In Defence of the USA
Posted on May 31, 2007 - Filed Under American Politics, Politics | 25 Comments
This post is in response to a rather heated argument I had with a friend today about the merits of American global hegemony, such as it exists. I tried to convince him that it was generally a good thing to have a generally good country like America exerting its influence across the globe in its own self-interest, since its own self-interest often corresponds with what is in the interest of the international community, or at least the West. Unfortunately I soon became exasperated with his counters and ended up sounding like Stephen Colbert with his ‘So would you rather have Saddam back in power?’ line of rhetorical questioning. Here’s my measured reply to my friends’ anti-Americanism. The points are all related to issues he raised.
1. The USA is founded on principles of liberty, justice and equality (not in the socialist sense), and the citizens of the USA generally expect their government to live up to these principles. Thus, even when acting in naked self-interest, the American federal government has to dress up their action in the cloth of these values in order to gain public support for it (which actually counts for something in the world’s oldest existing democracy). However, you cannot dress up certain actions in this manner, e.g. invading Venezuela for its oil, so these actions will never be undertaken, at least not overtly.
2. Further to the first point, there is a moral dimension to American foreign policy (at least in the manner it is explained publicly) that is completely alien to the foreign policy of, say, modern China, the USSR, or Fascist Italy. This is perhaps partly due to American’s fervent religiosity (one of the biggest voices demanding American intervention in Darfur is that of the Christian right), as well as the reasons already mentioned in point 1. What did America really have to gain from its humanitarian intervention in Kosovo in the 1990s, other than the peace of mind that accompanies exercising power in a benevolent and just fashion?
3. On the matter of Iraq, I suggest that going into Iraq to topple Saddam Hussain’s regime would have been a good thing in itself, regardless of the alleged WMD production and Al Qaeda links that were used to justify the war, if only it had been handled better. That said, I still have very little sympathy for those who would pin all the blame on America for the debacle Iraq has become; it is not American soldiers that are murdering civilians (glaring and extremely rare exceptions like Haditha aside), blowing up buildings and kidnapping people. If Iraq becomes a failed state then Iraqis will have no one to blame but their fellow citizens.
4. On the matter of Japan, yes, America did nuke two of Japan’s cities, but this was at the end of long and exacting war, the Americans did not wish to lose more soldiers in an invasion, and the Japanese should have surrendered before the bombs were dropped. Where had Truman’s loyalties ought to have lay, with American soldiers and their families or the people of a foreign country whose government was so stubborn it would rather suffer mass civilian casualties than surrender in a war it couldn’t hope to win? After the war, the Americans rebuilt Japan in America’s image and it’s now the second largest economy in the world. They could have just left it a broken nation and went home.
5. Likewise for Germany after the Second World War. America guaranteed the freedom of all Western Europe after the war’s end, a time when the Soviet war machine could have rumbled further across the continent and enslaved more people in communism. In time Germany’s economy recovered, as did the the economies of the other Western European nations, in no small part due to America’s supremely generous Marshall Plan. True enough, the Marshall Plan in the long term was to benefit America as well as the European countries, but so what? When it would have been easy to shun the world and turn to isolationism, the USA choose to lead the world’s democracies in the fight against communism in the form of NATO and other such organisations, and for that alone the country should have our eternal gratitude.
6. As regards free speech and other liberties, my friend argued that America was a rather intolerant place on the basis that if a Muslim over there started talking about bombing buildings he’d get hauled into jail. I’m not sure to what extent that is true, but the actions that groups like the Westboro Baptist Church are allowed get away with suggests to me that America is an extraordinarily lenient country when it comes to encouraging citizens to behave themselves.
I’m not trying to say that America is perfect; it isn’t, and W’s administration has managed to antagonise people the world over through it’s clumsiness and arrogance. However, I’ll take American hegemony every day of the week and twice on Sundays if the alternative is Chinese, or Russian (imagine Putin with Bush’s power) or almost any other brand of hegemony. For every bad thing about America (the substantial belief in creationism that exists there, Francophobia, rap music, Bill O’Reilly,…) there are at least two good things (Apple, developments in teh internets, Halo, Nine Inch Nails, Doonesbury, Bill Clinton, Woody Allen, Stephen Colbert,…), and so I say to you, Eoin O’Sullivan, that while you are welcome to your opinion, you are a fool to hold it.
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25 Responses to “In Defence of the USA”
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ah yes… the old “america is the best country in the world ” babble. ok. one point at a time so.
1.
“The USA is founded on principles of liberty, justice and equality.”
Yes. but not on the practices of liberty, justice and equality sadly.As you mention, liberty is curtailed to that which is acceptable to the government/state as in the muslim example etc. justice too is far from perfect as the legal system is often said to be inacessable to those who need it and biased against minorities and the poorer individuals. And equality if your white.yes.Anything else. no. no we have a country acting on the pretences of these noble virtues. Its doing a lot better than many other coutries yes, but far from perfect. Very far.
2.
“moral dimension to American foreign policy”
morals are not an excuse to invade of kill. Morals are the beliefs of a person or group of people, and should remain as such. something personal and private, not something to force down the throat of others because theres are unacceptable to you. and please dont suggest peace of mind was motivation to sort out kosovo. I would have thought the general outcry and efforts of the international community as as whole had more to do with it that americas burning ambition to do good at any cost.
3.
iraq.
“If Iraq becomes a failed state then Iraqis will have no one to blame but their fellow citizen”
america had no reason to invade that country other than self preservation which seems hollow in the face of non existant WMD. hilarious stuff. except for the iraqis. things have gone from bad to worse and before they lived in fear and opression, and then a bunch of cowboys hit town, killed sadam ( see it via videophone- way to exercise your morals there america) and now the pandoras box is open cause there is nothing to scare the extremeists. Normal iraqis cant control them. how can you be so narrow minded as to say they can only blame themselves? they prob dont know most of these psycos blowing themselves up. And selfish america decides it doesnt like soldiers dying and thats not a fun game, so it wants to pull out now and leave joe six pack on the streets fucked beyond belief. Morals in action… er… no.. blantent selfish motivation as per usual.
4..
why are american lives so much more valuabe than japanesse? in fact not only that, but there fucking SOLDIERS!!! they fight war. they die. part of the bargin. They dropped 2 atomic bombs on cities full of normal innocent people like you and me, who had nothing to do with any of the bullshit .impecable morals as per usual. Totally corrupted and demolised the land , its unusable and still affecting and killing japanesse today due to the extra bonus of radioactive contamination. sweet. and whats the point in offereing a truce to a man who clearly doesnt care? 2 bombs to him mean nothing seeing as the world has never seen ataomic bombs before. It was hihgly immoral for your beloved US to pretend he made that choice . understood what was about to happen and that was reason enough to wipe all those people off the face of the earth.any apres war action was due to guilt and the general world just balking at the excessive destruction..
5.yes… US pretect europe so it could protect itself against communisim. no other reason. build up some allys to stave it off at its own borders. nato=americas private anti commie militia. lets not dress it up any other way thanks.
6/
baptist church gets away with it cause there christian and america loves anyone who claims to be.simpletons really. the average muslim is of far more use to america and is less ignorant and annoying than these fools.
so thats my opinion. you wantch too much CNN and decided it would be mighty damn smart of you to have a mini backlash against the popular anti americanism. Im not anti america. They are the least of many evils, but not some amazing place you make them out to be. Deeply flawed. my anti american sentiments are thought out and measured and are not random tree hugging ignorance, so your little backlash “just to be different-and appear more intelligent” should really re evaulate itself. if you like self preservation and pretecting yourself and your posetions , no change and converting everyone into copys of your state/way of doing things, great. vote cian. otherwise i say yo you cian boland, go ride yourself.
sorry about all the typos.
wow… just re read that… its embarrasing how many bizzare typos are in there. apoligies to everyone for my eyewatering spelling and grammar. its 1 in the morning.
On point 4 it should be noted that at the time no one realized that atomic weapons had after effects. America thought they were dropping a bigger and better bomb, they didn’t realize that radioactive fallout even exists.
As for this whole debate, I’d say the whole idea of a any nation being so powerful that they don’t have to listen to anyone else is a bad idea. Of course an all powerful America is bettewr than an all powerful Russia or China, but that doesn’t really say much. No matter how good the intentions are if there’s no one to hold America accoutable you start off with freedom for everyone and end up with extralegal detention centres(or whatever thay called them) to defend that freedom.
No one is denying that America has done alot to fight much worse regimes but that just makes it the lesser of two evils. If there were more (any) nations who were broadly pro america but anti american forigen policy things might be better. (Mind you, history says they’d just stick together and screw smaller countries over, like America and the USSR did to Poland.)
i like daniel
How has America ever screwed Poland?
Poland and the Soviets never liked each other. After WWI, Poland and Russia fought a war which Poland won. After WWII, the US agreed to give Poland to the Russians, as some sort of bargain. You could call that screwing. Maybe there’s a better example.
The neutrality of this page is, surprisingly, undisputed.
In order to keep countries like Greece and West Germany free it was necessary to for America to allow the Russians to take Poland and other Eastern European countries. The Red Army was already there anyway, and America could hardly have forced it out of Eastern Europe without continuing the war. The US never promised Poland anything, and the fact that it didn’t go to war to protect it from communism does not mean it “screwed” Poland.
“In order to keep countries like Greece and West Germany free it was necessary to for America to allow the Russians to take Poland and other Eastern European countries.”
great. now replace keep free with protect america from the commies as this is closer the truth.
In order to protect america from the commies it was necessary to for America to allow the Russians to take Poland and other Eastern European countries.
and replace “take Poland” with something more accurate like.. ignore and leave for dead so the USSR could rape it and buy time for the US to build up its European barrier.
and we get Cians actual sentiment :
In order to protect america from the commies it was necessary to for America to ignore and leave Poland for dead so the USSR could rape it till it couldnt bleed anymore and buy time for the US to build up its European barrier.
the above is an example of creative logic and low brow trolling i believe, but has a point beneath it too.
The Tehran Conference:
“In November 1943, the Big Three (USSR, USA, and UK) met at the Tehran Conference. Both Roosevelt and Churchill officially agreed that the eastern borders of Poland would roughly follow the Curzon Line. The Polish government was not notified of this decision and the only information given was the press release claiming that We await the day, when all nations of the world will live peacefully, free of tyranny, according to their national needs and conscience. The resulting loss of the “eastern territories,” approximately 48% of Poland’s pre-war territory, to the Soviet Union is seen by Poles as another “betrayal” by their Western Allies.
According to many historians, Churchill and Roosevelt promised Stalin to settle the issue with the Poles, however they never sincerely informed the Polish side. When the Polish Prime Minister visited Moscow, he was convinced he was coming to discuss borders that were still disputed, while Stalin believed everything had already been settled. This was the principal reason for the failure of Polish Prime Minister’s mission to Moscow.”
And a conclusion:
“It was easy to argue that Poland was not very important to the West, since Allied leaders sacrificed Polish borders, legal government and free elections.”
With even W admitting guilt of the accusations (albeit without recrimination):
“In May 2005 US President George W. Bush admitted that the Soviet domination of central and eastern Europe after World War II was “one of the greatest wrongs of history” and acknowledged that the United States played a significant role in the division of the continent and that the Yalta conference “followed in the unjust tradition of Munich and the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact. (…) Once again, when powerful governments negotiated, the freedom of small nations was somehow expendable.”"
Sorry for the long quotes which rely solely on Wikipedia, but it can probably be deduced that the US may have, at one stage, screwed Poland.
They didn’t owe the Poles a damn thing! Russia screwed Poland by fucking it up with communism. Don’t blame America for what some other country did. By that logic it’s America’s fault for everything bad that happens in the world that could have been prevented by the use of American power.
teh winnarz!
Look, I’m pretty hammered at the moment but it seems, even to me, that a hegemony is an undesirable cock-up. I don’t want any foreign power deciding how I should live, be it America, Russia or the E.U.
Maybe it’s a ridiculous concept, but since I’ve turned 18, I’ve started to think of myself as an adult. Why should a global super power decide what’s good for me.
And Eoin. Your typos hurt my brain.
Eoin
Liam, what does Google search results have to do with this?
Eoin, how does America decide how you live? It doesn’t in anyway determine what you do. Neither does the EU. Of course, living under Moscow’s malevolent influence during the Cold War would be an entirely different matter.
Sorry, both the origin of that comment and my interpretation of it should have been better explained, and I dragged this off topic.
What I said was:
1. If there were more (any) nations who were broadly pro America but anti American foreign policy things might be better.
2. Mind you, history says they’d just stick together and screw smaller countries over, like America and the USSR did to Poland.
1. Is the basic Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? argument, that having a more even distribution of power might be a good thing. The problem with this is dealt with in point 2.
2. Is the basic “When elephants fight, the grass gets trampled” argument. The reason I mentioned Poland was to show how hegemonies serve their own interests, so even if there was another country able to stand up to America on issues, they probably wouldn’t.
The justification for starting WW2 was that Hitler was invading Poland and that invading Poland was wrong. After WW2 it was decided to give Poland to the USSR, basically because they wanted it and no one cared. Liam gave many nice linkys about this.
However, mine was never an anti American argument (I don’t think anyone else’s was either) It was an anti hegemony argument. After WW2 the two remaining hegemonies did a deal that suited themselves and screwed Poland over. I’ll admit freely that the USSR should take most of the blame for this, but America deemed the enslavement of eastern Europe to be “acceptable losses” to keep other countries free. If I was sold into slavery I’d be pretty damn pissed if someone told me that, while they were against slavery, concessions had to be made and I was one of the unlucky ones who had to be a slave. America decided who got to live in a free country (everyone in the west), while anyone east of Germany wasn’t their problem.
So I don’t see that having any hegemony is a good thing. You can say that America doesn’t control what I do, and you’d be right. You’re also right that a Soviet hegemony would try to control what I do. But the international community has no influence on how an American hegemony acts. If America decides to start a war Europe can agree or protest, but the war still happens, and here’s the problem. It cheapens the idea of democracy if the opinion of an American is worth more than mine of yours. I don’t think you can deny that from an American point of view the value of someones life can be calculated by: American life > western life > anyone else. As long as there’s an America hegemony that won’t change, and I don’t think I should be content with that just because I’m in the middle catagory.
I just thought the verb “to fuck up with communism” was amusing use of rhetoric. That’s all.
cian said= “They didn’t owe the Poles a damn thing! ” thus they can fuck off. great . In fact they dont owe anyone anything , but that doesnt stop them interfering under the guise of morals. you stated america saved europe and now have converted all the way to how they dont owe poland anything can be selective about how they apply their “morals and virtues”
Daniel, I better understand your argument now, but I still have 2 quibbles with it:
1. Only Britain and France allied with Poland prior to the Nazi invasion. America stayed out of the war until the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbour.
2. Granted, cutting deal with the USSR to carve up Europe in a liberal democratic and communist bloc was not the Americans’ finest hour, but what were they meant to do? Besides, you seem to be apportioning an undue level of blame to America here; the Russians were the villains in this case since it was they who imposed communism. If you blame America for this you might as well blame it for the violence underway in Darfur at the moment.
Eoin, I’m all for American interference if that interference will save innocent lives as in Kosovo or save liberal democracy as in Western Europe post-WWII. Just because America can intervene in some international issue, that doesn’t mean that it has a duty to do so.
I’m not naively arguing that America always does the right thing because it’s the right thing to do, I’m arguing that America sometimes does the right thing because doing the right thing is generally in America’s interests. Free trade benefits everybody, so America is pro-free trade, since it will benefit from it. Democracy is the best form of government to live under, and America believes in spreading democracy. Granted, it tries to spread democracy for its own ends, but the result is good for everyone.
Everybody, as far as I’m aware, I never argued that American hegemony was the finest configuration of the international system. My point on this issue was simply that, as global hegemons go, America isn’t such a bad one.
Democracy is the best form of government to live under, and America believes in spreading democracy. Granted, it tries to spread democracy for its own ends, but the result is good for everyone.
WAHT?!! SEZ WHO!?
Democracy clearly sucks.
1)I honestly to not trust most people to make a good decision and understand what is important.
2) i do not trust any man who’s career is politics as this fosters all the wrong traits and influnces them aas they stand to lose/keep their job
3) most politiiions are fools anyhow.
thus we have a system where idiots, vote for idiots who do medicore jobs at running a country.
smart people know well enough to stay away from politics and this is the punishment.
I think a different system is needed . something more paternalistic. seriously though. If we had a king, i would be so ok with that, if he was intelligent and kind and good. maybe if we had an election for king we could reach a compromise.
“Granted, it tries to spread democracy for its own ends, but the result is good for everyone.” Okay, that sentence was not properly thought through…
I really don’t want to get into a discussion on the merits of democracy. Ironically, the Plato essay I took down partly addressed this criticism. I think the main value of democracy lies in the ability of the citizenry to remove their current government if most people are unhappy with it. Rather than being a guarantee of very good government it’s an insurance against very bad government.
Yet more replies to replies:
“Only Britain and France allied with Poland prior to the Nazi invasion. America stayed out of the war until the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbour.”
True, I had this big paragraph originally about how neither of them was still really a superpower at the end of the war, and how that didn’t really excuse them but still…. It didn’t survive the editing process. However, your second point is a clear example that America acts for America first, the West, then anyone else. I’ll admit they couldn’t have stopped Communism totally, and that they can’t right all the wrongs in the world, but I don’t see them trying very hard unless there’s something in it for them.
“Free trade benefits everybody, so America is pro-free trade, since it will benefit from it.”
That’s just wrong. Western free trade is supported. If by free trade you mean everyone in the first world has to deal fairly with everyone in the third world, there’s not a single developed nation that would agree. I know this is a rich/poor thing not just an American thing, but if we’re talking about what America gave the world I don’t think you can include free trade.
A question for Eoin: What if Bush was elected king? Or America in general? Seriously, I know that it seems like giving one reasonable person control of the world would be a good idea, but that’s not going to happen. The same problems arise, only those with an interest in politics would apply to be king. (Also, start typing in Word and spell checking. You’re going to give Winning some kind of grammar epilepsy)
Finally Cian said “I think the main value of democracy lies in the ability of the citizenry to remove their current government if most people are unhappy with it.”
That’s true. Would you agree though with what I said before about an American hegemony cheapening the nature of democracy? The only people on earth who can hold Bush accountable are Americans. Regardless of what people in Europe or anywhere else think we have no input into American foreign policy and wars. That’s not democracy, America is basically a ruling class.
I read your Plato essay actually, there didn’t seem to be much to comment on though as I agreed with you for almost all of it. Not like this big sprawling debate of ours.
You try to convince us of three things – that the US is a hegemon, that it is good and that this is good for the world
You offer no argument that the US is a hegemon (it thinks it is and acts like one but is it really a hegemon?). I don’t think it is as evidenced by Putin’s current policies (overtly) and Europe in general (more subtlely). The US depends upon support from others when dealing with North Korea, it can’t lay a glove in Iran and smaller states such as Venezuala seem to enjoy antagonising the US who would be condemned as a bully if it responded
Your arguments about the US being good generally revolve around it being good internally but beyond the Marshall Plan not much is offered about the US “being the only good country in the world capable of acting”. The world community is up in arms about Darfur and Europe was involved in Bosnia as well plus it is obvious that the jury is still out on the “goodness” of the Iraq intervention.
Regarding the Marshall Plan, don’t forget the flip side that the US demanded the dismantling of all colonial empires at the end of WW2 to allow free access for US players whether it was economic or political.
Finally on whether the attempted US hegemony is good, you don’t describe the outcome of hegemony by another country or even a return to bi-polar (post WW2) or multi-polar (pre-WW1) balance of power alternative would deliver worse outcomes than present. So we can’t judge the merits of your position.
(Also the US is not the oldest democracy in the world for heaven’s sake and don’t go too far back in US history to climb onto the moral high ground – remember slavery and the horrors of the American Civil War.)
Personally I think the US does more good than harm in the world and there is plenty of both. But to me it must throw off its fear of wilderness that it has since the first settlers clung to the Antlantic seaboard. This fear has led to isolationism and in its current form the US is trying to “McDonaldise” the world so that the world is less strange and more predictable.