Another turn of the wheel

What defines a nation's "vital interests?" How that question is answered plays a large part in determining whether a nation reaches its full potential, or squanders its resources on fool's errands.

That the British stand was heroic is undeniable; that British policy was wise is debatable. For in just thirty years after 1914, the greatest empire of the modern world had been reduced to an American dependency. The principle cause of this historic decline was identified by historian A.J.P. Taylor:

Though the object of being a Great Power is to be able to fight a great war, the only way of remaining a Great Power is not to fight one, or to fight it on a limited scale. This was the secret of Great Britain's greatness so long as she stuck to naval warfare and did not try to become a military power on the continental pattern.

"A Republic, Not an Empire," by Patrick Buchanan, p. 302

When the Soviet Union imploded in 1989, American leadership was afforded a rare opportunity to manage a devolution in responsibilities--to allow Europe, Japan, Korea and a host of others to detach from the global umbrella of the U.S. military and relieve us of the role of global counterweight.

Instead, the push was on to expand NATO, and further provoke Russian nationalism by lecturing them on free markets while doing little to aid the cold turkey transition from communism. About the same time, we left thousands of troops in the Middle East after Gulf War I, enmeshing us further in that troubled region's endless strife.

I once attended a lecture where a U.S. Ambassador made the analogy that the Pax Romana was due to the strength of the Roman Legion; the Pax Britannia a credit to the British Navy, and that the U.S. was on the cusp of creating a Pax Americana on the still-growing prowess and precision of our airpower. He artfully dodged when, during question time, I asked if he was advocating we follow the model of imperial overstretch that has shattered many a once-great nation before us. America had a brief opportunity 20 years ago to stop playing beat cop around the world, focus on enjoying and enhancing the tremendous society bequeathed to us, and reserve its formidable technology to respond to anything that truly threatened the Republic.

Instead, our Legions are exhausted, our Navy shrinking and our Air Force deteriorating, even as we up the ante in remote parts of the world that have never known stability, much less republican government.

The energy and independent spirit that once made us great have been drained away in an effort to remake the world in our image. Instead, our global adventurism remade us in the image of the world, eroding principles and systems that made us unique. We had best figure out what is truly vital, while we still have the strength to defend whatever is left of our interests.