Idle Thoughts: 04.11.06

Sorry for not posting much today. This is just a random article that hopefully everyone will enjoy. My friend and I are watching an On Demand (the best invention ever) episode of The History Channel's hour-long show on Japan's atomic bomb program. It got me thinking about geopolitics, about geography, and about good old fashion luck. Allow me to elaborate.

For my economic goodies, there's GaveKal. For all around excellence, there's 13D. And for geopolitics, there's the "private CIA" aka Stratfor. While watching The History Channel video, I was reminded of an article on Stratfor, which unfortunately I can't link to because it's a subscription site. However, allow me to paraphrase, in bullet form:

• "As a geographically isolated continental power, the United States has far more wiggle room in its geographic straitjacket than do most countries, but what Washington does is -- to a large degree -- dictated by where the United States is."
• They go on to outline five themes that dominate U.S. strategy.
• Consolidate control over North America - Essentially, a large degree of our power comes from our control over all of North America. They cite the 1803 Louisiana Purchase as the moment when "the United States immediately attained the potential to become a global power." The United States must maintain control over the three coasts: Atlantic, Pacific, Gulf.
• Secure strategic depth for the continental United States - As Stratfor has written before, New Orleans is the center of gravity of the United States. One of the reasons Katrina was so scary was New Orleans location at the point where the Mississippi meets the Gulf of Mexico. It is an essential artery in our national transport system. The War of 1812 was fought to force Canada to a position of geopolitical insignificance, which persists to this day. The Mexican war of 1846-1848 did the same to Mexico, and "push[ed] Mexican forces roughly 1,000 miles away from New Orleans." The Monroe Doctrine has been an essential tool in maintaining American control of the Western hemisphere.
• Control sea approaches to the North American continent - As any fan of Tom Clancy knows, Iceland is an important ally primarily because of its location. The same for Alaska and modern-day Hawaii, which were both acquired for their geography. Access to our continent is a vital interest.
  
• Dominate the oceans - Today, America has the foremost navy in the world. Based on a web of nations across the world that, either directly or indirectly, respond to United States needs, "there is no place on the waters that the United States cannot reach or affect, nor is there a fleet that the United States cannot find, monitor and ultimately sink."
• Keep Eurasia divided - Stratfor cites this as "far and away" the most important part of the strategy. The entire 20th century, Eurasia was defined by war. First two world wars kept the entire landmass in turmoil with itself. After World War II, the Cold War pitted Russia against Western Europe. Today, as China rises economically, politically, and militarily, America has supported "a return of Japanese militancy" and sponsored "an informal Indian hegemony in South Asia," including a generous nuclear deal for India today. "Only a continental power can truly challenge another continental power" and "So long as Eurasia is divided and fighting with itself, it cannot contemplate targeting the United States."

Needless to say, I strongly recommend Stratfor.com for anyone interested in the real shape of the world.

Back to Japan's Atomic Bomb. The show explains that Japan was very close to beating America in the race to produce an atomic bomb. Indeed, a German U-boat was on its way to Japan with 1000 tons of badly needed uranium for their program, when Hitler committed suicide and the Germans surrendered. Several reasons contributed to America's first place finish. First, there were four possible designs for creating the bomb. While America had the economic resources to pursue all four, Japan had enough money for only one. Second, Japan had no reliable source for uranium, thus launching the aforementioned U-boat. The United States, on the other hand, had ready access to uranium. I couldn't help but think of how our complete geopolitical control over our hemisphere and the unity of our continent helped contribute to our ultimate victory of the Axis forces.

History truly is written by the victors. Firebomb raids made by the U.S. on Tokyo before the atomic bomb was dropped killed 100,000 civilians in a horrible, fiery death. We put our own citizens in camps, because of their nationality. Now please don't hate me, I'm not a super liberal or anything like that, but I'm just making a point. Had the Axis powers won, what would be the world consensus on each country's motives? Would America have been doomed to 50 years of military and political insignificance like Germany and Japan? Who knows. Just some idle thoughts I had.

Comments

[Dan Marques]

True...scary to thing about...but true

[Brian]

Had the Axis powers won, what would be the world consensus on each country's motives?

Since we live on the East Coast, the consensus would be chiefly in German. :)

That said, it is unlikely that we could have sat idle for much longer - FDR authorized sinking German ships in the North Atlantic. Even if Hitler didn't invoke the treaty with the Japanese (what a well thought out alliance that was!), we would have eventually entered after we dealt with the threat to our hegemony in the Pacific.

On the subject of the Japanese bomb, the rich irony is that the industrial base in Manchuria, wedded to the resources of Outer Mongolia, might have been enough for the bomb. The Chinese set up facilities in Lop Nor, which is technically in Xinjiang SAR but is close enough to Mongolia for resources to be transferred.

[Me]

Brian, I think I could probably start a blog just quoting your comments. Thank you for that insightful note.