America aims to be as much and as little interventionist and militarist as required in order to avoid ever becoming as catastrophically interventionist and militarist as she, in competition or cooperation with potentially many others, could be.
Neo-Imperialism
Si Vis Bellum, Part 1: “Militarism” and “Interventionism”
The un-clarity or confusion, or confusion of confusions, regarding the meaning of these two terms is typical of this historical moment, which in one sense can be thought to have simply befallen us, having never been willed into existence by anyone, but in another sense can be viewed as the predictable and desired product of choices made over the course of at least two or now three presidential elections, in as self-conscious a manner as a mass democratic system is able to undertake.
Bret Stephens: The System Didn’t Work – WSJ
The populist wave now cresting across much of the world is sometimes described as a revolt against globalization: immigrants failing to assimilate the values of their hosts, poorer countries drawing jobs from richer ones, and so on. But the root…
Max Boot: Trump’s ‘America First’ Is the Twilight of American Exceptionalism – Foreign Policy
In the terms coined by Walter Russell Mead, Obama is a Jeffersonian, while Trump is a Jacksonian: The former believes that the United States should perfect its own democracy and go “not abroad in search of monsters to destroy,” whereas…
Francis Fukuyama: US against the world? Trump’s America and the new global order – Financial Times
[T]he broader failure of the left was the same one made in the lead-up to 1914 and the Great war, when, in the apt phrase of the British-Czech philosopher, Ernest Gellner, a letter sent to a mailbox marked “class” was…
Posted in Neo-Imperialism, Noted & Quoted, Operation American Greatness, Political Philosophy Tagged with: Alt-Right, Fukuyama
Operation American Greatness
Ironic how Trump apologists, especially certain types of “American Conservative” paleo-cons, self-styled republican constitutionalists, and diverse fellow travelers all the way extending to everyday “Deplorables” drunkenly hurling foul epithets at campaign reporters, have adopted a main strategic rationale of the despised Neocons and Globalists.
Posted in Featured, Neo-Imperialism, notes, Operation American Greatness, Politics, War Tagged with: American Conservative, Iraq, NeoConservatism, Trumpism
Itani and Abouzahr: Lessons from Russia’s Intervention in Syria – Atlantic Council
Whatever its merits, the United States’ limited involvement in Syria granted Russia a powerful first-mover advantage, which in turn has complicated US policy options, granted a strategic foothold to a historical rival, facilitated mass atrocities, and undermined the concept of…
Shadi Hamid: Is a Better World Possible without U.S. Military Force? – The Atlantic
If the United States announced tomorrow morning that it would no longer use its military for anything but to defend the borders of the homeland, many would instinctively cheer, perhaps not quite realizing what this would mean in practice. But…
Marc Lynch: What’s Really At Stake in the Syria Debate – War on the Rocks
For many U.S. politicians and pundits, forceful action in virtually any arena is its own reward. In Syria specifically, many interventionists have argued that the United States needs to be more deeply involved in the war because this will give…
Katherine Miller: How Donald Trump Broke The Conservative Movement (And My Heart) – BuzzFeed News
…[W]e’re currently witnessing rapid shifts in: the geopolitics of Europe and the Middle East, the politics of U.S. and Russian hegemony, the demographic makeup of the United States, the way we buy things, the way we communicate. The reality is…