When America Falls Asleep
Published in L'Express
(France) on 16 February 2015
by Jacques Attali (link to original)
(France) on 16 February 2015
by Jacques Attali (link to original)
Translated from
by Jessica Loizou .
Edited by Nicholas Eckart.
Having alluded to the relative decline of American power for a long time, it is fascinating to observe its recent acceleration. Certainly, we can let ourselves be blinded by the triumphant statistics about the American economy in these past months, but the fact remains: Actual unemployment is double that which is claimed by official agencies, by the president of the Federal Reserve’s own admission. The economic system is very largely boosted by the mass of money that the [Fed] pours in and by the ridiculous speculations of “shadow banking,” which reinvents daily the subprime mortgage madness. The focus of wealth is such that democracy is almost only a masquerade.
The diplomatic reality is, itself, clearer: Since Aug. 28, 2013, when President Obama refused at the last second to set off retaliations against the Syrian president, who had just used chemical weapons against his own people, no one in the world took the American engagement seriously anymore. On any front. And the effective American drone strikes in Yemen and Pakistan provided more proof of this: no human involvement.
This explains things well: Saudi Arabia's fearless depreciation of petrol prices against American will and interests; the Egyptian president’s refusal to buy American planes from their preferred supplier over the past 50 years; and the concession accepted in Minsk by the Ukrainian president against his will, when he realized that he couldn’t count on real American military support in spite of the irresponsible reels of the (American) heads of NATO’s military command in Europe.
Finally, like a glaring symbol of this disengagement was the absence of the American president and all other senior representatives of the country at the march in Paris on Sunday, Jan. 11, 2015 after the Charlie Hebdo attacks. If this continues, the world will realize that American power is waning. We will see the dollar decline, China take control over the sea of China, North Korea advance its pawns and Japan seek to arm itself. It is possible that the next president, whether it be a Bush, a Clinton (who can only win by distancing themselves from Obama) or anyone else, will attempt to give America the role of superpower again. It won’t be the first time. But without a doubt it will only be one last spurt, as it’s too late: The Chinese military budget, like its GDP, will soon exceed its American equivalent. And the American people, unlike the French, Russians, Chinese and others, are no longer ready to risk the lives of their soldiers in a theater of operations.
The perspective is therefore clear: The American empire will fade. It will not be replaced, as was the British Empire by a rival empire in the conduct of global affairs, but will more likely be replaced, as was the Roman Empire, by a multipolar chaos in which a number of neighbors want to take on the American way of life and another group would like to oppose it — for religious reasons — by organizing themselves into theocracies. And even if, in the end, another empire managed to replace the American one at the top of the world, for the first time in human history it wouldn’t be Western. The West is therefore without defense for the first time. And nothing is more dangerous, particularly for us Europeans, than seeing our enemies cease to fear us.
It is time to realize that no one other than us will defend our values, our way of life and our freedom. Moreover, without expecting that the next American president might understand the importance of being strong, and accept the United States' share of the [responsibility for the] direction of global affairs with Europe, it is up to us as Europeans to learn to live and defend ourselves without America.
The diplomatic reality is, itself, clearer: Since Aug. 28, 2013, when President Obama refused at the last second to set off retaliations against the Syrian president, who had just used chemical weapons against his own people, no one in the world took the American engagement seriously anymore. On any front. And the effective American drone strikes in Yemen and Pakistan provided more proof of this: no human involvement.
This explains things well: Saudi Arabia's fearless depreciation of petrol prices against American will and interests; the Egyptian president’s refusal to buy American planes from their preferred supplier over the past 50 years; and the concession accepted in Minsk by the Ukrainian president against his will, when he realized that he couldn’t count on real American military support in spite of the irresponsible reels of the (American) heads of NATO’s military command in Europe.
Finally, like a glaring symbol of this disengagement was the absence of the American president and all other senior representatives of the country at the march in Paris on Sunday, Jan. 11, 2015 after the Charlie Hebdo attacks. If this continues, the world will realize that American power is waning. We will see the dollar decline, China take control over the sea of China, North Korea advance its pawns and Japan seek to arm itself. It is possible that the next president, whether it be a Bush, a Clinton (who can only win by distancing themselves from Obama) or anyone else, will attempt to give America the role of superpower again. It won’t be the first time. But without a doubt it will only be one last spurt, as it’s too late: The Chinese military budget, like its GDP, will soon exceed its American equivalent. And the American people, unlike the French, Russians, Chinese and others, are no longer ready to risk the lives of their soldiers in a theater of operations.
The perspective is therefore clear: The American empire will fade. It will not be replaced, as was the British Empire by a rival empire in the conduct of global affairs, but will more likely be replaced, as was the Roman Empire, by a multipolar chaos in which a number of neighbors want to take on the American way of life and another group would like to oppose it — for religious reasons — by organizing themselves into theocracies. And even if, in the end, another empire managed to replace the American one at the top of the world, for the first time in human history it wouldn’t be Western. The West is therefore without defense for the first time. And nothing is more dangerous, particularly for us Europeans, than seeing our enemies cease to fear us.
It is time to realize that no one other than us will defend our values, our way of life and our freedom. Moreover, without expecting that the next American president might understand the importance of being strong, and accept the United States' share of the [responsibility for the] direction of global affairs with Europe, it is up to us as Europeans to learn to live and defend ourselves without America.
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