Posted on 10/19/2009 1:04:01 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The 20th century was famously called “the American century”, yet its being so called occurred in an improbable way. The phrase itself was actually not used until Time publisher Henry Luce coined it in a special issue of Life magazine in 1941—by which time 40 percent of the 20th century had already passed. Moreover, 1941 was a year in which the superiority of America and of the American way of life appeared decidedly problematic. Only the year before had the United States finally exited, statistically speaking, the decade of the Great Depression. Nazi Germany’s armies occupied most of Europe, stretching from the Atlantic coast of France to the heartland of the Soviet Union. At the same time, Imperial Japan’s armies occupied most of East Asia, stretching from Manchuria through much of China to Indochina. No objective observer could have been blamed for entertaining a whiff of pessimism about America’s prospects.
Nevertheless, Luce was truly prescient. By the end of the 20th century, nearly everyone widely acknowledged that it had, indeed, been the American one. Certainly, no other power and way of life could claim that title. Moreover, as the 20th century passed into the 21st, it seemed reasonable and even self-evident to say that the 21st century, too, would be an American century. In the first couple years of this century there was a little boom in the publication of books and articles—some admiring, some disparaging—that even went so far as to proclaim an American empire. Then, in an amazingly short time, a relentless series of events—almost a staccato burst—perforated and punctured this centennial and imperial dream: the 9/11 attacks, the setbacks of the Iraq war and then of the Afghan War, and particularly the American-originated global economic crisis and Great Recession of 2008–09.(continued)
(Excerpt) Read more at the-american-interest.com ...
As a practical matter, that's still just pie in the sky and very expensive.
These include threats from transnational terrorist networks, nuclear proliferation, the global economy, global epidemics and global warming.
He undermined his credibility by mentioning global warming. It's looking to pan out as the biggest hoax of all time.
Anyone betting against America over the next hundred years will lose.
So many have underestimated us over the years. It just boggles the mind.
No longer true. See "Nanosolar" as to why. But that breakthrough is, once again, and American one.
And in the wings is IEC Fusion (aka "Bussard fusion" or "polywell fusion"), which looks to be THE next big leap forward in the nuclear power area. Also an American innovation.
Kurth is a Realist/Pragmatist. He has used the above title, Pillars of the Next American Century, as a contrast to the NeoCon’s Project for a New American Century.
You don’t need to lose wars to lose position either. Britain won both world wars, but lost global power as a result of both.
America doesn’t even need to fight any wars to decline in relative terms to the likes of China, all it needs to do is keep plodding the path it is doing at the moment. Increase its debt to foreign creditors and slowly erode confidence in the US dollar, and keep running up huge trade deficits with China and the EU....
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