America Agonistes

By Roger Cohen
NYT

LONDON — Pax Americana, unlovely but effective, has endured for more than 60 years, the consequence of the post-war development of the United States as a European and Asian power. It has averted the worst, but it is safe to say that it is closer to the end than the beginning of its life.

I say this with no enthusiasm. As a beneficiary of America’s far-flung garrisons, and a member of a generation blessed (as the Germans say) with late birth, I have few illusions about what greater disasters might have befallen Europe and Asia without the offsetting presence of U.S. power.

But, as General Motors has discovered, history moves on.

G.M., in fact, is not a bad emblem for this moment when the world’s tectonic plates are plainly on the move. No corporation ever symbolized American might with greater vividness. It topped the first “Fortune 500” list in 1955, the year I was born, and was in the top three by revenue every year until 2007. Now it is all but bankrupt.

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