Commentary | Young Americans for Liberty | The Foreign Policy Handbook | Issue V | August 2010 ernment, the American republic, and democracy in general. This has also brought us numerous scandals of torture, illegal spying on U.S. citizens, fudging facts in order to justify needless undeclared wars, and an acceptance of America as the world’s policeman. In terms as to who reigns supreme in government war making, one of Uncle Sam’s favorite pastimes; Congress has been consistent in abdicating its constitutional authority to declare war. It has instead chosen to empower an increasingly unitary president with the ability to initiate war via his own determination. Congress’ lack of willingness to provide the necessary check on the executive has enabled the president to initiate countless invasions such as the ones in Iraq and Afghanistan. This ―breakdown of constitutional government‖ as Johnson frames it has resulted in an international U.S. hegemony that spans to the corners of the entire earth. The extent to which America’s global network of military bases
spans is quite startling. According to the Department of Defense’s Base Structural Report as cited by Johnson, the United States currently operates and maintains approximately 737 military bases in over 130 countries. He also reveals that the Pentagon estimates that all overseas U.S. military structures collectively hold the worth of nearly $127 billion. Aside from the massive economic distortion they prop up domestically, a perhaps equally negative impact fermented by these bases is reflected in the resentment they create in their host nations. The hatred and opposition generated by the presence of U.S. forces in these countries and the local corruption that tends to accompany them get nourished because many large segments of the citizen population typically view American troops as an unjustified occupational force standing in their backyard. The picture painted by these bases of America
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around the world actually serve us greater harm and have a hand in creating the very thing they claim to be protecting us from. Johnson notes that America does not need colonies in the traditional and historical sense to be understood as an empire. ―Once upon a time, you could trace the spread of imperialism by counting up colonies. America’s version of the colony is the military base; and by following the changing politics of global basing, one can learn much about our ever more all-encompassing imperial ―footprint‖ and the militarism that grows with it.‖ An entire chapter is also devoted in comparing the American empire to those of Britain and Rome and presents a choice in determining which path the United States will follow. Johnson puts it this way: America can either go the way of the British empire and essentially abandon its imperial aspirations in search of a more democratic system of government (although Johnson himself admits this transition wasn’t carried out in the most effective manner) or the way of Rome and lose all attachments to a republic in favor of an authoritarian dictatorship. In his final chapter titled The
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