The American Empire?

Much has been recently said about the new American “empire”. The phrase was originally used in by Timothy Leary, I think. “Empire?” This is a pretty strange perspective from a nation whose origins were a result of a war to leave an empire. It does, however, go nicely with the jingle about “the world’s only superpower” and the old “Manifest Destiny” of the 19^th century. It’s babble.

Empires, generally, have had one thing in common. They all fell. Every single one of them. They all became insular, dysfunctional shells in which the support mechanisms failed. The Roman Empire, that bizarre aspiration of so many later nations, regularly went broke. More work was done holding it together than actually building it. It was in its latter years a farcical mess.

The analogy is interesting (if a bit too frequent) of a Roman and an American empire. The Roman empire was created by the much more efficient, highly pragmatic, extremely bitchy, but consistent, Republic. Rome created a large number of client states on its borders and swallowed them. The empire of Augustus was its largest expansion, and it was Augustus that called a halt to the spread of the empire. He did so because the stretch was becoming too much.

The Rhine/Parthian border isn’t really a natural one. Militarily, informing your enemies there’s a physical line you won’t cross isn’t a great idea. The Roman world knew of Alexander’s conquests, and the history of the Greco-Persian wars. They were also fully aware of the potential enemies on the other sides of those self imposed borders. Economically and logistically, even the Romans were understandably wary of fighting major wars and making gigantic financial commitments to them at such distances. Augustus, after one memorable defeat in Germany, and being a good soldier and one of the few truly respected administrative emperors, evidently didn’t think expansion for the sake of expansion was going to work.

The first real analogy with America occurs roughly here, at the start of the 20^th century. The American application, Isolationism, sprang from an entire different set of political and physical circumstances, but the effect was to seal out the rest of the world. This was the Melting Pot era, where the internal dynamics of America were driving the engine. Modern America had established itself, cleared up any ambiguities with its neighbors, and was doing quite nicely, thank you. “Manifest Destiny”, the jingle of expansion, had resulted in Pacific territories, and a global position after the Spanish American War and the opening of Japan and China to the West.

The original Roman expansion, as per Livy, was a much slower affair, but the idea of expansion and obtaining the resources Italy didn’t have were by Augustus’ time pretty well established. The Punic Wars were profitable, in terms of power, resources and influence, Egypt had been the only other real power in the region, and had decayed into irrelevance as opposition.

The Americans had the example of the British Empire, which was then at its height. The original American empire was a relatively modest thing on the map, but it was the first foray outward. The obvious immediate perception was that America didn’t have to operate that way. Trade, internal dynamism, and sheer financial power gave America a few extra strings to play. America grew rapidly, provided its own economic fuel to a large extent, and the early physical “empire” became something exotic on a game board. The British Empire, still working, was left behind. That model just didn’t work for America, and more notably wasn’t profitable enough.

History intervened, anyway. The analogy doesn’t hold in terms of the rest of the 20^th century. After the First World War, America was a World Power in the classic sense, although with a totally different strategic and ideological orientation to the rest of the world. It was a truly modern nation, a wealthy teenager among the poor pensioners. “Empire” has a few practical connotations, and the American industrial capacity was making an empire of its own, which had the added advantage of showing up on balance sheets. “Manifest Destiny” now looked like an old pop song, and sounded like it.

The Second World War was the admittedly vague equivalent of the Punic Wars. The result was the same. One large, powerful, nation, with a global reach, emerged. The USSR was the equivalent of Egypt, big, but rickety, strong, but lacking depth. The Communist bloc was a pretty ragtag collection of self interests, and nobody would now call it the sort of unstoppable monster it was alleged to be. More to the point, Russia, China and the US weren’t the sort of natural enemies that wrote Old European and Asian history.

Despite its century of wars and some really weird policy positions, the US isn’t physically or ideologically anyone’s natural enemy. In the ongoing game of global poker, as an economic entity it’s holding a good hand, and has the chips to sit. Militarily, it can simply hold its own as it sees fit. Historically, selective self interest has always been a good general motif. Ideologically, it can claim to have been pretty busy trying to operate a working democracy.

The Roman analogy, however, does have some valid points. Rome, like the US, was a world unto itself. The external/internal dichotomy was pretty extreme. The outside world wasn’t overly relevant to the Romans, except as an ongoing nuisance. As far as the US is concerned, the external realities are trade and political alignments related to trade and security. The US isn’t some monolithic militaristic thing, nor is it a particularly aggressive nation per se, compared to most others.

It has fought wars for various reasons, some good, some pretty pitiful, but the fact is that its interests are wide ranging and are affected by regional issues in other parts of the world. The US does really see itself as the good guy, and many of the internal criticisms of US policy are based on that view of itself. Someone should note that the most effective critics of the US are Americans, and that even if it takes a generation, they do usually make their points.

Sadly, if the US simply stuck to its own basic principles, the policies would work a lot better. Supporting sleazy strongmen and opponents of global enemies on principle, regardless of the fact that those opponents are also very sleazy, hasn’t been a good idea. Israel may not be sleazy, but some of the very mixed bag of Israeli policies aren’t, and shouldn’t be allowed to be perceived as, US policy. It hasn’t helped US credibility in the Middle East, and it’s not as though all Israelis mindlessly agree with those policies, either.

Rome, similarly, got dragged into a lot of situations by the allied and client states methodology. It ultimately worked, for a while, but it also set up the semi-manageable empire, and the strains they imposed on Rome itself. Historically, the US has done better using its own principles and self interest than it has through getting involved with the strange (and somewhat irrelevant, purely local) rationales of third parties.

There’s a further issue, which dwarfs Roman comparisons. Realistically, one good reason for the US not particularly wanting to run the world is the sheer cost. America has more experience funding useless undertakings on a global scale than any other nation in history. Nobody in their right minds would want to “manage” this mess, let alone pay for the privilege. America has more to gain by letting the other developed nations and the emerging nations, notably China and India, pick up the tab in the local brawls and general fiascoes.

If the idea were ever seriously proposed that America rule the world, I will make a sizable bet now that:

1. The immediate reaction would be an amount of written advice the size of the Library Of Congress to the effect that it’s a lousy idea, written by every business entity, think tank, lobbyist, economist, political scientist, and academic able to use a computer or a crayon.

2. Anyone fool enough to make that proposition would be entered on a very short list of unemployable lunatics by the GOP and Democrats.

3. That any government supporting the idea would shortly become an ex-government, as a result of completely misreading the electorate.

4. The entire US Treasury goes on stress leave the next day.

The “empire” mentality has already proven what it can’t handle. America’s relationship with South America and Central America is another indicative millstone, showing what “empire” can do when it really wants to create problems for itself. Here, the exclusion of illegal workers idea is at odds with the realities of needing labor, and more seriously needing viable economies in those regions. If legal workers are allowed, and that money flows back to their home countries, that would be a massive boost in their economies, and do a lot to make them more viable.

More importantly, it would allow them to capitalize. Even Brazil has taken an awfully long time to get to the levels of capitalization it now has, despite a lot of very unsubtle prodding. Why would the smaller nations just naturally capitalize, when they don’t even have the money to develop themselves? Give me the name and address of one financial institution or industry on Earth that works solely on rhetoric… please!

The millstone reaction, however, has been to miss that target completely, and create an expensive security issue, which many believe is unworkable as well as undesirable. This is “empire” logic at its least effective, trying to stem a tide that it created, and undermining its own interests. The US needs workers; the work they do is valuable, and their employers need them. It’s a lot better than aid, loans, and rhetoric will ever be.

Excuse me if I point out that the aid to Latin America alone, let alone loans, might be made a lot easier to live with if they could make enough money for themselves. A lot of the illegal immigration is purely economic. Aid and loans haven’t dented the poverty, and they’ve put some horrifying holes in the budgets, however well meaning the intentions. People handling their own money tend to be a lot more careful, and much more demanding of their governments. It’s not necessarily slower to do it through natural growth, either.

An American “empire”, political, military, economic, ideological, is the antithesis of pragmatic management. One good reason for that is that there are now 300 million critics likely to have views on the subject. Domestically, the US government on all levels is presently getting some of the most severe flak it’s ever received from its own people. The incumbent Congress in the 2006 midterm elections is said to be one of the most genuinely reviled in history. It is seen as do-nothing, and its own members are regularly to be seen and heard grinding their teeth and the amount of non-achievement in the House and Senate. When the people operating the machine say it isn’t working, you do have to listen.

There is a clear cultural shift in America, and it’s in almost direct opposition to “empire” or anything like it. At a time when telling the difference between parts of New Orleans and Iraq is a lot harder than it used to be, talking about “empires” tends to strain the credulity. Domestic issues are serious, and demanding attention. The bungling responses to crises are not improving the mood of the electorate. My guess is that the midterm will be purely anti-incumbency, and any babble about “empire” will be considered derisive of real issues at best, and unforgivably blue-sky intolerable at worst. This would be one of the few times I’ve ever seen an election where every incumbent is running a real risk of losing, based on incumbency. More than a few of the people obviously don’t like anyone trying to fool them, either.

I have nothing against America, or Americans. Quite the opposite. I learned to read, after my parents tricked me into reading, from The New Yorker Annual 1950, which I still have, well read, many times. I have, somewhere, Boston, I think, some American relatives. When I was a kid, every Yank I met insisted in feeding me on a colossal scale. They’re even worse than the Greeks; if you’re not dead, you haven’t eaten enough. The local expatriate Americans are generally well informed. One of them told me that dual citizenship is a good tax move, so you will gather that more than a few topics have come up over the years. I’ve also spent a very long time trying to fathom the logic of American thinking from every source I can find, and it’s an interesting study.

These encounters with Americans and things American have led me to believe that :

1. The American public isn’t much impressed by bull, however self serving, on the subject of how, or more particularly why, America does things.

2. Credibility is based on what actually happens, not spin. Ironically, the home of spin is the place where it has the least traction. Disbelief is more likely.

3. The average US politician can be the best informed person on Earth, if the attempt is made to be informed.

4. Partisan politics isn’t the big winner it’s supposed to be. The country is full of people on both sides with the qualifications to see what’s wrong with any piece of information or concept. If anything, purely partisan politics is just annoying people who know better.

5. The “empire” idea is likely to get ripped to shreds by all sides if it interferes with domestic issues.

6. The expectations of the public have been raised by repeated crises, and failure to meet those expectations will be fatal.

Under these conditions, “empire” isn’t a workable option. To voluntarily attempt to control the ongoing global sewer isn’t anyone’s idea of a good move. The US is interlocked with the rest of the world in enough irritating ways without having to run the bloody thing as well.

The sole superpower thing is getting a bit stale, too, reflecting the thinking of a world that’s moved on. It is axiomatic that conservative Americans believe in a strong military, and being the best equipped, the Fustest With The Mostest, in the most literal sense. That said, lousy accountancy and related budget problems isn’t conservative America’s favorite hobby, either. Even the most conservative think tanks are talking about relatively low, rational levels of expansion, not carte blanche whatever-the-taxpayer-can-afford stuff. The liberal side has been spectacularly less than articulate on the subject, but it’s highly unlikely that “superpower” and “idiotic spending” are synonyms.

Essentially, the US defence profile is broadly defensive, allowing for the understandable doctrine of preferring not to fight wars on home soil. That’s a Chinese idea originally, “Better to fight as a guest than as a host,” so it’s not a purely American perspective. It’s only sixty five years ago that people were bemoaning America’s lack of participation in a war. At that time, better preparation would have made things a lot easier than they were in 1941-2. So if the idea has taken hold that maybe it’s better to be ready than not, it’s believable.

But “empire” and “superpower” isn’t a good mix. Conceptually it’s absurd. The superpower is a far more advanced entity. Add to this the economic elements, in which the superpower is far more powerful economically than militarily. America has taken hits to equity values alone which would have destroyed whole continents’ capital assets. Enron and Worldcom would have financially maimed even Europe, as capital losses. America got some indigestion, and some necessary bile production.

You see what I mean: the facts are bit beyond the infantile concept of “empire”. The US may well be the last great nation state before whatever supersedes this almost Medieval world structure comes. The world’s too small for empires. Rome and the other old empires never conceived of this world.

The teenager is now an adult, much better educated, still energetic, if with one or two signs of early middle aged paunch. There are some fitness problems, and the home economics class might need to be revisited occasionally. That said, the result isn’t an idiot who needs more problems.