Imperial America

America transformed itself from being a defensive into an offensive power due to its territorial expansion in the nineteenth century. Those who mattered in government strongly felt that the vast areas from the Atlantic to the Pacific should be under their control. John O' Sullivan, the editor of Democratic Review termed this territorial hunger as the 'Manifest Destiny' of America. One by one, additional territories were acquired through fair and foul means - the underlying principle being that ends justify the means - and these included conquest, purchase and coups in foreign lands. For example while Alaska was bought from Russia at the rate of two cents an acre, the sovereignty over the Virgin Islands was acquired from Denmark for $25 million. On the other hand, the expulsion of imperial Spain from Cuba and Puerto Rico and the acquisition of Panama Canal made the US an invincible power in the Caribbean. In addition, the annexation of Hawaii was secured by engineering a coup against Queen Liliuokalani. Furthermore, Mexico was forced to cede an area of 850,000 square miles as a result of a war in 1846.

The American ascendancy witnessed the decline of British Empire in the 20th century and so the US policy planners confronted three choices: either to prop up the sinking British imperialism or to ignore the issue altogether and let the world go about its business or to replace Great Britain by enforcing a world order of their liking. They opted for the third choice. In order to shape the world in their mould, there have been thirty cases of American intervention in Latin America, the Caribbean, East Asia, Middle East and Southern Europe between 1945 and 1999. Even in the 21st century, the US has no intention to shrink itself. On the contrary, it intends to perpetuate its hegemony by preventing with all possible means the re-emergence of a new rival anywhere in the world. After 9/11, it has adopted a more aggressive approach whereby not only could it not be constrained in its designs by its allies or international institutions but it could also use blatant force to bring changes wherever it liked. To ensure this, it has set-up six combatant commands - CENTCOM, EUCOM, NORTHCOM, PACOM, SOUTHCOM and the one proposed for Africa. A quick look at her increasing defence budgets lays bare her intentions. In 1996, it was $266 billion, which equalled the combined total defence budget of the next six largest defence budgets including Russia, China, Japan, France, Britain and Germany. In 2000, it rose to $295 billion; after September 11 terrorist attacks, it jumped to $300 billion and escalated to $425 billion in 2004 due to Iraq war.