The Jeffersonian Empire of Liberty is being confronted by its own temporality. The “Unipolar Moment” which the Jeffersonians have been trying to build throughout the early 20th century has come to an end. America’s fiscal health is hardly suitable for waging a conventional war with anyone. Even if the Jeffersonians raise the Debt Ceiling and cut Federal spending, the Quantity of Schuld in the US National Debt continues to climb. As long as the US continues to amass more and more Schuld, it will become increasingly difficult for the Jeffersonians to exert power through the Empire of Liberty. Thus, it becomes inevitable for the Jeffersonians to change their tune on the military traditions of the Germans and Japanese.
The Reader might be perplexed as to why I refer to Germany and Japan as “West Germany” and “Post-1945 Japan” respectively. What we know as “Germany” today is essentially the continuation of old West Germany. Today’s Japan is shaped by the circumstances of post-1945 conditions like the Lost Decades.
In West Germany, there is the belief that the German-speaking world must constantly atone for the past instead of using the past as an opportunity to build a new legacy (which was what East Germany tried doing). We find a reverse trend in post-1945 Japan, where the belief has been to overlook the past or to recontextualize it in such a way that inconvenient events must be raised by other nations. The two nations, because they were supported militarily by the Empire of Liberty, invested significant efforts on their Market/Mixed Economies and Fractional-Reserve Banking Systems.
This trend throughout the late 20th century influenced how they approached the establishments of their own militaries. Post-1945 Japan was always looking for ways to bypass the constitutional limitations on its Self-Defense Forces, the precedents for which were provided by the PRC and the DPRK. For West Germany, Europe was entering the EU/NATO and Post-Soviet Russia is nowhere as powerful as the old Soviet Union.
Even so, one cannot help but realize how the Jeffersonians, the PRC, and Post-Soviet Russia are trying to get the Japanese and West Germans to remilitarize themselves in a world where the Unipolar Moment is collapsing. There has been a lot of rhetoric in West Germany and Japan about a desire to spend more Kapital on the Bundeswehr and Self-Defense Force and figure out where to earn that Kapital. But in all seriousness, it has been mostly rhetoric and not enough substance. The Jeffersonians in Washington, like Moscow and Beijing, are still wondering whether Berlin and Tokyo are serious enough about rearming themselves over the next several years. Never mind whether those endeavors would even be considered successful from economic and fiscal standpoints.
Why has it been mostly rhetorical? Up until recently, the German-speaking world has been skirting around the idea that it could rely on Russia for its energy needs and America for its defense needs. After Russia’s intervention, West Germany decided that it could no longer conduct itself within those parameters. Unlike East Germany, West Germany is a Liberal Capitalist Parliamentary Democracy committed to the EU/NATO, whose commitments are being tested by the US and others.
At the same time, France and Poland view West Germany as a threat to their own ambitions for the EU/NATO. The Polish are striving to become the vanguard of Neoliberal ambitions in Eastern Europe, going as far as to demonstrating a desire to have the largest military on the continent. The French, on the other hand, know that they and the West Germans are the two prominent key players of an EU/NATO that had just witnessed the UK’s abandonment of the EU. What the Polish and French are convinced on is that this new wave of German rearmament is a ploy by West Germany to gain the favor of Jeffersonians, whose relations were somewhat strained during the Trump Presidency.
From a Hamiltonian standpoint (as opposed to a Jeffersonian one), what can be said about the recent rhetoric about West German and Post-1945 Japanese rearmament? In essence, the Jeffersonians can no longer provide the national defenses of West Germany and Post-1945 Japan like it did over the past few decades. The idea that the Empire of Liberty could be sustained by America alone is fiscally unsustainable and so the Jeffersonians are expecting Berlin and Tokyo to spend more Kapital on supporting the Empire of Liberty. These pacificist and antiwar tendencies among the West Germans and Japanese were only there to consolidate their commitments to Neoliberalism, commitments which they must continue to uphold even in their Military-Industrial Complexes. There is no denying this fact in light of recent events.
Categories: Politics
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