A newย studyย conducted by members of the U.S. military establishmentย has concluded that the U.S.-led international global order established after World War II is โfrayingโ and may even be โcollapsingโ as the U.S. continues to lose its position of โprimacyโ in world affairs.
โIn brief, theย staยญtus quo that was hatched and nurtured by U.S. strategists after World War IIย and has for decades been the principal โbeatโ for DoD isย not merely fraying but may, in fact, be collapsing,โย the report states.
The report, published in June by the U.S. Army War Collegeโs Strategic Studies Institute, evaluated the Department of Defenseโs (DOD) approach to risk assessment at all levels of Pentagon policy planning.ย The study wasย supportedย and sponsored by the U.S. Armyโs Strategic Plans and Policy Directorate; the Joint Staff, J5 (Strategy and Policy Branch); the Office of the Deputy Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Developยญment; and the Army Study Program Management Office.
Imperial Hubris
Asย explainedย by Nathan Freier, the project director and principal author of the report,ย the U.S. and its defense establishment โare stumbling through a period of hypercompetition.โย From Freierโs point of view, the current era is marred with furious battles for positional advantage at a number of levels, whether national, transnational, or extra-national. Freier explains that Americaโs failure to cope is the result of โhubris,โ which is reminiscent ofย Imperial Hubris,ย a book by Michael Scheuer, theย former head of the CIAโs bin Laden unit.ย Imperial Hubrisย also warned the U.S. about the very controversial and hubristic reasons it was losing the war on terror (hubrisย meansย โexaggerated pride or self-confidence,โ according to Merriam-Webster).
Technically, the report does not officially represent the Pentagon, though it does represent the โcollective wisdomโ of those consulted โ including a number of Pentagon officials and prominent think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the RAND Corporation, and the Institute for the Study of War.
Nevertheless, the report involved consultation with key agencies across the DoD and the Armed Forces and encouraged the U.S. government to invest more heavily in surveillance, better propaganda through โstrategic manipulationโ of public opinion, and a โwider and more flexibleโ U.S. military. The report states:
โWhile as a rule, U.S. leaders of both political parties have consistently committed to the maintenance of U.S. military superiority over all potential state rivals, the post-primacy reality demands a wider and more flexible military force that can generate advantageย and options across the broadest possible range of military demands. To U.S. political leadership, maintenance of military advantage preserves maximum freedom of actionโฆ Finally, it allows U.S. decision-makers the opportunity to dictate or hold significant sway over outcomes in international disputes in the shadow of significant U.S. military capability and the implied promise of unacceptableย consequences in the event that capability is unleashed.โ
The year-long study concluded that the DoD should discard its outdated risk conventions and change how it describes, identifies, assesses, and communicates strategic-level and risk-based choices. As investigative journalist Nafeez Ahmedย observed, these are the very strategies that have led to the U.S.โ declining power in the first place. Further enacting these failed strategies will only exacerbate the problem and demonstrates Americaโs refusal to go down without a fight.
The Blame Lies With Resistant States
According to Freier and his team, the dangers currently challenging the U.S. donโt just come from countries like Russia and China (and even North Korea and Iran), but also from the increasing risk of โArab Springโ-style events that could potentially erupt all over the world. One might wonder, then, why the U.S. decided to support a number of these events, even to the greatย benefit of known jihadist movementsย that already existed within them.
Ahmed also astutely points out that the report doesnโt actually substantiate its claims that countries like Russia are a genuine threat to Americaโs national security, aside from the fact that these countries seek to pursue their own core interests โ as most countries should be free to do (within reason).
According to the report,ย Iran and North Korea areย โโฆ neither the products of, nor are they satisfied with, the contemporary orderโฆ At a minimum, they intend to destroy the reach of the U.S.-led order into what they perceive to be their legitimate sphere of influence. They are also resolved to replace that order locally with a new rule set dictated by them.โ
It is notable that the report does not list Iran and North Korea as nuclear threats โ as traditionalย neoconservative propagandaย often asserts โ but simply as perceived threats to the American-led world order.
The report also found that the international framework has been restructured in ways that are โinhospitableโ and often โhostileโ to U.S. leadership. For example,ย โproliferation, diversification, and atomization of effective counter-U.S. resistance,โ as well as โresurgent but transformed great power competitionโ are seen to be at the heart of this new international restructuring.ย According to the report, the U.S. is not prepared for these circumstances, and the report seeks to provide the U.S. with guidance to deal with these emerging scenarios.
In all seriousness, hostility to the U.S. military did not develop in a vacuum โ it is quite clearly the sheer arrogance of Americaโs leadership and its incessant meddling in foreign affairs that have created a number of adversaries who areย no longer willingย to bow to American interests.
Losing The Propaganda War
Renegade Inc’s Nafeez Ahmed also notesย thatย the โhyper-connectivity and weaponization of information, disinformation, and disยญaffectionโ, the study team observes, is leading to the uncontrolled spread of information.ย The upshot is that the Pentagon faces the โinevitable elimination of secrecy and operational securityโ.
โWide uncontrolled access to technology that most now take for granted is rapidly undermining prior advantages of discrete, secret, or covert intentions, actions, or operationsโฆ In the end, senior defense leaders should assume that all defense-related activity from minor tactical movements to major military operations would occur completely in the open from this point forward.โ
This information revolution, in turn, isย leading to the โgeneralized disintegrationย of traditional authority structuresโฆ fueled, and/or accelerated by hyper-connectivity and the obvious decay and potential failure of the post-Cold War status quo.โ
Bad Facts
Among the most dangerous drivers of the risk of civil unrest and mass destabilization, the document asserts, are different categories of fact.ย Apart from the obvious โfact-freeโ, defined as information that undermines โobjective truthโ, the other categories include actual truths that, however, are damaging to Americaโs global reputation.
โFact-inconvenientโ informationย consists of the exposure of โdetails that, by implication, undermine legitimate authority and erode the relationships between governments and the governedโ โ facts, for instance, that reveal how government policy is corrupt, incompetent or undemocratic.โFact-perilousโ informationย refers basically to national security leaks from whistle-blowers such as Edward Snowden or Bradley Manning, โexposing highly classified, sensitive, or proprietary information that can be used to accelerate a real loss of tactical, operational, or strategic advantage.โ
โFact-toxicโ informationย pertains to actual truths which, the document complains, are โexposed in the absence of contextโ, and therefore poison โimportant political discourse.โ Such information is seen as being most potent in triggering outbreaks of civil unrest, because it: ย
โโฆ fatally weakens foundational security at an international, regional, national, or personal level. Indeed, fact-toxic exposures are those likeliest to trigger viral or contagious insecurity across or within borders and between or among peoples.โ
In short, the US Army War College study team believe that the spread of โfactsโ challenging the legitimacy of American empire is a major driver of its decline: not the actual behavior of the empire which such facts point to.
The โWake Up Callโ
Though the report throws the word โadaptโ around often, the U.S. is clearly not willing to adapt at all if the only way it can deal with its issues is to strengthen the very sources of said issues in the first place.ย If the only tool the U.S. has is a hammer, every problem has to look like a nail. The more problems the U.S. faces, the more nails it sees in need of quashing.
While some may laud a report in which advisors to the U.S. have acknowledged Americaโs status as a dying power, the truth, as demonstrated in this recent analysis, is that the U.S. will not give up its place in global affairs without a fight.
As the report states, the reality of this looming collapse should not be seen as defeatism, but rather, should be a โwake up call.โ
Take the Syrian conflict, for example. The more places Assadโs military liberates, theย more refugeesย are returning home and theย more concertsย are being held. Syria, Russia, and Iran have achieved these mounting successes even in the face of direct American intervention โ and yet the U.S. still refuses to leave the country. Irrespective ofย crimes committedย by the pro-Assad axis, if the ultimate objective has been to reduce the suffering in Syria and end the war, the U.S. should admit defeat and move on โ especially once ISISโ caliphate collapses entirely. But the U.S. wonโt โ and is reportedlyย considering greater involvementย in the war-torn country.
The U.S. knows it is on the brink of collapse but refuses to go down peacefully.ย From the point of view of the powers-that-be, as long as every nail of resistance can be broken, the American hammer will continue to lead the world in international affairs. But even as this report indicates, it is preciselyย becauseย of Americaโs hubris that it has found itself in this position in the first place. In this context, the report is somewhat contradictory and only further encourages the United States to provoke further hostility from aggrieved players on the world stage.
Carrying on these practices and exacerbating them is totally nonsensical, but doing so continues to be the go-to mantra of the U.S. war machine.
This article appeared at ZeroHedge.com and wasย Authored by Darius Shatahmasebi via TheAntiMedia.org: ย http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-07-19/us-military-establishment-study-admits-american-empire-collapsing