, in short, become the kind of world empire we claimed that we were struggling, throughout the cold war, to prevent the Soviet Union from becoming.
Much of this neo con program has been implemented by the Bush administration. The test-ban and anti-ballistic missile treaties have been abrogated, along with the Geneva Conventions against torture and the Nuremberg Accords forbidding unprovoked war. The United States has refused to allow its citizens to be tried in the international criminal courts. The military budget has been expanded so that it now equals the combined military budgets of all other nations.
But in Iraq, the neo cons have been rudely awakened from their imperial dreams.
In August 2002, General Tommy Franks gathered a few of his senior officers, and together they predicted what Iraq might look like four years after an invasion and the fall of Saddam Hussein. These projections, assembled in a PowerPoint presentation, were recently obtained by the National Security Archives (a non-governmental research organization) through a Freedom of Information Act request. There we find that had the prophecies of Franks group proved true, today there would be only 5,000 American troops remaining in Iraq, while a representative government would be in place and the Iraqi army would be keeping the peace throughout the country.
But the spectacular failure of these rosy predictions should not surprise us. For at about the same time, Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Cheney were assuring us that the overthrow of Saddam would be a "cakewalk," and that we would be "greeted as liberators," with flowers and sweets. The cost of "Operation Iraqi Liberation" (O.I.L.) (oops, make that "Operation Iraqi Freedom"), we were told, would be paid for by oil revenues.
Well, it didn't quite turn out that way, did it? And why not? Many explanations have been offered. Among these: incredibly poor management by unqualified party hacks, failure to plan for the post-war occupation, failure to involve the Iraqis in the reconstruction. To be sure, all these factors and more have led to the appalling mess that is Iraq today. Underlying all these factors, perhaps, is a mind set of the neo conservatives who successfully urged Bush and Cheney to launch the war and who, before that, drew up and signed the neo con manifesto of 1997: "The Project for the New American Century" (PNAC).
By a "mind set" I mean assumptions that might be so far in the background of the neo cons thinking and planning that they are scarcely aware of them. These assumptions become apparent, not in what the neo cons say, but in how they act.
Three of these "mind set assumptions," I suggest, are especially significant:
The world beyond the US borders is essentially passive. Nations and peoples can be acted upon, but they will not react unexpectedly or resist effectively. In a sense, then, the "outside world" is like a sculptor's clay, a painter's canvas, or a writer's sheet of paper. Action without reaction. (The neo cons appear to have the same attitude toward the American public. But that must be the topic of another paper).
Dr. Ernest Partridge is a consultant, writer and lecturer in the field of Environmental Ethics and Public Policy. Partridge has taught philosophy at the University of California, and in Utah, Colorado and Wisconsin. He publishes the website, "The Online Gadfly" (www.igc.org/gadfly) and co-edits the progressive website, "The Crisis Papers" (www.crisispapers.org). His book in progress, "Conscience of a Progressive," can be seen at www.igc.org/gadfly/progressive/^toc.htm .
The idea that the US is last super-power is not entirely true. A nation with the kind of debt that we carry now is simply a "poser" when it comes to super-power status.
If China, a country which has been on the map for thousands of years, is not a super-power then I'm not sure what that term means.
If India, with the bomb, and an endless supply of cheap, educated labor is not a super-power then, again I'm baffled by what the meaning of the tag "super-power" implies.
Russia, the biggest country on planet earth, has nearly endless natural resources, and some of the toughest citizens in the world; but not a super-power....
Israel, with the bomb, endless financial support, and a penchant for stirring up trouble in their region of the world qualifies as some sort of a super-power
The US does have super-powers but that isn't always a good thing......The biggest bully on the play ground will get their way for a while....Ironically, some other power will eventually replace them.
So it has always gone with some of the greatest "super-powers" in world history.....Rome, Persia, The Ottomans, and the list goes on and on.
Thanks for your attention.....Mr. Brian Mathes
by
Brian Mathes (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 41 comments)
on Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 1:35:33 PM
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