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Irrelevant America
Just this weekend I was talking to another American about this, this eerie sense we both have that the United States is becoming irrelevant in a weird way that we would never have foreseen growing up. Josh Rogin describes this in Bloomberg View:
Europe is facing a convergence of the worst crises since World War II, and the overwhelming consensus among officials and experts here is that the U.S. no longer has the will or the ability to play an influential role in solving them.
At the Munich Security Conference, the prime topics are the refugee crisis, the Syrian conflict, Russian aggression and the potential dissolution of the European Union’s very structure. Top European leaders repeatedly lamented that 2015 saw all of Europe’s problems deepen, and unanimously predicted that in 2016 they would get even worse.
“The question of war and peace has returned to the continent,” German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told the audience, indirectly referring to Russian military interventions. “We had thought that peace had returned to Europe for good.”
What was missing from the conference speeches and even the many private discussions in the hallways, compared to previous years, was the discussion of what Europe wanted or even expected the U.S. to do. …
During the first day of the conference, the U.S. role in Europe was hardly mentioned in the public sessions. In the private sessions, many participants told me that European governments are not only resigned to a lack of American assertiveness, they also are now reluctantly accepting a Russia that is more present than ever in European affairs, and not for the better.
I know lots of people here will say, “See? This was Obama’s secret plan all along.” But it goes beyond that. It’s the collective impression people are getting from contact with America — not just our foreign policy but our culture, our political debates, our newspapers, our tourists, our movies. Not negative. Just irrelevant — whether or not this is a rational belief. And it’s not.
This is something I’ve felt in a personal way, though I’ve had trouble describing it. Just a subtle difference in people’s speech and reactions. Most of my life, people have noticed that I look out of place, or heard an accent, and asked me where I’m from. And obviously, all my life I’ve been saying, “I’m American,” and until recently, this has generally inspired some reaction — positive or negative, often strongly misinformed, but almost always some opinion about where America is, what it’s like, who the president is, what Americans are like. Even if the opinion clearly comes from nothing more than watching American movies or listening to American pop music, most people have at least heard of America.
But growingly, I feel as if the conversations are headed this way:
Random Foreigner: Where are you from?
Me: I’m American!
RF: How nice! Where did you learn such good English?
Me: Shouldn’t I be asking you that? Americans speak English. It’s our native language.
RF: [Puzzled.] Really? Oh! Crocodile Dundee!
Me: That’s Australia. America’s in the northern hemisphere. Clint Eastwood?
RF: Is he your prime minister?
Me: Clint Eastwood? Muhammed Ali, Elvis, Michael Jordan, Henry Kissinger … Monica Lewinsky? … Tiger Woods? Michael Jackson? You’ve heard of Michael Jackson, right? Have you heard of Facebook? We invented Facebook … McDonalds?
RF: I’ve never been much of a map person, I’m afraid. Bet this weather’s a shock, eh? Is this the first time you’ve ever seen snow?
Me: No, look, we’re a superpower. Barack Obama, you heard of him? Donald Trump? [RF shrugs apologetically] … Star Wars? Darth Vader, you’ve heard of Darth Vader, right? What about Steve Jobs? Haven’t you ever used a phone?
RF: Oh yes, of course! Do you like the food here? It must be hard to get used to, you’re used to spicier food, I bet. All those nice spices there …
Me: No, wait. You’ve heard of the United States of America, I guarantee it. 9/11? The World Trade Center? Great Satan ring any bells? Man on the moon? The Internet? Tear down this wall? [I’m getting frantic] USA! USA! USA! Come on … racist, imperialist, down with America —
RF: Oh, yes, that was terrible. Nelson Mandela was a great man. You must be proud of him. [thumbs-up gesture] Amandla!
Me: You don’t even hate us? You’ve got to have heard about us. Everyone’s …
Published in Culture, Foreign Policy, General, History, Military, Politics
Titus, we did not demand that Europe make itself into a welfare state, though I will admit that we facilitated it by providing military cover for many years. But Europeans have to exercise wisdom for themselves, and are perfectly capable of seeing, as Thatcher did, that the welfare state does make people into children. You are not going to lay that at our feet. In addition, that terrible idea that is the EU? That is not our idea or our fault. If you are going to place the blame for Europe’s problems at our feet, you need to be more specific about what you mean and how it happened. I actually don’t think you want to say that Europe and her nations have no agency, that we can and should control the world, do you? Anyway, elect Rubio, our foreign policy rock star, and things will begin to get back on track. Obama has been a disaster, I’ll grant you, but he will soon be a bad memory and we can begin to undo the damage.
Now, that I have read your brief statement, I have completely changed my mind: These achievements are proof that Europe can defend itself. I had recently entertained some worries, but they are gone, & I thank you for allaying them-
Europe invented the welfare state. I’ve not said nor suggested otherwise. Else, I’d be on the European version of Ricochet, which in that world would exist…
Before I was shown the error of my ways, I was of the opinion that a man looking at the American South around 1920 would not have seen a world light-years away from that of 1860. I now know better: The South had agency, two generations had passed, world’a difference. I used to be of the opinion that wars & political forms had a great importance; I will in future consider them as to be shaken off, so to speak…
There is a sickness in the news media, hollywood and entertainment, in business, and politics that is anti nationalistic. It has reached levels that ordinary citizens finally notice and are now reacting to. Regular people feel threatened.
Looking at Russian aggression, the invasion of Europe by the Muslim hoards, the spinning out of control mid-east, continuing attacks on Americans by Islamists, the open American borders, the real unemployment rate, collapsing infrastructure, an out of touch president and an indifferent congress along with a court system that rules on matters not within its jurisdiction and we now have a frightened and angry ever growing aware citizenship whose attention span is for the moment no longer short.
Most of us realize that government no longer serves us, we serve government. We recognize that government concerns itself with immigrants and not disabled vets. Europe is in trouble but we have our own problems. Good luck to them, don’t expect us to help until after February 2017.
In terms of the kinds of people who would be at the Munich security conference, for example, I’m sure they need a reminder at all. People on this continent don’t view that as “someone else’s history.” They know it. I don’t think external threats are doing much to unify the US right now, and I’m not sure that it’s true that having an external threat is unifying. It may be, if it’s a single threat. But I don’t know whether it’s true that a region or polity facing complex threats tends to unify. There’s a lot of evidence to the contrary. If that weren’t so, why would imperial powers traditionally rely on a strategy of dividing and conquering?
It hasn’t so far. The promise hasn’t been formally annulled, but it’s certainly been called into question profoundly. It doesn’t seem to be resulting in Europe suddenly doing the rational thing, and I’m not sure why we’d expect it to: Human beings tend to be pretty bad at that.
No, I don’t think it would unify Europe. What’s jarring to me is the growing sense that we could announce that we’re cancelling Article V and it would be scarcely noticed. An item on a long list of problems that begins with Russia, Syria, Libya, and China, and then, maybe, “And the US has pulled out of NATO.” If you look at the Munich Security report, there’s not even any mention of the US until the fifth page, and then just this:
And I’m pulling that out of an 80-page report. One with illustrations like this:
Nothing is going to unite Europe. The notion that people are going to bleed & die in Western Europe for people in Eastern Europe is not serious. Everyone knows it. That knowledge poisons politics. Few can even think about politics without the assumption of perpetual peace, or the Great American Father, I suppose is the more honest phrase-
Darth Vader? David Prowse and his stunt fencer Bob Anderson were both English. Sebastian Shaw from Return of the Jedi was also English. Hayden Christensen is Canadian, or I guess Canadian-American. Jake Lloyd is an American who struggles with schizophrenia. Or is Darth Vader supposed to be a Dick Cheney reference?
The phone? Alexander Graham Bell was a Scottish-born Canadian-American.
Great Satan? Is the Great Satan a natural-born American or did he become a naturalized citizen?
…
The other day I listened to a young lady say, “Denmark? I don’t know where that is. Is that in Germany?” (Well, there is that whole Schleswig-Holstein Question — which I guess Lord Palmerston had forgotten all about.)
Titus, you are too subtle and obscure for me, but I do agree that Obama’s response to Ukraine, Israel, Syria, Iran and Iraq have been utterly disastrous, not to mention his ineptitude in Libya. These are, of course, very important. War is important. I think Iraq did a lot to sour Americans on foreign intervention, though it was rather successful until Obama threw it away and started making love to Iran. The lefty code pinky peeps have had a lot of influence, I will grant you. But in this election I see interest in dispelling the weakness. Not surprisingly, people are less than enamored of spending money on foreign wars when the debt is so high and the economy is bad, but on the other hand, everybody sees the threat of ISIS and greatly fears it, the code pinky peeps excepted.
I detest Trump, but his “make America strong” message resonates with a lot of people. Hopefully we will be smart enough to elect a person who could actually make America strong, and who recognizes that the world is far worse of when we are regarded as weak.
Ma’am, you have to excuse my obscurity, at least because we live in different worlds. I do share your hopes & worries, & not only because the motions of America have effects beyond what mere men can foresee…
I’m on the record having predicted last year the GOP will lose on principle, or rather conservatism will lose on principle. I do not see much reason to change my opinion, I regret to say.
Merina Smith:
Trust the people, they come thru when the chips are down and they are down now. Keeping them steady on task is going to be the key to the survival of the West as we know it.
Alternative opinion: this is, in many ways, a wonderful thing. What we are seeing is the fruit of the visions of Presidents Wilson and W. Bush: America has made the world safe for democracy. We won WWI and temporarily secured self-determination for Eastern Europe. We won WWII and secured democracy for Western Europe, Japan, and the Pacific Islands. We saved South Korea and Taiwan. We contained communism, and Reagan drove the stake through its heart. In 1999, it looked like democracy, representative government, national self-determination, and capitalism were ending history.
Of course 9/11/2001 changed that, and Russia and China are resisting representative government and trying to expand their arenas of control. But these two powers have no competing systems to offer the world. The rising jihadi Islam, meanwhile, is simply a violent symptom of the Middle East’s demographic implosion at contact with western culture.
Europe is simply behaving like South America and Africa- embroiled in regional politics, ignoring the rest of the world. We just need to remind them of the external threats. They rallied to our side under Dubya. They’ll rally again if called. They just haven’t been called.
Our frustration with Europe is much like our frustration with fellow Americans: we fight for freedom, and all you focus on is Big Gulps and sports? Really? WAKE UP SHEEPLE! But our fellow Americans always rally when the situation is really dire. The Europeans will too, if they’re called.
I think it’s really too soon to decide this. We need to wait at least a decade. It’s certainly something I didn’t expect and I’m not used to.
http://www.militaryfactory.com/american_war_deaths.asp
Half a million Dead since 1940, to defend other people. We easily could have come to a peace with Japan. The only reason we were at war with them was because of standing against their expansion. An America not being dominant means a half million more men and women who would have lived.
Do not come at me about our blood and treasure. We have spent both in good measure to ensure the security of the world. We risked utter destruction in the Cold War to stand against the Russian Empire that was the USSR.
America has done more to protect and secure the peace of the Earth than any nation in the history of Mankind.
Next time you want to call me a chickenhawk, come out and say it. In fact, since you have slung that accusation before, I don’t see why you have to veil it now. I’ll have you know, my wife was in the Army. I have put it on the line.
We did not destroy the Old World. The Old World destroyed itself in the two more horrible wars ever seen on God’s Earth. The End Times came to Europe in back to back generations. Europe destroyed itself. America just picked up the pieces.
What if Obama is a symptom, and not the disease itself?
Middle East’s demographic implosion
That should be explosion. The Mideast has had healthly population growth for the past 30 years. It’s a main reason why there is so much unrest. Too many young men around.
For the same reason Russia is not a real worry. They don’t have young men to throw away in a real war. Putin is a master of statecraft, and knows how to leverage his dwindling resources to best effect. Putin knows that Russia is in decline and he is trying to secure Russia’s territory for the future when Russia won’t have the man-power to defend itself from the coming Muslim expansion. The problem is Europe is also in demographic decline and make an easy target, to secure revenue, concessions on his securing his borders in places like Chechnya, Georgia, and the Ukraine. You can directly blame the Obama administration for Putin’s aggression toward Europe.
I have a personal preference for American dominance over other kinds, but power does corrupt, you know.
I’m increasingly persuaded that’s the case. But I’m not sure what the disease is.
It is still good to be at the apex.
Irrelevance in Europe. This is the only Obama policy I support.
I have worked on-off in Europe since 2004, and the “morality on the cheap” exhibited by many across Europe has to be one of the most abhorrent cultural traits I have experienced. Climate change, the war on terror, Iraq . . . it did not mater which country (England, Germany, Austria . . . ), there was a local citizen willingly lecturing me on “American Imperialism” or “American Misconduct.”
Given that Europeans spent peanuts on defense, and by 2004 were clearly in a state of demographic decline (thank you Mark Steyn), their collective American complaints were laughable.
If we were out to dinner in a group and it was discovered that I was American, there would be tut-tuting, at a minimum, as to American global incompetence. A particularly humorous experience was when I was lectured by a German couple about war crimes shortly after Abu Ghraib was on the front pages. At which point I informed them that the only German I would listen to on matters of ethics and morality was Pope Benedict. In addition, I told them I would make room for them in the Unites States when Europe descended into chaos.
Irrelevance would be welcome. Unfortunately, I suspect that I will be receiving a call from Germany about the availability of our guest bedroom.
American dominance has been on the whole extremely benign; I don’t think I say this simply because it’s in my interest to do so. I agree that power is corrupting within a state, but the international state system isn’t a just Republic; it’s more like a Hobbesian nightmare.
Have you been acquainted with non-European cultural traits?
There is no single disease other than man’s unquenchable desire for power over others, progressivism being the current vehicle.
Leadership matters; one person can make a difference in the world, and Obama is an example. He’s the anti-Churchill. Deceit is the primary tool of evil, that force which I name Satan. Our fight is to expose truth, not navel gaze and postulate more effective or simply different policies for government dominance.
Figure out why BLM has any influence and you’ll discover root causes.
At least part of the disease is the “tragedy of the commons.” The federal government has become a communal feeding trough and much of the nation’s “human capital” is employed in siphoning out of the trough rather than in producing into it. Crony capitalism (or, more accurately, crony socialism) is becoming the norm.
I am either diseased or part of the disease, or part of the long and grand American aversion to entanglements in foreign conflicts. Looking at the statistics presented by Bryan G. Stephens (and the noble service of his wife – thank you), I question whether it was worth it?
Based upon my experiences in Europe, I would happily accept a proposal for the U.S. to exit NATO and pull all troops from the continent.
But then I think of my primarily positive experiences in Asia and a general sense of gratefulness for U.S. efforts that I have experienced.
It is a tough call for me, but I lean toward relinquishing the role as the global policeman. Irrelevance it is.
Only among the progressives in my family.
This is the most gallant thing I’ve read today-
We cannot withdraw and leave the world to be run by China. We will not like the results.
Hey, that’s what makes greatest generations!
IMHO the disease is that the American people don’t know what we are doing or why. During the Cold War the American foreign policy objective was clear. At the moment there is no clear vision as to what our responsibility is. We need an international strategy which can be explained to the American people. If Americans think the strategy makes sense they will back it. In a recent podcast I think Gary Kasparov said that once the Cold War was over Clinton did his own thing, followed by Bush doing his own thing, and now Obama is doing his own thing -but nobody articulated a strategy that superseded the political needs of the moment. American foreign policy currently is more about seamanship than navigation.