51吃瓜

Trump’s foreign policy advisers are plainly unhinged. But the old establishment isn’t much better.

In trying to unravel the debates over US foreign policy currently being fought out in the editorial pages of The听New York Times,听The Wall Street Journal and the magazine听Foreign Policy,听one might consider starting in late December on a bitter cold ridge in northern Wyoming, where 81 men of the US Army鈥檚 18^th听Infantry Regiment were pursuing some Indians over a rocky ridge.

The year was 1866 and the United States was at war with the local tribes鈥擲ioux, Cheyenne and Arapaho鈥攊n an attempt to open a trail into the Montana gold fields. The fighting was going badly for an army fresh from the battlefields of the Civil War.

Oglala Sioux leader Red Cloud and his savvy lieutenant Crazy Horse didn鈥檛 fight like Robert E. Lee, but rather like General Vo Nguyen Giap a hundred years in the future: troops were ambushed by attackers who quickly disappeared, isolated posts overrun, supply wagons looted and burned.

The time and place was vastly different, but the men who designed the war against Native Americans would be comfortable with the rationale that currently impels US foreign policy. In their view, the army wasn鈥檛 fighting for gold in 1866, but was embarked on a moral crusade to civilize the savages, to build a shining 鈥渃ity on a hill,鈥� to be that 鈥渆xceptional鈥� nation that stands above all others.

The fact that this holy war would kill hundreds of thousands of the continent鈥檚 original owners and sentence the survivors to grinding poverty was irrelevant.

Is that so different from the way the butcher bills for the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the overthrow of Libya鈥檚 government, and the Syrian Civil War is excused as unfortunate collateral damage in America鈥檚 campaign to spread freedom and democracy to the rest of the world?

The Roots of Exceptionalism

鈥淲e came, we saw, he died,鈥� bragged then-US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton about the murder of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. Libya is now a failed state wracked by civil war鈥攁nd a major jumping off place for refugees fleeing US wars in Yemen, Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan.

In his book听The True Flag: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire, author and former听New York Times听reporter听听traces the roots of this millenarian view that America鈥檚 mission was to 鈥渞egenerate the world.鈥� That this crusade was many times accompanied by stupendous violence is a detail left unexamined by the people who designed those campaigns.

Kinzer argues that this sense of exceptionalism was developed during the Spanish-American War (1898) that gave the US colonies in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines. But, as John Dower demonstrates in his brilliant book on World War II in the Pacific,听War Without Mercy, that sentiment originated in the campaigns against Native Americans. Indeed, some of the same soldiers who tracked down Apaches in the southwest and massacred Sioux Ghost Dancers at Wounded Knee would go on to fight insurgents in the Philippines.

The language has shifted from the unvarnished imperial rhetoric of men like Roosevelt, Henry Cabot Lodge and Senator Albert Beveridge, who firmly believed in 鈥渢he white man鈥檚 burden鈥濃�攁 line from a poem by Rudyard Kipling about the American conquest of the Philippines.

Today鈥檚 humanitarian interventionists have substituted the words 鈥渋nternational鈥� and 鈥済lobal鈥� for 鈥渋mperial,鈥� though the recipients of 鈥済lobalism鈥� sometimes have difficulty discerning the difference.

At the ideological core of exceptionalism is the idea that American, in the words of former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright鈥攁nd repeated by presidential candidate Hillary Clinton 鈥� is the 鈥渙ne essential nation鈥� whose duty it is to spread the gospel of free markets and democracy.

New Delusions, Old Delusions

On the surface, there appear to be sharp differences between what one could call 鈥渆stablishment鈥� foreign policy mavens鈥攍ike听, Paul Wasserman,听 and听鈥攁nd brick tossers like Stephen Bannon,听 and Stephen Miller.

To a certain extent there are.听, for instance, predicts a major land war in the Middle East and a war over the South China Sea. Next to those fulminations, liberal interventionists like Kagan, and even neoconservatives like听, seem reasoned. But the 鈥渙ld hands鈥� and sober thinkers are, in many ways, just as deluded as the Trump bomb throwers.

A case in point is a recent article by the Brookings Institution鈥檚 Kagan entitled 鈥�,鈥� in which he argues the US must challenge Russia and China 鈥渂efore it is too late,鈥� and warns that 鈥渁ccepting spheres of influence is a recipe for disaster.鈥�

Kagan has generally been lumped in with neocons like Boot, Paul Wolfowitz, Elliot Abrams and Richard Perle鈥攖he latter three of whom helped design the invasion of Iraq鈥攂ut he calls himself a liberal interventionist and supported Hillary Clinton in the last election. Clinton is a leading interventionist, along with former United Nations representative Samantha Power and former National Security Adviser Susan Rice.

鈥淐hina and Russia are classic revisionist powers,鈥� Kagan posits. 鈥淎lthough both have never enjoyed greater security from foreign powers than they do today 鈥� Russia from its traditional enemies to the west, China from its traditional enemy in the east 鈥� they are dissatisfied with the current global configuration of power. Both seek to restore hegemonic dominance they once enjoyed in their respective regions.鈥�

Those 鈥渞egions鈥� include Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia for Russia, and essentially everything west of the Hawaiian Islands for China.

For Kagan, this is less about real estate than 鈥渢he mere existence of democracies on their borders, the global free flow of information they cannot control, [and] the dangerous connection between free market capitalism and political freedom.鈥� All of these things, he says, 鈥減ose a threat to rulers who depend on keeping restive forces in their own countries in check.鈥�

An Alternate Universe

There are times when one wonders what world people like Kagan live in. As听, a foreign policy researcher, journalist and professor at Georgetown University in Qatar, points out concerning Russia: 鈥淎 child with a map can look at where the strategic border was in 1988 and where it is today, and work out which side has advanced in which direction.鈥�

The 1999 Yugoslav War served as an excuse for President Bill Clinton to break a decade-old agreement with the then-Soviet Union not to recruit former members of the Warsaw Pact into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). In the war鈥檚 aftermath, the Western coalition signed up Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Romania.

For the first time in modern history, Russia had a hostile military alliance on its borders, including American soldiers. Exactly how this gives Russia 鈥済reater security鈥� from its enemies in the West isn鈥檛 clear.

Of course, in a way, Kagan has a dog in this fight. His wife, former Assistant Secretary of State for Europe and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland, cheer-led the 2014 coup that overthrew Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovych. Prior to the coup, Nuland was caught on tape using a vulgar term to dismiss peace efforts by the European Union and discussing who would replace Yanukovych. Nuland also admitted that the US had spent $5 billion trying to influence Ukraine鈥檚 political development.

As Lieven argues, 鈥淩ussia鈥檚 intervention in Ukraine is about Ukraine, a country of supreme historical, ethnic, cultural, strategic, and economic importance to Russia. It implies nothing for the rest of Eastern Europe.鈥�

Kagan gives no evidence of Russia鈥檚 designs on Central Asia, although one assumes he is talking about the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Since that trade and security grouping includes China, India and Pakistan, as well as Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan鈥擨ran has also applied for membership鈥攅xactly how Russia would 鈥渄ominate鈥� those countries is not clear.

Kagan鈥檚 argument that 鈥渁ccommodation鈥� with Russia only encourages further aggression is, according to Lieven, a 鈥渧iew based upon self-deception on the part of western elites who are interested in maintaining confrontation with Russia as a distraction from more important, painful problems at home, like migration, industrial decline, and anger over globalization.鈥�

As for 鈥渇ree market capitalism,鈥� the fallout from the ravages that American-style capital has wrought on its own people is one of the major reasons Donald Trump sits in the Oval Office.

Picking Poisons

Meanwhile, according to Kagan, who offers no evidence, US allies in Asia are 鈥渨ondering how reliable鈥� the United States is given its 鈥渕ostly rhetorical鈥� pivot to Asia, its 鈥渋nadequate鈥� defense spending,鈥� its 鈥減remature鈥� and 鈥渦nnecessary鈥� withdrawal from Iraq, and its 鈥渁ccommodating agreement with Iran on its nuclear program.鈥�

Again, one wonders through which looking glass the Brookings Institution views the world.

The US has more than 400 military bases in Asia, has turned Guam into a fortress, deployed Marines and nuclear-capable aircraft in Australia, and sent six of its 10 aircraft carriers to the region. It spends more on defense than most of the rest of the world combined. The illegal invasion of Iraq was an unmitigated disaster, and Iran has given up its nuclear enrichment program and its stockpile of enhanced uranium.

But in a world of 鈥渁lternative facts,鈥� the only thing that counts is that the US no longer dominates the world as it did in the decades after World War II. 鈥淥nly the United States has the capacity and unique geographical advantages to provide global security and relative stability,鈥� writes Kagan. 鈥淭here is no stable balance of power in Europe or Asia without the United States.鈥�

The fact that the 鈥渟ecurity鈥� and 鈥渟tability鈥� that Kagan yearns for has generated dozens of wars, a frightening nuclear arms race, growing economic inequality, and decades of support for dictators and monarchs on five continents never seems to figure into the equation.

Where the politics of Trump fits into all this is by no means clear. If the president goes with Bannon鈥檚 paranoid hatred of Islam鈥攁nd given conspiracy theorist and Islamophobe Frank Gaffney has also advised the president, that is not a bad bet鈥攖hen things will go sharply south in the Middle East. If he pushes China and follows Bannon鈥檚 prediction that there will be a war between the two powers, maybe it鈥檚 time to look at real estate in New Zealand, like a number of billionaires鈥�40% of whom are Americans鈥攁re already doing.

An Old Nightmare

But no matter which foreign policy current one talks about, the 鈥渋ndispensable nation鈥� concept鈥攂orn out of the Indian and Spanish-American wars鈥斺�渨eighs like a nightmare on the brain of the living,鈥� as Karl Marx wrote in the 18^th听Brumaire.

A century and a half ago on a snowy Wyoming ridge, a company of the 18th Infantry Regiment discovered that not everyone wanted that 鈥渟hining city on a hill.鈥� From out of a shallow creek bed and the surrounding cottonwoods and box elders, the people whose land the US was in the process of stealing struck back.

The battle of Lodge Pine Ridge didn鈥檛 last long, and none of the regiment survived. It was a stunning blow in the only war against the US that Native Americans won. Within less than two years, the army would admit defeat and retreat.

In the end, though, the Indians were no match for the numbers, technology and firepower of the United States. Within a little more than three decades, they were 鈥渃ivilized鈥� into sterile, poverty-ridden reservations where the only 鈥渆xceptionalism鈥� they experience is the lowest life expectancy of any ethnic group in the United States.

The view that America鈥檚 institutions and its organization of capital are superior is a dangerous delusion and increasingly unacceptable鈥攁nd unenforceable鈥攊n a multi-polar world. The tragedy is how widespread and deep these sentiments are.

The world isn鈥檛 envious of that shining 鈥渃ity on a hill.鈥� Indeed, with Trump in the White House, 鈥渁ghast鈥� would probably be a better sentiment than envy.

*[This article was originally published by .]

The views expressed in this article are the author鈥檚 own and do not necessarily reflect 51吃瓜鈥檚 editorial policy.

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