The image above is the 18th century
home of friends in Colonia, Uruguay. Today, sitting on their back patio on the
Rio de la Plata, I looked out at a small yellow buoy in the harbor that marks
the final resting place of the Lord Clive, a large, 60-gun British warship from
the 18
th century.
In 1763, we British, already at war with Spain,
decided to expand the venture to the New World. The Lord Clive arrived in
Colonia, Uruguay and began firing into the tiny town. With her heavy contingent
of cannon, her captain was confident that he could do enough damage to make the
Spanish inhabitants surrender. After extensive bombardment, the Spanish had
still not raised the white flag; however, the crew of the Lord Clive had
managed to set fire to their own ship. The fire spread quickly and it soon
became apparent that the crew must abandon ship, which they did.
Swimming ashore, local accounts of the event
have it that, the English crew apologized for bombarding the town and asked for
mercy. Not surprisingly, the Spanish killed them all.
Of course, this is not the outcome that’s
described in English history books. Although the defeat of the British on that
day is acknowledged, the folly is not. Although historians will generally
acknowledge a defeat, they’re often reluctant to mention any idiocy on the part
of their own military. And so any English language version of the story tells a
different tale from the account above.
This is a great pity, as much can be learned
from historical idiocy. Since it’s rarely taught, military leaders often make
the same idiotic mistakes that their predecessors made.
As an example, we can look at the adventures of
the US today and observe their serial invasions over the last fifteen years in
the Middle East and elsewhere. These adventures are being pursued ostensibly
“to make the world safe for democracy.” However, whenever the US takes over a
foreign country, it puts in place a puppet government – not exactly the
textbook definition of “democracy.”
And, of course, warfare is very costly.
Choosing to invade multiple countries at the same time, as the US has been
doing over the last fifteen years, is quite a bit more costly.
Worse, the US government never misses an
opportunity to portray the Russians as evil aggressors – an appellation far
more suited to the US. On one occasion after another, Russia has sought to tone
down the level of aggression, whilst the US has been conducting a shoving match
with the Russians, goading them into a conflict.
This is extraordinarily foolish, as it would
take very little to light the fuse of direct warfare between the US and Russia.
Over the centuries, quite a few countries have challenged Russia, but Russia
has always proven to be a very hard country to defeat. Although American films
about World War II tend to portray the US of having won the war against the
Germans, it was the Russians that did the lion’s share of the job. Even when
poorly armed and poorly prepared, Russia simply throws another ten or twenty
million men at the problem and ultimately wears out any attacker. Russians
don’t like war any more than any other people, but they do have astonishing
staying-power. They’ll grimly see a war through, long after their opponents
have lost heart.
In addition, China and others have stated their
support for Russia, should the US get carried away with its aggression in the
Middle East. Both China and Russia have stated that, should the US move on
Iran, they will join the fray on Iran’s side.
It would be foolhardy in the extreme for the US
government to assume that it could take these powers on and come out of the
fight victorious.
But what does this have to do with the burning
of the Lord Clive?
Well, as stated above, the Captain of the Lord
Clive had a massive warship, capable of doing a great deal of damage as he
bombarded houses including the one pictured above. But the crew became so
caught up in their zeal for destruction that they failed to extinguish a fire
on board the ship and had to dive overboard, surrendering to the Spanish who,
by that time were understandably not feeling particularly merciful.
The US is in a similar situation. It’s not
exactly in the best shape at home. The economy is on the ropes and a financial
collapse may be imminent. The government is rapidly becoming more autocratic
and a police state is likely to be instituted in the near future. It will be
needed, as funds for entitlements dry up and those who now praise the
nanny-state will find that they’ve been lied to all this time. Pension funds
also are beginning to fail and people in both the private and public sectors
will be more than a bit peevish when they discover that this rug, too, has been
pulled out from under them.
If we were to imagine the worst possible future
for the US, it might go something like this:
-
The US invades Iran, or
directly attacks Russian forces in Syria or another third country.
-
Russia retaliates and the world
takes up sides as World War III begins.
-
For the first time in
history, the American people are angrier at their own government than they are
at the trumped-up enemy their government has chosen to oppose.
-
The US government finds that
it must fight a full-blown foreign war at a time when it’s fighting a second
one at home.
-
All of the above takes place
at a time when the US is broke and is economically unable to sustain a fight on
either front.
-
The world turns against the
US for causing this fiasco and for the first time, there’s no one standing on
the same side as the US.
-
The US effort collapses and,
like the crew of the Lord Clive, the US, in effect, abandons ship and asks for
forgiveness from those it has invaded.
In the above scenario, we can imagine that the
US would have created a situation that would maximize enmity from the rest of
the world. (In 1919, Europe forced the Treaty of Versailles on Germany, not out
of necessity, but out of vengeance. It served to cripple the German people for
decades thereafter – both socially and economically.)
A final thought: Every night on American
television news programmes, pundits, politicians and retired generals perform their
sabre-rattling, stating that the world at large had better cooperate with the
US or else. Whilst this bravado may appeal to a segment of the American
population, the programming is also available to the rest of the world. We who
aren’t American and don’t reside in the US, listen to the threatening rhetoric
and find it decidedly unsettling. More to the point, the world’s leaders are also
observing the programmes. It has a similar tone to the Nazi buildup in the
1930’s. To those outside the US, US leaders are becoming increasingly
dangerous.
If this does play out along the lines of the
sinking of the Lord Clive, it will be the American people who will pay the
price for their leaders’ reckless behaviour.
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Jeff Thomas is British and resides in the Caribbean. The son of an economist and historian, he learned early to be distrustful of governments as a general principle. Although he spent his career creating and developing businesses, for eight years, he penned a weekly newspaper column on the theme of limiting government. He began his study of economics around 1990, learning initially from Sir John Templeton, then Harry Schulz and Doug Casey and later others of an Austrian persuasion. He is now a regular feature writer for Casey Research’s International Man (http://www.internationalman.com) and Strategic Wealth Preservation in the Cayman Islands.
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The author is not affiliated with, endorsed or sponsored by Sprott Money Ltd. The views and opinions expressed in this material are those of the author or guest speaker, are subject to change and may not necessarily reflect the opinions of Sprott Money Ltd. Sprott Money does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, timeliness and reliability of the information or any results from its use.
