Chalmers Johnson: ‘The Last Days of the American Republic.’

June 16th, 2006 at 12:52 Björn Hallberg

A brilliant interview with Chalmers Johnson (second transcription) from C-Span’s Q&A filled to the brim with insightful reflections and a historical perspective that is usually lacking from the contemporary discourse.

This territory — Southern Eurasia — was opened up by the collapse of the Soviet Union to enormous geopolitical pressures. I don’t think we’ve done it particularly well. I think we’ve been remarkably cynical. I can’t imagine how these people, with a straight face, talk about the promotion of democracy in places still ruled by old Soviet apparatchiks who are very regularly welcomed to the Oval Office by our President and described in glowing terms, whereas, the British Ambassador to Uzbekistan quit because of the tortures being carried out by the government and explained them to the world. …We’ve had a long history of this, after all, going back into the first World War when Woodrow Wilson, William Jennings Bryan, his Secretary of State, were declaring that we were the exemplar for good government on earth that all moral issues rested in the American leadership. I think as a historical generalization you could not be wrong today to say its unmitigated tragedy that the American President believes such nonsense. Had he not, we might have avoided intervening in a war between the British and German Empires.

Johnson’s new book “Nemesis. The Last Days of the American Republic” is finished and will be out later this year.

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