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October 26, 2003
Review: Unackowledged empire
TO MANY people the most important issue currently facing the world is the conduct of the United States vis-‘-vis other nations. This deep mistrust of America’s intentions has been accentuated since the current Bush administration took office in 2001. Over the past two years, this government has fought two savage wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, walked away from many international agreements, unilaterally terminated the ABM missile treaty with Russia and actively opposed the creation of an International Criminal Court.
President Bush and the neo conservatives that surround him, have seriously undermined the United Nations, weakened Nato, and threatened a host of countries with military action for “regime change”. It therefore comes as little surprise that the term “rogue nation”, once formally reserved for outlaw countries, is increasingly being applied to the United States.
The book Rogue Nation by Clyde Prestowitz seeks to explain to Americans “why the world seems to be turning against them, and also to show foreigners how they frequently misinterpret America’s good intentions”. While the book’s title may be provocative, Mr Prestowitz is in fact no liberal but a “rock ribbed” Republican. During his travels in 2002 he had a feeling that the US was deliberately separating itself from other countries and “blatantly asserting its right to supremacy”.
Despite all the talk of democracy, human rights and free trade, America’s real aim is to control the destiny of other nations in pursuit of its own short term interests. America’s sense of self-righteousness is a real danger because it can no longer ignore the truth of its own role in global affairs — “its time to wake up to the need to see ourselves as others see us”.
The author argues that the United States is an unacknowledged empire — not in the classical sense as the Roman or British Empires — but in many ways even more powerful. Citing impressive and unassailable statistics, he rightly concludes that the United States is the most powerful economic and military empire in history. At 10 trillion dollars, the US economy accounts for 30 per cent of the world’s GDP and it probably spends more on its military capability than the rest of the world combined.
The US dominates the world in so many other different ways — 85 per cent of the world’s computers run on American owned companies and the vast bulk of new drugs and medicines are developed in the United States. Culturally as well, the US dominates. The author is of the opinion that such dominance does not necessarily equal imperialism — “American power makes itself felt in at least three distinct ways: coercion, seduction and persuasion”.
Coercion is applied in different ways — the famous phone call to President Musharraf being one glaring example. Citing the case of US satellites like South Korea and Japan, the author reaches the conclusion that “through military might, unequal treaties, intellectual excellence, reward and friendly persuasion, America has established an unprecedented condominium over the globe”.
While the world acknowledges the unique power of the United States, most people are extremely disturbed as to how America uses this power. Under the mantra of globalization, the US has through its selfish policies caused further impoverishment of the world’s poorer countries. While urging others to open up their markets, it heavily subsidizes its own producers of steel and cotton. The same attitudes and policies are followed with regard to the use of energy. More efficiency in the oil sector would have reduced America’s need to import oil. It would also mean less military deployments and savings of hundreds of billions of dollars per year.
But as the author points out, this would go against the “sense of American entitlement”. Gas should be cheap because this is America and “Americans have a right to cheap gas”.
While there is much to be critical of in US policies on a host of issues, the author sums it all up in four basic words: Israel, Taiwan, religion and lobby. Increasingly it seems to the rest of the world that Israel’s war with the Arabs is America’s war. A man like Ariel Sharon who has a long history of using violence against Palestinians, is “a man of peace”, according to President Bush. Prestowitz demolishes the assertion that Arafat was to blame for rejecting a final settlement as offered allegedly by the then Israeli Prime Minister Barak. He blames Israel for brutal treatment of the Palestinians that led to the second Intifada — contrary to what Israel and the US would like the world to believe.
A fair and equitable settlement of the Palestinian question is not possible he asserts because of the power of the Israeli lobby in the United States and the strength of Jewish voters in crucial states.
In an incisive summing up, the author bemoans the fact that in spite of the American people’s basic goodness, the policies pursued by the current Administration have meant that the nation is seen as “a candidate for the rogue nation list”. For this he puts the blame squarely on powerful figures such as Cheyney, Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld who first called for a strategy of preventing the rise of any challenging power. The new doctrine as articulated by President Bush is blatantly imperial — its logic one of infinite expansion.
This has now been proven in the case of Afghanistan and Iraq. While this book was written before the invasion of Iraq, the author with remarkable perception feels that this course will only subject America to new dangers as “the only safety is in making every place an extension of yourself”. An American crusade will not work because it will meet with mass resistance even from its allies who have no appetite for ruthless actions.
The weak state of the American economy is another factor — rich as America is, it cannot afford senseless adventures in foreign lands. Finally, Americans are not Romans or even Brits. “America may do stupid and bad things but the American people don’t regard body bags as symbols of their glorious valour”. Americans according to Mr Prestowitz are not good imperialists — “we are too eager for people to like us”.
The book comes at an appropriate moment — to remind America of the limits of its power and to the world’s anger at its policies. As we have seen, the American adventure in Iraq is now turning into a quagmire and President Bush is now seeking the help of the United Nations — after publicly deriding it in the lead up to the war. In a short period the US has learnt a sharp lesson — a country even as powerful as theirs needs to seek the cooperation of the rest of the world.
Rogue Nation — American Unilateralism and the Failure of Good Intentions
By Clyde Prestowitz
Basic Books. Available with Liberty Books (Pvt) Ltd, 3 Rafiq Plaza, M.R. Kayani Road, Saddar, Karachi
Tel: 021-5683026.
Email: libooks@cyber.net.pk Website:
www.libertybooks.com
ISBN 0-465-06279-2
328pp. Rs750
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