U.S. Independence Day

The United States is celebrating its 226th birthday today, the first after last year's horrendous September 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington D.C. Ironically, right after that calamitous event, almost the entire world, including America's former foes, immediately rallied to display their solidarity and offer their support, today a few cracks are beginning to show up that may damage that cohesion. Perhaps the Fourth of July is the right moment for the U.S. to ponder for a while its very position in a world that is constantly changing. It is also a day, perhaps, on which Washington should listen to the voices coming from around the world that give expression on how others look at this sole global superpower.

Understandably, this is not an easy posture to adopt. Whatever measure we apply, the United States is an outstanding and impressive power and cannot be compared to any other in the history of the world so far. Although its population is only 4.7 percent of the global total of six billion, the U.S. has managed to achieve a GDP of 31.2 percent of the world's total, or US$31.4 trillion. It can therefore afford to allocate such a high percentage of its budget for military purposes, namely 36.3 percent of the global defense spending of $811.5 billion. An array of impressive statistics can be presented here to display the superiority of the U.S.

Perhaps it is in the nature of a sole superpower to act unilaterally on major global issues without wasting time to listen to lesser creatures, even when they happen to be traditional allies of the U.S.

However, right after Sept. 11 last year, President George W. Bush's effective pitch to the world was that the war against terrorism was not a matter that concerned the U.S. only, but the joint responsibility of countries around the world since terrorism was branded, and rightfully so, as a kind of global cancer that could threaten any country on earth.

Since then, however, we have noticed how in the previous months, the U.S. has effectively rocked that newly established coalition by its position on at least three issues. We are referring to Washington's unilateral positions toward global environmental issues, global trade and the creation of a global criminal court institution. In terms of protecting the global environment, participants at the Fourth Preparatory Committee Meeting/Ministerial Level for the World Summit on Sustainable Development, which was recently held in Bali in preparation for the upcoming Johannesburg Summit, were witness to the U.S.'s inflexible stance. The recent U.S. actions to impose special tariffs on steel imports and to grant generous subsidies to several of that country's agricultural products are raising questions about the United States' sincerity in supporting efforts to promote the establishment of an open regime in international trade.

A third case in point was illustrated by the U.S. permanent representative to the United Nations, Ambassador John Negroponte, raising his hand, practically vetoing the efficacy of the newly established International Criminal Court, even if it meant ignoring the position of its traditional allies such as Great Britain and France. That gesture conveyed the message that the U.S. has a selective understanding of what the word "coalition" really means.

The U.S.'s tendency to arrive at a new level of complications after having achieved success in overcoming previous problems has occurred several times in that country's recent modern history. On December 7, 1941, Imperial Japan took Washington by surprise with an attack that almost destroyed the U.S. Pacific Fleet anchored at Pearl Harbor. However, it managed to forge a powerful coalition and emerged victorious after World War II in 1945. It then had an excellent opportunity to build a new international order while at the same time forging a new coalition to face the Communist Bloc. Again, because of its strong economy and modern weaponry the U.S. emerged from the Cold War the victor with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. However, the post-Cold War world with the absence of a visible foe is apparently not as simple as Washington had thought.

All this reminds us of an astute observation made by a respected student of American history and teacher of Christian social ethics, Reinholt Niebuhr, who wrote in The Irony of American History (New York, 1952):

"The irony of America's quest for happiness lies in the fact that she succeeded more obviously than any other nation in making life 'comfortable', only finally to run into larger incongruities of human destiny by the same achievements by which it escaped the smaller ones."

Today, when the U.S. is celebrating its Independence Day, the world is also witnessing a large incongruity in its social culture, namely the decay that has led to the collapse of several large corporations such as Enron and WorldCom. The greediness of some of America's top CEOs to enrich themselves could hardly serve as an example for the rest of the world in the efforts to develop a competitive and efficient economy without the direct support of their governments.

Even so, given the eminence of the U.S. and its position to play a positive role in order to make the world stable and secure with a global economic system that would enable scores of developing countries to enhance the welfare of their people, we will continue to welcome the U.S.'s global eminence. Hopefully, as it becomes older and wiser it will act less self-righteously and develop a better ability to listen to others, since, however outstanding its position, it cannot act alone in a world that is becoming increasingly complex.