The spite of dying empires
We might see life as the eternal quest for rising above our human imperfections for survival in a world we never fully comprehend and more than willing to desecrate.
“Rome’s transition from a republic to an empire touches upon many themes in Roman history. The century between the destruction of Carthage in 146 BC and the assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BC was characterized by the personal ambition of military dynasts like Sulla and Caesar, the flood of wealth (and ensuing decadence) afforded by Rome’s foreign conquests, and the bloody consequences of a military state exhausted of external enemies – only to turn its weapons on itself”.— Alexander Meddings is a Rome-based writer and historian.
Human nature has become human folly permeating the actions, not only of individuals, but of whole governments and especially falling empires. The rage of failure and decline becomes the anger and spite vengefully directed at a world no longer under their control. Ultimately, the world is controlled and propelled by the transcendental momentum of immutable historical cycles over time immemorial, the tyrants of our times simply refuse to accept there are forces they cannot control, or the stark limitations of their massive incompetencies.
In essence, the failure of empires results from the fact that fallible men create them. To create them is a declaration of their immoral impertinence.The collapse of empires can be seen as retribution by the “gods” against empire builders refusing to accept their mortal existence and defying “the middle way.”
The Roman empire lasted five hundred years. The largest ever has been the British empire lasting three hundred years. Hitler’s Third Reich was supposed to last a thousand years, but was over in a generation. There have been five empires collapse in the last hundred years. History tells us the American empire began with the assassination of John F. Kennedy sixty two years ago. Now, in the final stages of decline, it desperately tries to rewrite history.
In the overall the world is over populated, more integrated and complex. There is little room for empires and the barbarism of times past. The existential necessity of better governance, much greater global cooperation and harmony stares us down. The age of empires is over and long past due.
We are led to believe the Empire is all powerful when in fact it is inherently self-diminishing. It has “Crossed the Rubicon”- the point of no return, under siege from a rapidly changing world. The barbarous war mongers refuse the Ouroboros- the snake eating its own tail which is the mythical symbol for life, death, and the cyclical harmonies of life in constant renewal. They drown themselves in despotism rather than entertaining renewal. They have inherited the barbarity of their predecessors and know no other way forward. Their weapons of choice are war, genocide and chaos, driven by revanchism and spite. Where they have no hope of attaining global hegemony as they insist on being the vindictive spoiler.
As Meddings points out above the Roman Republic was betrayed for the sake of empire. Yet in America it appears there is no sense of this same betrayal. Especially so, when empires by definition parasitically feed off the resources, human and otherwise, of their own homeland and their colonies.
Too many decades later NATO member states have once again ratified their blind allegiance to the empire, their own impoverishment and the empire’s forever wars. This is alarming as it takes the measure of Europe’s deeply embedded colonial subservience to the empire. Europe has no desire to challenge and be anything more than satraps to a failing empire.
The West is caught in a suspended and deepening crisis, lurching from one nefarious escalation to the next. Wars have morphed into“propawars”—propagandist, choreographed conflicts designed to perpetuate chaos and maintain the tyranny of our times. There is neither the will nor any visible sign of a turning point. As a result, the prospect of resolution—and any return to functional, civil equilibriums—grows increasingly remote and intractable.
The crisis of the West is that governments have abandoned their populations to their cowardly obsessions of untaxed wealth, illegitimate power and forever wars.
Governments have recklessly adopted ideologies they cannot control, ranging from predatory capitalism, neoliberalism, militarism, forever wars, corporatism and systemic corruptions.
Populations of the West have to face the stark reality that our governments and political parties are absent without leave (AWOL). They were first of all neutered by 40 years of neoliberalism. Now they are totally devoted to saving the failing empire and more than willing to cannibalize their own nation states and wage endless wars to do so. They simply cannot face the fact the global dominance and the unipolarity they presided over for a few decades is gone—Not from any malice directed at us from the East; but from the inevitable coming of age of Asia which just happens to represent the majority of the world’s population.
It doesn’t seem to matter the American Republic is being destroyed to save a morally and fiscally bankrupt empire. It doesn’t seem to matter stupefied governments of the West have become the agents of their own self-immolation.
Western Civilization is trapped in a out of control vortex of decline and self- immolation with no resolution insight. The first steps forward are to repudiate war and empire, only then will better futures appear.
History’s Parrot is read in 38 US states and 54 countries world wide.
The U.S. had empire in its origins and founding. Expansionism is its fundamental thrust. Creating a continental empire was the original vision. When that was accomplished it moved into the world in 1898 with the Spanish-American War. The global empire emerged over decades until it fully emerged in 1945. But as with Rome, which expanded even as it maintained a republic, the forces of empire consumed it. Caesar crossed the Rubicon. I would say the Kennedy Assassination signified the shift from republic to empire. Today it is in decline, but as you say, is a vengeful beast. I don’t think we can restore the republic until we shed the empire and its institutions, military and “intelligence.”
And if war and empire can be repudiated, then perhaps we can have many more days without nuclear winter. Enjoy them while they last.