Two Faces of Pax Americana

Much of the retrospective discussion of the American-led invasion and occupation of Iraq has centered around the ideas of crimes and mistakes, and the characterization of specific events. Although there was no lack of both crimes and mistakes, and the use of the latter characterization as an excuse to avoid condemnation for the former, the Iraq wars beginning in 1990 can be better understood in their entirety as part of an imperial project of ‘Pax Americana’ to inoculate the Middle East against the potential threat of any regional challenge to American power. The building of Pax Americana has involved both violence and deception, overt and covert methods, direct force, and indirect force through proxies, sometimes willing, sometimes manipulated. The complexity of this web of cause and effect, over time, inevitably also gives rise to self-deception, which imposes costs on the imperial project and threatens its longevity.