What Are Some Reasons for a Change of Direction in US Foreign Policy?

In his book titled “China,” Henry Kissinger wrote, “American exceptionalism is missionary. It holds that the United States has an obligation to spread its values to every part of the world. China’s exceptionalism is cultural. China does not claim that its contemporary institutions are relevant outside China.” China does not demand models; the U.S. imposes them — Venezuela, for example.

When the book “The Silent Conquest of China” was written by Juan Pablo and Heriberto Araujo it stated that “to traverse Asia, Africa and Latin America is to see, touch and breathe how China is becoming a world power.”

Why is the U.S. changing? Surely not out of goodness. It is comfortable being an empire.

I) The wars between Rome and Carthage (264 & 146 BC) were fought for control and supremacy in the Mediterranean Sea, which was small for two emerging powers. Rome dominated and believed in the idea of Mare Nostrum (Our Sea).

In history that sea moved to the Atlantic Ocean for the control of the colonies. Today in the 21st century, it moves again, to the Pacific Ocean. The Carthage and Rome of yesterday are today China and the United States, with a market of over 3 billion consumers. The United States has decided to transfer 60 percent of its military fleet by 2020, demobilizing in other regions of the world.

II) The fall of Carthage (149 & 146 BC) and the fall of Rome (476), many centuries ago, had many similarities, one of which is the breakdown from endless wars. Their economies and tax revenues could not hold out any longer. The war budget sunk them. The United States has a multimillion-dollar military budget for the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, etc. Can it keep it up?

III) The U.S. is involved in wars. China says, “While the U.S. makes war, we make love.” While the U.S. makes enemies, China invests, makes friends, advances and consolidates its economy in projects throughout the world. In their book, Juan Pablo and Heriberto describe that strategy as “without haste and without pause” since 1980. They researched 25 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America: Cuba, Iran, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Peru, Ecuador, Argentina, Russia, India, Egypt, Vietnam, South Africa, Angola, Namibia, Thailand, Taiwan, Sudan, etc. Those are the initial findings.

IV) In 2015, China announced the creation of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, which will rival the World Bank — controlled by the United States — and whose first member, to the United States’ disgust, was England. Fifty-seven founding states have followed — France, Italy, Australia, South Korea, Brazil, Egypt, Spain, Norway, India, Switzerland, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Poland, Sweden, Israel, South Africa, Russia, Azerbaijan, Iceland and Portugal, among others.

V) Russia holds back U.S. and U.N. advances in Ukraine. Crimea is the declaration of “no more.” Syria is bogged down; the Russian motherland has returned, which is something that Europeans, the press and the population clearly understand. German Chancellor Angela Merkel travelled to the U.S. to tell Obama to give space to European diplomacy in Ukraine. France and Germany went in depth to seek an agreement with Russia. The European Union is taking a lot of risks by going along with the United States, whose fallout is splashing the EU’s borders.

VI) The formation of the Islamic State group, which published a map that includes Spain and Portugal as its future territory, has not made people happy. The involvement of young people from the EU, as well as attacks, has demonstrated a jihadism that is out of control and is expanding toward Europe.

VII) Latin America is unified in diversity, in the interest of economic development. The area’s economies have obviously strengthened, which gives autonomy in decision making; the results have been seen at the 2015 Summit of the Americas in Panama. China is already in that region.

VIII) The economic crisis of 2008 was the result of the speculations of irresponsible corporate finance, which divorced the U.S. from the real economy. Exporting the crisis to the European Union created world resentment and reservations over the trustworthiness of the dollar as a future hard currency. The EU has taken steps toward seeking a substitute for the dollar, something that will accelerate even more if the U.S. does not regulate itself.

IX) Uncontrolled and massive immigration to the EU from countries where the United States supplies weapons to military conflicts upsets and disturbs Europe. These and other deeds make it necessary for the United States to change its direction and policies in the world. If it does not make these changes, with Cuba and Iran for example, what will become of the United States in the near future?