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December 24, 2006
Decline and Fall
Here is a bit I posted at my place a few days ago. It fits in with the themes often seen here at Classical Values. === Commenter Karridine alerted me to this interesting piece by Orson Scott Card on the decline and fall of the Roman Empire. Card's central thesis is that trade made the empire and its people richer and that the empire fell because trade was no longer safe. Trade breaks down as merchants lose confidence and markets are disrupted by barbarian invaders. When this happens, specialization becomes impossible, local areas must become agriculturally and militarily self-sufficient again, and between disease, famine, war, and emigration, populations crash.Then he asks the most important question of the day. Can it happen to us? For a century, America has been the great cushion to absorb the shocks that might have brought down western civilization. In the Great War (WWI), Europe crashed its own population through war and then crashed further through the influenza epidemic. But the American economy provided the means for France and Britain -- but not Germany -- to recover. Arguably, it was the failure to include Germany in the recovery that led to repeated economic crises, and when America finally joined Europe with its own Depression in the 1930s, the stage was set for the next barbarian invasion.He discusses the German and Japanese barbarians of WW2 and why it was good that America defeated them. He then goes on to discuss the American "imperial" system. In the aftermath of WWII, once again America was the economic cushion -- only this time the portion of Germany under western occupation was included in the economic recovery, as was Japan.He then goes on to discuss China and Russia and the different path's they have taken. He is not optimistic about either country. Then he discusses how the American system could fall to the barbarians. Here's how it happens: America stupidly and immorally withdraws from the War on Terror, withdrawing prematurely from Iraq and leaving it in chaos. Emboldened, either Muslims unite against the West (unlikely) or collapse in a huge war between Shiites and Sunnis (already beginning). It almost doesn't matter, because in the process the oil will stop flowing.He points out what I have and so many others have said over and over. At this time oil is the life blood of civilization. Without it there will be a huge die off. Card looks at what America might become without world trade and imported oil. ...our own oil production cannot meet the demands of transportation and production at current levels. Rationing will cripple us. We will not be able to maintain our huge fleet of trucks. Air travel will becoming shockingly expensive and airlines will fail or consolidate. We won't even be allowed to drive our cars on long trips because gasoline will be rationed.A similar crash of global trade happened in the aftermath of the European wars of the 20th century. Starting in 1914 it did not fully recovered until 50 years from the end of the last of the European shooting wars. We many not be so lucky this time. Fortunately we have an ace in the hole. However, we had better get cracking. This new source of energy will take 5 years to prototype and probably 10 years to roll out. There is no time to waste. posted by Simon on 12.24.06 at 09:57 PM
Comments
cryinginthewilderness, Doubts are one thing. Evidence is something else. Got any? Libertarian Saint Jefferson understood the value of protecting free trade. One of the many places I agree with him. BTW Saint Adam Smith showed the value of specialization which free trade encourages. Saint David Riccardo had a few things to say about specialization as well. This is all old stuff. Got anything newer or better in opposition? When the Libertarians take the Communist line on world affairs there is something irrational going on. Something out of touch with reality. Didn't Libertarians used to be free traders? Didn't they at one time favor an end to piracy? And to think I joined the Libs because Communists didn't get economics. Utopianists are the same every where. The socialists require a world full of the New Socialist Men for their plan to work. Libertarians require a world full of the New Libertarian Men. My attitude is that thieves, brigands, and pirates must be put down at the point of a gun if civilization is to work. It is sad that the US Congress understands the world better than Libertarians. US Policy On Tyranny. Well maybe not so sad. Libertarians are for the most part unelectable. I'm doing my part to make sure it stays that way. M. Simon · December 26, 2006 08:06 PM All the more reason to move ahead as fast as possible with switching to non-fossil-fuel energy sources. However, there are sources of oil outside the Middle East which would not be affected by a Sunni-Shiite conflict. That would, at least, mitigate the effects. Such a conflict would be unlikely to last for "two generations" with enough intensity to keep all the Middle East's oil turned off. If it did, a crash program of technological development in the US could shift our economy over to non-fossil-fuel sources in far less time than that. If the worst came to the worst, a lot of the Middle East's oil is in thinly-populated areas which could be secured militarily by the US, if the effects of a shut-off at home were really so dire. As for Europe, an economic collapse seems more likely to stimulate the growth of violent, xenophobic nativism (as it has in the past), which would very likely be directed against the Muslim minority, especially if the economic crash had been caused by Muslim violence in the Middle East, and if Sunnis and Shiites were also fighting each other in Europe. I'm generally suspicious of scenarios in which a crisis in one area (such as energy) leads to a cascading catastrophic failure of the entire US-dominated global system. If the system were really that fragile, it would have collapsed a long time ago. Infidel753 · December 28, 2006 07:43 AM |
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Hi,
We hear this cri de coeur from time to time. Here's the way it really is: If you leave the American economy alone it will adjust to any change in circumstances. Can things get difficult? You damn right. Will the USA descend into barbarism? I have very strong doubts.