Saturday, August 6, 2016
#1. Isolation and Growth. An emerging society with potential can grow if ignored by older militarized neighbors and allowed to devote resources to economic growth rather than wasteful military spending. Separation from others by large bodies of water can also help. Navies are a low cost way to achieve superiority over other nations tied down with large land army costs.
#2. Economic Dominance. The emerging nation over the course of several decades will eventually overtake the slower growing militarized nations around it and becomes the dominant economic power. Access to resources and fertile land can help a lot along the way.
#3. Military Domination War. Economic domination usually leads to military domination after war between the top two economic powers. Usually the other power has been dominant but has limited its growth through militarism allowing the new power to catch up and overtake it.
#4. Military Control of Others. Military domination leaves the new power in an unfamiliar position, leading to maintaining high levels of peacetime military power in the mistaken belief that it is now a rich society and can afford to maintain a higher level of military spending. This feeling of hubris comes from the sense that the society is just better than others, not understanding that the low military start was what allowed that society to emerge, not some intrinsic superiority.
#5. Economic Control of Others. The new power can dominate now both militarily and economically and proceeds to do so. The military asserts that they are the reason others trade with the power, falsely claiming that resources will only be made available to those with the most power. In reality, resources are available to those who are able to pay the price.
#6. Military: Source of Political and Economic Power Internally. The military now becomes a dominant internal force and begins to dominate and control politically and economically within its own original nation. The government taxes slow down growing industries in order to pay the new huge military budget. Control of that huge military budget becomes a major source of power. Government control goes with the territory of the new high military landscape. In turn, the military now captures control of those in power.
#7. Destination for the Young. The new dominant society attracts aspiring young people from around the world who want to be a part of the highest level of civilization. This reflects the saying that "all roads lead to Rome" in the case of the Roman Empire. In America, 75% of immigrants are talented professionals and businesspeople, earning two and a half times as much as average Americans.
#8. Military Industrial Complex Dominates Government. The high levels of military spending lead to the formation of a military industrial complex that turns its dependency on the government around and starts to dominate and control the government. Which came first, the chicken or the egg, doesn't matter as each depends on the other.
#9. Generating Wars to Dominate Internally and Externally. The new military economy justifies itself to the larger community by generating and rationalizing new wars to increase its domination both internally and externally.
#10. Economy Erodes as Scientists, Engineers, and Capital Wasted. The economy erodes with the new high levels of military spending as the best resources of scientific talent, engineering talent, and capital investment are consumed in the nonproductive military economy.
#11. Workforce and Society Stagnate and Change. The new slower growing economy that emerges now demands a "sideways" workforce to manage the stagnation. Soon the whole society changes to meet the new situation. The command and control nature of the military reinforces these internal changes. Top down management dominates over collegial management as income mobility becomes more difficult from one generation to the next and a class oriented society emerges. Crime, poor health, and income inequality grow. Drugs, lotteries, and other forms of desperation emerge.
#12. Collapse or Replacement. The now collapsing society can salvage some of its former glory by abandoning expensive overseas entanglements, or seeking another society to take over its formal role of dominance. New international institutions can help make either task easier.
For more information about how these twelve points apply to America:
https://www.academia.edu/5415354/STAGES_of_EMPIRE
Professor Robert Reuschlein, Dr. Peace
Nominated and vetted for the Nobel Peace Prize 2016
bobreuschlein@gmail.com,
www.realeconomy.com,
608-230-6640