Tuesday, April 15, 2008

'The world's "indispensable nation" '

 
False Choice

Like a good con man, Brzezinski insists that there is only one alternative to American imperial domination of Eurasia and thus the world. Of course, there is little time to take advantage of this "narrow window of historical opportunity".

"In brief, America as the world's premier power does face a narrow window of historical opportunity. The present moment of relative global peace may be short lived. This prospect underlines the urgent need for an American engagement in the world that is deliberately focused on the enhancement of international geopolitical stability..." - 213

"The sudden emergence of the first and only global power has created a situation in which an equally quick end to its supremacy -- either because of America's withdrawal from the world or because of the sudden emergence of a successful rival -- would produce massive international instability. In effect, it would prompt global anarchy." [emphasis mine] - 30

"In that context, for some time to come -- for more than a generation -- America's status as the world's premier power is unlikely to be contested by any single challenger. No nation-state is likely to match America in the four key dimensions of power (military, economic, technological, and cultural) that cumulatively produce decisive global political clout. Short of a deliberate or unintentional American abdication, the only real alternative to American global leadership in the foreseeable future is international anarchy. In that respect, it is correct to assert that America has become, as President Clinton put it, the world's "indispensable nation." " [emphasis mine] - 195

The Legacy of American Imperialism is United Nations Control

"Accordingly, once American leadership begins to fade, America's current global predominance is unlikely to be replicated by any single state. Thus, the key question for the future is "What will America bequeath to the world as the enduring legacy of its primacy?" " - 210

"Meeting these challenges is America's burden as well as its unique responsibility. Given the reality of American democracy, an effective response will require generating a public understanding of the continuing importance of American power in shaping a widening framework of stable geopolitical cooperation, one that simultaneously averts global anarchy and successfully defers the emergence of a new power challenge. These two goals-- averting global anarchy and impeding the emergence of a power rival-- are inseparable from the longer-range definition of the purpose of America's global engagement, namely, that of forging an enduring framework of global geopolitical cooperation." [emphasis mine] - 214

"In brief, the U.S. policy goal must be unapologetically twofold: to perpetuate America's own dominant position for at least a generation and preferably longer still; and to create a geopolitical framework that can absorb the inevitable shocks and strains of social-political change while evolving into the geopolitical core of shared responsibility for peaceful global management. A prolonged phase of gradually expanding cooperation with key Eurasian partners, both stimulated and arbitrated by America, can also help to foster the preconditions for an eventual upgrading of the existing and increasingly antiquated UN [United Nations] structures. A new distribution of responsibilities and privileges can then take into account the changed realities of global power, so drastically different from those of 1945." [emphasis mine] - 215

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