4 Scenarios for the Coming Collapse of the American Empire

[Octafish]

If you get a chance, an important heads-up from McCoy:

4 Scenarios for the Coming Collapse of the American Empire

By Alfred W. McCoy, Tomdispatch.com
Posted on December 5, 2010, Printed on December 6, 2010

A soft landing for America 40 years from now? Don’t bet on it. The demise of the United States as the global superpower could come far more quickly than anyone imagines. If Washington is dreaming of 2040 or 2050 as the end of the American Century, a more realistic assessment of domestic and global trends suggests that in 2025, just 15 years from now, it could all be over except for the shouting.

Despite the aura of omnipotence most empires project, a look at their history should remind us that they are fragile organisms. So delicate is their ecology of power that, when things start to go truly bad, empires regularly unravel with unholy speed: just a year for Portugal, two years for the Soviet Union, eight years for France, 11 years for the Ottomans, 17 years for Great Britain, and, in all likelihood, 22 years for the United States, counting from the crucial year 2003.

SNIP...

Significantly, in 2008, the U.S. National Intelligence Council admitted for the first time that America's global power was indeed on a declining trajectory. In one of its periodic futuristic reports, Global Trends 2025, the Council cited “the transfer of global wealth and economic power now under way, roughly from West to East" and "without precedent in modern history,” as the primary factor in the decline of the “United States' relative strength -- even in the military realm.” Like many in Washington, however, the Council’s analysts anticipated a very long, very soft landing for American global preeminence, and harbored the hope that somehow the U.S. would long “retain unique military capabilities… to project military power globally” for decades to come.

No such luck. Under current projections, the United States will find itself in second place behind China (already the world's second largest economy) in economic output around 2026, and behind India by 2050. Similarly, Chinese innovation is on a trajectory toward world leadership in applied science and military technology sometime between 2020 and 2030, just as America's current supply of brilliant scientists and engineers retires, without adequate replacement by an ill-educated younger generation.

By 2020, according to current plans, the Pentagon will throw a military Hail Mary pass for a dying empire. It will launch a lethal triple canopy of advanced aerospace robotics that represents Washington's last best hope of retaining global power despite its waning economic influence. By that year, however, China's global network of communications satellites, backed by the world's most powerful supercomputers, will also be fully operational, providing Beijing with an independent platform for the weaponization of space and a powerful communications system for missile- or cyber-strikes into every quadrant of the globe.

CONTINUED...

http://www.alternet.org/story/149080/

Not happy about this in any way. How about we figure out a way out of continuing on the path of a doomed empire?

(Hand raised, like the teacher's pet sitting in the front row.) I know! I know! Let's not continue as an empire!

[villager]

1. I just wonder if environmental factors are reckoned into these alleged trajectories

...of replacement empires?

By mid-century, we won't be an empire, but I'm not sure China and India will, either -- if there's no fresh water (to use but one example) for those empires, etc...

[theaocp]

2. Yea, I read this piece this morning

Great, but depressing article. The WWIII scenario sounds like the Chinese version of SkyNet is coming for us. Plan for the worst and everything that doesn't come to pass will be a pleasant surprise. :)

[lunatica]

3. Outsourcing jobs to China and India is working out really well for the US

:sarcasm:

It's already biting us in the ass.

The US government in bed with corporations is singly responsible for what world status it's losing. They're giving it away as fast as they can.

[WingDinger]

4. Thus, PNAC. Use that stick, for all it's worth. All we gotz.

[Coyote_Bandit]

5. I remember my high school civics teacher

back in the 70's warning that it would be China and our own internal failures that would lead to the downfall of the US. No surprise here.

If I didn't have elderly and aging family members to care for I'd buy my way out of this failed country. I figure I'd recoup the cost through the better economic opportunities available elsewhere. I also figure I just might be able to score affordable and meaningful access to healthcare.

I'm no patriot. I will take care of myself and my family before I even consider sacrificing for a nation that does not serve to advance and protect my own needs and interests. The present incarnation of the US government is a failure. It is not what it masquerades as: government of the people, for the people and by the people.

[kctim]

6. Even more reason

to stay out of the 'government provides all' game.

[Bigmack]

7. I can beat 4... I have 2 ways the Empire could end....

1. Gracefully..... backing out of our (attempted) military control of the world. Cutting waaaay back on our military spending. Re-tooling for peaceful manufacturing. Diplomacy and horse-trading... I realize we have little experience with this concept, so we'll have to ramp up our learning curve a bit.

2. The Ugly route. We can continue the internal collapse of our country. Continue to spend on a futile world mission. We can just wait to end up like the Soviet Union.

That's our choices... and every day I see us choosing #2.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

8. G. W. Bush* Murdered the U.S. of America.

[dixiegrrrrl]

9. Started long before bush, I'm afraid.

We got seriously imperialistic around the turn of the century, mostly focusing on So. America, Panama Canal, ( Think T.R.)

and by end of WWll cheerfully helped Britain carve up the world.
By that time, Britain was heading downhill, we were arm wrestling with USSR ( remember the whole Cold War thing?),
and occasionally staring China in the eye, over lines in the sand in Korea and later Viet-Nam.
Kissinger held a lot of sway for way too long , then Brezinski took his place on the Dem team.

Things ramped up a lot when Reagan and the PNAC crowd got a hold of the purse strings in 1980.
Those PNAC guys have pretty much been control since, one way or the other, for over 30 years.
the banskters stealing all our wealth was just part of the outcome.

I fully expect it will take the coming environmental catastrophe to stop these maniacs,
who, ironically, are doubling up on their contributions to that catastrophe.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

18. I know all of that and in total agreement as to when and where it started.*bush was the final nail

I just needed to vent it

[bobthedrummer]

24. Truth. Kick. n/t

[leftstreet]

10. K&R

Interesting article
K&R

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. It could be as early as NEXT SPRING

debt ceiling vote.... and the party of no... and what cold do to the USD as a reserve currency...

[amborin]

12. K&R

[SidDithers]

13. I predict that in 2067, giant Dragons will rise from our oceans...

and devour the world's supply of elderberries, thus setting off a cataclysmic chain reaction that results in a year 2082 Zombie apocalypse.

Sid

[Xenotime]

14. america has been dead for years. it deserves to die.

[SpiralHawk]

15. Chop wood. Carry water.

[Karenina]

16. An oldy moldy...

[bobthedrummer]

17. Good for UW's Professor McCoy, again when it comes to teaching US about the black hole in the empire

Chalmers Johnson is another futurist when it comes to plotting the possible course(s) of the unsustainability of maintenance of our position of the sole remaining military superpower (the primary goal of neolibs/neocons and their allies in and out of uniform).

Btw, as a UW System grad I've paid attention to Professor McCoy's writings over the years-even the ones that were once considered politically incorrect-including the contributions of the US intelligence community to the crimes against humanity they've committed in our name, especially torture.

Tomgram: Alfred McCoy on the CIA's road to Abu Ghraib (posted September 9, 2004 TomDispatch.com)
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/1795/

UN recognized non-lethal expert and human rights activist Cheryl Welsh expanded on McCoy's work about the history of the "research and development" of US intelligence community torture, which I've posted here several times and do so again on this post-WikiLeaks Monday.

In Contravention of Conventional Wisdom by Cheryl Welsh (January 2008 Mind Justice.org)
http://mindjustice.org/wisdom.htm

Thanks for starting another ultratimely thread Octafish.

K&R

[Yavin4]

19. Empires Crumble When They Avoid Truths and Listen to the Myths

We became a world class power in the 20th century because we faced the truths about the power imbalances in our economy, our social, and political institutions, etc. We gave labor a seat at the table. We tried to correct racial and sexual discrimination.

In the past 30 years, we've run away from the truths and instead we started believing in the myths. We believe that reciting the pledge of allegiance was being patriotic. We believe that we can have tax cuts and fight two wars at the same time. We believe that investment in education is wasteful. That private insurance is the best way to deliver healthcare.

When you believe in myths over reality, you collapse.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

20. Sure. On December 12, 2000,

the Supreme Court of the United States will stop the recount of votes in Florida and declare that * can keep packing the moving vans for his move into the White House.

The collapse is inevitable after that.

[Strelnikov_]

21. ..

[kgnu_fan]

22. Sad thing about it is that almost nobody (even in DU) want to understand this scenario

[bobthedrummer]

23. "Let's not continue as an empire." Yep, kick n/t