How Woodrow Wilson Ruined the World: The Empire Strikes Back
Woodrow Wilson ruined the world. Actually, I'm saying this tongue in cheek. I've always been a big Wilson fan. Joanne and I were married at the Prospect House at Princeton, which served as his residence when he was president of the university.
I'm not suggesting that he actually ruined the world, of course, but he certainly changed it. Future historians may, or may not not, think it was changed for the better. It's too early to tell.
The Zeitgeist is against Empire. Self-determination of peoples was a theme that came out of the Versailles treaty and was a hallmark of Wilsonian democracy. The idea that people should be self-governing seems reasonable and right. Who would question it?
But let me be the devil's advocate for a moment. Yes, empires have their downsides. They are arrogant, they exploit. They can be brutal. They can have an infuriating sense of superiority and entitlement. They offend our sense of basic equality.
But they build roads and aqueducts. They build railroads and get them to run on time. They establish a civil service and build hospitals. Children of colonial leaders go on to Oxford and Cambridge and learn to speak with posh accents. They give out Bibles (as they are taking the land). Most importantly, after they have finished cracking skulls and looting temples, they send governors and bring peace. (Or, more exactly, they *enforce* peace.) Historic enemies may not become kissy-face, but they do not attack one another. That last benefit might save your life and make all the bad stuff worth it.
Think of Pax Romana. Pax Britannia. Pax Sovietica. Pax Tito. You may not feel a particular nostalgia for any of these, but is anarchy any better?
I really don't know to what extent Wilson was sincere about any of this, although I'd like to think he was. But he was certainly an elitist. Would the future be a peaceful one under the League of Nations? Or would there be a Pax Americana governed not by monarchs and aristocrats, but by American patricians and plutocrats filling the vacuum left by collapsing European and Ottoman empires? No more Roman 10th Legion or Turkish janissaries, HM Coldstream Guards or Highland Fusiliers to keep the peace, but one could always send the Marines. And no more colonies. The little nations can have their own flags and their own presidents and pretend that they are independent. They can put down the British (while trying to imitate them).
But nature abhors a vacuum. The Empire strikes back.