Imperial Precipice

The Roman Empire survived Caligula, but the American one may not live through it's own mad emperor

This week has brought some hair-raising news about American foreign policy. North Korea’s missile launch indicates the complete breakdown of nuclear talks with that nation after America already bargained away one of its biggest chips by already granting a summit meeting. Trump has initiated a trade war with China, confident that he can win it. The United States supported an unsuccessful coup in Venezuela that led to civilian deaths. On top of it all, the Trump administration seems ready to gear up for war in Iran. All of this news seems to have registered very little with an apathetic public and a Resistance that tends to have tunnel vision around Trump’s corruption and Russia connections. The media, as always, is treating this as a normal presidency because to do otherwise would force them to actually have to take risks.

I see the events this week as a sign of America’s imperial precipice. Like the Roman empire, its height lasted much shorter than its long, slow decline. The fall of Saigon in 1975 marked the definitive end of the apex, along with the Iran Hostage Crisis. The fall of the Soviet Union was a Pyrrhic victory; the United States merely outlasted their enemy in a Cold War that hobbled them. 

That too was masked by the Gulf War, which happened right on the heels of the fall of the Berlin Wall. The failed invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan ten years later exposed the weakness of the American Colossus. What was once deemed a "hyperpower" looks pretty pathetic. This supposedly all-powerful nation's bridges are falling apart, its people are killing themselves at fearsome rates, and many more die of guns and opiates. Nothing is being done to solve any of these problems, a sign of the collapse of the political system

The failed diplomacy in Korea and failed coup in Venezuela are signs of a creaky empire led by a feckless, incompetent wannabe emperor. The trade war with China and the threats against Iran are signs of this mad emperor's complete recklessness. So many people in America are paying this little mind, worn down by Trump's erratic behavior, or still believing that America will never lose its preeminent place in the world.

I look at this and see and empire about to fall off a clip. History tells us that mighty empires can hold on even after decades of rot. However, once an empire has rotted from within, all it takes is one good hard whack to send the whole thing crumbling down. Rarely do people at the time anticipate this.

I am currently reading Stephen Platt's recent book on the Opium War, and I am struck by how fast China's empire was brought low. In the late 18th century Europeans considered China to be not only a massive and powerful country, but far more advanced in civilization than Europe. Something like a third of the world's population lived there. The rot of corruption and complacency existed in the Qing Dynasty, but that was hard to see from the outside. It only took the short, sharp shock of the Royal Navy's cannons to turn that mighty empire into a pawn for outsiders. I likewise think of the Soviet Union, which in the early 1980s appeared to be an eternal monolith. In 1985 when Gorbachev took control no one could have possibly imagined that he would be its last leader. 

Other historical empires had disastrous rulers through the accident of birth, which can wreck monarchical systems. America's precipice is so striking because Trump was elected, and even though he has been behaving like a tyrant, his opponents refuse to impeach him. His presence in the White House is truly one of the greatest self-owns in human history.

I honestly believe that something like an invasion of Iran would be the disaster that finally brings permanent imperial retreat, a la Britain and the Suez Crisis. Actually, imperial retreat is an optimistic outcome. Collapse is more likely on the radar. That might seem hyperbolic, but history shows us otherwise.