By John Varoli, Substack, 1/20/25
Donald Trump returns to the White House today. The fate of mankind is in his hands. He can save us from a third world war by doing the right thing — end all support to the regime in Kiev and disband NATO; put an end to U.S. militarism and imperialism, and restore the Republic. This should be his top priority. But that seems unlikely.
A republic doesn’t seek control over others. Trump’s ambitions towards Panama, Greenland, Canada and Iran indicate that it will be business as usual.
Empire is Trump’s vision, and Elon Musk — who bought the presidency with his $250 million in donations — shares that ambition. During Trump’s rally in Washington DC yesterday, Musk endorsed U.S. domination, calling “to make America strong for the rest of this century, for centuries and forever”. That sounds like a ‘code’ for building an American reich that will rule for 1,000 years.
No, I don’t want to live in a “strong” America because in the minds of our ruling class “strong” implies violence and coercion. I want to live in the American Republic. I want to live in a prosperous, moral, law-abiding and productive America. Why are so many Americans obsessed with ‘strength’ and ‘global leadership’, which are euphemisms for empire and global domination? How does that make the lives of Americans any better and safer?
Restoring the Republic means ending all foreign wars and conquests, bringing the troops home, shutting all foreign bases, and ending military alliances. These are not radical words or fanciful goals. This is the vision for America set by the Founding Fathers almost 250 years ago. If you don’t like what I write, don’t lash out at me. Lash out — if you have the arrogance — at George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, etc.
Today, America is far from its original ideals. Since the conquest of Hawaii and the Philippines in the late 1890s, the U.S. has been a rapacious and constantly expanding empire (despite the valiant but often vain efforts of those courageous Americans who are ridiculed as “isolationists”). We are told that it’s our “Manifest Destiny” — our divine right to rule the world.
But nothing is more un-American than imperialism, which has very real material consequences that we face every day — in the form of inflation and high prices due to rampant state spending and corruption. Empire also leads to a paranoid government that extinguishes our freedoms in the name of ‘national security’ as it seeks to combat exaggerated foreign threats.
The U.S. is not a “shining city on a hill”; it has no special status in the Almighty’s plan. The tragic wars of the past 35 years, as well as America’s current war against Russia and the savage slaughter in Gaza, make that very clear. For America to become truly great, we must dismantle the empire. Entirely. Without question.
Throughout the 19th century, the U.S. maintained a policy of geopolitical neutrality, allowing it to focus on economic growth and development. This policy contributed to the country’s rapid industrialization and emergence as a peaceful global economic power without the destructive conflicts that plagued Europe. As a neutral power with one of the world’s largest economies, 19th century America truly served as a model for genuine freedom and democracy for the global community.
One of the most important and now forgotten arguments for neutrality is found in George Washington’s Farewell Address (1796), when he warned against permanent alliances, of which NATO is today a prime violation. Washington recognized that involvement in foreign disputes would drain national treasure, divide the nation, and endanger the very independence that the country had fought to secure. (All of which has sadly come true today).
Thomas Jefferson, too, recognized that foreign entanglements could corrupt our government and dilute its republican ideals. Also, the notion of a permanent military was condemned by the Founding Fathers, who recognized that a massive standing army would lead to tyranny, which is what we’ve had since 1945.
In 1821, John Quincy Adams, the country’s most experienced and prominent diplomat, and a future president, aptly expressed the sentiment of the early Republic. Aware that his rapidly growing country would become a global economic power, Adams warned the U.S. not to get involved in foreign wars.
“[The U.S.] goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.
She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all.
She is the champion and vindicator only of her own…
“[The U.S] well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy,
and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom.
The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force….
She might become the dictatress of the world. She’d be no longer the ruler of her own spirit….”
Yes, World War 2 was a righteous cause, but immediately after it ended the U.S. should have returned home and stayed home. Instead, under the influence of the British ruling class, the U.S. became involved in a competition with the Soviet Union, igniting proxy wars across the globe for decades. In 2001, this was followed by a crusade against a vague and undefined enemy — “global terrorism”, which in fact was merely an imperial war against the Middle East.
However, as we know all too well — the war is not meant to be won, it’s meant to drag on for decades. We could have negotiated with the Soviets in the late 1950s and ended the Cold War, but we chose not to. We could have refrained from getting involved in the Middle East, but we let Israel drag us into its affairs.
Today, our ruling class has new crusades — against Russia, Iran and China. These external threats are fabricated and exploited to scare the American people into accepting a foreign policy that is neither vital to our national interests nor aligned with our principles. In the meantime, our parasitic ruling class grows wealthy as the state spends trillions of taxpayer dollars on national security, war and conquest.
Imperial-globalists (both liberal and conservative) claim that if the U.S. retrenches from the international arena then there’ll be more wars and chaos. That is not true.
In an effort to remake the world in its image, the U.S. often imposes its values on others through the barrel of a gun. This only creates more instability and resentment, rather than fostering goodwill. We must stop being an oppressive ‘global gendarme’ that interferes in the affairs of almost every other country.
The desire to project American power and intervene in the affairs of other nations always has unintended and unforeseen consequences. Take, for example, Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Bin-Laden in Afghanistan — both were on the CIA payroll during the Cold War. But those unruly vassals came back to haunt us. Likewise, I suspect Ukrainian terrorism will become a huge problem for the West in the coming years, as irate Azov Nazis will feel used and betrayed by Washington.
In reaction to the U.S. abuse of its vast economic and military power over the past 35 years, most countries today support a multipolar world based on non-interference and mutual respect for national interests. We should join them.
By adopting a policy of neutrality and non-interference, the U.S. would avoid bloody and costly quagmires, and could focus on rebuilding its own infrastructure, economy, and social fabric. Neutrality would ensure that the U.S. remains a genuine beacon of peace and stability in the world. This would be true leadership. Only then would America be great again — as the Founding Fathers envisioned nearly 250 years ago.