Why America can't break out of the cycle of neverending war

I submit that America has heard quite enough about the “moral context” that always seems to justify our use of military force (whatever we choose to call it). What we need is a little less about how important it is for us to blow other people to bits and a little more about what it’s like to live in a world in which a single nation has the power to strike a deadly blow wherever it wishes, anywhere on the planet.

The first step in moral reasoning, after all, is the imaginative act of placing oneself in another’s shoes. Judged by that standard, Americans regularly fail even to begin to reflect morally on how the nation conducts itself in the world.

How would we feel, I wonder, if we lived in a world in which another country was so powerful that it could inflict military pain on any nation, including us, with impunity? Without an act of imagination, we can’t even begin to answer that question — because we are the only nation in that position, or even close to it. Russia, our nearest rival, may be flexing its muscles in Ukraine. But as with all of Russia’s post-Soviet military adventures, this one is taking place right next door. The United States, by contrast, hasn’t fought a war with a neighboring power since the mid-19th century, and it regularly (as in: every few years) starts wars many thousands of miles from its territory. In this sense at least, America truly is an exceptional nation.