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

Hi all,

Just read this article in the Guardian newspaper, which sums up many issues that have been floating around recently, concerning the US and New Imperialism. Have a read, then make a comment - if you want to.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,794163,00.html

What did the Romans ever do for us, anyway?

imagne President Bush wearing a toga.

Its the Pax Americana that rules the world.

Geggs

Oh, Peace!

Interesting article. I'd be interested to hear a counter argument too though

Can any of you wonderful people think of a counter argument? It's more difficult than you'd think. Well, it has flumaxed me for the time being...

That's because it is a very well written article

Just because you can draw an analogy and make lots of striking examples of similarity does not make their case true.
It wouldn't however be the first time history had repeated itself though now would it.

How about for a further parallel the fact that Rome based a lot of it's myths religions and other aspects of society from its forebears the Greeks. Similar to the relations between USA and UK?

Revenue system is the same as well (or so I'm told).

If you were Roman then yoy paid Roman taxes no matter where you went or lived. Same with American taxes.

Geggs

"Pentagon figures show that there is a US military presence, large or small, in 132 of the 190 member states of the United Nations."

If America goes ahead with its attack on Iraq, that figure may diminish somewhat as former 'allies' rebel and kick them out.

"The Romans used the propaganda technique of their time - gladiatorial games in the Colosseum - to show the world how hard they were."

Perhaps an American researcher can help me out here by explaining who The Ad Council are, but they have been running some very blatant nationalistic propaganda on American tv in the last month or so. All hingeing on the pretext that no-one else in the world has freedom the way that Americans do, these ads are, IMHO, preparing the American people for a 'just war' in the name of securing that freedom... at least, within US borders. If the rest of the world is a smoking ruin, that's a small price to pay.

The paragraph beginning "Rome even had its own 9/11 moment..." is very telling.

http://www.adcouncil.org/

I must admit I have been thinking this for years.

What interests me, and what I guess I should post in the 'War with Iraq' thread, is that America seems to think that it is ok for it to ignore the UN. All I see is that the US sees the UN as a political stumbling block, not as the curators of any kind of moral stumbling block.

I had an argument yesterday with a colleague on the subject of an illegal war. He stated that all wars are illegal, therefore if the US attack Iraq it does not matter that it does it outside the remit of the UN. He also came up with a whole load of other militaristic and imperialistic bulls**t. Mind you, I only started the conversation because I knew he would rise to the bait, and he knows me reasonably well, so we could have just been pressing each others hot-buttons for fun.

But I do worry that the US is so used to the idea that it is morally in the right, (regardless of whether or not it is), that it will decide that if the UN opposes it that the UN must be morally in the wrong. I fear for the UN and for the rest of us.

And meanwhile, in another part of the forest, China waits.

B

*I* think the fate of the free peoples of Taiwan is the price that has already been agreed for 'co-operation' with the invasion of Iraq.

I await the first reports of terrorist outrages from China with interest.

I'm very glad this has become a topic because I am sick to death of hearing about an American Empire that *does not exist*.

I find it interesting that there are two political branches that choose to believe that the US "empire" exists, the anti-american Left and the self-aggrandising nationalist American Right. Usually, when the American right makes absurd claims such as "we are at the end of history" or "trickle down economics mean everyone gets richer" the Left usually picks them to pieces. However, in the case of the "empire", the left agrees unequovically. They are both wrong.

I'm something of a historian. I know how an empire works. An empire works by annexing territory and the Imperial capital and home nation having rulership over that territories subjects, including the right to tax them and incorporate them into it's armed forces and having fundamental veto over the local imperial representative. The great empire's of history were usually so huge that they were split into "provinces" or similar territories and assigned "governors" who collected taxes and operated local government. Although fairly independent, the imperial government could impose it's will at any time.

Contrary to popular belief, the Roman Empire has been matched since, most notably by the British Empire. The fall of the European Empire's marked an important turning point in history - the end of Imperialism.

You see, before the 20th century, a Great Power could enter the third world, easily annex huge swathes of territory and people using superiior technology, set up the local imperial bureaucracy and trade and become very wealthy and powerful from territory she owned. Any attempt at rebellion could usually be put down, since troops could be shipped from the home nation or recruited locally. For Europe, things were easy. Then the 20th century happened and what had once been rumblings became large-scale movements and suddenly imperial power was being erroded by "home-rule" and troops that once conquered were pushed back and defeated and suddenly the home nations had representative government and people weren't too keen on their children dying in "foreign" wars and the Empires fell and, contrary to what you may read, are probably gone for good.

If the United States has "economic influence" over a nation (what this "imperialism" really means) it is, from an imperial viewpoint, worthless. It is done with the permission of the other nation's ruling class - they are the ones benefiting from US trade (even if their people do not). That's not imperialism, that's capitalism.

Also, if the US government stations troops in a country it has not annexed it and does not control it. It has many bases in Saudi Arabia and many regarded that as part of America's "empire" in the Middle East and then, oh look. They said the Americans couldn't use it to launch strikes on Iraq and the Americans could do nothing about it. Some empire.

So how does the American empire score according to proper imperialism. Let's see:

It does not control any other nations (subterfuge is as old as the hills and has not been regarded before as imperialism and does not count)

It cannot tax the citizens of any other nations

American governors do not control any other nations

America does not control any foreign government (threats and influence are also as old as the hills and have never been regarded before as imperialism, thus they do not count)

It cannot incorporate the citizens of other nations into it's armies

America is not capable of imposing it's will on another nation smoothy and easily without trouble. (

So it scores a big fat zero.

Yes, the United States is very powerful, yes it is the most powerful nation in the world. But it is *not* an empire. The influence it has should be given a name, but "imperialism" is misleading. It is far, far, weaker than that.

"America is not capable of imposing it's will on another nation smoothy and easily without trouble. (wars against another nation without annexing it cannot be regarded as imperialism)"

As it should have read, in case you were all wondering what the open bracket was about

Just out of interest Zagreb...did you read the article?

I read most of it - parts of it seemed to be repeating oft-repeated subjects. I understood the jist of it.

"They ruled by proxy whenever they could. We, of all people, should know: one of the most loyal of client kings ruled right here, in the southern England of the first century AD."

Tony Blair

No counter argument - and I'm an American. I've often thought in the past few years that the similarities between Rome and the US are a bit too close for my comfort.

The weirdism that set it off was the whole reality tv thing... it smacks of gladiators and other such "realistic" events quite a bit.

More details when my brain is a bit more together...

If we're the new Rome, we're pretty damn pathetic. I mean, we're trying to convince other countries of what we should do. If we were a real empire, we wouldn't be sweating it, we'd do it. We wouldn't try to cajole the UN into supporting our actions, we would use the UN as an instrument to control the rest of the world.

I don't think we meaure up as an empire.

I have seen the idea discussed before. Jerry Pournelle, who is my favorite author, keeps talking about the decsion that we have to make, are we going to conitue being a republic or are we going to move on to being an empire.

http://www.jerrypournelle.com/reports/jerryp/empire.html