Just like Americans, German Third Reich followed a "divine" mission of expansionism, or Lebestraum. As a consequence we had Hitler. Even though Germany gave up its expansionist approach in foreign policy, American Exceptionalism is still around after so many years. It seems that such a notion continuously die and resurrect, gets revived and always gives the Americans the upper hand. Seeing American success as part of God's plan must have been appealing for all those who were fleeing religious oppression in Europe. America did not treat people from different religions unequally ( I'm excluding the anti-semitism of 1940s and current Muslimophobia). Of course religious people fled to God's garden, and God's "timing" was so perfect in revealing America, to save his good (and bad) followers. The names hiding beyond the Manifest Destiny idea changed, but the American exceptionalism remained the same.
On pg. 40 Stephenson writes: "Christianity, democracy and Jacksonian America were essentially one and the same thing, the highest stage of history, God's incarnate plan." If we are so able to personify God, call him "him," and assume that he makes plans for us, I'm curious what his plan has been for Africa or elsewhere? Did God simply abandon the East to come settle in the West? Or is God's favorite type of human is caucasian? We are left with a condition as a consequence: "America" as a state of mind...a political religion. As America moved from its isolationist policies to become the leading actor in world politics, it never left the state of being "America." Evangelizing other regions slowly became inevitable. It remains so to this day. Allow me to use NATO Expansion as an analogy for American Manifest Destiny.
There is an argument made about NATO expansion which says: "if NATO does not expand, it might as well just dissolve."* So if America did not follow expansionist policies, would it have disappeared?
My only comparison is the Ottoman Empire, which also followed the will of God in spreading the religion of right across Middle East, Euroasia and Central Asia as well as sieging Vienna. In this case, Ottoman expansionism also became its downfall. It expanded to an extend, which slowly dissolved into nothing. I do not know if there is something distinct in the stories of two state of minds: Being "American" or being "Ottoman?"
(*) Peter Duignan, NATO: It's Past, Present, and Future (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2000), 77.
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First, I'd add the Catholic movement to America(specifically Irish) as an example of religious recrimination in American. As Protestants, the idea of the Pope having a word in this country really shook a lot of people.
ReplyDeleteNext, I would argue that there is a huge difference between America and the Ottoman Empire. The Ottomans didn't simply expand their ideals, their conquered the territory as well. One reason the use of U.S. troops in nations hasn't created a great negative response is that it tends to not stay. America tends not to be imperialist in the conquering of territory sense. I think it is easy to argue that capitalism and the growing global world has made dominance through this strategy much easier(i.e. possible).
I agree with you. I'm curious to hear your perspective on the U.S. and British bases all over the world? I mean, yes technically speaking American/British troops are not in the country, but practically they are?
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