h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Interesting editorial in the New York Post. To make a quick summarization, basically the columinst thinks that we have to fight alone and set up a pax Americana. So just a few quick points to see if I can get this discussion off the ground.

1. He says that France and Germany, for example, have pledged support. Obviously the rest of NATO has as well. In any case, his argument that most countries are paying lip service. We do all know that Germany has been reluctant to send forces anywhere these last fifty years, France is somewhat unreliable in a crisis, and a lot of other countries in the alliance have either needed US support either as part of a NATO action or a UN action. I understand that, since the US is one of the biggest members of the alliance, of course most of the burden falls to us. What he is saying is that the other 18 nations will be no help at all. I don't agree with this, but I do think that we will get our most useful support (if we decided we need it) from the UK, Canada, and Australia. Nothing personal against the rest of Europe, it's just that those are the three countries I would go to first for help.

2. Pakistan has pledged to help as well. The columnist doesn't believe a word of it, and I'm somewhat skeptical as well.

3. China and Russia are interested in helping. They have their own problems to deal with, and I, along with the columnist, think that while they could be very helpful in giving the US space to attack (current international law prohibits cruise missiles going through another country's airspace without permission, for example), I doubt that they could be much help otherwise.

4. A Pax Americana would benefit the entire world. This seems to me to be a reaction to the attack, maybe as a a bit of propaganda. I was just wondering what the rest of the world would feel about offical American hegemony. I don't think it's possible to make offical what the US has been trying to do for the last 50 years.

Please, please, comment. I want to know opinions.

Sorry about the double post. The BBC server has been acting up for several days now it seems to me.

The problem with a Pax Americana is that any group who think they are being hard done by (and if you parcel everything out equally to everyone, there will always be someone whinging that their portion is smaller), they will declare that the US is oppressing them.

What is needed is for the world to get its finger out, rather than sit around doing nothing (which it has shown itself to be very good at).

I totally disagree. I as an American don't want to be a world policeman. Some of these issues have been going on for hundreds of years and make no sense whatsoever...

I am not sure what the legal situation is regarding Germany's army, but it would not surprise me if there are limitations on what it can do. The British Army in Germany has technically been an Army of Occupation. The Japanese have given up their right to an Army, as I recollect. (Mycroft may know the details).

On the subject of a Pax Americana - it depends on what you mean. But if the US tries to take military, legislative or any other action which reduces my country's sovereignty, then I'll be building bloody bombs. (So now I find where my limits are... interesting, and humbling).

Americans are mainly of the off-spring of people who believed that America was a better place to be than their homelands. But the people who stayed in their homelands did it because they preferred it there.

I find the concept of a Pax Americana profoundly insulting. But before I get all insulted I would like to know more about what is meant.

It seems to me that we won't get a Pax Americana, but a Bellum Americanum.

The more I think about it the more my reaction to the idea is "f**k that".

Really - the rest of us can run countries and economies and hold elections and defend freedom too you know, (better in some cases - how long did it take for the US to come into ww2, and just how crooked were the Florida recounts, and the only British Premier to be killed was killed by a train, we don't assasinate our leaders, we elect new ones).

So what IS a Pax Americana when it's abroad?

*confused*
a human-being called Ben

I don't know either. I was just putting up some of the ideas of one columnist in New York because I thought it could make for an interesting discussion of what a post-terrorist war world could look like.

I didn't expect anyone else to like the idea either. I don't like it myself. I tend to get p****d when we are peacekeeping other countries, or when it's under NATO or the UN but the main contingent are American soldiers and American F-117s and B-2s and other planes and ships.

Ben, you're right about Japan: Article 9 of their constitution gives up their right to declare war or even threaten force on anyone else. Technically it also says they can't have any military capability (it's something along the lines of "land, sea, and air forces, as well as any other war-making potential, will never be maintained"), but this has been interpreted as meaning they should have no offensive capability. Japan does in fact have an army, navy and air force but almost none of their hardware could be used for any purpose other than defending Japan. Incidentally, Germany has similar though less stringent restrictions in its constitution: they're allowed to wage wars as long as they don't start them.

The concept of a Pax Americana isn't quite as draconian as you see it: post-war Japan is probably the best example of it in extremis, and to a certain extent all NATO members live under a Pax Americana too. However, I can't really see much of the rest of the world buying into it without WWIII kicking off, and the whole idea of aggressively imposing American values on countries which aren't actively trying to destroy America - which many states feel is happening anyway and are none too happy about - seems, well... un-American.

About German self-restrictions to start a war: Every action of the German army outside German territory has to be approved by the German Bundestag (=lower(?) house of German parliament). At the moment, the government consists of socialists (with a certain pacifistic tradítion) and the green party (with mainly developed out of the pacifistic movement of the 70's/80's).

When troops had to be sent to Mazedonia for the "Essential Harvest"-Operation, the government had to convince the opposition to work together with them, because many members of the government refused to give ther permission to any military operations.
Under this circumstances, I strongly doubt that there will be any real military envolvement of Germany in an american war against whoever.

About the Pax/Bellum Americanum: this is an dangerous idea. People don't like to be more or less forced to change their Culture. People don't like to know that there is an big brother controlling them, even if this control is abstract at best. An open american hegemony would cause much more hate then we already have. I think it would become an Bellum Americanum.

I would like once again to cover my ass and point out that this is the view of one columnist in the NY Post and that I generally don't support world government, especially not world government under the US, whether formally or informally.

Jor, Germany may not have a choice. Now that Article 5 of NATO's been invoked, if NATO asks then Germany goes to war.

Mycroft, you may be right.
After my information, article 5 of the Nato-Treaty still allows every land to decide on it's own how many support it gives to the country calling for help. But if really asked to go to war, Germany coudn't stand back without isolating itself as totally unreliable country.

Still, the German Bundeswehr is mainly an defensive army. It is said to be notoriously bad equiped and funded, compared to the US-Army. The question is, how much help can the US get from Germany?

Perhaps this is, what gave this NY Post-columnist this strange idea of Pax Americana:
America IS the last superpower and has an possibilty for worldwide actions (military or else) no other country can dream of.

I agree, I don't like the idea of a Pax Americana. I am mildly concerned that we may wind up in that condition after this.

My major concern is that we may give up too many of our rights to maintain internal security.

Is this the end of an American republic and the begining of an American Empire?