Death of an Empire

Chronicles are littered with the footnotes and forebodings of academic ‘Cassandras’, condemned to watch helplessly as their warnings were ignored and tragedies unfolded. It seems that modern historians too are consigned to spend their days learning the lessons of humanity’s greatest mistakes, and to spend their nights watching helplessly as another generation repeats them. Scholars of classical civilizations might find parallels between the Spartan-inspired Doric architecture of Western capitals and the willingness of their elected Emperors to send troops across the world to defend the far flung interests of their modern empires. However, upon deeper deliberation, they might also identify the differences that will serve to explain why the empires of China, Rome, Sparta and Britain lasted for hundreds of years while that of modern America has risen and fallen within only a Century. This brief discussion does not seek to celebrate the building of empires, or to idealize brutal conquerors and their machines of power, but the contrasts between the enduring ages of Rome or Sparta and the short span of the American empire are perhaps worthy of reflection.

America, certainly until the sunset of its empire, largely avoided the strategy of invasion, conquest and assimilation employed by past empires, notably the British and Roman, preferring instead to expand its sphere of influence through subject states that were subjugated by economic might and commercial allegiances with ‘elected’ officials or dictators. For decades military advisors were deployed to subject nations as American business and capital flowed to all corners of the globe, from the Philippines to the Gulf States, Israel, and much of Western Europe (i.e. NATO), not to mention Central and South America. As a self-declared ‘superpower’, America preferred to buy loyalty in foreign states and to reinforce its interests in these client regions by building military bases and corporate alliances. Senior political figures in these client states were offered inducements, whether elected or not, and in return corporate America had access to new markets and to a vast hinterland of raw materials and cheap labor. Such foreign interests were vigorously defended by a vast navy and a willingness to deploy forces to Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, Panama or any other nation that was threatened by internal or external conquest. At its height, towards the end of the 20th Century and prior to the failure of both its economy and military invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the American empire extended across the length and breadth of both American continents, through much of South-East Asia, Western Europe, Australia, the Middle East and even into parts of Africa (please see inset map).

The dawn of American empire can be traced back to the Indian wars of expansion (1789–1849), the French Louisiana Purchase of 1803, and the Mexican-American War of 1848. This continental expansion continued with the Spanish-American War of 1898 with a view to acquiring Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines and Guam. By 1912 the consolidation of the central tract of the Northern American continent had been achieved with the admission of Arizona to the Union, with Alaska and Hawaii later acquired in 1959. Subsequent victory in two World Wars expanded the horizon of American interests, fuelled by massive war reparations and post-war loans, as conquest and devastation placed Japan, Britain, Germany, and many other nations deeply into America’s debt and under her spell. As with countless other empires, the United States repeated the errors of Victorian Britain, Nazi Germany, Napoleonic France and the USSR by overextending her economic and military sphere of influence. Although all conquerors are tempted to continue victorious campaigns rather than to consolidate their position, all new colonies must first be subjugated and infrastructures put into place to allow the spoils of war to be reaped in the form of trade, materials, produce and industry. Up until the Vietnam War American colonial policies appeared largely effective, curbing Chinese influence in South-East Asia, and limiting Soviet expansion into Western Europe and Cuba. This was largely achieved by supplying military aid, funding and advisors, rather than through direct military intervention per se. However this policy began to change as American confidence grew and power was transferred to a post-war generation that had never known military defeat or economic depression.

Major setbacks in Vietnam, Somalia, Afghanistan, and Iraq have since eroded the notion of American invincibility and challenged the wisdom of supporting a military-industrial complex which has made the American economy completely dependent upon foreign oil, imports and a constant procession of wars to fuel the sales of American arms manufacturers. Although popular at home until recently, such foreign policies have lost the ‘hearts and minds’ of Asians, Arabs, and Europeans alike. You only have to cast your mind back two decades towards the end of the Soviet Union to recall the sudden cataclysmic collapse of a military industrial complex which had overextended its reach and budget.

In an all too familiar fiscal maneuver, past US governments had used the rhetoric of an ‘American commercial peace’, a 20th Century version of the ‘Pax Romana’ in which conquest and economic subservience were rewarded with relative peace and moderated military expansion. As with any good protection racket, if you traded with Rome, paid your dues to the Emperor, hosted their forward bases, allowed your young men to perform military service, and swore allegiance to the emperor, then a 'peace' was maintained. However, insurrection was punished by total war, wars that led to the destruction of a million Gauls and the destructon ofJudea, Palmiera, Carthage and countless other rival nations. A loyal client state of America such as Honduras, Columbia or Panama was rewarded with ‘incentives’, military support and trade, whereas insurgencies in other nations led to ritual bombing campaigns, the funding of insurgents, and frequently direct invasion. The problem with maintaining such ‘client states’ is that they require constant vigilance, propaganda, arms supplies, and the payment of rulers and their officials, not to mention the establishment of forward bases of military advisors and elite forces.

With so many client regimes on the payroll of the former Soviet Union, its decaying and decrepit industrial base inevitably imploded, and with it the entirety of its Empire. Similarly America, with its various ‘client states’ in South and Central America, Africa, the Philippines, Israel and beyond, is experiencing the full costs of empire as it continues to expend trillions on futile wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The United States Congress, with their private military-industrial interests in such companies as Halliburton and the Carlyle Group (ignoring oil investments for the sake of brevity), has engaged in a prolonged Middle-Eastern conflict through a level of government borrowing unseen since World War II. To add to these trillions of war dollars, the United States has since compounded the gravity of such vast national debts by borrowing trillions more in order to recapitalize the collapsing banking system and to finance a fiscal stimulus package to ‘kick start’ its ailing economy. Within five short years, the Federal Government has borrowed more in real terms than it did for both World Wars and the Great Depression combined…

As the true fiscal damage of the twin wars rises above $6 trillion, and the combined cost of the bank bailout and fiscal stimulus package is already set to exceed $3 trillion, all traditional economic prudence has clearly been abandoned, and any pretence of a ‘real currency’ has been cast to the four winds, as the appetites of the banks and corporations (GM, AIG, etc) are sated by the provision of seemingly limitless access to borrowed capital. Other than questioning the wisdom of bailing out declining industries at the beginning of a major depression that could last for many years (rather than spending that money on the creation of new ones better suited to the environment and the 21st Century global economy like renewable energy and wireless networks), the notion of giving bankrupt gamblers an extended credit line (and bonuses) would seem to contradict the old military maxim that one should never reinforce (or reward) failure.

The prognosis for the US economy is dire, and short of a general mobilization, America’s sphere of influence is set to contract violently. The new Asian tigers in the form of India and China are presently currying favor in parts of the world once dominated by American economic and military might, as a resurgent and commodity rich Russia is reasserting its economic and military muscle across Central Asia and Eastern Europe. So what then were the seeds of the rapid decline of the American Empire? How did Britain and Rome manage to sustain vast empires across expanses of space and time when America’s has lasted less than a century?

As with all cultural decline, the process of decay often begins slowly and remain unidentified and untreated until a structure becomes too rotten to support its own weight. The collapse in many cases is often dramatic, as we saw with the fall of the former Soviet Union. The slow decay of the structures of empire often relates to cultural or biological issues such as the bubonic plague (aided by vast open city sewers) or the rise of decadent behaviors which classically afflicted Rome. Such cultural decline and decadence, evident in a modern America which has long been mired by organized crime, systemic prostitution and ‘pork barrel’ budgets, have in no uncertain terms led directly to the recent global economic collapse which was itself triggered by systemic fraud and corruption.

Perhaps the two greatest and most enduring empires were constructed by the British and Roman civilizations (the Chinese empire lasted over a thousand years but was not based upon military expansion). These empires were built upon the principles of Romanization and of ‘British’ culture, in which the invading nations did more than merely conquer, they invested heavily in the infrastructure of their new dominions and brought with them architecture, technology, education and civil planning. The British introduced their industrial revolution, building bridges, railroads and factories, preferring to train, to trade and to ‘enculture’ their subject nations rather than merely to enslave them. When the British Empire finally contracted after the second world war, the vacuum was filled by a vast Commonwealth of former colonies which became strategic allies, independent nations where cricket, British institutions and architecture still survive proudly to this day. There may still be lingering resentment, but much of the culture of modern Australia, South Africa, West Indies, Canada, India and other colonies is based upon the British way of life, and there is no more sincere form of flattery than imitation.

Similarly, where the Romans conquered barbarian nations, they left aqueducts, walled cities, bridges, vineyards, paved roads, amphitheatres, forums, sewerage, running fresh water and heated public baths. When the Emperor Justinian finally reconquered North Africa from the Vandals in 533 AD, it is said that the recently Romanized Vandals wept for the loss of their treasured new way of life. This is perhaps the single most important reason why the British and Roman empires spanned centuries rather than decades. Their civilizations superimposed a greater culture upon their conquests rather than merely inflicting a smash and grab raid for slaves, materials and resources reminiscent of Viking or Mongol invaders. This is perhaps why the Soviet, Nazi and, more recently, the American empire experienced rapid decline, as culturally transformed nations are more likely to prove willing and productive vassal nations than subjugated slave colonies, and consequently require fewer resources to maintain.

The American empire was built upon a surge of economic and military might, pervasive corruption and, more recently, through debt and terror. There is however nothing remotely civilizing about a chain of McDonald's restaurants illuminating the ancient streets of the world's oldest cities, or indeed an invasion of naked glossy magazine covers or designer sunglasses. Quietly we endured as quaint British market town centers closed down in the wake of new American ‘style’ out-of-town shopping malls, junk food restaurant chains, and drive-in movie theatres. As the sun sets upon the environmentally unsustainable American empire, we are now counting the cost and a new generation is preparing to clean up the mess.

Perhaps the primary reason for the decline in global American influence was the pervading tide of corruption and decadence that infiltrated the nation’s structures and institutions, spreading to foreign regimes and economies. From humble origins in the mean streets of Chicago and New York to the polished marble of Washington and Hollywood, organized crime conquered America with the seductive appeal of easy money in a nation which is driven by the acquisition of personal wealth. America, like many empires, became addicted to the spoils and trophies of foreign conquest. When the ruling classes gain greater wealth and more servants, so their tastes and appetites become ever more expensive and expansive. The empire’s resources are then channeled inwardly to satiate an increasing demand for luxury travel (be it performance cars, yachts or private jets), vast accommodations, servants, designer clothes, objets d’art, and exotic food. Labour and resources are thus diverted to the courts of rival social dukes and CEOs, and before long the elite have siphoned off ever greater proportions of the national and imperial wealth in order to maintain their expanding courts. Sound familiar? The Rockefeller and Bush dynasties and corporate mandarins such as Bill Gates, Sheldon Adelson, and Sergey Brin accumulated vast personal fortunes and helped to forge the greatest income disparity in American history. Presently, more than 50% of all American interests are owned by fewer than 5% of its population.

Such patterns of behavior may appear sustainable during a period of imperial expansion, where new wealth is continuously acquired and pumped into the economy in order to maintain growth and meet demand. However, when the bubble eventually burst and individual lifestyles were threatened by repossessions and insolvencies, scams and schemes abounded as the elite desperately tried to keep their American ‘dream’ alive, frauds which were aided by regulatory indifference and corruption. Take, for example, the topical issue of the $400 billion sub-prime loan crisis, in effect a massive confidence fraud in which high risk loans were packaged as safe investments, or Bernard Madoff’s $50 billion Ponzi investment ‘scheme’ in which no underlying investments were ever made. We have already, in less than two years, witnessed just two schemes which between them siphoned off almost half a trillion dollars from the global economy, money that simply seems to have disappeared. Where has all this money, since written off by global banks and hedge funds, actually gone? In a ‘zero sum’ free market money cannot simply vanish from the face of the earth (although it can be ‘printed’), and all those dollar bills and digital zeroes must have gone somewhere. The simple truth is that most of it has found its way into the pockets of American criminals, never to be recovered.

Resorting to criminal frauds on such a massive scale is symptomatic of a decadent culture that has become desperate to maintain the unsustainable lifestyles of an increasingly avaricious and quixotic elite. Now that decades of borrowing have failed to sustain their lifestyles, many have now resorted to fraud, enslavement, illegal bonuses and to printing money from the Federal purse in order to maintain the 'wealth divide'. The roots of this American largesse may be traced back to the plantations of the American South, or perhaps to the rise of the mafia during the prohibition era and their subsequent expansion into Las Vegas, Columbia and the adult Internet. In America, the line that separates legitimate from illegitimate wealth has become increasingly blurred and gray, and whether you consider ‘old money' made from the slave plantations of the south or the newly acquired wealth of the moguls of Las Vegas, Hollywood and Miami, organized crime and its expensive tastes have now pervaded all levels of American society. To the American mindset, wealth represents achievement and thus commands respect, and so all Americans culturally aspire to the pursuit of wealth as a conduit to happiness, regardless of the misery that it ultimately causes. The blind pursuit of affluence without the virtues of Spartan discipline, French reserve, or British moderation inevitably causes the fat of prosperity to teeter upon the vestigial legs of privilege. In an American nation that has become one vast, unsustainable gold rush, it is hardly surprising that the pioneering and industrious values upon which America was built have been superseded by a creed of easy capital.

The only thing that remains for us to do, as we watch America implode into a mire of debt, recrimination and impotence, is to ignore the historians as they sigh and mutter that they told us so…