Empire in Denial
This week: a conversation with the historian Stephen Wertheim about Joe Biden’s foreign policy and the history of global interventions by the U.S. Hear it today at 2 pm or anytime at our site.
Here comes the Biden presidency, and with it questions about foreign policy. Robin Wright, over at the New Yorker, writes of Biden’s record to this point:
As a senator, he opposed authorizing Operation Desert Storm, to oust Saddam Hussein’s Iraq from Kuwait, in 1991 . . . He then supported the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003; it was an epic failure that dragged on for years. In 2006, he co-authored a widely criticized Op-Ed in the Times that proposed the division of Iraq into autonomous Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish statelets — the kind of territorial split that ISIS achieved by carving out a Sunni caliphate between 2014 and 2019.
The historian Stephen Wertheim joins us this week and considers what a Biden presidency might mean for foreign policy. At least Biden’s campaign for president, he says, deemphasized military action:
By the time we got to the general election campaign against Trump, he had blunted the notion that Trump would be perceived as the anti-war candidate against against somebody who was gunning for war. Biden did claim the mantle of ending the Forever Wars. And he let people know in the primary, I think it was the same debate when he said that he just wasn’t going to criticize Barack Obama on the stage, he then turned around later in the debate and let us all know that he he opposed from within the Obama administration the surge in Afghanistan, meaning that he disagreed with President Obama at that time. So I think he had a sense of where the electorate lay, the Democratic electorate at least, and the public at large.
Wertheim’s new book is Tomorrow, the World, which looks at the history of U.S. military dominance following WWII. It’s a story about a national character and attitude marred by eroding coherence. Wertheim tells us:
If we go back to the origins of American dominance, the decision for dominance, that decision was premised on a certain condition in the world. It was premised on the idea that totalitarian conquerors existed, and it would be a problem for the United States and the world for totalitarians to be the premiere powers in the world. Thus, it was either U.S. power or their power, us or them.
Now, that logic had a certain coherence to it. We can debate whether it was right or wrong or tragic or glorious, but there was a coherence to the argument. That coherence ended when the Soviet Union ended.
What happens to the inclination toward global dominance in the coming Biden years, with regard, for instance, to China? Maybe a change is on the way. Wertheim says:
I expected to see a little more China bashing out of the election in general. And Biden . . . after making a kind of move in that direction, he did not do that as heavily as he might.
And one reason might be that Donald Trump overplayed his hand on the virus, clearly trying to deflect away from his own failures to control the spread at home by blaming China for the virus that somehow he simultaneously said didn’t really matter . . . That I think has produced a backlash or a greater sensitivity among Democrats or anti-Trump people about the way China-bashing is substituting for us focusing on our own problems at home and taking responsibility for our actions.
I also think climate change is a big factor. The Biden team is concerned about climate change. Democratic voters in their own right identify climate change and pandemic disease as the top national security threats that the United States faces today. More than China, more than Russia, more than any challenge from a rival nation-state. And the fact of the matter is that if the United States is going to continue its drift into a Cold War with China, where every gain for one side is viewed as a loss for the other side in intense security competition, I struggle to see how climate change is going to come under control.
Coming Up: The Story of mRNA
Vaccines are on the way, too. It’s being called one of the most impressive feats in the history of medicine, and much of the work was advanced here in Cambridge, Mass., by Moderna. At the heart of Moderna’s discovery is its emphasis on mRNA, which looks to be the source of vaccine developments for years to come. We’re talking to Moderna’s founder, Derek Rossi, and more for next week, to figure out the kind of discovery, collaborations, and competitions that might stop one of the world’s major killers.
The Books of 2020
It’s the season for end-of-year book lists, but those feel really wrong now: so many people were too distracted to read at all in 2020. Our own end-of-year book list, then, consists of books talked about in the Open Source Universe (on the radio, in podcast form, or over at our Patreon). If the news impedes your reading, you can always listen.
Moby-Dick by Herman Melville—This book of global-but-let’s-face-it-fundamentally-American catastrophe is easily the book of the year, if not of every year. Hear our 2020 Moby-Dick show with Jonathan Lethem, Cornel West, Alexander Chee, Wyn Kelley, and Donald Pease.
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott—Our year started happily in this show with Greta Gerwig and a reflection on Alcott’s Concord.
Wagnerism by Alex Ross — Hear all about the legacy and ominous implications of not just the composer Richard Wagner, but a whole way of thinking about art, in our conversation with the New Yorker’s Alex Ross.
Conditional Citizens by Laila Lalami—Perhaps always timely: here’s a book on American citizenship beset by looming oppressions. You can find Lalami in conversation here.
Tomorrow, the World by Stephen Wertheim—This is necessary reading, and on this week’s show, Wertheim is necessary listening.
The Unreality of Memory by Elisa Gabbert—Over at our Patreon, listen to Gabbert discuss her brilliant new collection of essays on doom.
Love and Rockets by The Hernandez Brothers—This is not strictly one book, and certainly not from this year, but it might be the greatest comic book ever, and Gilbert Hernandez spoke about it during the pandemic. You can find that conversation here.
JFK by Fredrik Logevall — Here’s a crucial biography, discussed both in our show with Logevall and in our recent conversation with Steve Wertheim.
The Price of Peace by Zachary Carter—Carter enlightens (in his elegant/expansive book and on our show) on the subject of John Maynard Keynes.
Everywhere You Don’t Belong by Gabriel Bump—Elements of this new novel spoke uncannily to the news in the months after the killing of George Floyd. Here’s the conversation with Gabriel Bump.
The Arsonist by Chloe Hooper—This and all foreseeable years are apparently years of eco-catastrophe; Hooper’s tough-minded book on wildfires in Australia will expand your thinking on that grim reality. You can hear her talk about it at our Patreon.
The Age of Illusions by Andrew Bacevich — Don’t miss the conversation between Chris and Bacevich; this one, too, resonates through the latest show with Wertheim.
Baseless by Nicholson Baker—One of the world’s great novelists explores the effect of secrecy on the soul of America; the conversation with Baker is here.
Weather by Jenny Offill—Jenny Offill’s new novel is a mysterious story told in fragments about fragmentation; find her in conversation here.
Owls of the Eastern Ice by Jonathan Slaght—This is a transporting book about owls; highly recommended for when you’re weary of your own owl-free living quarters. And Slaght’s connection to owls is audible.
Philosopher of the Heart by Clare Carlisle—It’s Kierkegaard season too, and this is a wonderful Kierkegaard biography. Listen to Carlisle here.
Cool for America by Andrew Martin—Here’s a book of painful fiction about people gone wrong; reading it stings, but in a salutary way. Listen to Martin here.
Perfect Tunes by Emily Gould—Gould helped us start our online series of short conversations on reading/writing during the pandemic. You can find her in the launch of that series here; it’s a real time capsule.
Three Rings by Daniel Mendelsohn—Mendelsohn’s new book is about exile and narrative; he spoke with us about critical distance afforded by remoteness.
The Equivalents by Maggie Doherty—This inspiring group-biography considers the life and work of Anne Sexton, Maxine Kumin, Tillie Olsen, Barbara Swan, and Marianna Pineda, especially in their time at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Listen to Doherty in conversation here.
Topics of Conversation by Miranda Popkey—hear Popkey in conversation about her book of conversations, and about an inventive kind of storytelling.
Balzac’s Lives by Peter Brooks—this is a magisterial walkthrough of the essential novels of Balzac. You can find Peter Brooks talking about it all at our Patreon.
Coming Up: Who Is Erroll Garner to You
Our conversation with author and historian Robin D.G. Kelley on his 12-part podcast series about legendary pianist Erroll Garner is in the can. Look for this music-filled hour just before the holidays!
Coming Up: The Broken Heart of America
You can trace America’s history of racism and inequality through the stories of lots of post-industrial cities that emptied out their poor and Black residents. In the rise and fall of St. Louis, not far from where Harvard Af-Am history professor Walter Johnson grew up, you can get from the Lewis and Clark expedition to the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson about 200 years later. We’ll be talking to Walter early in the new year.
Listen: Resistance
Better late than never, but good TV can sometimes sidetrack the old podcast queue (The Queen’s Gambit or The Undoing anyone?). This one, from Spotify and Gimlet and hosted by writer and poet Saidu Tejan-Thomas Jr., is a series of portraits from the front lines of the BLM protests. It’s framed in the series opener with Tejan-Thomas Jr.’ s honest account of his connection to the uprising: “I’m kind of ashamed to say I was on my couch, playing video games,” he says. “I convinced myself that I was staying home because I didn’t want to catch coronavirus, but honestly, I was afraid of being let down again… I’ve marched, I’ve yelled, and yet we keep ending up right back here again.” Resistance tells a series of compelling smaller, individual stories in and around the movement — in New York City and small town Nebraska in the first three episodes.
This Week’s Ephemeral Library
Meet the Canadian Hockey dad behind COVID-19 vaccine developer Moderna. Disease experts ask themselves: why do we even bother ?Times critics talk 2020 in books (including the challenge of “pandemic blur”). Confessions of a ClintonWorld Exile. Bernie was Crushed by Neoliberalism. A.O. Scott’s movie of the year is Borat Subsequent Moviefilm. And here’s the Times list of best movies of the 21st century so far. Why We Love the Monolith.
That’s all for this week, folks. Stay warm and safe.
The OS Internationalists
