We didn’t get to be a superpower by obeying libertarian pacifist sentiment, which, BTW, was superimposed anachronistically on 19th century America by 20th century political philosophers.

http://www.firstthings.com/postmodernconservative/?p=404&cpage=1#comment-5250

Why do you assume the Founders assumed American expansion was bad? They didn’t. The enormity of the United States of America was the result of the most vigorous expansionist policy in the world.

Robert Kagan’s “Dangerous Nation” illustrates the point superbly in his history of America’s 19th century foreign policy.

Libertarians ignore that most pointed of facts in American history when they argue that Americans just wanted to mind their business. Tell it to the Indians, the French, the British, the Spanish, the Mexicans, the Russians, the Hawaiians, the Filipinos.

In fact, America’s Founding Generation invented one of the true wonders of the world: The very first non-colonial system of political expansion. Almost simultaneously, the Confederation Congress and the Constitutional Convention laid out the plan in the forms of the Northwest Ordinance, and Article IV. Each new state was admitted to the Union free and equal to the older states, not as colonial provinces.

The only reason America didn’t expand further than it did was slavery. The Caribbean,Central and South America would have been slave states, Canada would have been composed of free states. Congress would not permit annexation of those territories for obvious reasons. Just think “Missouri.” After the Civil War, American energies turned inward as it industrialized.

I deliberately left the means open to how (if it ever happens) America would turn the world into an free and democratic American empire.

It’s possible (just barely) that no use of arms will be needed. Most of our states joined the Union at their insistence, not at Washington’s. And certainly not at the point of bayonets and cannon.

It’s also possible that it may happen very incrementally, and may have already begun. In “The Case for Goliath,” Michael Mandenbaum makes a convincing case for the fact that forms of American informal governance of the world already exist. Many leftists believe American empire already exists, also. Of course they are very much against it, but the points they make are suggestive.

Incrementalism may occur as the result of world demand and/or perceived dire necessity on the part of American leaders. (See the Somalian pirates for a good example.) In which case, it will be more of an evolutionary process than the revolutionary process involved in traditional national “unfriendly takeovers” that you have in mind.

The world empire I have in mind would be enforced judiciously by very high tech, pinpoint military operations, with little or no collateral damage. The idea that we are stuck with today’s military tech for tomorrow’s operations is laughable considering how fast our tech has developed during our wars (Iraq included) and between our wars.

Have you ever seen the world map of American military commands (SouthCom, CentCom, PaCom, EuCom)? Check it out here:

http://www.yes-dk.dk/YES/images/stories/Upload/uscom.jpg

This map is a map of world empire American style. Benevolent, kindly meant, but world empire just the same.

There are two things I worry about most. Both involve Obama. 1. He takes leftist pacifism seriously and seriously degrades our military. 2. He begins to envision a leftist takeover of the world, a la the Soviet Union. Disastrous.

I suspect (I hope) he’ll just let what has been evolving continue to evolve, cut back a little here and there, and then leave office in 2013 without doing too much damage.