Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic (American Empire Project) | Chalmers Johnson

Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic (American Empire Project) | Chalmers Johnson | "Let our object be...nothing but our country"

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Nemesis: The Last ...

	Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic (American Empire Project) Chalmers Johnson Metropolitan Books, 2007 - 368 pages average customer review:based on 70 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

The long-awaited final volume of Chalmers Johnson?s bestselling
Blowback trilogy confronts the overreaching of the American empire and the threat it poses to the republic
In his prophetic book Blowback, Chalmers Johnson linked the CIA?s clandestine activities abroad to disaster at home. In The Sorrows of Empire, he explored the ways in which the growth of American militarism and the garrisoning of the planet have jeopardized our stability. Now, in Nemesis, he shows how imperial overstretch is undermining the republic itself, both economically and politically.
Delving into new areas?from plans to militarize outer space to Constitution-breaking presidential activities at home and the devastating corruption of a toothless Congress?Nemesis offers a striking description of the trap into which the dreams of America?s leaders have taken us. Drawing comparisons to empires past, Johnson explores in vivid detail just what the unintended consequences of our dependence on a permanent war economy are likely to be. What does it mean when a nation?s main intelligence organization becomes the president?s secret army? Or when the globe?s sole ?hyperpower,? no longer capable of paying for the vaulting ambitions of its leaders, becomes the greatest hyper-debtor of all times?
In his stunning conclusion, Johnson suggests that financial bankruptcy could herald the breakdown of constitutional government in America?a crisis that may ultimately prove to be the only path to a renewed nation.

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A Great American Patriot

Chalmers Johnson is one of America's greatest heroes for writing INFORMATIVE books that display his critical thinking. We must know what is going on with our American country and we must understand that the mainstream media is part of the empire umbrella. (For example, if you saw the movie, Charlie Wilson's War, you'll be intrigued to learn of the REAL Charlie Wilson in Chalmers' book). What struck me first and foremost as I was reading this book is the insight and intelligence Chalmers has about his subject. He informs us of some incredible facts, such as: The U S spends more on its armed forces than all other nations on earth combined, and that the U S has military bases in more than 130 countries! A critical thinker must ask him/herself why this is so. These are very important facts when reading political books about our United States of America because they help us to understand what is really going on, as explained in the book, Don't Weep for Me, America: How Democracy in America Became the Prince (While We Slept) Chalmers explains the relationship between big American corporations, such as ITT and the U S Government, and how the President's private army the CIA factors in. Chalmers discusses the 9/11 Commission and says, "...the fix was in..." And then in gutsy investigative detail, he says, "The Senate Intelligence Committee, the 9/11 Commission, and the CIA's Iraq Survey Group, under Charles Duelfer, all reported that the CIA's intelligence on Iraqi WMD was largely fictitious. Even more dangerous for the White House, these reports suggested that much of this intelligence had been manufactured by neoconservative officials in the Pentagon long eager to invade Iraq." But Chalmers doesn't stop there. He gives a very brief historical context for such governmental subversion by writing, "at the apex of those who profited from British-style "free trade" at the end of the nineteenth century was the Rothschild Bank, then by far the world's largest financial institution with total assets of around forty-one million pounds sterling. It profited enormously from the wars-some seventy-two of them-during Queen Vicotria's reign and financied such exploiters of Africa as Cecil Rhodes"-see my review: Rhodes: Race for Africa. It can't be easy to inform the American public of such an evil government without crossing the line of "unacceptability". Chalmers Johnson is brilliant in his scope and his scholarship. Read him and you'll understand why Tocqueville wrote in his "Democracy in America" in 1835 that civilization has perfected despotism. And then you'll understand Chalmers subtitle: "The Last Days of the American Republic".

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"Let our object be...nothing but our country"

Nemesis (2006) is the final book in Johnson's trilogy, following Blowback in 2000, and The Sorrows of Empire in 2004. It is a warning call to Americans in our interdependent world that our foreign policy actions have consequences, and that we cannot continue to guide our destiny through aggressive use of military power. Nemesis is well researched with scores of citations. It poses alarming questions, such as: 1) is our political system capable of saving the US in the face of the DOD and unaccountable government spending? and 2) What are the effects of having the US maintain so many bases in foreign lands? and 3) Is "military Keynesianism" a sustainable policy?

Johnson draws some historical lessons from the empires of Rome, which tried to maintain a far flung empire but eventually lost its government, and Britain, which gave up its distributed empire for the benefit of more robustly sustaining England. He devotes a chapter examining the CIA as an agency of foreign policy and the effects of US military bases in foreign countries. He has many surprising facts, such as there are more people of Lebanese descent in Brazil than in Lebanon, and that post WWII Japanese pacifism is a fiction.

Johnson considers space the next battleground and describes the currently deployed ground-based missile defense as a `dual use' system with the potential offensive purpose of shooting down satellites. Johnson's description of the future battleground of space is quite thought provoking and alarming, whatever your attitudes about the efficacy of military preparedness and the use of force. He points out the collateral damage likely during earth orbit warfare will have detrimental consequences for everyone, as the debris clouds will affect all communication satellites. Johnson states that our government operating in shadows of secrecy is not what the Constitutional framers intended, and the public should have access to information about the activities of our government.

This book is depressing in its hard-edged assessments of the future of the US, and is a signal alarm to that it may already be too late influence a more secure and sustainable nation for successive generations.

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Great Read

Thorough, chilling and compelling read. I want to read other titles by the author now.

An outstanding scholarly study

This book brings a critical eye to bear on trends in the United States today and relates them to developments over time in the Roman and British empires. The writer examines the United States as an empire today and raises questions on whether we can preserve our democratic character while retaining and enlarging our grip on areas in the world that we now hold or control. This is an outstanding scholarly work by a highly regarded historian.

Articulate, Provocative, and Interesting

Each work in this author's trilogy (`Blowback' 2000, `'The Sorrows of Empire' 2004, and `Nemesis' 2006) raises questions about the wisdom of post WWII American policy, with abundant examples that include counterproductive military base leases (leading to routine local outrages) to the not-so-public black operations that very often misfire and result in the opposite effect of the original intentions.

Each of these books is well written and well worth reading. The subject is vital to anyone concerned with our status, and (more importantly) with the ideals that founded, sustained, and made the United States a great nation.

Highly recommended -you decide.

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