Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The American “Empire” Reconsidered

notevenpast.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 54 posts

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#21

Post by wastedhours »

wu-ikkyu wrote: post #20
pjc50 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

America does not officially have colonies or call itself an Empire. It does however have states that are second-class citizens (what is Puerto Rico?), weird extralegal exclaves (Guantanamo), tiny occupied islands (Guam), and lots of other countries which are independent but also to some extent economically and militarily subordinate, in which the US State Department feels entitled to influence policy, from the famous…

Empire: an extensive group of states or countries under a single supreme authority, formerly especially an emperor or empress. >It does however have states that are second-class citizens Colony: a country or area under the full or partial political control of another country, typically a distant one, and occupied by settlers from that country. >lots of other countries which are independent but also to some extent eco…

Rounding the point off - hence why "Empire" was in quotes and not just written as Empire. It's not a technical empire, but is making a point (using conversational context).

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#22

Post by wu-ikkyu »

wastedhours wrote: post #21
wu-ikkyu wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Empire: an extensive group of states or countries under a single supreme authority, formerly especially an emperor or empress. >It does however have states that are second-class citizens Colony: a country or area under the full or partial political control of another country, typically a distant one, and occupied by settlers from that country. >lots of other countries which are independent but also to some extent eco…

Rounding the point off - hence why "Empire" was in quotes and not just written as Empire. It's not a technical empire, but is making a point (using conversational context).

What specifically disqualifies it from being defined as an empire?

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#23

Post by Arnt »

wu-ikkyu wrote: post #22
wastedhours wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rounding the point off - hence why "Empire" was in quotes and not just written as Empire. It's not a technical empire, but is making a point (using conversational context).

What specifically disqualifies it from being defined as an empire?

It's not really large enough. The no-quotes empires had subject peoples and areas at least comparable in size to their own people.

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#24

Post by AnimalMuppet »

wu-ikkyu wrote: post #22
wastedhours wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rounding the point off - hence why "Empire" was in quotes and not just written as Empire. It's not a technical empire, but is making a point (using conversational context).

What specifically disqualifies it from being defined as an empire?

An empire would have held on to Iraq after the Gulf War. An empire would have held on to the Philippines after [edit: World War II]. An empire would have held on to Japan after World War II.

The US is not an empire because it doesn't act like one, not really. Yes, it has some overseas possessions. No, it's not the expansionist conquer-the-world Borg that many people mean when they call it an empire.

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#25

Post by nickik »

jacquesm wrote: post #10
sremani wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What Trump is doing and what Obama did to some extent is Retrenchment rather than Isolationism. US is hyper-extended and pulling back is pretty natural reaction after two decades of engagement in Middle East and Afghanistan. That is not Isolationism, my rule of thumb is when US Navy vacates Diego Garcia (naval base in Indian Ocean), I will consider they are becoming Isolationist until then the talk of Isolationism ju…

Isolationism is much more than giving up foreign territories, it is as much about that as it is about solely looking after your own interests rather than a more global view. Places where you would see this are treaties, entities like NATO, the United Nations and so on and by that yardstick the US is becoming more isolationist by the day. Diego Garcia being vacated would be a sign that America is no longer a world pow…

The problem is that in politics you get called Isolationist as soon as you suggest sometime a little out of the 'allowed opinion' stream. Many so called 'isolations' are not against building a bunker around the US and doing nothing.

The United Nations for example can easily be engaged in even if you are against most US foreign policy.

> about solely looking after your own interests rather than a more global view

This 'global view' was basically about building a global order that the US could control. I was just another view about what in Americas best interest by a different group of elites.

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#26

Post by nickik »

aaron-lebo wrote: post #2

This is really good, as in there isn't anything really to disagree with good. I've found Edmund Morris's books about Teddy Roosevelt to be a great insight into this time because he was such an epitome of the Gilded Age generation that wanted empire. 1898 really does seem to be a crucial year, prior to that the US had not gone much past enforcing the monroe doctrine (see Cleveland's disagreements with the Germans over…

> Roosevelt and Taft who otherwise were very moral men

What? Roosevelt was a despicable war monger, an extreme racist and he had little respect for the lives of his own soldiers (the more die the bigger the glory) or anybody else.

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#27

Post by jacquesm »

nickik wrote: post #25
jacquesm wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isolationism is much more than giving up foreign territories, it is as much about that as it is about solely looking after your own interests rather than a more global view. Places where you would see this are treaties, entities like NATO, the United Nations and so on and by that yardstick the US is becoming more isolationist by the day. Diego Garcia being vacated would be a sign that America is no longer a world pow…

The problem is that in politics you get called Isolationist as soon as you suggest sometime a little out of the 'allowed opinion' stream. Many so called 'isolations' are not against building a bunker around the US and doing nothing. The United Nations for example can easily be engaged in even if you are against most US foreign policy. > about solely looking after your own interests rather than a more global view This…

> The problem is that in politics you get called Isolationist as soon as you suggest sometime a little out of the 'allowed opinion' stream.

That's not my experience.

> Many so called 'isolations' are not against building a bunker around the US and doing nothing.

That may be so. But many of them are. You can't build yourself up as the policeman of the world and then within the space of 6 months do a full 180 on that policy without getting called out on it.

> The United Nations for example can easily be engaged in even if you are against most US foreign policy.

Yes, but there are more ways to do this and the present day administration seems to have thrown 50 years of built up credit out with the remaining bathwater. Note that it is easy to destroy a reputation, it is very hard to put it back together again.

> This 'global view' was basically about building a global order that the US could control.

Agreed. But now we're headed towards a global order that the US definitely won't be able to control with China and Russia as dominant poles and the United States voting 'present' or even taking sides with Russia. This is going to have some significant consequences none of which will be pleasant.

> I[t] was just another view about what [is] in Americas best interest by a different group of elites.

That may be so. But the price for that changing viewpoint will not be paid by Americans.

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#28

Post by wu-ikkyu »

Arnt wrote: post #23
wu-ikkyu wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What specifically disqualifies it from being defined as an empire?

It's not really large enough. The no-quotes empires had subject peoples and areas at least comparable in size to their own people.

Where in the dictionary definition of empire does it state this?

Anyways, it still seems to meet your criteria:

>the United States still maintains nearly 800 military bases in more than 70 countries and territories abroad—from giant “Little Americas” to small radar facilities. Britain, France and Russia, by contrast, have about 30 foreign bases combined.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/us-military-...

Re: The American “Empire” Reconsidered

#29

Post by wastedhours »

wu-ikkyu wrote: post #28
Arnt wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not really large enough. The no-quotes empires had subject peoples and areas at least comparable in size to their own people.

Where in the dictionary definition of empire does it state this? Anyways, it still seems to meet your criteria: >the United States still maintains nearly 800 military bases in more than 70 countries and territories abroad—from giant “Little Americas” to small radar facilities. Britain, France and Russia, by contrast, have about 30 foreign bases combined. https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/us-military-...

Although tiresome to argue dictionary pedantry, I think the crux of it is that the implication is that the the US doesn't have any defined role in the rule of a lot of the countries (as in, they don't claim ownership, or even influence), but that it's exerted either overtly or covertly by other means.

The point in this context is that the US's web of influence extends outside of the areas in which they have a direct structure of power in place (and isn't consistent within those that it does) - those points, in this sense, imply an "Empire" (quotes, as nebulous), rather than an Empire (the defined thing).

Post reply on HN