Don't Know Much About History
The Pentagon looks back to four great empires for tips on how to rule the world.
In the summer of 2002, the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment (ONA) published an 85-page monograph called "Military Advantage in History". Unusual for an office that is headed by Andrew Marshall, the Pentagon's "futurist in chief," the study looks back to the past—way back. It examines four empires, or "pivotal hegemonic powers in history," to draw lessons about how the United States "should think about maintaining military advantage in the 21st century." Though unclassified, the study was held close to the vest; a stamp on the cover limits its dissemination without permission. Mother Jones obtained it only through a Freedom of Information Act request. Though the report is far from revelatory, it provides a window into a mindset that unselfconsciously envisions the United States as the successor to some of history's most powerful empires.
The study looks a little like a high school text book, devoting chapters to Alexander the Great, Imperial Rome, Genghis Khan, and Napoleonic France and citing texts by Sun Tzu, Livy, and Jared Diamond. It attempts to break down exactly how historic empires sustained their military might across continents and even centuries. The study posits that the historical examples offer "insights into what drives U.S. military advantage," as well as "where U.S. vulnerabilities may lie, and how the United States should think about maintaining its military advantage in the future." There is no one secret to world domination, however. The Mongols' military advantage was rooted in their "tactical and operational superiority"; the Macedonians' in the "exceptional leadership" of and "cult of personality" surrounding Alexander the Great; Napoleon's in "innovative operational concepts" and "information superiority"; and the Romans' in "robust tactical doctrine" and "strong domestic institutions" which were "designed to incorporate conquered peoples as the empire grew." In an extraordinary passage, the study cites the Roman experience—from over a millennium ago—as a precedent for America's long-term dominance: "The Roman model suggests that it is possible for the United States to maintain its military advantage for centuries if it remains capable of transforming its forces before an opponent can develop counter-capabilities. Transformation coupled with strong strategic institutions is a powerful combination for an adversary to overcome."
The report's language is jargon laden and opaque—a lance used by Macedonian horsemen is referred to as a "primary weapon system." That may be due to the methodology of "net assessment," a fancy term for the ONA's approach to analyzing complicated real-world situations that is rooted in systems analysis and game theory. Military author James Dunnigan compares it to engineering. "You take apart historical events, reassemble them as a simulation, and then tinker with the simulation until you can recreate the historical event accurately," he explains. "What that allows you to do is play out 'what if?' situations: What if Napoleon did this? What if Ghengis Khan did that?"
While the study was produced under the auspices of the ONA, its five authors work for government intelligence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, and they wrote the study as part of a contract for the Defense Department's Information Assurance Technology Analysis Center. Booz Allen won a 10-year, $200 million cost-plus contract to establish and "host" that center in 1998. (In May, the Carlyle Group announced it will be taking over Booz Allen's government services arm.)
The original idea for the study predates the Bush administration. Mark Herman, the Booz Allen vice president and war-game designer who is the study's lead author, recalls being asked to give a presentation on historical empires at one of Andrew Marshall's famous "summer studies" at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, in 1999. At that annual retreat, experts from government, academia, and beyond are invited to contemplate a big-picture question. Newt Gingrich, for example, participated in the 1999 program, according to Herman. He says that the ONA "liked the presentation so much they felt it should be written down" and expanded. A earlier version of the report, titled "Sustaining Military Dominance: Examples From Ancient History," was presented at the 2001 summer study and was later cited in a Maureen Dowd column. The current version was published a year later.
Coming out of the Office of Net Assessment, the study's theme of military transformation is not surprising. Described by the Washington Post as "an obscure but highly influential unit," the ONA was established as an in-house think tank in 1973. Its founding director was Marshall, a strategist who achieved demigod status in the press after years of colorful profiles portraying him as a visionary. (A 2002 article in the New York Times Magazine named Marshall the "Yoda of the Rumsfeld Defense Department"; William Safire dubbed him "the freshest mind in the Puzzle Palace.") ONA specializes in trend spotting and forecasting military threats. The office spent the 1980s exhaustively studying the US-Soviet balance; recently, it has turned to topics as diverse as neuropharmacology, Islamic warfare, and the national security implications of climate change.
Now in his 80s, Marshall has been a chief proponent of the so-called Revolution in Military Affairs, a cause also championed by Donald Rumsfeld that emphasizes speed and increased use of precision weapons and advanced communications technology. In 2001, Marshall was given a high-profile assignment by Rumsfeld to conduct an extensive review of the military and the possibilities of military transformation.
Most striking is how the study conceives of the United States in imperial terms. "You'll see some neoconservatives at the beginning of the Bush administration crowing that 'we do have an empire, let's just come out of the closet and say we do,'" said Ivan Eland, the author of a book on America's "informal empire" and the director of the Center on Peace & Liberty at the Independent Institute, on hearing a description of the study. "But the administration never did that because empire doesn't sell well with the public." After reviewing the study at Mother Jones' request, William Hartung, director of the Arms and Security Initiative at the New America Foundation, said he was struck by its "arrogance and immorality." "The presumption that the United States should rule the world, sword at the ready, for the foreseeable future is an unacceptable basis for a just, even-handed foreign policy."
Even coming from an office vaunted for its intellectual seriousness, "Military Advantage in History" often reads like it was meant as window dressing for the Revolution in Military Affairs agenda—sometimes at the expense of historical fact. (Herman says that the theme of transformation emerged naturally from his research.) After reviewing a section that identifies five discrete "transformations" of the Roman military over a period of 1,000 years, Lee Brice of Western Illinois University, president of the Society of Ancient Military Historians, described it as "so completely incorrect as to be useless." In general, Brice noted, "it is inappropriate to apply modern concepts of systems theory, doctrine, and strategy to ancient armies. That required a level of planning and centralization that simply did not exist."
Eland speculates that a study like this would "get warped by the military-industrial-congressional complex into more money for weapons." Furthermore, he says, it ignores the economic implications of military expansion. "The Office of Net Assessment is doing this to show, 'Well, gee, these other empires transformed themselves, they were successful, we need to do the same thing,'" Eland says. "Well that's going to cost big bucks, and that will cause economic overstretch. People say it can't happen to us since we have such a big economy, but every empire has said that." It is unclear how the study has been used; the Office of Net Assessment declined a request for an interview. Herman says only that "a whole bunch of [copies] went out to the government."
The idea that contemporary society can or should try to find direct guidance in the past has been assailed by some historians. The American historian Bernard Bailyn wrote of "an obvious kind of presentism, which at its worst becomes indoctrination by historical example." But the ONA study charges ahead, plumbing the past for contemporary lessons. An extraordinary color-coded table in the study's conclusion attempts to literally "map" the historical findings to the United States with an eye toward "enduring dominance." (See image above.)
Several historians who reviewed the study differed on its quality and meaning. Walter Scheidel, a Stanford professor of classics and the coauthor of a forthcoming survey of ancient empires, called it "a successful distillation of relevant information and scholarship complemented by very interesting systematic analysis." Others found the scholarship to be shoddy and superficial. Pamela Crossley, a Dartmouth historian who teaches on the Mongols, described the chapter on Genghis Khan as mostly "an accumulation of popularly transmitted misconceptions." She also noted the study's "amazingly strange spelling 'Chengis.'" Brice, the ancient military historian, said the text suffered from "an intense, myopic habit of wanting to make the ancient world fit into modern stereotypes." He compares it with "much lower-undergraduate-level work."
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actually, the 'chengis' spelling resembles many of the possible alternate transliterations of genghis khan's name, including 'chinggis' the preferred version of the mongolian government. let's keep our criticisms to something substantial, like the content of the report, rather than attempting to discredit it on what could simply be the confusion over differing standards. mother jones should be loath to print such vapid comments.
I personally have no problem with the US as empire in the abstract. But George Bush is no Augustas.
Reminds me of a RAND pamphlet I once saw about "swarm" tactics, attributed to Genghis Khan and other historical armies and leaders listed here. It touted the smaller, lighter, but well-informed armed forces that Rumsfeld was hoping to build as SecDef
How does a nation in a $9trillion hole rule the world? Just Askin'
So the resounding financial and civilian-controlling failure that was the Iraq War proves that we're nowhere near able to conquer countries, and some of these guys want more with Iran? What do you think happened to the rest of these Empires, fellas?
Perhaps the American people should begin to study past revolutions
Thank you for the article. I found it enlightening, particularly the points you raise regarding the use of inexact and/or incorrect historical analogies to service otherwise politically despicable goals (i.e., military domination of the planet? WTF). Also, per MikeNearMcChord's comment, I truly wonder why the military obsessed fan-boys never take those numbers into account. $3 trillion required for the Iraq debacle would feed, clothes and provide clean water to a lot of the planet's destitute people. Apologies for the soapbox.
I think Kanye West had it wrong, its not that George Bush doesn't care about black people - it's that every single person in his administration cares about no one and nothing, except power of course. I wonder if they got the idea of giving citizenship to illegals that join the army from one of these ancient war obsessed empires. Or maybe Nero gave Bush the idea to burn down one of his own cities (re: Twin Towers) and then blame it on the Christians (re: Islamic Terrorists). These PFNAC neo cons are sociopaths to the point that it probably embarrasses most people in insane asylums right now. I truly hope justice is served on all of the Reagan, Bush, Cheney, Ashcroft, Wolfowitz, Rove and Rumsfeld crowd - if not in this life than the next.
I've always said that our destruction of Fallujah would have been much more effective if we crucified the population along the roads into Baghdad.
They need to look at recent history for lessons. America brought down the British Empire through 'guerilla' tactics. The VC fought off the Americans [and the French] with "guerilla" tactics. The Taliban, Al Quiada, the Iraqi insurgents have fought off our military with "guerilla" tactics. Seems they learned more from our history than we have.
"But the decline of Rome was the natural and inevitable effect of immoderate greatness. Prosperity ripened the principle of decay; the causes of destruction multiplied with the extent of conquest; and as soon as time or accident had removed the artificial supports, the stupendous fabric yielded to the pressure of its own weight. The story of its ruin is simple and obvious; and instead of inquiring why the Roman empire was destroyed, we should rather be surprised that it had subsisted so long."--Edward Gibbon
"All glory is fleeting."--Roman slave
At one point, when the Romans conquered a nation or state, they put in a real governor, perhaps a propraetor, who stayed and ruled the conquered peoples. He had power, and he used many of the nobles of the province or state as slaves. But the Romans also built acqueducts and roads, and civilized them with courts and laws and revived trade and, in this way, brought the territories into the Roman Empire. This is not the U.S. style and therefore the U.S. couldn't really assemble an Empire as coherent as the Romans. The U.S. tradition is to let locals run things, because we have no infrastructure to really control that which we may conquer militarily. That's why we supported dictators like Hussen and the Shah, etc.
It makes me ashamed to have fought in Iraq for America
It sounds like the neocons were trying to learn from the past without actually asking anyone who knew something about it. Kind of like the approach to planning the Iraq invasion.
I refuse to call it a war. It was an unprovoked attack on a sovereign nation followed by an unwelcome occupation.
4th Reich, anyone? Are we sure we want our country to become Vatican City / Rome a few hundred years from now, after we have 'conquered' the world. It worked out so well for the Romans! Hey, didn't they worship Apollo and Zeus and stuff? Hey, lets do that too! I wonder if I can get a $200 Million dollar grant to study that?
You don't need apologize: you are right.
Since the very definition of empire implies hegemony and domination, I deplore the possibility that America has become even remotely close to such a thing. If we are to survive and succed, we need to become a willing participant in the administration and handling of world affairs as a co-participant with other nations - not a force that dictates its direction.
It is an interesting selection. Equally interesting that the attempts at global rule through credit extension based on raw materials access and control, sea-power enforced tribute systems are excluded from public view. It would be interesting to know what they thought about Venice, Spain, Holland and Britain and what the strong points and weak points of each were.
They obviously missed the part about how all of these empires fell...
Is it so hard just to live in peace? Imperialism is overrated.
what a great shame for american people that their great president kidnapped a very poor and weak woman of pakistan without any valid reason bad bush
A lot of good it did them. The Neocons have demonstrated themselves as a rather stupid bunch. You'd think they never were in school. The only thing they've demonstrated a knack for is fascism at home.
The suggestion that the Roman experience show that one can maintain empire over centuries if the army constantly keeps ahead of its opponents militarily is historically ludicrous. Please suggest to the Pentagon people that Rome remained a successful state because it commanded allegiances of considerable segments of the populations behind its borders. Rome survived because it was able to mobilize resources for the defense of an impossible frontier from a population which had more or less accepted its rule and was happy to be part of the game. There is little that the US empire with its projection of power beyond its frontiers can learn from what was in effect domestic policy. Rome did not survive on legions but on a steady diet of integration and consensus building.
Read Clifford Ando on Provincial loyalty and Anthony Kaldellis' latest book on Hellenism in Byzantium. Both books demonstrate the effectiveness of these mechanisms of consensus building.
The Dalai Lama said killing your enemies is an outdated idea.
Does the "Kill Machine" aka the Pentagon know that?!
You don't think that that is happening now?
You've got to hand it to the Pentagon and the neocons. They have been and are making a lot of mistakes but they're also doing a lot of things right. Just look at the state of America. We've been a colonial power almost from the beginning. We've started wars for over a hundred years now and fooled our populace into believing they were just (excl. WWII). Now we're the pre-emininant neo-colonial power. We've invaded two nations, subverted the Constitution, made torture legal, made the US more fascist than anytime in history, we spend more on military than all other countries combined, .... come on. The cold war ended over a decade ago. Yet each year we spend billions more on war. Yes, we are an empire. Empires should be relegated to history. Or else we'll see death in the billions.
One item is glaringly lacking in the cursory and self-serving report from the Pentagon's hired history hacks. Those stooges fronting for empire seemed to have completely forgotten the object lesson that history teaches us and one our founders recognized and repeatedly warned us about; empires are lethal to republics!
Cicero and other Roman statesmen tried to warn their countrymen of this danger (read Erik Hildinger's Swords Against the Senate) but as Chalmers Johnson and others have described the militaristic demands of empire consumed that great republic.
Jefferson, Madison and Washington passed the same concerns to American posterity but it was a general much closer to our time than theirs, Eisenhower, who warned us of the toxic threat of militarism and power to the health and longevity of democratic republicanism.
You can have empire and you can have republic...but you can't have both.
Sic semper imperium!!
I don't think the folks in power care what's going to happen after they die. They just want to get as much money as they can now. Short term profit trumps all logic.
So what ! Only through study of the past can we hope to know anything of the future. This is taught in schools all over the world...someone at "Mother Jones" was gazing out the window when this occurred in their life. Instead of playing "Gotchya" you could try some unbiased critical journalism...haven't seen much of it in the States fo' some time.
None of these ideas are new. for most of the world, you know, the people that are usually referred to as the “Anti American crowd” the once that have been at the receiving end of Americans greed and lies like sending aids workers only to spy like talking about human right whilst conducting unspeakable crimes in secret labs inside and out side America (it always astonishes me how even amongst so called progressives they are more outraged if such crimes are competed inside America as suppose to out side America) none of this is new.
We in Iran understood that when the country that was suppose to defend the right of the people against vested (monarchial) interest deposed our prime-minister and imposed their own will on our people (the shah). Every nation on the face of the earth has its own story of how they ware cheated by the western powers.
Now the question is my brethrens is this. Will you be willing to stand –up your big fat asses and fight?????
Or, are you just a lying cheating twofaced blabber moth like your governments.
I know the answer.
There is an ancient proverb: "We do not see the world as it is; we see it as we are."
Those who wish to find justifications for diverting humankind's wealth from developmental investment to debilitating spending could read "The Three Pigs" and find more and quicker ways to slaughter the wolf. They would get the pigs to pay for it, and sacrifice their piglets to do the dirty, wet-work of it. They would propagandize to get the surviving pigs to tolerate the injustice to the innocents in the wolf's community caught in the crossfire and backlash.
Of course they could read "Alice In Wonderland" too and find someone or something to designate as 'the wolf' and use the same ways and means preconceived for destruction to assault it too, and all on the back of the designated 'pigs.'
Another proverb: "When your only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." When war is your heritage, and you don't really know your true heritage, just the glorified version, 'sanitized' of the bloody truth, war looks like a pretty good idea. "Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself."
Can you imagine where humankind could be had the Nazis not won WWII? Their influence in 'the west' and 'the east' kept a 'Cold War' going for half a century. Not just any half-century, but one where humankind made great strides in developmental aspects of every stripe. But their greed is so great every stride became a tool for conquest, for domination, for covert manipulation of commerce, government, education, manufacturing, agriculture, science, religion, culture, music, art, media, writing and publishing fiction and nonfiction, finance, insurance, real estate, military, industry, intelligence, politics and organized crime. This military-industrial- political-intelligence-underworld complex is so greedy, fighting over this ball of mud, misleading the poor to war against each other around the planet, we will probably be engaged in conflict when cosmic circumstances doom us, with too little reaction time, too late to enable survival of the curious little creature, humankind.
It's a shame we can't find leaders to lead us developmentally, to defend representative Constitutional democracy from fascism, entrenched and unapologetic for its misleadership of the human race headlong into hell. War is hell. Not 'like' hell. Hell.
It is no surprise to find the hammers made nails of the data, fitting it to their agenda, and themselves to the description of the enemies of humankind, fascist.
I recently heard that other nations don't consider the U. S. a 'real nation' because it hasn't had its second revolution. I'm not sure the fascists would tolerate revolution. Rather, it would be their excuse to nullify the Constitution, as is done with the secret "Alito Veto," Presidential 'signing statements' that covertly nullify the Congress, arrogating power to the "Unitary Executive."
We are deep in a revolution, but no revolutionary has ever faced an enemy so empowered, with its primary weapon system being data, and the competence of supercomputers to collect, process, and analyze it, as programmed by the hammers, who will find their nails in the net assessment and hammer them down.
As a grad student standing at the base of a seemingly giant ivory tower, I was especially intrigued by the rift between federal contractors and professors that emerged in this article. It's of little surprise to me that the feds have lower intellectual standards than specialists in the field, but it makes me wont of a new system where scholars themselves would be contracted to do this work.
As we all know, the W. administration has been deeply scornful of expertise, preferring hack idealogues to do their bidding. Hopefully Obama will help turn this nightmare ship around.
" for America's long-term dominance..."??? America has been dominate for barely 60 years, hardly an empire. The ONA is nothing but a bunch of small men with delusions of grandor. The British Empire, the Spanish, even the Ottoman Empire presisted for several hundred years. And the one common element of all the empires in history? That of course would be the eventual downfall...
Remember that when Eisenhower first used the term "military-industrial complex",it was the pentagon's term for the Hitler's Nazi party.
If America is bent of taking over the world, why did we not claim Iraq for ourselves? Why haven't we touched their oil? Why did we insist on helping these people develop their own government? This has cost us greatly and it has been an honorable undertaking.
Why would you want to rule the world? And how does the military solve civic problems, legislate, and gain money for it's goals? Is the ideal world one giant military institution where everything is regulated?
Note- Chingis Khan is how the name of Genghis Khan is spoken and written in Eastern Cultures. He was originally called Temujin.
Macedonian/Alexander’s Empire – Alexander was driven by revenge(against Persia’s historic aggression) and desire for grandeur(to surpass the achievements of Philip, his father, and achieve greatness equal of the myth of Hercules). He over extended himself and created an Empire that did not survive past his own death, greed imploded it(his Generals, already rivals during Alexander’s life, became self-imposed Monarchs of their own private kingdoms in constant competition with each other). Alexander could not be defeated by Armies but was defeated by Syphilis.
Roman Empire – Rome’s rise to power is due to several previous Regional Powers. Greek City States and their Colonies, the Etruscan people, Latin people(origin of the language), potential influence of the ancient city of Troy, and the Phoenicians which extended trade and their culture across the Mediterranean and likely helped create written Greek language which expanded that culture’s influence over the region. The Phoenicians likely founded the future city and nation of Carthage which successfully invaded Roman territory under the leadership of Hannibal. It is not surprising Rome is described as the historical predecessor of the US considering the similarities of Colonialism leading to its creation. Worshipping violence(as many Romans did) has rarely had positive results. Sacrifices to the God of War were always common. From brutal blood sports(the Gladiator competitions) to Civil War.
Julius Caesar conquered Gaul not through issuing citizenships but through brutality against the local population leading to massacres and enslavement of 1,000s of people. Garrisons were set up to control the areas afterwards.
The Romans “prepared for war” as the famous quote goes, and frequently turned their Javelins, Spears, Arrows, and Swords on their own people. Before Rome “officially” became an Empire ruled by 1 Emperor it saw years of brutal infighting involving 1 Roman Legion against another Roman Legion. Driven by greed and lust for power Roman leaders(Senators and Provincial Governors and future Triumvirs) saw nothing wrong with sending their men to kill each other, and who was able to mount a better attack or defense survived the “political” struggle. Rome quite frequently would try to bite off more than it could chew. Losing battles to Germanic, Persian, and Hun Armies. Refugees from the North and Nomadic Warriors from Central Asia eventually overwhelmed Rome, and it collapsed under its own weight.
Genghis Khan’s Empire - The Mongol Empire that came from Genghis Khan’s conquests was a result of constant war between Central Asian people, the unified Mongol people, perhaps once numbering in the millions in the region were almost completely devastated and bled dry over 3 centuries of warfare leaving behind small and powerless groups. They may have been fierce warriors but an Empire could not be sustained with their available resources. The Mongol Horde was known for its brutality, something the US should not copy.
Napoleonic France – To analyze Napoleon’s long term planning one must only analyze Napoleon’s not so successful invasion of Russia which cost him 80% of his Army. Having suffered defeat he was never able to recover what he had lost and France has not had any significant military victories since Napoleon was defeated.
I am surprised China is not mentioned. China has had several cycles of decline and growth and occupation, but it has only grown stronger since its creation. None of the above Empires has survived as long as China.
I've often heard voices decrying our failure to learn the lessons of history, and the military is often derided for fighting the last war. Then, when they try to do exactly that, they get slammed for being "immoral."
There are some things worse than war. Try losing one.
Having both a background in the military and a graduate degree in history I'm not so sure either side really understands the other. One thing for certain though, historians from my experience tend to be horrible when it comes to their understanding of the military. They are tremendously deficient in their understanding of the necessity of training, junior leadership, tactical or operational matters and so on. Military history is a field filled with rank amateurs.
You've done well to pick out some real nobodies when it comes to assessing this study. Wm Hartung? When did this amateur become an 'expert'?
Seriously, next time get some real experienced and knowledgeable 'experts'. Lazy friggin' journalism, you really missed the boat on this one.
It's quite easy. Our debt load ration, debt as a percentage of GDP is lower than Japan's and about the level of Germany and France's. It's not the total number of the debt that's important, it's the relationship to the GDP that is.
In other words if you make 100,000 dollars a year and you're 65,000 in debt that ain't really to bad. And that is the debt ratio we have.
The sky is falling, but it's not the National Debt that's doing it.
''Posted by:Alexander Makedonsky''
Thanks for the huge tome, I bet you're a real treat at parties.
Sure, it's like much undergraduate thinking. but so is u.s. politics. kurt vonnegut's never to be forgotten
observation that u.s. politics is like u.s. high school. so is u.s. foreign politics; and the u.s. adversarial system like football.
stupid, primitive, but effective and worthless. pragmatism run haywire.
Rome, Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, and Napoleon as exemplars. Thomas Jefferson would have been so proud! Wasn't he recalled as Ambassador to France because he hated Napoleon so much? I hardly this Roome is what was meant by a 'shining city on a hill'.
I've read some of this sort of stuff. Shallow, vapid, stupid scholarship. A few citations from Sun Tzu, a reference to ancient Rome and Bob's your uncle.
I thought the article fair and balanced reporting. The subject under discussion however, seems to be confusing many. In truth, are there any historical precedents for what the USA faces today? Reasonable people feel contingency planning is acceptable, even if the subjects of such planning make us uncomfortable.
Since 1989 the USA and its European franchise have found themselves with the' wrong kind' of forces. The difficulty lies in trying to decide what kind of world we think we are currently in and what armed forces are required to match against need. In fact, as the think tanks are demonstrating, no one knows. But what a lucrative field in which to find oneself. How I wish someone would pay me oodles of dosh to day dream. I suppose they could always ask Mr Steven Spielberg or Mr George Lucas for their thoughts, though I sense the Pentagon already gets lots inspiration for gadgets - and all their political thinking - watching their productions as things are.
Nor is Obama -- Caligula does come to mind, however
Indeed, Rome gave citizenship to barbarians who served 20 years or more as auxiliaries, frequently as cavalrymen, and in life and death situations they even freed slaves if they would fight.
The article, as did the study although hard to tell from the amount of description, seems to have missed the point that the U.S. "empire," if you want to call it that, is very differently organized than the empires mentioned. For one thing, re Rome the U.S. has never even come close to blithely imposing the sort of hegemony that Augustus considered utterly normal on a conquered people.
That aside the article was thought provoking.
My bad. . . except in the case of the Native Americans during and since the conquest of the U.S. itself.
Sully: I concur entirely. What do the systems examined have in common? They were autocracies, impelled by brutally imperialistic and hegemonic motives, and willing to embrace very cruel methods.
I doubt the U.S. is prepared to order, for example, the crucifixion of the entire population of the Sunni Triangle (that'll learn 'em!), or the transportation of the residual population of Pashtun Afghanistan to New Mexico, there to labour as slaves until totally assimilated.
George W. has his moments, too, but I've never heard that he thought himself a god, or that there was a movement afoot to make him one. For what its worth, if we are looking for a pretext for mass crucifixtion that would work -- make him a god, set up statues of him in the streets of Kandahar and Baghdad and expect the locals to get on their knees.
Like it or not, there is really only one comparison for the U.S. 'empire' -- inhibited in the same fashion, faced by similar challenges, impelled by the same motives. Its the British Empire, stupid.
