The Donelson Files

Margaret Thatcher viewed Europe as Community of nations, allowed to keep their identity but also one free trade system from Central Europe running through London. In her speech to the College of Europe and now claimed the Burges speech and her first principles was “My first guiding principle is this: willing and active cooperation between independent sovereign states is the best way to build a successful European Community.”   Note the word independent sovereign states, for Thatcher, this was not a Union but a European Community.  She was not opposing European integration or Britain role in Europe and noted, “Europe will be stronger precisely because it has France as France, Spain as Spain, and Britain as Britain, each with its own customs, traditions and identity. It would be folly to try to fit them into some sort of identikit European personality.”  Translation, she favored a Europe Community in which kept their identity and not adopt a European Union identity that overshadowed nations own identity. 

She warned, “Europe is stronger when we do so, whether it be in trade, in defence or in our relations with the rest of the world. But working more closely together does not require power to be centralised in Brussels or decisions to be taken by an appointed bureaucracy…Indeed, it is ironic that just when those countries such as the Soviet Union, which have tried to run everything from the centre, are learning that success depends on dispersing power and decisions away from the centre, there are some in the Community who seem to want to move in the opposite direction…We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to see them re-imposed at a European level with a European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels.”  She envisioned a Europe with independent nations and free trade among each nations, encouraging market reforms including in the soon to be freed nations liberated from the Soviet Empire.  She opposed a European Union that re-imposed a power from a central location.

Her second principles was based on “Community policies must tackle present problems in a practical way, however difficult that may be.” In dealing with Agricultural policies, she noted, “We must continue to pursue policies which relate supply more closely to market requirements, and which will reduce over-production and limit costs.”  This reinforces her view on the importance of markets and enterprise as she noted, “My third guiding principle is the need for Community policies which encourage enterprise…If Europe is to flourish and create the jobs of the future, enterprise is the key…The basic framework is there: the Treaty of Rome itself was intended as a Charter for Economic Liberty…But that it is not how it has always been read, still less applied…The lesson of the economic history of Europe in the 70’s and 80’s is that central planning and detailed control do not work and that personal endeavour and initiative do…That a State-controlled economy is a recipe for low growth and that free enterprise within a framework of law brings better results…The aim of a Europe open to enterprise is the moving force behind the creation of the Single European Market in 1992. By getting rid of barriers, by making it possible for companies to operate on a European scale, we can best compete with the United States, Japan and other new economic powers emerging in Asia and elsewhere…And that means action to free markets, action to widen choice, action to reduce government intervention.”  She viewed Europe as individual nations, acting in their interest but also trading with each other while encouraging competition within the European community and allowing the rise of a market economy capable of competing on the world stage with United States and other economic powers including those that rising nations including China and India.

The fourth principle she wanted, was “My fourth guiding principle is that Europe should not be protectionist…The expansion of the world economy requires us to continue the process of removing barriers to trade, and to do so in the multilateral negotiations in the GATT…It would be a betrayal if, while breaking down constraints on trade within Europe, the Community were to erect greater external protection…We must ensure that our approach to world trade is consistent with the liberalisation we preach at home.”  She wanted not just the spread of market but she also wanted to open up new markets.  She would be disappointed with what she sees in not just EU but also in America on the trade issue. 

Thatcher wanted to build upon the institution already built including NATO for defense but within a short period, she saw that her vision for Europe was not shared. Thatcher ended up opposing the formation of the EU and in a speech given in 1992, she noted, “When Britain joined the ERM we believed not that it was a fixed rate system but an adjustable one. However, when it was treated as a stage towards a single currency it became far more rigid. Devaluations and revaluations were increasingly frowned upon. And so the trouble began. For no fixed exchange rate system—be it the gold standard or Bretton Woods—has been sustainable. Unless there is some adjustment to the realities of the market and capital movements, the devil will always take the hindmost. The strongest currency will always make the running.”  She favored a floating regime of different currency but when she figured out that ERM would be formation of a single currency, she opposed EU integration since she feared that this would leading to a European Super state, She noted, “We must return to the policy of domestic monetary control that worked throughout most of the 1980s, cutting inflation from over 20 per cent to under four per cent while the economy expanded…Such an economic strategy for sustained growth and sound money will require the firmest possible leadership. It will mean rigorous control of public spending and borrowing, enabling the lower interest rates and lower taxes that boost investment, output and jobs. Above all, it requires confidence—the confidence that we had in the 1980s that we can manage our own monetary policy and economic affairs without depending on anyone else.”  Thatcher did not trust the Euro and felt that Great Britain should have the flexibility to follow its own destiny and noted that Britain needed to have its own ability to deal with inflation, favored domestic monetary control.

 She predicted the problems of single currency when she stated, “And that leads directly on to Maastricht. That treaty’s goal of European economic and monetary union looks even more impossible after recent events. At least under the ERM there was an escape hatch—as Britain and Italy found three weeks ago; but there would be none under a single currency, which remains the objective of the treaty.”  While British did not accept the Euro, Italy did and Thatcher viewed the single currency would close any escape hatch, something that the EU wanted.

She put the two vision side by side, “There have been two visions of Europe competing with each other in recent years. There is, first, the federalist vision of a Europe run increasingly from Brussels, united by a common citizenship, harmonised by bureaucratic regulations, equipped with common economic, budgetary, foreign and defence policies, using a single currency and acquiring all the flags, anthems and symbols of nationhood: all in all, a United States of Europe in embryo…Then there is what might be called the “con-federal” concept of a Europe of nation states, based upon the idea of co-operation between independent sovereign countries loosely linked in a free trade area, with competition between differing tax and regulatory systems and with freely floating currencies. This “confederal” Europe would accommodate the countries of Eastern Europe and give them a reasonable stability. It would maintain, not jeopardise, our relationship with Europe’s great friend and protector, the United States.”  She foresaw the formation of a bureaucratic EU and its impact including possibility injuring its long term relations with the United States.  Her vision of independent sovereign nations would not only led to a more confident Europe but it would have most likely to have alleviated the populist mode that is riding across Europe since each nation sovereignty would have been recognized and reduce the tension that between nationalism revival against a bureaucratic Super state.

While She called for re-negotiation of British links with the European Union, and she never called or withdrawal but did recommended that British should pull out of common agricultural, fisheries as well as joint foreign and defense policies.  She wrote, “Most of the problems the world has faced have come from mainland Europe, and the solutions from outside it.”

Thatcher’s argument served as a basis for Brexit and her view of what European Union was evolving into didn’t serve the British interest.  If Europeans had listen to her and her vision, there would be no Brexit or the prospect of other nations leaving as well. The rise of nationalism in Central Europe as well as the populist government in Italy threatens the European Union and a question that need to be asked is whether the EU itself won’t implode. 

The Rise of the Anglosphere:  From my book the Rise of Nationalism and Democratic 

Socialism: What Our Response Should Be 

James C. Bennett and Michael J. Lotus in their book America 3.0 [1]see the end of the bureaucratic state, or what they call “the end of America 2.0,” and return to a smaller and more decentralized “America 3.0.” Bennett and Lotus begin with a brief history of how we got to where we are at present, as we moved from being an agricultural America 1.0 to an industrial America 2.0. What Bennett and Lotus present is not just a roadmap toward a new America over the next quarter century domestically, but a new foreign policy based on the one alliance that will prove dependable for the next century, an alliance of the Anglosphere nations: United States, Great Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

Bennett and Lotus trace our roots and our desire for liberty and individualism back before 1776 to the Anglo-Saxon invaders after the fall of the Roman Empire. Our culture has two thousand years of history, and our desire for liberty is inherited. One thing that scholars see as a sign of progress is the nuclear family with individuals, not parents, selecting their spouse. The beginning of freedom for women began when this happened, and children left their parents’ home and no longer belonged to extended families. From there, they made their own wealth and expanded the economic pie.

The nuclear family encouraged the market economy and property ownership to go with common law that moved toward court cases that broke from more rigid Roman rules. America 1.0 had a decentralized government with states largely left to pursue their policies. This model came apart during the Civil War and the subsequent development of the industrial state. Economic innovation fostered growth. Big corporations rose and with it big government to counter the influence of those large corporations. 

The two world wars and the Great Depression led to the formation of the bureaucratic state and the era after post-World War II from 1940s to the present stage and the 1960s was the peak of “America 2.0.” America 2.0’s development of the bureaucratic state has led to our present situation as we are witnessing bureaucracy on steroids. The 1980s and 1990s saw reform of the bureaucratic state that worked, but this century saw bloated government and unsustainable debt, making the demise of America 2.0 possible. 

The question is whether we can move to an America 3.0 without a complete collapse, and the authors say yes, it can happen. They present a libertarian vision that includes the elimination of the federal income tax and dramatically reducing federal government power, but they still support a defensive posture that includes maintaining our present alliances, along with federal protection for civil rights. So while the authors questioned much of our foreign policy for the past decade and their criticism was similar to Trump’s own message, they don’t call for the non-interventionist policy of Ron Paul or his son, Rand Paul (although Rand Paul might want to adopt their policies as his own). They believe America should continue to protect the trading routes, following a policy that Britain and America have done for three centuries. 

On domestic policy, they see many of our social problems being created by the Federal government and foreseeing many states forming regional compacts on policies like health care. While many conservatives and libertarians may not agree with their vision, Bennett and Lotus present a confident future for conservatives and libertarians to consider while putting together a governing vision that can unite the two groups. It is a vision that can form a basis to counter the leftist vision that governs America today.

Bennett’s and Lotus’s vision depends how intelligent policymakers can become. Here is the crux of their argument: the end of the present bureaucratic state can be a blessing in disguise and that America will come out of the present implosion of command-and-control bureaucracy as stronger as and more prosperous than before. The authors are happy warriors who view America’s best days ahead of us.

National Review editor Ramesh Ponnuru calls this alliance of English-speaking nations, “The Empire of Freedom”[2] which he says where the United States belongs. James Bennett has termed this alliance as the Anglosphere. Anglosphere is the branch of Western civilization that is moving beyond the West and on to its own sphere of influence. As Ponnuru writes, the Anglosphere is “no longer purely Western civilization.”[3]

Bennett writes that the Anglosphere is “Western in origin but no longer entirely Western in composition and nature, this civilization is marked by a particularly strong civil society, which is the source of its long record of successful constitutional government and economic prosperity.”[4] While European are attempting to build a European Union that is bureaucratic in nature, the Anglosphere nations are for most part suspicious of such super state institutions build from top down and instead as Bennett states, “promote more and stronger cooperative institutions, not to build some English-speaking super state on the European Union, or to annex Britain, Canada or Australia to the United States but rather to protect the English speaking nations’ common values from external and internal fantasies.” [5] Brexit gives us the first opening to build the Anglosphere and tie Great Britain to the United States and move away from the bureaucratic European Union, which may be beginning its own implosion.

Who is part of the Anglosphere? Author James Bennett answers, “Geographically, the densest nodes of the Anglosphere are found in the United States and Great Britain, while Anglosphere regions of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, and South Africa are powerful and populous outliers. The educated English-speaking populations of the Caribbean, Oceania, Africa and India constitute the Anglosphere’s frontiers.”[6]

What we may be witnessing is a cooperative alliance based on defense alliances and trade. Ramesh Ponnuru notes, “An important point here is that all these countries remain broadly in harmony on the subject of global free trade and more supportive harmony on the subject of global free trade, and more supportive of free trade than most countries outside the Anglosphere.”[7]

(We could easily see an expansion of an Anglosphere trading zone beginning with the United States and Great Britain and including Australia, New Zealand, and Canada.)

Anglosphere may be just another word for an American-led Empire of Liberty. While some feel that Europe is going in one direction and United States and other Anglosphere nations another direction, Ponnuru notes, “Is it inconceivable that the political cultures of France and Germany could change into a free-market and pro-American direction in 20 years- or even ten?[8]“As Ponnuru observed, Ireland has become an economic dynamo based on free market ideals, so Europe is not yet lost to statis and it will be curious about how the rise of populism in Europe will affect all of this. European populists have less support for free markets than the Anglosphere populists but European populists don’t have any real love for the European Union so who knows how this will turnout. In France, the main battle may be between the hard-core nationalist populism of Marie Le Pen and the more conservative reformist populism of Francis Fillon. (The rise of Macron is temporary victory for the EU establishment within France but his victory was due as much to French’s voters’ fear of Le Pen than affirmation of Macron.) While the European experience is different from North America, there is still enough similarity between the two separate cultures to make comparisons possible.

Former Margaret Thatcher advisor John O’Sullivan has called for an American policy that is pro-American while undermining the super state structure of the European Union. The present German government has is attempting to use the European Union as a tool for its own economic hegemony over Europe. Germany needs to tie Central Europe to modern Europe and many Central Europeans want an American presence in Europe to safeguard their security, not just from the European Union dominated by Germany but a resurgent Russia to their East.

James C. Bennett’s thesis begins with the premise that manufacturing supremacy begins with those countries with the best information technology. Bennett notes, “The United States, being the current leader in information technology while still possessing a large manufacturing base, is likely to be the primary beneficiary of this process.” [9] While critics have expressed concern that we are seeing an outflow of manufacturing jobs overseas, Bennett considers such observation misplaced. Bennett quips, “This is like fearing that the advent of steel-hulled warships in the nineteenth century would undercut British or American naval might, because it made irrelevant those nations’ mastery of wooden ship technology.”[10]

The dominant economic activity in the world will be information based and Bennett states that this is economic development that is moving beyond the corporate model that has dominated the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The new economic model will feature organizations that link entrepreneur, financiers and marketers. Those nations that encourage entrepreneurship will predominate and the Anglosphere world leads in that area.

America still leads the world in the second decade of the new century. But there is a new movement of nations that is challenging America’s lead, beginning with China in the Western Pacific and Russia throughout Europe and the Middle East.

In the nations that form the Anglosphere, Bennett notes, “The market economy is more than the absence of socialism. It is more than the absence of interventionist government; it is the economic expression of a strong civil society, just as substantive democracy is the political expression of a civil society and civic state.”[11] While there is no rule that democracy and the market economy need to exist side by side, but they often do. What matters is a civil society and understanding that government is but one player in society and part of a greater society. Religion, private charities, and corporations of varied sizes as well as political parties are all players in society that interact with one another. A strong civil society sees individuals creating and working in a variety of enterprises.

For the Anglosphere nations, strong civic societies had their roots in medieval Europe. James C. Bennett contends that in the Middle Ages, particularly in England, the modern-day society was built upon mix of “tribal, feudal, local, church family and state institutions”[12] and the lack of a single overwhelming power capable of dominating. From the Magna Carta, English princes and barons made it clear to the royal crown that they had rights and this ideal became rooted in English custom and eventually making its way across the Atlantic. When civic society is strong, government can be limited to specific duties since welfare can be provided through the private aid as well as public aid.

The weakness of the non-English-speaking nations is not the lack of creativity on the part of their people but the political institutions in place retard growth. Even in older European countries such as France and Germany, entrepreneurs are frustrated by bureaucratic inertia. And as James C. Bennett notes, “It is likely that the Anglosphere will continue to pull away from Continental Europe and Japan.”[13] In the United States, the Obama administration placed countless obstacles in the path of economic growth. Trump’s policies have much to offer as far as growth but it is possible that the Trump administration will put their own restrictions to growth through protectionist trade policies.

The United States and the United Kingdom have the world’s best navies and their armed forces can operate worldwide for an extended period of time. This allows the Anglosphere to operate in any theater of the world and deploy an appropriate military response to defend their interests. Throughout the world, there are Anglosphere nations at key junctions. Australia faces a long-term serious threat in Southeast Asia as they are near heavily populated and underdeveloped Asian nations. The United States has bases throughout the world but in a world of shifting alliances and changing world crises from the Far East to the Middle East, a strong Anglosphere alliance will give Americans dependable and capable allies in crucial areas.

The British armed forces are capable of working with American military and are probably the only European nation that has the ability to operate with the technically advanced American armed forces. Australia provides an Anglosphere armed force that can also be incorporated into a strike force in key areas in the Middle East and the Far East. The Gulf War and the Iraq War showed that today the Anglosphere is the dominant military power but that the Anglosphere needs to expand the alliance, as the limits on resources are starting to appear.

James C. Bennett writes, “The United States is facing pressure to reduce the universality of its commitments, combined with a certain fatigue among the populace for the extensive nature of American alliances… Unlike the United States, the United Kingdom has already reached the point where it is greatly limited in its ability to go it alone on any major military commitment; its armed forces are explicitly in existence to serve as leverage in a variety of alliance situations.”[14] Bennett correctly assumes that any primary alliance should focus on nations that have strong shared values and the Anglosphere has just an alliance in place.

Indian writer Pramit Pal Chaudhuri wrote in India’s Hindustan Times in 2003, “Russia provides the type of weapons needed for mass wars of millions of men, thousands of warplanes and tanks. What New Delhi is looking for today is smart weaponry, stuff that will allow it to attack a terrorist camp with smart missiles or stealth-drop commandos. This is exactly what Russia cannot provide. As it is, even the warplanes it sells now have to get their more advanced avionics and missiles from Israel or France.”[15] Many nations are reexamining their military strategy and the weapons that go with it. Countries like India, Russia, and China are now studying our tactics to adopt for their own forces. The Anglosphere superiority in technology allows them to be able to fight any kind of war in any place of the world. While the rest of the world is enhancing their technology to catch up the United States, the U.S.’s commitment in various wars throughout the Middle East is taking resources away from improving our own weapon systems to stay ahead of our potential competitors.

The Iraq War and subsequent combat showed the flexibility of the American forces. The United States military won the ground war in Iraq and George W. Bush handed Barack Obama victory on the ground. Obama’s diplomacy turned that victory into defeat and chaos.

What was seen during the Iraq War is that the present-day American military can now fight any style of combat. While one Russian observer stated that Americans were cowards depending soley [PHP1] on technology and did not like to fight street-to-street, this war proved that the Americans, borrowing from their British allies, learned street fighting. They did the dirty work while losing very few men. Contrast this to the Russians, where 50,000 people may have died in the Chechen wars during the 1990s including 5,000 Russian soldiers in similar urban combat. The British and Americans showed that one could fight in an urban environment without destroying everything and still secure the major centers. As George Patton once said, “No dumb bastard ever won a war by going out and dying for his country. He won it by making some other dumb bastard die for his country.”[16] Americans and the British can fight in the urban center, in open ground, and on the sea as well as the air.

Vladimir Dvorkin, the head of the Russian Defense Ministry’s think tank, reflected the thinking of many in the Russian military when he said in 1997, “The gap between our capabilities and those of the Americans has been revealed, and it is vast. We are very lucky that Russia has no major enemies at the moment, but the future is impossible to predict, and we must be ready.” [17]

Israeli defense officials expressed similar amazement in 2003 when they witnessed one of the more powerful Arab countries conquered by what amounted to fewer than three American divisions. Major General Dan Harel told a reporter that he was jealous of the American military. He said, “They have advanced in areas that we were leading in only a few years ago. They have the ability to put everything together in command and control. Our navy and air force have systems. But we have to integrate them.” [18] Israelis were impressed that the Americans lost slightly more than 100 men in the Gulf War whereas the Israelis lost six times as many in the Six-Day War. Both friend and foe will study the Gulf War for its appropriate lessons. Even the subsequent Iraq War has seen Allied casualties lower than comparable wars while inflicting higher causalities upon the terrorist thugs they are fighting.

What the Americans do have is ingenuity. Stephen Ambrose in his many books on World War II continuously observed that under the strain of combat, the American soldiers who were raised in freedom were constantly were able to adapt more freely to conditions on the ground than their inflexible German counterparts. Technology is not all that wins wars. It also takes the soldier on the ground to make it work. The American soldier is raised in a world of technology, so a strategy based on technology is second nature and this shows in combat as well. The American soldier brings this strength into battle.

Fred Kaplan details that the origin of the victories in the Gulf War and the Iraq War began in the early 1980s. With the advent of digital technology, a new war-fighting doctrine was born. With the defeat suffered in Vietnam, a whole generation of officers determined never to repeat Vietnam’s mistakes. Among those were Huba Wass de Czege, who wrote a major revision that broke the Army’s previous strategy of attrition warfare, setting up static lines against the enemy’s assault, and repulsing it with superior firepower. De Czege began a new strategy that emphasizes lightning strikes behind enemy lines and emphasizing speed. Speed Kills. When the Gulf War began in 1991, many of De Czege’s students were part of Norman Schwarzkopf’s staff and the Gulf War was a combination of superior firepower matched with feints and the classic deep strike behind Saddam’s army, still in Kuwait.

With the advent of smart bombs and their increased use in combat, the military could better target its weapons while employing deception. Increased accuracy also meant less civilian casualties. Fred Kaplan said of this strategy, “Operation Desert Storm was really two wars—the air war and the ground war—each fought autonomously and in sequence. Gulf War II was an integrated war, waged simultaneously and in synchronicity, on the ground, at sea, and in the air. The vast majority of air strikes, from Air Force bombers and attack planes as well as Navy fighters, were delivered on Iraqi Republican Guards, in order to ease the path of U.S. Army soldiers and Marines thrusting north to Baghdad.”[19] As mentioned previously, synergy of all of the services became a reality.

In addition, Fred Kaplan stated, “Another new thing, which started in Afghanistan and continued in Iraq, was the systematic inclusion of the so-called “shadow soldiers,” the special operations forces. The 1986 Goldwater-Nichols Act, which was best-known for giving new authority to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, also made special ops a separate command, with its own budget.”[20] The warriors of the night became an integral part of American strategy.

A pundit recently pointed out that an army that combines the use of dolphins and satellites is a tough army to beat. This is an army that is capable of using what is available to fight. Americans use old-fashioned “Yankee know-how” in war as effectively as they do in business. The entrepreneurial spirit that exists outside the military has now made its way into the military. The Anglosphere nations’ power lies not just in its economic prowess but it’s military as well.

What the Iraq War showed is that future wars on terrorism will be fought with actual combat, imaginative diplomacy, and through subversion of terrorist sponsor states. The combat tactics of the Iraq War demonstrated that the United States has the capability to either strike with the thunder of armed columns or special ops operating in the shadows. To win the war on terror in this century we will need armed forces that can fight under any and all conditions. Nothing replaces a well-trained soldier carrying out the policies of diplomats; but without the soldier, diplomacy is nothing more than an empty bluff. This is something the Trump administration needs to learn and the Obama administration never did learn.

The Rule of Law and Anglosphere

“L’Angleterre, en effet, est insulaire, maritime, liee par ses echanges, ses marches, son ravitaillement, aux pays les plus divers et souvent les plus lointains”.[21] (England is indeed insular, maritime, and tied by its exchanges, its markets, its supply with the most diverse and often most remote countries.)

—Charles de Gaulle, vetoing British membership in the Common Market, January 14, 1963.

The American Constitution is a document whose existence is rooted in a wider constitutional tradition derived from Britain. From the Middle Ages to the present, there is a continuity and stability that undergirds the Anglosphere. James C. Bennett observes that a business lawyer in New York would recognize the common law code of Australia or England. The lawyer would know the problems while dealing with any issues across the Pacific or Atlantic in a fellow Anglosphere nation.

The English monarch was never as absolute as his or her counterparts in continental Europe. From the Magna Carta onwards, the powers of the monarch were restricted. The belief in limited government has given Americans and the rest of the Anglosphere an advantage over their competitors. In the Anglosphere nations, entrepreneurship has flourished and spread beyond their borders. From the time of the American Revolution and development of the Constitution, the French have endured two Napoleons and five Republics. Outside of England, no European nation has had more experience with democratic rule than the United States. The development of a strong civil society and long time understanding of constitutional rule has fostered both political and economic freedom within the Anglosphere and led to its present domination throughout the world.

Within the Western traditions, there are now two competing ideas. For the French, there is a continental system that features extensive government intervention within the economic sphere and beyond. Many French have derided what they call “Anglo-Saxon” Ideas. In the 1960s, de Gaulle envisioned a block of nations as a separate world power that stood as a counter to the Soviet Empire and the American led “Anglo-Saxon Empire.” Whether it is attacking American culture or complaining about America hegemony, much of the French intellectual and foreign policy apparatus viewed American ascendancy as counter to their goal of dominating Europe through the EU. France wants to become a major player on the world scene through various international bodies such as the European Union and the United Nations. For many French intellectuals, the EU represented the both the political and economic counterweight to what they view as “cowboy capitalism.” (The problem is that EU and the euro aided Germany in being the dominant economic power within Europe, and it is no longer the French leading the way but they are becoming a tail wagged by the German dog.)

One of the future key issues for the Anglosphere nations will be Great Britain’s relations with Europe. The present EU and continental system favors more bureaucratic control over the economy and increased industrial policies targeting specific industries. The harmonization of taxes and budgets within the EU is designed to maintain high taxes and support an ever-expanding welfare state. The policy of harmonization is being used as wedge against lower tax countries such as those in Ireland and in the emerging democracies in Central Europe. Britain’s goal of being “the Anglosphere voice” would have been compromised by dealings with the French and Germans, the present leaders of the EU. James C. Bennett observed in 2007, “Were the United Kingdom to leave the Union and join NAFTA, it would lead to far more productive partnership.”[22]

For Bennett, Britain needs to be more closely integrated into the Anglosphere through inclusion in NAFTA and the other Anglosphere pacts. This is a more logical alliance as Bennett observed that having the United Kingdom join NAFTA would, “accelerate the existing trend toward mergers, partnerships, and alliances between U.S., Canadian, and British infotech companies. It would extend them into allied defense and defense-impacted fields such as aerospace and commercial aviation.”[23] In other words, Brexit.

Many European leaders have learned the wrong lessons of the past fifty years. At this moment, Europe is at peace for the first time in a millennium but with the resurgence of Putin’s Russia, there exists for the first time a prospect of a major European war. This peace came as a result of American steadfast military support of Western Europe. During the 2016 campaign, Trump refuse to committing American support for NATO and European collective security.

India and the Anglosphere

James C. Bennett does not yet consider India formally part of the Anglosphere but for the Anglosphere to dominate the 21st century, India must become part of the alliance. He writes, “In such a commonwealth (Anglosphere), should the Indian choose to engage it, It may well be that Bangalore becomes a major center of the Anglosphere in thirty or fifty years’ time. Anglospherists do not fear this, knowing that just as London is still great today because it shares an Anglosphere with New York and Los Angeles, it and the American metropolises will be great tomorrow partly because they might share it with Bangalore.”[24]

Indian writer Gurcharan Das remembers attending Henry Kissinger’s lectures at Harvard in the early 1960s and listening to Kissinger point out that Nehru was a dreamer and “it is dangerous to put dreamers in power.”[25] Kissinger’s own views on Nehru may have been misplaced and he admitted it in his most recent book on diplomacy. Nehru was not an idealist and certainly not a pacifist like Gandhi. When force was needed, Nehru was prepared to use it. Three wars with Pakistan, including the liberation of Bangladesh from Pakistan in 1971, one war with China, and pushing the Portuguese out of Goa showed that India was not afraid of using military force. What Kissinger called a foreign policy of dreamers was a serious attempt to buy time for the new nation, residing as it does in a tough neighborhood. Kissinger’s own opinion from his Harvard days changed when he stated “India’s conduct during the Cold War was not so different from that of the United States in its formative decades.”[26] The difference is that in the United States’ formative years, there was an ocean between America and Europe. India, on the other hand, is in a region populated by vipers and political rivals.

The United States, as the leader of NATO and the premier Western power, has inherited the traditional British interest in ensuring that no one single nation dominates the Eurasia landmass. India, also, has co-opted policy from its former English master. In 1934 Britain designed a plan to stabilize the Sino-India border and to dominate the Indian Ocean from Aden to Singapore. India’s present naval building effort reflects those same objectives. Like the United States, India does not want to see an Islamic fundamentalist revolution sweep through the Middle East. As China grows in strength and challenges the United States in the Far East, China also threatens India at her northern borders and through the sea lanes including the Indian Ocean.

A recent stumbling block that stood in the way of Indian-American relations was India’s ownership of the bomb. Kissinger noted that India “will not risk it’ survival “on exhortations coming from countries basing their own security on nuclear weapons.”[27] Kissinger concedes that India is acting rationally and that President Clinton’s reaction to India’s holding nuclear tests in 1998 and subsequent expansion of its nuclear capacities was “emotional.”[28] While Clinton would tell the Indians that they did not need nuclear weapons, India’s own reaction was to ignore Clinton’s appeal. As far as Indians were concerned, they were not under the American nuclear umbrella and were facing two nuclear rivals, Pakistan and China, in their own backyard. The Bush Administration removed the various sanctions put in place in 1998 after the events of September 11.

The biggest problem with nuclear non-proliferation is the unrealistic approach that good intentions are enough to ensure enforcement. The 1994 Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Act requires the imposition of sanctions against any nation that pursues and acquires nuclear weapons. These sanctions include denial of World Bank aid, restricting bank loans and technology exports. The problem with this approach is that it does not distinguish between friend and foe. India’s nuclear program is designed to protect against growing Chinese military clout, and the desire to counter Pakistan’s intentions in South Asia. Nuclear weapons are India’s entry into the superpower club and India’s nuclear plan does not threaten America. New Delhi’s actions are not motivated by any desire for a military confrontation with the United States, now or in the future. Washington has tolerated nuclear weapons in the hands of the U.S.S.R. and Red China, so why not India? India’s nuclear possession does not threaten American interests any more than do France and England with their nuclear capability. France’s own nuclear plan was based simply on the idea that France and only France is responsible for its own security. England also did not choose to live strictly under America’s nuclear umbrella and India is merely following its own national interest in becoming a nuclear power. If anything, Obama’s own policy led to nuclear proliferation. When Obama and Hillary Clinton led the effort to overthrow Gaddafi in 2011, they increased the chances of nuclear proliferation since Gaddafi surrendered his own weapons of mass destruction in exchange for neutrality in the war on terror. The message to any future nation with nuclear weapons that to trade them in exchange for American security is riskier than keeping the weapons. Ukraine’s own security was also guaranteed by both Russia and United States when they gave up nuclear weapons on their border. Today, Putin controls a third of Ukraine through proxies, and annexed the Crimea. If our allies can’t trust our own nuclear umbrella, they will obtain their own nuclear weapons. Does anyone think that Saudi Arabia won’t obtain their own nuclear weapons if Iran finally obtains its bomb?

The final solution is simply the adoption of the Strategic Defense Initiative. The use of technology to checkmate present missile technology allows the United States and her allies, including India, to maintain its military superiority while giving potential nuclear powers a reason not to proceed with their own program. SDI provides the West an insurance policy against any cheaters. The days of depending upon mere pieces of papers for security are over. A missile shield allows the United States to protect its own national interest, while securing a nuclear umbrella to protect other nations, including India. The reason that the nuclear club has not gotten even bigger is that America’s nuclear umbrella has been extended to potential nuclear powers such as Japan and Germany, and in the past there was no need for those countries to be nuclear powers in their own right as long as they are allied with the United States. (The Obama administration’s reckless policies that rewarded our enemies more than our allies will only encourage many of these allies to pursue their own nuclear weapons to ensure their own defense.) A strategic defense initiative protects the United States in a world of changing alliances. China has made it clear that it is considering challenging the United States’ role in East Asia and its own nuclear and military buildup is predicated upon its own military objectives that are not necessarily in sync with ours. SDI allows a sensible policy of containment if that is what is required in the future, and also allows for reduction in nuclear weapons since it allows nations an insurance policy against cheating and reduces the utilities of nuclear weapons.

A new nuclear non-proliferation policy begins with the principle that we can no longer keep the nuclear genie in the bottle. There are some nations in whose hands nuclear weapons may in fact be a stabilizing factor. In the 19^th century, Europe was dominated by a concert of leading powers, whose goal was to maintain the peace and European stability after the end of the Napoleonic wars. What is required today is a concert of democratic states, starting with the Anglosphere and including other democratic states like India. In this new era of terror, stability is dependent upon this new group of nations acting in harmony. And certainly, this concert of power should include other alliances with other nations not just limited to the Anglosphere. While military options will always be considered, the ultimate protection is a new group of democratic states prepared to defend what is right under the umbrella of a Strategic Defense Initiative and backed by the United States-led Anglosphere.

The final piece to India’s greatness will be the evolution of its relationship with Pakistan, including how it deals with the Kashmir question. Pakistan, formed as a result of the partition of 1947, has been a dysfunctional society, cash strapped and living in the shadow of India. For millions of Indians and Pakistanis, the partition had its own human tragedy, ending in the deaths of hundreds of thousands, if not millions. Pakistan’s former strongman, Pervez Musharraf, migrated from his home in India to Pakistan after partition, whereas author and business consultant Gurcharan Das went in the opposite direction as a refugee. Nearly 40 million people traveled in either direction in a tragedy that today still threatens both the security and prosperity of India and Pakistan. India diverts billions of dollars of defense funds that should go into economic development and expanding its own influence outside the South Asia continent to defending its borders with Pakistan. As for Kashmir, Pakistan’s claim is due to a substantial Muslim population, and some in Pakistan even view Kashmir as a part of a “Greater Pakistan.” India views Kashmir as part of its own territory and the Kashmiri people, themselves, are uncertain about their own fate.

A democratic, moderate Pakistan would be a boon to peace in the region and possibly give India an extra market for their products. India is now the dominant power on the South Asian continent. An autocratic, economically dysfunctional Pakistan is not in the interest of either the United States or India. Pakistan stands between the forces of Islamic radicalism and modernity and is proving to be a dysfunctional nation.

Great Britain was the inspiration for both the United States and India in the values of freedom. Both nations now have the responsibility to spread those values throughout the world. A country of more than a billion people will never be a junior partner in any relationship and, unlike Great Britain, India will be an equal partner based on its potential as an economic and nuclear power. With nearly a million Indians living throughout the United States, there is a personal connection being developed between these two nations. These immigrants live in America but much of their heart belongs to India. These people to people contacts further cement relations between these countries. These contacts also bring down the veil between these countries as well. As India learns more about the United States, we also learn more about India.

India will prove useful in battling terrorists and defending the West. India, for many years, has set itself apart from the West, but in recent years, this is beginning to change. Gone are the days of reflective anti-American attitudes that infiltrated Indian leadership and there is a more balanced approach to world events. It will be imperative among American policy makers to encourage India to become a permanent member of the Anglosphere

SDI and Anglosphere Technical superiority
In 1988, I managed the campaign of GOP candidate Mary Ellen Lobb, who was running against Democrat incumbent Alan Wheat in Missouri’s 5th District. One of the issues that we highlighted was Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative. When discussing SDI, Lobb told me that “we must remind the voters that within the next decade, we’ll need strategic defense not just against the Soviet Empire but various Third World regional powers such as Iran.” We would not always be in a world, separated into two armed camps led by the Soviet Union and the United States.

Within a year after the election, the world that Mary Ellen Lobb foresaw became a reality. The Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Empire imploded. In this century, we’ve seen the rise of regional powers that threaten our own national interests-including Iran in the Middle East and China in the Far East. Missile technology is no longer “high technology”, and it is spreading to rogue nations such as North Korea, making them become “superpowers” on the cheap.

In the 19^th century, Great Britain was the dominant world power based on her navy, which allowed the English to project force throughout the globe. England maintained bases on every continent to defend the empire. Britain’s population was relatively small, precluding a dominant standing army, and her statesmen understood that her superpower status was delicately poised. British defense plans were based on maintaining naval superiority supplemented by continental alliances against whatever nation was threatening to dominate Europe.

When Kaiser Wilhelm II decided to challenge British naval hegemony, English statesmen took this as a challenge to British world dominance. Throughout the 19^th century, Great Britain maintained technical superiority over all opponents, taking advantage of its industrial might as the world’s strongest and freest economy. This allowed Great Britain to maintain its military superiority.

The collapse of the British Empire after World War II ended the British domination in world affairs. The United States, through the Marshall Plan and the GATT system of trade, inherited England’s mantle as the defender of Western democracy while the Soviet Empire assumed Hitler’s role as the exemplar of socialism. The Soviet Union dominated the Eurasian landmass, with the largest standing army in history and by the time Ronald Reagan became President, the Soviet Empire stretched from the Berlin Wall to the Pacific Ocean, with satellite nations on every inhabited continent, including North Vietnam, Angola, Ethiopia, Cuba, and Nicaragua. The threat it posed was real.

The Cold War ended with a whimper, not a bang, as the Soviet command economy collapsed. This felicitous outcome was due in part to the Reagan administration’s military buildup and the beginning of the SDI program. The Soviet economy could not compete with technological advances that a free economy adapted to military use. The West’s superiority in military hardware was showcased during the Gulf and Iraq Wars. These conflicts also illustrated the security threats of this century. Iraq, a regional power, launched Scud missiles against our allies throughout the Gulf War. As Patriot missiles dueled Scuds, we saw the first field demonstration of why strategic defense is essential. In the Gulf War, this missile duel was a sideshow. In a future regional conflict, it may become the main event, whether the payloads are nuclear, chemical, or biological.

The major impediment to missile defense is not technology, but America’s will to deploy. As Professor Frederick Seitz, a leading expert in missile technology, concluded, “The science behind missile defense is solid, and we certainly do possess the capabilities to defend ourselves.” Seitz observes that missile defense technology has been around for decades. The key to its success today is the ability to destroy enemy missiles in their boost phase, when decoys can be more readily defeated. The difficulties of boost-phase intercept are best approached through space-based and naval platform systems. With the demise of the ABM treaty, the last legal restraint to develop these systems has been removed.

American missile defense allows Americans to protect potential land-based allies, freeing them to divert their energies toward trade, currency reform, and capital formation. Pax Americana-—the extension of democracy and economic development throughout the Third World—depends on America’s ability to prevent aggressive regional powers from becoming international powers “on the cheap.” Strategic defense is a key component of this strategy. The sea-based Aegis missile extends a defensive shield to our allies, and expands our naval superiority over any potential enemies. A space-based anti-missile capability ensures the defense of our key command centers in space and allows protection of the American people. With our technical superiority, we will be able to neutralize the nuclear capabilities of most regional powers such as Iran and China. SDI is a manifestation of the Anglosphere’s technical superiority.

During the 20^th century, the United States became the dominant superpower. SDI will allow America and the Anglosphere to continue to exert its influence throughout the world-, with the result being an expansion of economic and political freedom, worldwide. The United States is a commercial nation similar to nineteenth-century Britain, and depends upon the freedom of voluntary commerce to ensure its economic well-being. NATO was an established land-based alliance to ensure that no power dominates the Eurasian continent and this ensured the general peace of Europe. Now NATO cohesion is now threatened and in the United States, support for NATO is on the wane and it may be on the wane within Europe as well.

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[1] For a summary of their book, see James C. Bennett and Michael J. Lotus, “America 3.0:  The Coming Revolution of America,” American Enterprise Institute, August 20, 2013.

[2] Ramesh Ponnuru, “The Empire of Freedom,” National Review, March 24, 2003.

[3] Ponnuru, “The Empire of Freedom.”  ARE QUOTES FROM THIS ARTICLE?  IT IS BEHIND A PAYWALL

[4] James C. Bennett, “Our Emerging Anglosphere,” Orbis, Winter 2002.

[5] James C. Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge:  Why The English-Speaking Nations Will Lead The Way in The Twenty-First Century (Lanham, Maryland:  Rowman and Littlefield, 2007) GIVE PAGE NUMBER

[6] James C. Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge, 80.

[7] Ponnuru, “Empire of Freedom.” OK?

[8] Ponnuru, “Empire of Freedom.” OK?

[9]  Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge, 26.

[10] Bennett, The Anglopshere Challenge, 27.

[11] Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge, 34.

[12] Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge, 35.

[13] Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge, 38.

[14] Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge, 287.

[15] Pramit Pal Chaudhuri, “Indo-Russian Ties Going Nowhere,” Hindustan Times, October 13, 2003.

[16] James M. Gavin, War and Peace in the Space Age (New York:  Harper, 1958), 64.

[17]  Thomas C. Reed, At the Abyss:  An Insider’s History of the Cold War (New York:  Presidio/Ballantine, 2004), 347-48.

[18] “Israeli Military Amazed, ‘Jealous’ At U.S. War Against Iraq,” worldtribune.com, April 14, 2003.

[19] Fred Kaplan, “Force Majeure,” Slate, April 10, 2003.

[20] Kaplan, “Force Majeure.”

[21] “Conference de Press de Charles de Gaulle (14 janvier 1963)” in Charles de Gaulle, Discours et Messages.  Volume IV:  Pour l’effort (1962-1965).  Paris:  Plon, 1970, 66-71

[22] Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge. 164.

[23]  Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge, 167.

[24] Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge, 7.

[25] Gurcharan Das, India Unbound (New York:  Knopf, 2001), 83.

[26] Henry Kissinger, Does America Need a Foreign Policy? Toward a Diplomacy of the 21^st Century (New York:  Simon and Schuster, 2001), 156.

[27] Kissinger, Does America Need a Foreign Policy?, 158.

[28] Henry A. Kissinger,  “India and Pakistan:  After the Explosions,” Washington Post, June 9, 1998.

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