Quote from: Annwyn on November 08, 2008, 12:10:27 AMAlthough looking historically, glory was always returned to nations that conquested... Egypt's greatest age was in her conquest, some with Greece, same with Rome, same with Syria, same with China, same with the UK... so, why not the US?
That's an interesting thought, but is it borne-out by fact? Not necessarily. One might note the six following examples I can think of off the spur to say instead: perhaps such a pov becomes an investment of the way history is written and by whom.
Political historians until Braudel, tended to focus on wars and politico-economic hegemony. They looked/look at imperial governments and decided that a certain period was a particular place's "golden age" or "greatest age." Often enough that has to do with an empire's "greatest extent" through conquest.
But, when one looks at "Old Europe" in the Danube Basin 5000 or more years ago, Minoan Crete, Heian Japan, Renaissance Italy and Languedoc (Provence/the Toulousaine/Bordeaux/Perigord during the 12th and 13th centuries) one doesn't find huge outer-directed enterprises other than economic ones going on. Yet all of those civilzations were "advanced" for their periods.
In the case of Old Europe the one thing not found yet in what seems to have been a highly-evolved and dynamic culture that ran roughly from Budapest to Ploesti and down into northern Greece (as it is today) is the absence of any fortifications of any kind. Much smaller (area-extent) and less-vibrant cultures in Anatolia, Mesopotamia and the Nile Valley of roughly the same time show evidence of fortifications. The presumption is that in the fortified cultures there were wars and conquests, thus the fortifications for protection.
Old Europe didn't have those, yet from other finds of artifacts one discovers that goods (non-organic goods) from all four of those other cultures made their way to Central Europe by means, no doubt, of trade.
Heian Japan formed a delicate and beautiful civilization where, although fights amongst clans did occur, there was no imperialistic expansion to speak of. Again the impetus was economic not martial as the evidence of trade with China, Korea and the Phillipines is in evidence from that period.
Minoan Crete, again, although a vibrant and strong civilization shows no major evidence of fortifications until very late in it's existence as the Dorians began to raid it. Yet, again, it's merchant trade was huge with the Hittites, Babylonians, Egyptians and even the Harappan civilization of the Indus Valley. Not through the means of warfare were the Minoans imperial; they used economic-strength and a de facto dominance of sea-faring.
Harappan civilization shows a wide-spread culture that included the Indus Valley, what was then the Sarasvati Valley (Now mostly the Thar desert probably due to the river changes in the Sarasvati due to seismic activity) and the Central Ganges Valley. Again trade routes to the north, east and west had to have existed as Mesopotamian, Egyptian, and artifacts from the Yangtze Valley are numerous. What isn't numerous are evidence of fortifications.
Both Renaissance Italy and the "troubador" civilization of Provence showed tremendous internecine struggles but no "projected" warfare. Yet each culture is generally regarded as light-years ahead of the other European cultures of their times. Since there are written historical records from those cultures we are aware that they were warlike inside the parameters of their own lands, but used trade and economic influence to establish and maintain flourishing cultures.
QuoteEven if it is for oil though, I don't ->-bleeped-<-ing get what the problem is. We've got bigger guns, better trained military, and better standards of living. The Iraqi people have everything to gain from being conquered and absorbed into America.
Atlantic seaboard cities in the 1760s and 1770s had much to commend a continuing relationship with the British Empire. In doing so they had military protection, huge economic advantages through British imperial trade networks that spanned into the Far East, the Near East and Europe.
Yet a desire to propogate their own trade without the restrictions "for the good of the Empire" and what they found to be regressive taxation: until the 1760s the Brits had operated military and economic networks without taxation to any degree of the colonials, stirred a desire to have a separate political state from what was obviously in the best-interest of all the colonial lands: to remain in the British Empire.
Yet, as we know, they revolted to make their own self-government.
Economically and even socially Cuba and the Phillipines had many advantages in being part of the USA-empire. Yet, again, they decided instead to run-liberation movements instead and strive for their own political and economic independence. Why?
I think the desire of folks to run their own show often trumps any perceived economic or social advantages of being amalgamated into a "higher" civilization.
I imagine German peoples living east of the Rhine and north of the Danube could literally see material advantages in the Pax Romana across the rivers. Yet, they made tremendous struggles in warfare to avoid being absorbed, and succeeded, although one could imagine a high cost culturally and economically to them. They still longed to "do it their own way."
Nichole
