The 'American World Empire' (in the imagination of an American lecturer)

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See the Lev Navrozov Archive By Lev Navrozov SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM Lev Navrozov emigrated from the Soviet Union in 1972 He settled in New York City where he quickly learned that there was no market for his eloquent and powerful English language attacks on the Soviet Union. To this day, he writes without fear or favor or the conventions of polite society. He chaired the "Alternative to the New York Times Committee" in 1980, challenged the editors of the New York Times to a debate (which they declined) and became a columnist for the New York City Tribune. His columns are today read in both English and Russian. .

The words ÒempireÓ and ÒimperialistÓ became derogatory early in the 20th century. Lenin called WW1 Òimperialist,Ó that is, a war of empires for territorial acquisition, which helped him to seize power from the Provisional government, since it was for the war and he was against it. Finally, even the British Empire changed its name for the ÒCommonwealth of Nations,Ó but disintegrated all the same and lost, in particular, Iraq. The United States supported the disintegration of the British Empire especially since the United States itself was a result of struggle for independence, along with South American countries.

The key charge against Hitler before his genocide became widely known after the Allied troops had seen the death camps was Hitler's quest for a world empireÑa world Third Reich. The cause of the Cold War was Stalin's conversion of the East European countries into provinces of his empire, while Stalin invariably called the U.S. government and Congress the ÒAmerican imperialists,Ó and branded the United States as the inheritor of Hitler's imperialism. Needless to say, Stalin and his successors supported all wars against the United States or Britain as Ònational-liberation movements,Ó and, owing to Soviet aid to North Vietnam, the United States failed to defend South VietnamÑlost the Vietnam War.

But here in front of me is a lecture that Dr. Michael Vlahos published at the website ÒTech Central StationÓ on 6/19/2003. Dr. Vlahos lectures at the Naval War College and is a Senior Member of the Joint Warfare Analysis Department (Johns Hopkins University). The lecture is entitled ÒMilitary Identity in the Age of Empire.Ó

You see, ÒAmerican Empire is some sixty years old,Ó and the subject of the lecture is: ÒHow will an American world empire change military identities?Ó

Before Òthe debacle of VietnamÓ there had been Òthe Draft.Ó It did not benefit the ÒAmerican world empireÓ (did the draft cause the debacle?). So the draft was abolished, the American military Òhas slowly assumed the character of all great professional militaries.Ó Compare the Òdebacle of Vietnam,Ó which cost about 50,000 American lives, with the instant victory of the American PROFESSIONAL military in Iraq. Dr. Vlahos posted his article a month and a half ago, when few doubted that the victory in Iraq was complete and final, and Dr. Vlahos could well assume that Iraq is part and parcel of the ÒAmerican world empire.Ó Not even once does he use the word ÒdemocracyÓ (or Congress, human rights, freedom of the press). Is the United States still a ÒrepublicÓ?

Well, the Roman Empire was once a republic. Says Dr. Vlahos (p. 5):

ÒAmerica itself is in an imperial mid-passage. So it is not surprising in the least that the army and navy of the old RepublicÑdesigned to defend American interests in peace and then to mobilize and lead the nation in warÑis gone. In its place is a superb military institution now charged with securing world peace for all time. The Roman metaphor is thus not entirely out of place. Like Rome's legions in the first century A.D., our military still retains traditional institutions and forms. But the legions were increasingly removed from the life of society and no longer served the Republic, but the Emperor.Ó

Who is the American Emperor? This is clear even on the previous page (p. 4):

ÒLoyalty [in the ÒAmerican empireÓ] is moving from national society to its own military society, allegiance from the nation to the commander-in-chief. There is no sharp break implied here, or sudden shift in attitude or behavior. There is after all what a transformation suggests: the profound change imperceptibly achieved.Ó

We also learn (on p. 5) that this ÒAmerican world empireÓ is not a defender or a liberator, but Òan enforcer,Ó since Òthe transformation the American Military needs to think about has three passages: from serving a republic to serving an empire, from a national-tribal identity to a world-cosmopolitan identity, from being a defender to being an enforcer.Ó

To express all this in the conventional language, Dr. Vlahos describes in triumph the conversion of the country still called the United States into a military dictatorship, attaining world domination as an Òenforcer.Ó

Dr. Vlahos says what foes of the United States have been saying in China, Russia, India, the Islamic world, France, Germany, and elsewhere. But he presents his description not as vicious hostile propaganda or evil illiterate fantasy, but as an inevitable and praiseworthy course in American history in the past sixty years and in the foreseeable future.

Is this course possible? There is nothing physically impossible about its first part: the conversion of the former United States, a republic, into a military dictatorship. Germany gave much of Western culture, and in 1932 it was a republic. But due to its fear of Stalin's invasion of Germany, it transformed into a military dictatorship. The fear of terrorism may likewise convert the United States into a military dictatorship, which Dr. Vlahos hails in a public lecture without any protest I know of.

But what about this military dictatorship becoming a WORLD empire? Is this as easy as it might have seemed to Dr. Vlahos last June after the U.S.-British-Australian invasion of Iraq? The victory was so final and complete, since the possibility of terror against the Coalition troops was not foreseen.

Before the Òpreemptive invasionÓ of Iraq, it was assumed by the Coalition that Hussein's troops were armed with Òweapons of mass destruction.Ó If they didn't use WMD in this decisive battle for Iraq, when could these WMD be used? But it turned out that Hussein's troops didn't use WMD against the Coalition troops. So the rascals hid them! But why and what for? Surely the battle against the Coalition was their last chance to use WMD, and they had nothing to lose. What was the purpose of hiding WMD? To use themÑwhen? After death, in heaven?

But even if Hussein's troops had been armed with weapons of mass destruction and Hussein's troops had hidden them to no conceivable purpose, those Òweapons of mass destructionÓ are laughable compared with the post-nuclear weapons Russia developed up to 1991 and China has been developing since 1986. The invasion of Iraq has brought about official military ÒpartnershipÓ between the two military giants, and that makes the Iraqi Òweapons of mass destruction,Ó allegedly hidden to no conceivable purpose, doubly laughable.

In October 1941 Hitler could look back on his brilliant victories: the rout of France along with the British Expeditionary Force, the rout of Poland, and the rout of the Soviet forces up to Moscow, which he had reached and could occupy without battle. But suddenly and unpredictably, the series of his brilliant victories turned to his defeat.

What brilliant victories can Dr. Vlahos recall to justify his ardent upbeat belief in the global military success of the ÒAmerican world empireÓ? The invasion of Iraq?

How does Dr. Vlahos visualize the future? As the world, including China, Russia, France, Germany, and all Islamic countries, ÒenforcedÓ by the ÒAmerican world empire,Ó as Iraq was ÒenforcedÓ by the Coalition as the event was perceived about a month and a half ago?

Those whom the Gods want to destroy they deprive of sanity.