The Problem of U.S. Power

The uneven development of world economy has resulted in a disastrous split between the industrialized West and primitive East; but it has also brought another split, at the moment quite as important, between the United States and its own allies. Those theoreticians of liberalism who advance claims for American uniqueness generally do so in a spirit of eulogy, but if they were to stand back a little from the problem and see it in some historical perspective, they might make a genuine contribution. For there is a sense in which America is becoming unique. Even as it is inextricably drawn into the historical dilemmas of Europe and Asia, even as Europe and Asia become “Americanized,” there has developed in this country such a concentration of wealth and power, with so many new attendant values, as to make America increasingly isolated from the rest of the world.

Far more than good or bad will is at stake. A kind of symbiotic relationship can be traced: the decline of ...