We (my university) are talking about empires. Modern and ancient civilizations and empires, the rise of them and their fall, in addition to all the positives and negatives of their time of reign. Corruption, bloodshed, wars, propaganda, etc.
We need to write an essay on modern-day America. If it were to fall, how would we go about falling? If someone were to want to make it fall, how would they go about doing it?
Now, this can be any type of book, as long as it’s helpful and useful. And it doesn’t have to be USA only, so when I tell you if you have any books that could go in depth on this, please let me know! Try to make it revolve around America, but you don’t have to.
Any books on how to destroy and defeat empires, corruption, propaganda, and civilization? You see what I’m trying to tell you. Imagine you yourself are in a powerful, corrupt super empire, and you are part of a resistance, or you want to be, and you want to figure out how to free everyone and remove the empire’s evil. Completely go against them. What books?
by Unhappy-Ad4536
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*The Storm Before the Storm: The Beginning of the End of the Roman Republic* – Mike Duncan
*All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror -* Stephen Kinzer
*Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle -* Chris Hedges
*The Death of Democracy: Hitler’s Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic -* Benjamin Carter Hett
• *The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire,1936-1945* by John Toland.
• *The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich* by William Shirer.
• *The Coming of the Third Reich* by Richard J. Evans.
• *The Third Reich in Power* by Richard J. Evans.
• *The Third Reich at War* by Richard J. Evans.
The Grand Chessboard by Zbigniew Brzezinski
A long explanation with current reflections in 2024.
Chapter 1 is titled Hegemony of a New Type will compare America to Rome, Chinese, British, etc. Empires. He will talk about the sources of power for Empires and what causes their fall. He compares advantages and disadvantages of all these to America’s situation in the 1990s after the fall of the Soviet Union which is now the chance for the birth of the worlds first global empire to which you can see he has much hubris.
It should be noted that the year that book was published the Secretary of State was Madeleine Albright who called Brzezinski her “mentor”. The current Secretary of State, Antony Blinken also recently called Brzezinski a “mentor” and “inspiration”
Brzezinski’s a Hawk (none of the more dovish elements of America’s Foreign Policy elite could gain a foot hold in significant government, media, and think tank positions) and an empire builder (under the “camouflage” of “democracy” as he admits in his 2004 book The Choice – Global Domination or Global Leadership) but he split with the more Hawkish faction by the time of the Iraq war in 2003 known as the Neoconservatives.
Towards the end of Brzezinki’s life in 2015 he was arguing for a strategy to make sure America was leading the new Multipolar order which he felt was foolish to resist at that point giving up on Unipolarity. The more Hawkish faction, however doubled down on Unipolarity (as outlined in the Wolfowitz Doctrine leaked early 1990s out of the Pentagon to the NYT) which ironically only accelerated the fall of America. I say ironically because America’s Super Hawks are the best friends to competing powers in the world like China yet they don’t necessarily see it because their mind is blinded by ideological vs realistic foreign policy thinking strategies that divide the world to good and evil meaning they can be easily played to overextend themselves.
Current problems include a Debt that would require $250,000 per taxpayer to pay off at 35 trillion and quickly approaching $1 Trillion a year in interest payments alone. Increasingly internal divisions between parties to a civil war dynamic fueled by the party system and in particular with inputs from the most Hawkish faction to guarantee the battle of Americans remains on “Culture War” and away from the Debt and disastrous Foreign Policy which creates enemies and blowback which then requires reducing Constitutional rights for “Security”. The Culture War directly contributes to a loss of productivity and performance.
Internationally, the most important of the 4-Powers for an Empire as Brzezinski defined is Money/Finance. The birth of an alternative financial system called BRICS that many nations are lining up to join because America’s use of Dollar Diplomacy scares the hell out of them. The Dollar is used as a weapon as part of the Grand Chessboard game and more and more states want to check out of the Dollar completely.
Once this process happens, and it could have a 5-30 year time range, the inflationary effects on America will be devastating. American Treasuries have already been downgraded from top bond status in August 2023. I would argue the Elites on Wall Street (one of three main power factions described in the book Power Elite that run America per C Wright Mills classic 1956 book) transferring industrial/manufacturing out of the homeland to what they now consider a primary “enemy” beginning in the 1980s even after that “enemy” had used tanks to roll over Democracy protestors in 1989. Note the nation’s myth is promote, protect and extend Democracy to justify foreign policies involving wars and proxy wars (intentionally provoked) yet for close to 4 decades their has been no problem transferring the industrial base to a country that never held elections ever as a trade off to also open markets to sell to their 1.4 billion consumers.
The cost of the industrial/manufacturing situation became apparent during the Ukraine war as you can watch press conferences of NATO’s Secretary General admit to the press that all Western countries combine cannot produce enough ammunition and the ramp up time is years. Russia, alternatively, did not gut their industrial/manufacturing capability while America transferred its own to China (now allied strongly with Russia and the Anti-Hegemonic Coalition that Brzezinski feared in his 1997 book that he said was only possible by total incompetence in foreign policy handling by Washington DC) in favor of a Financial/Services (sexy stuff) economy.
Most Elites in America know it is a sinking ship so they will extract as much as possible of the wealth for themselves before the truly bad times hit. One could argue, the desire for cheaper labor, and higher executive bonuses with “industrial offshoring” 30-40 years was already a part of that process. It is much like Enron Executives who were videotaped in company meetings telling their employees to buy Enron stock for their 401K/IRA plans while they, behind the scenes, were selling.
In any case, it is a large and complex topic but Brzezinski is a good starting point just because of his summary for Empires throughout history in his first chapter. Unfortunately, he is no longer alive to add his expertise on America’s current situation.
George Washington’s Farewell Address 1796
[https://www.georgewashington.org/farewell-address.jsp](https://www.georgewashington.org/farewell-address.jsp)
It is about 10 pages printed up.
Two major features of the address, thought the context and times were different, still apply and are talked about in depth.
He warns that the most corrupt and ambitious men will take over the project of political parties and that these parties would destroy the nation as they thrive off splitting the citizens, who otherwise have much in common, by lies, hyperbole, etc.
He also warns of foreign entanglements and “favorite nations” where true patriots will be demonized by those who have been fooled in the masses by the corrupt and “dupes” playing the foreign policy games. Keep in mind, the real money in the world isn’t within the United States but outside of it. That includes in terms of total world’s population vs U.S. population and valuable resources needed to make the physical things people actually want to buy. They may not be the “sexiest” industries like software and tech but ultimately these raw materials are needed, even to produce the machines that run that software.
Brezezinski will touch on aspects of both of these in that Chapter 1 I mentioned in my first comment. Internal strife and over-extending on foreign policy, particularly military actions.