[Peace-discuss] The Empire is Here to Stay

[David Green]

 Despite these concerns, officials have been willing to give Trump a chance to lead the country. Over the past few months, state leaders have done everything in their power to prepare Trump for his new position.Notably, Obama played a lead role in welcoming Trump to Washington. Just days after the election, he complimented the president-elect on his willingness to cross the ideological divide. “I don’t think he is ideological,” the outgoing president said. “I think ultimately he’s pragmatic in that way. And that can serve him well, as long as he’s got good people around him and he has a clear sense of direction.”In the following weeks, Obama also requested that people around the world give Trump a chance. People should not “just assume the worst,” Obama said. It would be better to “take a wait-and-see approach,” and allow Trump the opportunity to run the country.Politicians, Obama stressed, often make promises that they don’t keep. “My simple point is that you can’t assume that the language of campaigning matches up with the specifics of governing, legislation, regulations, and foreign policy,” Obama said. He continued: “I can’t guarantee that the president-elect won’t pursue some of the positions that he’s taken. But what I can guarantee is, is that reality will force him to adjust how he approaches many of these issues. That’s just the way this office works.”Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter provided similar reassurances. “America’s interests remain the same,” he insisted. “So, we still have ISIL to fight, we still have Russia — that isn’t gonna change, the world isn’t gonna — isn’t gonna change.”Establishment officials have also been willing to accept the new leadership and look for silver linings in Trump’s cabinet. For instance, they were pleased that Trump chose Gen. Mattis to be the next secretary of defense. Mattis is “a friend, and I hold him in the highest regard,” Carter commented shortly after the nomination’s announcement.Trump’s secretary of state pick, Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson, was also met with applause. The man is “superbly qualified,” former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates promised. “He is deeply knowledgeable about the international scene and geopolitics and importantly would be an informed and independent adviser to the president.”So far, a number of Trump’s establishment critics have found continuity in the new administration’s foreign policy. Early last month, Obama’s former advisor David Axelrod tweeted that a number of the Trump administration’s earliest moves bore striking resemblance to Obama’s policies: “Much of what @realDonaldTrump admin has done in foreign policy in the past 36 hours is Obama policy, just delivered thru clenched teeth.”The New York Times has also begun to moderate its tone. Since early February 2017, new headlines have included: “Trump Embraces Pillars of Obama’s Foreign Policy,” “Trump Foreign Policy Quickly Loses Its Sharp Edge,” and “From ‘America First’ to a More Conventional View of U.S. Diplomacy.”In short, the establishment, at least for now, seems confident that it can continue having its way with the world. Despite all of the post-election quaking about Trump, which was greased by the ongoing concerns about Russia, China, and ISIS, establishment officials and their supporters seem to believe that Trump is starting to understand what they mean when they say that the United States is indispensable to the world order. As always, they are speaking the words of empire, and they are determined to keep it.“I know some people are looking at the world and saying, ‘Oh my God, the world order is coming apart,’ and this and that,” Secretary of State John Kerry commented during his final days in office. “No, it isn’t, folks. And it won’t.”The empire, in other words, is here to stay.
The American Empire Isn’t in Decline
  
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The American Empire Isn’t in Decline
 The foreign policy establishment remains confident it can steer the US into a new age of global hegemony.  |   |

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