As US power wanes, the radical right is blaming Obama. I do not blame anyone. I think the flag wavers for American power are living in a fantasy land where Washington DC is the most recent capital of the Roman Empire … a claim made before by Rome, Constantinople, Moscow, Vienna, and London.
I do not extoll Rome, I bemoan it. Rome destroyed the cultures it touched. With military conquest, the Romans brought their culture and religion … a version of cultural genocide. Later Roman wannabees spread the white man’s burden, with the sword, the school, and the repeating rifle. If we go back to the war-torn lands bordering the Mediterranean 2000 years ago, we Jews are one of the very few peoples that resisted and the only ancient culture that seems to have survived.
America never did quite fit the mold. Our expeditionary forces lacked the bloody conviction of the Conquistadors or the British Army. At least in our minds, our military were less legionnaires than cops.
We kept the peace for about 7 or 8 decades. That is not very long for an imperial reign, but I do not see how America can continue to be the world’s policeman. We lack the money, the imperial culture, the willingness to sacrifice blood, and the Caesars, Herods, Stalins, or Napoleons needed to justify that spilling of American blood. Worse yet, as an immigrant nation, may of us care deeply about the blood of the target of American weapons … our cousins and others who “look like us.”
We also live in a world where other powers can rival us. China is the most obvious. But in this smaller world, China is much closer and more involved with us than Rome was with its rivals. We … the world … are going to have a new world order and that order will not be ruled by one or event two hegemons.
Sadly, starting with Raygun, the US has lived in a fantasy where the death of the Soviet Union conferred an imperial crown on America. Obama is the first President to understand that and to begin the difficult process of cooperation with global and regional powers that will create the new order.
I suspect this order will include regional powers. Sadly for Israel I see Iran as the most likely claimant of that throne.