August 18, 2023
“We’re an empire
now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that
reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new
realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re
history’s actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”
Karl Rove – 2004
By most accounts,
Karl Rove was correct about the American empire. Nineteen years ago, America had the strongest
military in the world, but the economy was showing signs of weakness. Back in
March 2000, the stock market bubble burst, resulting in the NASDAQ or “dot com
bubble” crash. Still at that time, most of the country believed former President
Ronald Reagan as he referred to America as “the shining city upon a hill.”
Due to its military
might America was able to project its power and impose its will upon the world.
Rove’s arrogant
assertion that “…when we act, we create our own reality…” is a major part of
the problem that the American empire is facing today. What gets lost in this
assessment is the historic reality that all empires run their course. The European, Greek, Roman and British
empires tell the stories of tragic endings. A common and significant factor in
their demise was arrogance. Instead of
recognizing the changing of global dynamics, the geopolitical landscape and
making the requisite adjustments, they believed they could manage the world by
sheer force, power projection and will.
America is blinded
by its arrogance and cannot properly assess the realities before it. America still believes it is the unitary
hegemon and many of its recent actions are exacerbating its demise.
In 1991, President
George H. W. Bush announced a “new world order” that he believed would replace
the bipolar politics of the Cold War era with a U.S.-driven unipolar order.
His son, George W.
Bush — while still governor of Texas but running for president — outlined the
foreign policy principles that would guide his presidency, promising a
“distinctly American internationalism,” again, not so subtle code language for
a unipolar American order.
Recently, Secretary
of State Antony Blinken and other Biden administration officials continue to
discuss a “rules-based order.” They seem
to be the only ones who know what the rules are.
America continues to
assert itself as a unitary power in what is emerging as a multipolar world. In
The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway’s character Bill Gorton asks Mike
Campbell, “How did you go bankrupt?” Mike replies, “Two ways …Gradually and
then suddenly.”
The unipolar
hegemonic dominance of the U.S. is bankrupt and coming to an end.
In October of 2020 I
published a piece entitled “The Non-Aligned Nations Realign” wherein I wrote,
“As the U.S. has emerged from the post-Cold
War era as the unitary global hegemon, it became increasingly more difficult
for countries to maintain their sovereignty and battle the inequities of the
‘new world’ economic order imposed upon them by the United States. The U.S.’
‘maximum pressure’ campaign of sanctions and regime change has been applied as
a weapon of economic warfare against U.S. ‘enemies’ such as China, Cuba, Iran
and Venezuela. Except for China, these tactics have crippled economies and
wreaked havoc on societies.”
With the technology
at our disposal, we can see the demise of the American Empire happening in real
time. According to Alexander Mercouris,
host of The Duran,
“the great period of danger in any
international system is when the overarching empire declines, when it starts to
lose control. Whether they (the leaders of the empire) understand that their
empire is in decline and try to manage that decline in a way that preserves the
international system or whether alternatively they try to go for broke and they
try to preserve their position by managing conflicts that they believe that
they can win.”
Even though the
empire is in decline, it is far from over. It is important to understand that
America is a nuclear power and still maintains military dominance over most of
the world.
According to The
Soldiers Project, America has roughly 750 U.S. foreign military bases spread
across 80 nations. Russia (a nuclear power) has about three dozen bases and
China (a nuclear threat) has just five.
This implies that
the U.S has three times as many bases as all other countries combined. One of the major challenges facing the U.S.
is nuclear deterrence and the concept of mutually assured destruction. A
nuclear attack by one superpower would be met with an overwhelming nuclear
counterattack such that both the attacker and the defender would be
annihilated.
With that reality
being understood the issue shifts to one of economics. Until recently, the U.S.
has been able to assert its will via its economic leverage and a sanctions
regime combined with the threat of military action. That’s not working any
more. The non-aligned nations have
realigned.
China, Russia &
Other Realignments
In response to the
U.S. sanctions regime, China and Russia were forced to reassess their interests
and differences. They came to understand that U.S. hegemony and imperialism was
a common threat. The U.S. proxy war in Ukraine has proven to be a major threat
to Russia and the U.S. involvement in Taiwan threatens to start a war with
China. Russia and China now enjoy the best relations they have had since the
late 1950s. There is a “new world order” on the horizon but it’s not the same
order Bush 41’ spoke about.
Other examples of
global realignment include, on March 10, Saudi Arabia and Iran announcing the
normalization of ties brokered by China and South African President Cyril
Ramaphosa inviting 67 country leaders and 20 representatives of international
organizations to the upcoming BRICS summit.
Even though it’s not
on the immediate agenda, BRICS is moving towards a new currency that will be
based on a basket of the currencies of the initial five-nation bloc. Kenyan
President William Ruto has called on African nations to shift away from using
the U.S. dollar for intra-continental trade and opt for the use of local
currencies.
In response to U.S.
sanctions, the non-aligned nations are realigning, making it increasingly more
difficult for the U.S. to project its power as nations seek to assert more
control over their country’s resources and governance.
It is important to
realize that in spite of U.S. sanctions, well-stocked Iranian supermarkets have
opened in Venezuela and Iran is exporting oil to Venezuela. China and Iran have
entered a 25-year strategic partnership in trade, politics, culture and
security.
Remember when
President Joe Biden told the world that U.S. sanctions against Russia would
cripple its economy? “As a result of these unprecedented sanctions, the ruble
almost is immediately reduced to rubble…,” he infamously said.
According to World
Bank data, Russia was among the world’s five largest economies and the largest
in Europe in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP) as of the end of 2022,
despite Western sanctions. China topped
the list as the world’s biggest economy ($31 trillion), followed by the U.S.,
India and Japan. So much for U.S.
sanctions.
Even as the U.S. is
trying to protect its drone base and France’s access to uranium by attempting
to exert its power in Niger, the current leaders of that government would not
take a meeting with America’s coup plotter extraordinaire, Acting Deputy Secretary
of State Victoria Nuland. They would
also not allow her to meet with deposed President Mohamed Bazoum. They are
ignoring the “rules-based order.”
As Algeria, Mali and
Burkina Faso continue to back the junta in Niger, the U.S.’ ability to control
the dynamics is in question. It becomes
increasingly more difficult to project power when the world sees that you are
weak and alternative alliances become available.
Americans see
America in the romantic context of Reagan’s “shining city on a hill” while the
“Third World” sees the U.S. as a monster, in which the taints, the sickness,
colonialism/neo-colonialism and the inhumanity of Europe have grown to
appalling dimensions. The “non-aligned” nations are in realignment. The U.S.
should be as Killens says, about “free people” not “free enterprise.”
It is said that a
dying mule can manage to engage in some kicks. These kicks may be dangerous,
but they don’t last long. Progressively, they become weaker and weaker until
the mule finally gives up. We know the U.S. empire won’t go quietly into the
night. That’s when it is proving to be its most dangerous. As Antonio Gramsci wrote,
“The crisis consists precisely in the fact
that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great
variety of morbid symptoms appear.”
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