America Contra Mundum
The best ally world peace has ever known is a strong America. With these words, Mitt Romney opens a chapter in his book No Apology (1). The book is written as a call from Romney to his countrymen not to apologize for being the freest, as well as militarily and economically strongest, country in the world. At the same time, he emphasizes that it is important to protect this leading position. A similar argument is made by the historian Niall Ferguson in Colossus, where he traces America's imperial history—he explicitly calls it an empire—and argues, like Romney, that the U.S. is by far the best option available to us as a world leader. China, the EU, and global Islamist terror supported by regimes like Iran are the alternatives, but they are not strong enough on their own to shoulder the yoke of being world leader (2). The conclusion is therefore the same for the British Ferguson as for the American Romney; a weakened USA is likely to lead to a power vacuum rather than a multipolar world, while at the same time running the risk of undermining the freedoms and rights we take for granted in the Western world.
The potential rivals to American hegemony that Ferguson points to are the EU, China, or radical Islamism. They all possess certain strengths that point towards them being able to take the leading position. The EU has expanded and has a relatively strong economy, but demographic trends point downward and economically the U.S. has outpaced the EU. China has had a miraculous economic development since abandoning a planned economy, but despite strong growth, 20 years after Ferguson's book, the U.S. is still leading economically and militarily (3). Islamism does have a stronger demographic trend but consists of splinter groups rather than a unified organization. Attempts by ISIS to create a caliphate were nipped in the bud and no alternative has emerged since. Instead, Ferguson sees a much more likely scenario of a new "Dark Age" similar to the Middle Ages where pursuits of global empire led to political fragmentation.
More recently, this American hegemony has come to be questioned evermore. "Postliberals" and others argue against American intervention in foreign conflicts. These interventions and those who support them are often referred to as "neoconservative." The problem with such labels is that, when not held up as straw men, serve more as simple characterizations of a loosely assembled group of thinkers, which is then easily dismissed. Neoconservatism is primarily characterized by the desire to spread liberal democracy abroad, while classical American foreign policy, which has often been interventionist, does not primarily aim at this, but rather has other strategic considerations in mind. Neoconservatives are also less concerned with defending established institutions if they do not happen to agree with their own ideological aims.
Two examples will suffice to illustrate the exaggeration of the influence of neoconservatism. First, it is only a small part of the Republican establishment that has been neoconservative (4). They had a certain influence during the Vietnam War, but, for example, none of the leading figures in the Bush administration can be found among the thinkers or leaders of neoconservatism (5). All the neoconservatives who were in President Bush's circle were of lower rank. Second, it is not enough to point to American intervention as a legacy of neoconservatism. With such labeling, it becomes difficult to understand American foreign policy since it transitioned from the early isolationism that characterized the country in its dawn to the more expansive and involved foreign policy they pursued since around 1890, albeit not always consistently (6). In addition, there are thinkers who cannot be considered neoconservative who have supported a more active foreign policy; among others the British philosopher Roger Scruton who argued for the invasion of Iraq and William F. Buckley Jr who argued for the same thing.
In other words, neoconservatism is a grossly exaggerated enemy. That is not to say that it hasn’t existed and been a threat to traditional definitions of conservatism. Neoconservatism was led by thinkers who were ex-Trotskyists who said they had been "mugged by reality." They turned to the right of the political spectrum but brought many of their revolutionary methods with them. Instead of communism, it became liberal democracy that was to be exported around the world. We face the same problem again—albeit with different political motives—from the so-called "Postliberals." Several of its leading figures are former Marxists, socialists, and some are former staff members of the Democrats who now wish to dictate which direction the Republicans should go (7). This is reminiscent of what their neoconservative predecessors did. All who have gone before the Postliberals are now accused of being neoconservatives, a group small enough to be unable to defend itself, and a label that mainstream Republicans cannot respond to because they do not recognize themselves in that characterization.
In fact, the threat to world peace and the aims of traditional conservatism is globalism, or global rule, not an “imperial” United States. This globalism can be defined as transnational as opposed to international, where supranational organizations gain an increasingly powerful position at the expense of sovereign nations. The relationship between global governance and sovereign nations has been studied extensively by Dr. John Fonte at The Hudson Institute, in his book Sovereignty or Submission? Fonte describes how transnational bodies such as the UN, the EU and non-profits such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have gained a stronger position on the global stage, as well as gaining influence in domestic politics and sovereign nations' own legislation (8). Instead of cooperation between nations, global bodies gain more and more legislative power. Ferguson wrote something similar in Colossus, where he—as mentioned above—sees globalism as a new Dark Age:
The United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization each consider themselves in some way representative of the “international community." Surely their aspirations to global governance point to the true alternative to American empire—a new Light Age of collective security and international law, the very antithesis of the Dark Ages? (9)
One area Fonte highlights is war and lawfare. As an example, Fonte writes about lawfare in the aftermath of 9/11 (10). In the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, condemnations came from international organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. The standard set for these condemnations was Protocol I, adopted at Geneva in the 1970s, which designated irregular forces and terrorists as "lawful combatants." The US top leadership never came to ratify Protocol I, but nevertheless, the transnational legislation has become standard.
Ferguson writes further in Colossus about the shortcomings of the UN while the United States has had to stand as global leader:
[…] it has been the United Nations that has performed a shifting role in the last decade and a half, and American policy has been in large measure improvised in response to the failures of the UN and, in particular, to the failures of the European powers represented on the UN Security Council. It was during the 1990s that the United States learned, through bitter experience, the value of credible military interventions in countries where state terror was being used against ethnic minorities. It also learned that these did not require explicit authorization in the form of UNSC resolutions. "Coalitions of the willing" could suffice (11).
Intervention abroad to bring down a threatening and despotic regime is nothing new in history. Two different governments with different motives can be adduced as examples. The British Empire led an invasion of Omdurman in Sudan in 1898 where it defeated the Wahhabist regime, while the US got rid of Manuel Noriega in Panama in 1989 through military intervention (12). The question cannot thus be limited to a supposed neoconservatism. Even Edmund Burke argued for humanitarian intervention in France (13). Admittedly, it was to save an existing order instead of establishing a new one. But the distinction is qualitative; the invasion is justified by pointing to a perceived better model and thus starts from a moral standard.
Ironically, many of those who criticize the US's active foreign policy are furthering the cause of globalism by questioning the US's own strategic considerations and foreign policy interests. You may dislike the United States, just as many Americans dislike various governments that they themselves have not voted for. One can also question the leadership's direction. But we should ask ourselves whether we are right to also question America’s leading global position. The likely alternatives—global governance or a power vacuum—seem far worse than an "imperial" USA. Pope Pius XII summed it up in words that still hold true today: Into the hands of America, God has placed the destinies of an afflicted mankind.
Footnotes:
Mitt Romney, No Apology: Believe in America (St. Martin's Griffin: 2010), p. 65.
Niall Ferguson, Colossus: The Rise and Fall of the American Empire (Penguin: 2005).
Bloomberg Report on U.S. and China Economic Lead
Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Elliot Abrams, and Richard Perle are counted among the neoconservatives. None of these belonged to the administration's top echelon, including figures such as Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, and President Bush himself. The Iraq War was motivated primarily by national security and the threat of Saddam Hussein, with democracy promotion as a secondary motivation that increased in the post-war period to justify a continued presence in Iraq.
To see how America’s foreign policy has been more or less interventionist from its founding see "The American Revolutionary Tradition, or Why America Wants to Spread Democracy around the World" in The Idea of America: Reflections on the Birth of the United States (Penguin: 2011) by Gordon S. Wood. See also a Swedish study of American foreign policy history, American Foreign Policy in Historical Light, Royal Academy of Military Sciences Proceedings and Journal no. 6/81 by Gunnar Jervas.
See for example, John Milbank's Theological Socialism, Sohrab Ahmari with his Democratic Socialism, and Patrick Deneen who was a speechwriter and adviser during the Clinton administration, all leading figures for Postliberalism.
Dr. John Fonte, Sovereignty or Submission: Will Americans Rule Themselves or Be Ruled by Others? (Encounter: 2011).
Ferguson, Colossus, p. 28.
Dr. John Fonte, Sovereignty or Submission: Will Americans Rule Themselves or Be Ruled by Others? (Encounter: 2011).
Ferguson, Colossus, p. 27.
While Operation Just Cause did involve aspects of promoting democracy and using military force, it was primarily driven by concerns over drug trafficking, the protection of U.S. citizens, and strategic interests related to the Panama Canal. These motivations align more closely with traditional American foreign policy concerns rather than the ideological drive characteristic of neoconservatism.
Boisen, C. (2016). Triumphing over evil: Edmund Burke and the idea of humanitarian intervention. Journal of International Political Theory, 12(3), 276-298. https://doi.org/10.1177/1755088215590886. See also Burke's letter to Richard Burke, 5 August 1791, where he writes "By the law of nations, when any country is divided, the other powers are free to take which side they please. For this, consult a very republican writer, Vattel." He refers here to the legal philosopher Emmerich de Vattel (1714-1767). Or see Burke’s letter to Lord Grenville, where he states that Jacobins in England claim that a country has no right to meddle in another country’s affairs. Burke rejects that notion.
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