Reflections on John Newhouse’s ‘Imperial America’


We should be careful not become guilty of blowing out of proportion and then tagging hastily the causalities of the 9/11 attacks. Now, this is not to minimize the tragicness of the events or to create room for a loose framework for deterrence. Rather, it is to ensure that in the process of dealing with those groups lazily called American enemies we don’t end up becoming just like the people we hate to be like. In the game of naming it is easy to become victimizers as well as victims.

The above paragraph captures most of the lines of thought that runs through the fibers of John Newhouse’s brisk, well-researched articulation of the power machinery and geopolitical muscling surrounding the elusive 'war on terror' declared by the Bush administration. Newhouse, an acclaimed journalist and outstanding journalist, not only has important things to say, he says it with a certain kind of gusto. Argued eloquently by him is a stark reality: that American policy under George W. Bush has become extremely unilateral, militaristic, forceful, undemocratic, and unrestrained by balance of power mechanisms lodged within the grid of the international community and international law. For the most part, in Bush II’s conceptualization of America, the apt measure of dominance is sly arrogance, an uncanny fixation with one-sided approaches to problem-solving, the ability to elicit fear, and a monopoly on the vocabularies of 'defense.' Despite being a model of all these and more in its neo-imperial aspirations, the U.S. cannot fumigate its way out of the present Iraqi and related crisis without sustaining some sidekicks to its own future. This is doubtless what Newhouse has in mind when he speaks of the consequences of America’s problem of power abuse. And the problem is not that of power or powerlessness, for power is both a given and a derived. It only becomes an inhibiting factor when its tangent is skewed.

Indeed, in terms of power projection, and in a curious manner, America played wholly the role of self-appointed Punisher in the treatment of the world of the 'other' post-9/11. Perhaps it was a turf battle or a resplendent appropriation of the military/security mix, where 'defense' is the (un)codified buzzword. Nevertheless, and quite frankly, defense becomes an offensive word when the very strong links connecting it with armament also detaches it from the idea of global justice. A reckless optimism for war as the antidote to the bites of terrorism presumes rather blindly that there is no relationship between action and purpose, questions and questioning. Wrong. In the bid to capture the essence of the poli-trickery that began after 9/11, Newhouse chronicles those inert maneuverings that began to cohere in tune with decisions emanating lavishly from Bush’s stable. And it is easy to agree with him. By pitting the West against the Rest and insisting on the capitalization of the globe, America is ebbing further away from the terrain of helpful answers, hence the vehement opposition to its pushiness. Undebatably, the assertion of a new type of American sovereignty obliterated sound diplomatic procedures, since Washington opted to put to effect a ‘dismissive approach’ to tackling its nemesis. The touchstone of the approach was towering sole action as well as the use of 'preemptive force,' the latter being rooted in obviously overzealous - and tainted - intelligence systems.

Niall Ferguson, history professor at New York University recently called America 'an empire in denial'. The import of his labeling may well be understood when the question is asked: what really makes an empire - at least the non-denying kind? Is it skill in the protection of its interests or at assuming a totalistic role in the accumulationist schema of capital? Could it be a belief locked within the nostalgic fantasies of monstrous control cum imposition? Is it a preoccupation with approaches to governance that is annoyingly pro-business and anti-people, characterized by weakened links between politics and civil society? Or is it an overbearing preference for non-self-scrutiny let alone alliance-building lest its power be deposed or subordinated? Although a variant of the 17th century British imperial order, unlike its predecessor post-modern imperialism is a unipolar arrangement existing on the basis of a dichotomous superior/inferior authority. Evidence that the U.S. has garbed the emperor’s brightly-colored clothes is, of course, a ubiquitous one.

In Jean-Marie Colombani’s much-cited article published in Le Monde the day after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the forcefulness of America’s impact on the world order is made manifest, albeit meekly. For Colombani, because the U.S. is an 'unrivalled power' unmatched by 'any counterweight' it did not merit such malevolent troubling. Quite, except that it is this very thinking of an 'almighty' America that can harm but not be harmed, and that is inundated with an indomitable power to rat out global 'devils' that is the raison d’etre behind America’s shrinking eminence around the world. And the case is not even the better in its relationship with traditional allies. The world watched as over a hundred thousand protesters gathered at Trafalgar Square in England on the occasion of Bush’s visit to Britain after 9/11, displaying anti-U.S. sentiments. In the practice of world politics, boundary-crossing does have its limits and flak, even seemingly meaningful flak, is not gumbo, and phoenixes do not always rise from ashes.

If the truth be told, the transatlantic tide slowly but surely lifting America’s boat is not unconnected with the air tight geopolitical box Bush chose to fling the country into in his vaunted mission against the - his - 'axis of evil.' The strident superpowering of America’s imperialism, it seems, has become a yoke on the neck of most of the world - it took the hideous anti-terror 'crusade' to unearth this. And the Iraqi siege pictured adequately and in Technicolor the obsessive nature of imperialism. Indeed, the American-British led coalition troops, apart from transgressing civilian immunity, molesting and causing untold damage and carnage, contributed to the de-securitization and further despoliation of the Iraqi state. Rash judgments, selfish interests, unpragmatic policies and naïve presumptions trailed Washington’s absurd moves in Iraq like a hound. The end product was the production of the dominant image-ination of war, and the shabby elegance of commandeered danger.

Clearly, Bush and his cohort were oblivious of the fact that by triggering off a 'terror war' in Iraq, another kind of war would automatically materialize - the war over control, not least because the country is ridden with insurgents and (sub)nationalist groups. The presently endless power contestation embodied in the form of chain suicide bombings in Baghdad and other locations attest to this trend. Yet, these are but minute signs of things to come. History repeatedly shows that war has a very neat way of breeding new difficulties, new insurgencies, new tyrannies. The illegitimacy of the war in Iraq (Newhouse calls it 'dubious') is not contestable: Iraq, it was apparent, did not and possibly was not quickly on its way to possessing the kind of weapons it was accused of. This was substantiated credibly in the book Disarming Iraq: The Search for Weapons of Mass Destruction by former UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix. If the imperialist enterprise has become a normal course for America, in its inclination toward the hyperactivity such a role demands it has never been very good likewise at clearing up its own mess, heaped as this may be. This situation has left the viruses of anti-America sentiments mutating even in the most unlikely places. Following the argument of the global majority and the discontents associated with this, the proper language of questioning should therefore be reconstructed to not read 'Why do they hate us?' but 'Why is it us they hate?'

Newhouse notes wisely the fact that 'American military power is constantly growing although the country’s overall security may be declining.' He points out that this condition is simply an offshoot of 'skewed and unbalanced' priorities. In highlighting the paradox of what is popularly called 'hard' power, we are brought face-to-face us with the question: how far can war-centered dominance go in normalizing a deeply injured world system replete as it is with a plethora of anomalies? War, the lowliest of containerist forms, has never offered sustainable solutions. Perhaps this was why Ambassador Warren Zimmerman warned against 'exaggerating the value of war.' Though Osama bin Laden is to be held responsible for 9/11, it is only honest to do two things: first, recollect that Great America once recruited him to fight against the Soviet Union occupation of Afghanistan, and second, question whether removing Saddam Hussein has translated to nabbing the Al-Qaeda chief. And if another brand of terror is operationalized by the ‘developed’ world to get Al-Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah and their ilk in line - this is a very slim possibility - aren’t more fundamentalist groups going to get hatched along the line? They likely will. To be realistic, the vicious cycle of terrorism won’t be neutered as long as America continues to allow the state of Israel mete out injustice to Palestinians, as long as the importance of human welfare and security is diminished in favor of corporatism and a great number of people continue to be plagued by shocking poverty levels, deprivation and nescience, as long as the global media networks remain complicit agents that dispense doxas that push the 'other' to the cold corner.

Certainly, 9/11 cannot alter the fact that capitalistic fundamentalism, if left as it is, will not cease to make violence and disorder an omnipresent feature of global existence. As has been severally noted terrorism is merely a smokescreen that disguises a broad range of deeper vicious causes. The grand dream of universal peace, thence, would remain a mythical and elusive one until the power of neoliberal hegemony and monopoly is doused. Anything short of this and we’ve just begun the onerous going-round-in circles journey. If the well-publicized parlance of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s which states that 'there are known unknowns' is in fact correct, then it could be argued in the converse that there are 'unknown knowns'. The act of knowing, we must recollect, equates with intimate engagement and therefore nullifies the regular assumption that we really know most of what we know a propos what we are made to know about. In this case, the knowledge of Iraqi citizens and their rights to life and freedom from intrusion, destabilization, and humiliation (a la the Abu Ghraib incidence) is certainly an unknown known in the annals of Bush and his loyalists.

In many ways Newhouse succeeds in making known astonishing facts about U.S. grand strategy, the militarization of the spaces of reason, and the role of Bush’s national security team in the fulfillment of the vision. 'Excepting Powell,' he notes, 'Bush’s senior aides are seen … as combining arrogance with a stubborn unilateralism.' This group consisting of largely hard-liners of every available hue is depicted rightly as being deficient in the art of cooperation, egotistic and prone to veering off course. In a way, could it not be that their exaggerated busybodying is a cover-up for the fact that their administration has mishandled and mismanaged the country’s economic and sociopolitical in-workings? Newhouse, as many other commentators have done, portrays Rumsfeld in particular as probably the 'baddest,' slyest and most defiant of the bunch; a political misfit driven by faulty acumen, blind to options that do not coincide with his right-wingism.

It is premature as yet to forecast with near-accuracy the eventuality of the 'Bush assault on the world order,' but indications abound showing that the future may not hold the much-desired prize of change, at least not until an ideological substitution that champions an alternative global order is emplaced. The greatest point to note in all of these is this: in the promotion of America’s brand of 'democracy' it should not be forgotten that real democracy is not necessarily coterminous with Western ideals. The two do not have to mix. Democracy essentially means fairness, equity and justice, acting and not reacting, and upholding the freedom to be sensibly different. Democracy is the track upon which global security obtains it gait. With the dramatic nonsensizing of the New Deal beginning with Reagan and now Bush II, however, America has swerved sharply to the far right - 9/11 is the current excuse - and the focus is now on the propagation of anti-social doctrines and the enrichment of a minority, America has taken on the duty to spread its ‘virtues’ to every corner of the earth. Even on the home front this strategy has been challenged: correctly-thinking individuals question Bush’s tax cuts which favor dismally the already-swooning-in-money cadre. As it is, the future of the majority is at stake, and it is in the milieu of contemplating the future that Newhouse leaves us - more or less - to question the validity of the status quo and make redeeming gestures, in an event-changing kind of mutuality, with the wind of change.

In the meanwhile all eyes should be trained toward the signs of things to come, toward the big picture. The task, however, requires seeing the unseen and the seen in complete togetherness and then believing that in matters such as this the unseen is almost always a product of the seen that is being seen. In this election euphoria war and security are redefined art forms that manipulate the rhythm of history and must not evade the thinking of an inquisitive and observant mind.

But whilst we watch, we may be moved to ask: what will 'Dubya' Bush likely do now as Iraq continues to boil and as the much-awaited elections draw close? Answer: carry on as before. Young or old, the leopard, like they say, never loses its spots. For Mr. President, winning is not a wouldacouldashoulda game. In what is likely to follow, consolidating the cumulative densities - and politics of the behind-the-scenes - of the post-Bushism future of America may well have a repetitive tendency, regardless of who wins the elections. America is Imperium, and maybe nothing else really matters.



--Akinbola E. Akinwumi is an independent writer and researcher currently living in Lagos, Nigeria where he writes from. He can be reached at akinbolaeniola@yahoo.com.



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