How kind-natured and generous are the American people, yet they can never find peace.
A source of pride in “American Exceptionalism”, the richest, most powerful nation in human history, in actuality, a “forever war” state, spending approximately $997 billion on its military in 2024, while “50 million Americans live in or near poverty.”
Analysts suggest America often wins militarily but struggle to establish a lasting peace: “Never lost a war, never made a peace.” It was Jimmy Carter, the 39th president, who described the US as “the most warlike nation in the history of the world”, citing the US has been at peace for only 16 years of its nearly 250 years. It has rarely spent a year without engaging in some form of foreign war, from its initial expansion across North America to post-colonial conflicts.
Since its founding in 1776, the US has been at war for roughly 93 per cent of its history. Analysts suggest they had about 16 to 20 years of total peace in its entire existence. Since 1945 it has used military force in over 90 countries. A study at Tufts University found that the US undertook 500 military international interventions between 1776 and 2017, with nearly 60 per cent of these occurring between 1950 and 2019, notwithstanding the recent acts of aggressions.
A peaceful group of religious immigrants, with an “exceptionalist” mindset, created, of necessity, a “New England Way” of warfare, defending their colony by organising a militia but also used for expansionist “crusade-like” actions, hence their ideological footprints persist, leaving their legacy in American militarism.
The US maintain a unique global footprint with roughly 800 military bases in at least 80 countries, with 170,000 active-duty troops, outside the US, 30,000 are stationed in the Middle East.
How about expenditure? It is naturally the highest military budget, roughly 40 per cent of the total global expenditure, spending more on defence than the next nine countries combined, according to figures released from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Lust for the military knows no end.
The American appetite for war is driven by a combination of political ambition, economic greed, and ideological factors. Historically, it is rooted in a sense of exceptionalism, the pursuit of global stability, to protect economic interests, and a national desire to dictate to the world. Why the urge to act as the world’s policeman? It was Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th president who directly claimed the right of the US to act as “an international police power” in the Western Hemisphere.
Since WWII, the US has been adopting a “world police” role to counter communism, often intervening in foreign affairs to prevent the spread of opposing ideologies. Its wasted efforts are costly, unwanted, unwarranted and often fails: in Viet Nam, Afghanistan, and Cuba, among others. It is more likely a foreign occupation.
Despite its failures, the US world order is on its way. As it did during its early history focusing on territorial expansion, its Indian wars, it is evolving into a 20th and 21st century ruling role as a global power, maintaining a vast network of international military bases.
Who said “the sun never sets on the British Empire?” It was Irish diplomat George Macartney in 1773, describing the expanding global British territory. It was later popularised in the 19th century and could well apply to the “imperial playbook” of today by the US. “The apple never falls far from the tree” adopts the expansionist energy of the “mother country”.
When you have the world’s largest manufacturer and exporter of weapons what do you do? You produce, you sell, and you set the world ablaze.
The US has engaged in prolonged active warfare in several countries, indicating that the polls view the US as a significant threat to global peace. The world’s perception is that the US frequently uses military action to enforce its own political and economic ideas. The US acts as a world police, despite the existence of the UN. The reason is the lack of a standing army. Was it not designed for diplomacy? With its many deadlocks and power vetoes it has rendered paralysed, barely standing on its last legs.
The Global Peace Index, measuring international peacefulness, finds Canada consistently ranks 14th as most peaceful country, tied with the Netherlands. Where is their neighbour the US? It ranks 128th out of 163 countries, categorised among the least peaceful nations in the world.
As of 2026 the US maintains a near constant military presence abroad showing an average of 46 bombs or missiles dropped on other countries in the last 20 years — and counting.
It is a profoundly ironic and tragic spectacle to witness a nation of immense material wealth, capable of elevating humanity, instead choosing to plunder its treasures to hammer out weapons for destruction.
While money can purchase the arsenal of war, it remains hopeless, incapable of pursuing peace.
In his farewell speech (1961) president Eisenhower expressed his fear of the “Military Industrial Complex, warning against the immense enhancement of the “arms industry”, lest it could gain “unwarranted influence”, at the cost of other democratic processes, like economic stability and civil liberties. A “disastrous rise of misplaced power, could become a permanent condition.”
His prophetic words have come true. This war monster lusts for war and profit, shifting from temporary wartime mobilisation, becoming a permanent feature, to the detriment of the rest.
With an arsenal at their feet, they are drawn to war like honey to a bee.
Now the drums of war are never silent.
“All war is a symptom of man’s failure as a thinking animal.”
John Steinbeck (1902-1968)
* A version of this article appears in print in the 19 March, 2026 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
Short link: