daacss.blogg.se

Now the Cold War is over, and, observes Johnson, That tradition was abandoned during the Cold War, but only for compelling reasons.

But such foreign commitments were considered alien to America throughout most of its history. As Chalmers Johnson puts it in his new book Blowback, “Perhaps the Romans did not find it strange to have her troops in Gaul, nor the British in South Africa” (p. policy have a different perception.Īmerica is an empire. Alas, many people on the receiving end of U.S. No matter what they do, they act as if they are implementing justice and truth, if not the American Way. Members of America’s foreign-policy elite apparently see themselves as the anointed spokesmen for the “international community,” whatever that is. With varying amounts of effort, the United States could defeat any (and probably all) of those great countries if it chose to do so. Even western Europe, an international aggregation whose population and economy exceed those of the United States, has only 10 to 15 percent of America’s combat capability. China is a rising power, but it remains a military pygmy. Japan has minuscule international influence compared to its economic strength. In contrast, the United States possesses not only the ability to intervene everywhere, but the ability to defeat any adversary. Eventually, and predictably, it was eclipsed by several of them.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, it dominates the world in a manner not seen for least 150 years, and perhaps much longer.Īlthough Great Britain once had global reach, with its dominant navy and far-flung imperial possessions, it alone could not impose its will on its most important international competitors—the United States, France, Germany, Japan, and Russia. In what columnist Charles Krauthammer calls the “unipolar moment,” this country stands as an international colossus.

The United States is a unique imperial power.