"The first great surprise attack in American history -- the British burning of Washington in 1814 -- effected Thomas Jefferson's empire of liberty: the liberty the republican experiment had produced could only flourish within an empire that provided safety. So emerged the John Quincy Adams strategy of seeking control over the continent, by unilateral means where possible, through preemptive action where necessary, and by granting statehood to the newly acquired territories. Empire and liberty had indeed become compatible.

"Rather than continuous coercion and abridgement of liberty, this empire remained one based on continental hegemony, ideological example, and commercial opportunity -- until the second great surprise attack, at Pearl Harbor in 1941. Empire and liberty could still coexist, but now the military and economic strength of the United States would have to be extended to restore and preserve an international balance of power in which democracies would be secure." This global empire of liberty emerged from hot and cold wars victorious and with a new name: the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

"The third great surprise attack -- that of September 11, 2001 -- made it clear that the surviving authoritarian regimes, even if feeble or failing, can breed terrorists capable of attacking NATO nations with devastating results on their own soil.

"Some NATO nations, therefore, have called for another expansion of the empire of liberty: to no longer respect the sovreignty of any state that harbors terrorists; to preempt such threats wherever they appear; to extend democracy everywhere.

"Unfortunately, this expansion would produce what Adams himself warned against: a dictatress of the world that deliberately goes abroad in search of monsters to destroy -- lest those monsters destroy it.

"Rather, these NATO nations should seek to make the world safe for the federalism of Adam Smith and Alexander Hamilton, which has served the U.S. in particular, as well as the cause of freedom in general, and NATO itself, remarkably well. All the more reason, then, for these nations not to discard it lightly now that NATO has the opportunity to do so much designing: to design something we are ready [like good Queen Bess] to fight for, something worth taking responsibility for, something which always offers the hope for a better life."

J. L. Gaddis, Surprise, Security, and the American Experience, Harvard U. Press, 2004

It is time for the U.K. and U.S. to get with the program and think imperially, which means to think always of something higher and more vast than their own self-serving national interests. And it is time for the other NATO nations to stop watching cartoons, kick out Belgium and France, and start contributing to the 21st century.

"Let tyrants fear. Therefore I am come amongst you, as you see, resolved, in the the midst and heat of the battle, to live or die amongst you; to lay down for my God, and for my kingdom, and for my people, my honour and my blood, even in the dust. I myself will take up arms; I myself will be your general, judge, and rewarder of every one of your virtues in the field." (Queen Elizabeth, to her army along the Thames, with the Spanish Armada off the coast, 1588)

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"To the colonists whom Caesar sent to found or people a score of cities from Gibraltar to the Black Sea, he gave Roman or Latin rights, and evidently hoped to extend Roman citizenship to all free adult males in the Empire; the Senate was then to represent not a class in Rome but the mind and will of every province. This conception of government, the most resented [and fatal] of Caesar's undertakings, completed the miracle whereby the youthful spendthrift and roisterer had become one of the ablest, bravest, fairest, and most enlightened men in all the sorry annals of politics." (Will Durant, Caesar and Christ, Simon & Schuster, 1944)

Last modified: 4/6/2006