Is America an empire?

[originalpckelly]

Poll question: Is America an empire?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empire

"Talk softly, but carry a big stick."
-TR

[onehandle]

1. Not anymore.

Ask me the same question about China in a few decades.

[leftstreet]

2. The Ruling Class is the nationless Empire

Throughout history it's moved around the globe exploiting labor and resources.

Where it builds its mansions, what kings or politicians it owns - changes.

[The2ndWheel]

3. From day one

[bdamomma]

4. not anymore.

[camera obscura]

5. Nope, nope aaaand... nope.

[originalpckelly]

9. Whah?

[JackRiddler]

25. Erp.

[Idealism]

6. Neo-colonialism does not mean land conquest

America has imperial aspirations, but we don't conquer foreign lands like past empires (that would be too costly for no gain). Instead, we exploit the inhabitants by installing puppet governments, write their laws that allow transnational corporations to rape the resources with impunity, then dump the problems back onto the locals.

[originalpckelly]

8. I think we need to dispense with the linguistic games.

If we're controlling another country, using it for mineral resources and cheap labor, it's an imperial system. The people who rule this empire have figured out that you don't need to actually install a territorial government, no annexation is needed, and in the long run doing that lets people see how wrong it is.

Why do that, when you can get all the practical benefits of the traditional empire with none of the downside? I think another reason it's not necessary to formally incorporate the countries that would traditionally be our colonies in a normal empire into our government, is that we've got free trade. Before, you needed to do that to get around the problems of tariffs. Now, they just eliminate the tariffs, and it works just the same.

[Idealism]

11. There is downside to the traditional empire

If we annexed, say, Mexico tomorrow, we would have a shit storm of problems to deal with. The biggest impact would be economically: we would have to provide basic services to all 110 million new American citizens. Schooling, welfare, worker protections, future entitlements, security issues, et al. This would compromise any gain the government receives in kickbacks from the transnationals to allow them to exploit workers and pillage the resources of Mexico.

The way America colonizes today is much more efficient.

[sinkingfeeling]

18. Uh, how much have we spent on Iraq?

[Idealism]

20. It is still less than what we would spend on annexation.

Think of my Mexican example: The US population is 305 million, if we were to annex Mexico it would be about 415 million in total. We already running a $1 trillion budget deficit, which if taxes aren't raised soon, will only continue to to skyrocket due to boomers retiring and receiving social security and losing a decent chunk of taxes on their income. If we were to take on 33% more people, within 3-4 years we will already spend more than we have spent in Iraq since 2003 (6 years).

[peacetalksforall]

27. Yep. From hit men to massacres, from torture prisons to the World Bank and IMF, from foreign

councils of so-called leaders (partners) to secret societies, from weapons trade to drug control, turf wars, and trade, from complicit media to stranglehold reverends who are the equivalents of the King's advisors and hostage holders, from the pretense of love of country to the spying and databases.

[The2ndWheel]

12. "but we don't conquer foreign lands like past empires"...any longer

The land mass we call America wouldn't exist if it never happened.

[Idealism]

21. Which is why I call it neo-colonialism

Of course we colonized and began the American empire a different way than it is ran now.

[The2ndWheel]

30. We're managing to turn the whole world into the same place

There just isn't anywhere left for conquest. If there was still some "unknown" place on the planet, things would be different. Once everywhere was found, and all the great wars over which way the world was going to be run were done, you don't have to hold physical space.

If our race with entropy isn't able to be pushed off into the future this time(if the trillions of digits on a screen don't work to keep this whole experiment going), then the world will be a bigger place again. Which obviously causes its own problems. It won't be a global network where place doesn't exist. All those dead centers of power might come back.

[JackRiddler]

26. "we don't conquer foreign lands like past empires"

Duuuude... what the fuck?

[Idealism]

28. Are Iraqi citizens now Americans?

Have we given them SS numbers?
Did we guarantee them basic rights to education, social safety nets, security, liberty, etc.?

We have not annexed Iraq, like say the Ottoman empire did. That is why the current American empire is not the same as the Roman empire, Ottoman, Persian, et al.

[sinkingfeeling]

31. When did the Romans give those in Palestine citizenship? Granting citizenship and full rights

to a occupied country rarely happened in past empires nor in ours.

[Idealism]

32. They still paid taxes to their government in past empires

and were conscripted into service to fight in wars.

The point is, if America was an empire of conquering and annexing land like past empires, that today we would be forced to grant privileges to the peoples of land we annex or commit atrocities to prevent popular revolt. We choose to colonize in different ways because it is cheaper than annexing lands.

[JackRiddler]

34. Did India receive seats in the British parliament?

[suede1]

7. Yes it is, and we haven't had a serious discussion about dismantling it either.

But it should be.

[damntexdem]

10. No, just a wannabe.

[sinkingfeeling]

13. What else would you call a country that has 748 military bases in 130 other countries with a quarter

of a million personnel?

[leftstreet]

16. A large Private Security Force for the wealthy n/t

[Echo In Light]

17. Irrefutable point, that.

[mix]

14. of course

it was born of empire (Britain) and expanded westward until the Pacific ("Westward the course of empire takes it way," is a mural in the House of Representatives)
from the Pacific the American Empire went north to Alaska, then west again to Hawaii and the Philippines
all the while it was also expanding its influence in places like South America and the Caribbean

things became less formal in the 20th century, after WWII, when the American Empire ruled through proxy organizations like NATO and the World Bank

43 gave us some of that ol' timey empire building though after 9/11 with Iraq and Afghanistan (three cheers for the blue-skinned beast)

it's a way of life for Americans, sadly.

Here is an interesting list of where the US ranks alongside other empires by territory:

1. British Empire - 36.6 million km² (under George V in 1922) - 24.6% of the Earth's total land area
2. Mongol Empire - 33.2 million km²<1> (under Kublai Khan in 1268)
3. Russian Empire - 24.8 million km² (under Alexander II in 1855) - including Alaska<2>
4. Spanish Empire - 20 million km² (under King Charles III r. 1759-1788)<2>
5. Umayyad Arab Caliphate - 13.2 million km²<2> (under Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik r. 723-743)
6. Qin Empire - 13 million km²<3> (under Emperor Qianlong r. 1735-1796)
7. French Empire - 12.5 million km²<2> (under President Albert Lebrun in 1938)
8. Portuguese Empire - 12.4 million km²<2>
9. Ottoman Empire - 11.5 million km²(under Mehmed IV in 1680))
10. United States of America - 10 million km² (1898-1902 and 1906-1908)

[ieoeja]

15. Guam, Somoa, US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico. I'm sure I missed more.

This shouldn't even be a debate. Our overseas possessions of non-American states taken originally by force of arms makes us an empire by every definition of the word. Maybe 99% of the native people LIKE being a US possession. But we are still an empire.

[Marr]

19. Yes, obviously. Anyone saying we're not simply because

our methods don't usually involve overt use of the US military is, I think, making a silly argument. You might as well say we're not an empire because we don't use muskets.

Our empire was mostly built with banking tricks and monetary policy. Force has been used when those tricks failed.

[stray cat]

22. A group of peoples under a single entity; United States of America

at least thats the dictionary definition. Mr Wiki must have a different one unless someone updates it in the meantime :sarcasm:

[On the Road]

23. Past Empires Often Had

a series of puppet staes at the edges of their territory. This was often done when their ability or desire to force further outlying areas into the empire itself was dimished.

The British did this with the kings of Rajastan. The Romans did it with Herod's Palestine.

That is what the American empire mostly resembles. The 50 states and miscellaneous territories (eg Guam, Puerto Rico) are part of the nation. Others (eg, much of Central America, South Korea, Taiwan) form a vast and changing soft empire.

[JackRiddler]

24. Hey there, TR: Is the question from like, 1898?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

29. Yup. And, following the downward trajectory of it's predecessors.

Like our predecessors we became dependent on our colonies and couldn't afford to lose what they produced or had. Now we are compelled to try (vainly) to preserve our hold on them. Which is obviously bankrupting us. Morally, spiritually, and economically.

And, as all the empires before us believed, we think that we're different and will survive our demise.

[Phoonzang]

33. No, I think of Empire as having direct control over various regions and

many different peoples, not just dominating them culturally or financially. The Iraq and Afghanistan occupations don't count as direct control in my book as we have no intention to keep them as dominions or colonies.

[sinkingfeeling]

35. And why do we still have all those military bases in Germany, Japan, etc.?

[Phoonzang]

37. Because they let us have them there? We don't have control over those countries. nt

[leftofthedial]

36. not anymore.

or not for much longer.

[bird gerhl]

38. No, not anymore,

but not for lack of trying.

Those days are over though whether USA likes it or not. No matter how many foreign markets it momentarily forces open or how many bombs it drops on poor countries, this century will not be an American century.