How Empires Fall
Paul Craig Roberts
Counterpunch
May 13, 2008
In a new book that will infuriate the fake conservatives who inhabit the
Republican Party, Patrick J. Buchanan documents how British
self-righteousness, delusion, and hubris destroyed both the British Empire
and Western ascendancy in two unnecessary wars launched by a small cabal of
morons that ruled Britain
Churchill, Hitler, and the Unnecessary War shows that the two world wars
that destroyed European civilization began when England declared war on
Germany, thus dragging in the Empire, Commonwealth, and United States. This
was a strategic blunder unparalleled in history. Mighty Britain emerged from
World War II as an American dependency.
Buchanan cites such British notables as F.J.P. Veale, B.H. Liddell Hart, and
C.P. Snow to document that it was Winston Churchill who committed, in Veale's
words, "the first deliberate breach of the fundamental rule of civilized
warfare that hostilities must only be waged against the enemy combatant
forces." It was Churchill, not Hitler, who first targeted civilian
populations in World War II and caused the structure of civilized warfare to
collapse in ruins.
The Americans quickly adopted Churchill's criminal policy of attacking
civilians, culminating in the outrageous use of nuclear weapons against two
Japanese cities, the slaughter of Vietnamese civilians, and the ongoing
slaughter of Afghan and Iraqi civilians.
A popular American myth is that "the greatest generation" saved the world
from Nazi tyranny. As Buchanan points out, the fact of the matter is that
the Normandy invasion in June 1944 played little, if any, role in Germany's
defeat. By the end of 1942 Hitler had lost World War II at Stalingrad, long
before any American troops appeared on the scene. What the Normandy invasion
achieved 18 months later was to keep the Red Army from over-running all of
Europe.
Although Buchanan's book is about how the British destroyed themselves,
Buchanan is clearly thinking about America. In the closing pages Buchanan
shows how the Bush Regime has broken from the sound policy of President
Reagan and is replicating the British folly of self-destruction. "There is
hardly a blunder of the British Empire we have not replicated," laments
Buchanan.
The distinct American hubris that we are "the indispensable nation" and the
braggadocio that we are an "omnipower" has us overcommitted in alliances
that we cannot fulfill. Despite 25 percent of the Iraqi population killed,
injured or displaced, the "world's only superpower" cannot even control
Baghdad. To deal with the pointless war we started in Afghanistan, we have
had to sucker our NATO allies into a conflict that is no concern of theirs.
Militarily overextended and with a faltering economy and collapsing
currency, the cabal of morons that rules America still hopes to attack Iran,
Syria, and to drive Hezbollah from Lebanon. American idiots in think tanks
are busy at work drawing up plans about how the US is going to check China
and prevent her emergence as a power beyond US control. The Republican
presidential candidate has boasted that he will challenge Russia and bring
Putin to heel.
Amazing.
The world's greatest debtor is going to take on the two powerful countries
with the largest trade surpluses. According to the World Factbook, an annual
publication of the CIA, Russia's 2007 current account surplus is $465
billion and China's is $363 billion. In contrast, the US current account
deficit is $987 billion-an amount larger that the total deficits of all
other countries in the world combined. The out-of-pocket and already
incurred future cost of Bush's wars of aggression is between $3 and $5
trillion, every dollar of which must be borrowed. That comes on top of the
unfunded liabilities of the US government totaling $53 trillion. By any
account the US is the world's worst credit risk. The "mighty" US relies on
foreigners to finance its consumption, its wars, and the daily operations of
its government.
When Buchanan looks at the collection of idiots that comprise America's
ruling class, he despairs.
In truth, American power is already broken, and the country is already lost.
The country is lost, because the brownshirt Bush Regime has destroyed the US
Constitution with the complicity of the opposition party and the federal
courts. There is no organized power that can restore the Constitution or
even much concern that it has been overthrown.
The country is broken, because American capitalists have moved offshore so
many US manufacturing, engineering, and research jobs that US imports now
exceed US industrial production. American dependency on imported
manufactured goods, advanced technology goods, and energy is astounding.
Moreover, the dependency is escalating dramatically. In March 2002, prior to
Bush's decision to impose Israel's will on the Middle East, oil was $25 a
barrel. Today oil is $125 a barrel, a five-fold increase that has seen our
oil import bill rise from $145 billion in 2006 to $456 billion presently, a
$300 billion addition to a trade deficit that was already running $700-$800
billion annually.
There is no possibility of the US closing its trade deficit. The US is able
to survive such enormous deficits only because the US dollar is the world
reserve currency. This role for the dollar is nearing an end as the world
looks for more stable stores of value. Although oil is still nominally
priced in dollars, in reality it is being priced in euros as oil producers
raise the dollar price with a view to keeping their oil revenues at a
constant purchasing power in euros.
When the dollar loses its reserve currency role, foreign financing for US
trade and budget deficits will evaporate. US living standards will collapse,
and the indispensable omnipower will be just another washed up country.
For a world weary of "American exceptionalism," this can't happen too soon.
http://www.infowars.com/?p=2115
