Empire Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ===Present=== {{Main|American imperialism}} {{See also|Pax Americana}} [[File:Combined Air Operations Center 151007-F-MS415-019.jpg|thumb|[[Al Udeid Air Base]] in [[Qatar]]]] [[Chalmers Johnson]] argues that the US global network of hundreds of military bases already represents a global empire in its initial form: {{Blockquote| For a major power, prosecution of any war that is not a defense of the homeland usually requires overseas military bases for strategic reasons. After the war is over, it is tempting for the victor to retain such bases and easy to find reasons to do so. Commonly, preparedness for a possible resumption of hostilities will be invoked. Over time, if a nation's aims become imperial, the bases form the skeleton of an empire.<ref>''The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy and the End of the Republic'', New York: Henry Hobt and Company, (2004), p 187.</ref>}} [[Simon Dalby]] associates the network of bases with the Roman imperial system: {{Blockquote| Looking at these impressive facilities which reproduce substantial parts of American suburbia complete with movie theatres and restaurant chains, the parallels with Roman garrison towns built on the Rhine, or on Hadrian's wall in England, where the remains are strikingly visible on the landscape, are obvious ... Less visible is the sheer scale of the logistics to keep garrison troops in residence in the far-flung reaches of empire ... That [military] presence literally builds the cultural logic of the garrison troops into the landscape, a permanent reminder of imperial control.<ref>Simon Dalby, "Imperialism, Domination, Culture: The Continued Relevance of Critical Geopolitics," ''Geopolitics'', 13/3, (2008): p 425.</ref>}} [[Kenneth Pomeranz]] and Harvard Historian [[Niall Ferguson]] share the above-cited views: "With American military bases in over 120 countries, we have hardly seen the end of empire." This "vast archipelago of US military bases … far exceeds 19th-century British ambitions. Britain's imperium consisted of specific, albeit numerous, colonies and clients; the American imperial vision is much more global…"<ref>Kenneth Pomeranz, "Empire & 'Civilizing' Missions, Past & Present, ''Daedalus'', 134/2, (2005): p 43, 45.</ref> {{Blockquote| Conventional maps of US military deployments understate the extent of America's military reach. A [[United States Department of Defense|Defense Department]] map of the world, which shows the areas of responsibility of the [[Unified Combatant Command|five major regional commands]], suggests that America's sphere of military influence is now literally global ... The regional combatant commanders—[[Pax Americana|the 'pro-consuls' of this imperium]]—have responsibility for swaths of territory beyond the wildest imaginings of their Roman predecessors.<ref>Niall Ferguson, ''Colossus: The Rise and Fall of the American Empire'', (New York: Penguin Books, 2005), p 17.</ref>}} Another Harvard Historian [[Charles S. Maier]] opens his ''Among Empires: American Ascendancy and Its Predecessors'' with these words: "What a substratum for empire! Compared with which, the foundation of the Macedonian, the Roman and the British, sink into insignificance."<ref>(Massachusetts & London: Harvard University Press, 2006), p 1.</ref> One of the most accepted distinctions between earlier empires and the American Empire is the latter's "global" or "planetary" scope.<ref>[[Neil Smith (geographer)|Neil Smith]], ''American Empire: Roosevelt's Geographer and the Prelude to Globalization'', (Berkeley & Los Angeles & London: University of California Press, 2003), p XIII.</ref> French former Foreign Minister [[Hubert Vedrine]] wondered: "The situation is unprecedented: What previous empire subjugated the entire world...?"<ref>Hubert Vedrine & [[Dominique Moisi]], ''France in an Age of Globalization'', (tr. Gordon, Philip H., Washington: Brookings Institutions Press, 2001), p 2.</ref> The quests for universal empire are old but the present quest outdoes the previous in "the notable respect of being the first to actually be global in its reach."<ref>{{cite web| url = http://bev.berkeley.edu/ipe/readings/American%20hegemony%202005.pdf| title = David C. Hendrickson, "The Curious Case of American Hegemony: Imperial Aspirations and National Decline," ''World Policy Journal'', 22/2, (2005): p 5}}</ref> Another historian [[Paul Kennedy]], who wrote [[The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers|prediction]] talks of the imminent US "imperial overstretch," in 2002 acknowledged about the present world system: {{Blockquote| Nothing has ever existed like this disparity of power. The Pax Britannica was run on the cheap. Napoleon's France and Philip II's Spain had powerful foes and were part of a multipolar system. Charlemagne's empire was merely western European in stretch. The Roman Empire stretched further afield, but there was another great empire in Persia and a larger one in China. There is ... no comparison.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.digitalnpq.org/archive/2002_spring/kennedy.html| title = "The Greatest Superpower Ever," ''New Perspectives Quarterly'', 19/2, (2002)}}</ref>}} [[Walter Russell Mead]] observes that the United States attempts to repeate "globally" what the ancient empires of Egypt, China and Rome had each accomplished on a regional basis.<ref>"America's Sticky Power," ''Foreign Policy'', 141, (March – April 2004): p 48.</ref> Professor Emeritus of Sociology at the University of Leeds, [[Zygmunt Bauman]], concludes that due to its planetary dimension, the new empire cannot be drawn on a map: {{Blockquote| The new 'empire' is not an entity that could be drawn on a map... Drawing a map of the empire would also be a pointless exercise because the most conspicuously 'imperial' trait of the new empire's mode of being consists in viewing and treating the whole of the planet ... as a potential grazing ground...<ref>''Europe: An Unfinished Adventure'', (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2004), p 55-56.</ref>}} ''Times Atlas of Empires'' numbers 70 empires in the world history. Niall Ferguson lists numerous parallels between them and the United States. He concludes: "To those who would still insist on American exceptionalism, the historian of empires can only retort: as exceptional as all the other 69 empires."<ref>"The Unconscious Colossus: Limits of (Alternatives to) American Empire," ''Daedalus'', 134/2, (2005): p 20-21.</ref> [[Fareed Zakaria]] stressed one element not exceptional for the American Empire—the concept of [[American exceptionalism|exceptionalism]]. All dominant empires thought they were special.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.newsweek.com/arrogant-empire-132751| title = "The Arrogant Empire," ''Newsweek''. (March 24, 2003)| website = [[Newsweek]]| date = 23 March 2003}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page