The Next 100 Years

SOVIET UNION
SOVIET UNION
SOVIET UNION
The Soviet Empire

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dition to its natural endowments, the United States became enormously 
prosperous from its sea power and that the Soviet Union couldn’t possibly 
compete, being landlocked. 
Second, having control of the seas gave the United States a huge political 
advantage as well. America could not be invaded, but it could invade other 
countries—whenever and however it chose. From 1945 onward, the United 
States could wage wars without fear of having its lines of supply cut. No 
outside power could wage war on the continent of North America. In fact, 
no other nation could mount amphibious operations without American ac­
quiescence. When the British went to war with Argentina over the Falklands 
in 1982, for example, it was possible only because the United States didn’t 
prevent it. When the British, French, and Israelis invaded Egypt in 1956 
against U.S. wishes, they had to withdraw. 
Throughout the Cold War, an alliance with the United States was always 
more profitable than an alliance with the Soviet Union. The Soviets could 
offer arms, political support, some technology, and a host of other things. But 
the Americans could offer access to their international trading system and 
the right to sell into the American economy. This dwarfed everything else in 
importance. Exclusion from the system meant impoverishment; inclusion 
in the system meant wealth. Consider, as an example, the different fates of 
North and South Korea, West and East Germany. 
It is interesting to note that throughout the Cold War, the United States 
was on the defensive psychologically. Korea, McCarthyism, Cuba, Vietnam, 
Sputnik
, left- wing terrorism in the 1970s and 1980s, and harsh criticism of 
Reagan by European allies all created a constant sense of gloom and uncer­
tainty in America. Atmospherics gave the United States the continual sense 
that its advantage in the Cold War was slipping away. Yet underneath the 
hood, in the objective reality of power relations, the Russians never had a 
chance. This disjuncture between the American psyche and geopolitical re­
ality is important to remember for two reasons. First, it reveals the immatu­
rity of American power. Second, it reveals a tremendous strength. Because 
the United States was insecure, it generated a level of effort and energy that 
was overwhelming. There was nothing casual or confident in the way the 
Americans—from political leaders to engineers to military and intelligence 
officers—waged the Cold War. 

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That is one of the primary reasons the United States was surprised when 
it won the Cold War. The United States and its alliance had the Soviet 
Union surrounded. The Soviets could not afford to challenge the Americans 
at sea and had instead to devote their budget to building armies and mis­
siles, and they could not match American economic growth rates or entice 
their allies with economic benefits. The Soviet Union fell further and fur­
ther behind. And then it collapsed. 
The fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, 499 years after Columbus’s expe­
dition, ended an entire age in history. For the first time in half a millen­
nium, power no longer resided in Europe, nor was Europe the focal point of 
international competition. After 1991, the sole global power in the world 
was the United States, which had become the center of the international 
system. 
We have examined how the United States came to power in the twentieth 
century. There is one additional accompanying fact—a little- studied statis­
tic that I mentioned earlier and that speaks volumes. In 1980, as the U.S.– 
Soviet duel was moving to its climax, transpacific trade rose to equal 
transatlantic trade for the first time in history. A mere ten years later, as the 
Soviet Union was collapsing, transpacific trade had soared to a level 50 per­
cent greater than transatlantic trade. The entire geometry of international 
trade, and therefore of the global system, was undergoing an unparalleled 
shift. 
How did this affect the rest of the world? Quite simply, the cost of sea 
lane control is enormous. Most trading countries can’t bear the cost of con­
trolling sea lanes and therefore depend on nations that do have the resources 
to do so. Naval powers therefore acquire enormous political leverage, and 
other nations don’t want to challenge them. The cost of controlling an adja­
cent body of water is expensive. The cost of controlling a body of water 
thousands of miles away is overwhelming. Historically, there have been only 
a handful of nations that have been able to bear that expense—and it’s no 
easier or cheaper today. Take a look at the U.S. defense budget and the 
amount spent on the navy and on related space systems. The cost of main­
taining carrier battle groups in the Persian Gulf is a greater outlay than the 

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total defense budgets of most countries. Controlling the Atlantic or the Pa­
cific without a shoreline on both would be beyond the economic capability 
of just about any nation. 
North America alone can house a transcontinental nation capable of 
projecting power simultaneously into the Atlantic and the Pacific. Therefore 
North America is the center of gravity of the international system. At the 
dawn of the American age, the United States is far and away the dominant 
power in North America. It is a country that simultaneously invaded Eu­
rope and Japan in 1944–45. It took military control of both bodies of water 
and retains it to this day. This is why it is in a position to preside over the 
new age. 
But it is important to recall that Spain once dominated Europe and 
presided over the opening century of the European Age. While I expect that 
North America will be the center of gravity of the global system for the next 
few centuries, I also expect the United States to dominate North America 
for at least a century. But as with Spain, the assertion that North America is 
the center of gravity does not guarantee that the United States will always 
dominate North America. Many things can happen—from civil war to de­
feat in a foreign war to other states emerging on its borders over the cen­
turies. 
For the short term, however—and by that I mean the next hundred 
years—I will argue that the United States’ power is so extraordinarily over­
whelming, and so deeply rooted in economic, technological, and cultural 
realities, that the country will continue to surge through the twenty- first 
century, buffeted though it will be by wars and crises. 
This isn’t incompatible with American self- doubt. Psychologically, the 
United States is a bizarre mixture of overconfidence and insecurity. Interest­
ingly, this is the precise description of the adolescent mind, and that is ex­
actly the American condition in the twenty- 
first century. The world’s 
leading power is having an extended adolescent identity crisis, complete 
with incredible new strength and irrational mood swings. Historically, the 
United States is an extraordinarily young and therefore immature society. So 
at this time we should expect nothing less from America than bravado and 
despair. How else should an adolescent feel about itself and its place in the 
world? 

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But if we think of the United States as an adolescent, early in its overall 
history, then we also know that, regardless of its self- image, adulthood lies 
ahead. Adults tend to be more stable and more powerful than adolescents. 
Therefore, it is logical to conclude that America is in the earliest phase of its 
power. It is not fully civilized. America, like Europe in the sixteenth century, 
is still barbaric (a description, not a moral judgment). Its culture is un­
formed. Its will is powerful. Its emotions drive it in different and contradic­
tory directions. 
Cultures live in one of three states. The first state is barbarism. Barbar­
ians believe that the customs of their village are the laws of nature and that 
anyone who doesn’t live the way they live is beneath contempt and requiring 
redemption or destruction. The third state is decadence. Decadents cyni­
cally believe that nothing is better than anything else. If they hold anyone in 
contempt, it is those who believe in anything. Nothing is worth fighting for. 
Civilization is the second and most rare state. Civilized people are able 
to balance two contradictory thoughts in their minds. They believe that 
there are truths and that their cultures approximate those truths. At the same 
time, they hold open in their mind the possibility that they are in error. The 
combination of belief and skepticism is inherently unstable. Cultures pass 
through barbarism to civilization and then to decadence, as skepticism un­
dermines self- certainty. Civilized people fight selectively but effectively. Ob­
viously all cultures contain people who are barbaric, civilized, or decadent, 
but each culture is dominated at different times by one principle. 
Europe was barbaric in the sixteenth century, as the self- certainty of 
Christianity fueled the first conquests. Europe passed into civilization in the 
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and then collapsed into decadence in 
the course of the twentieth century. The United States is just beginning its 
cultural and historical journey. Until now it has not been sufficiently coher­
ent to have a definitive culture. As it becomes the center of gravity of the 
world, it is developing that culture, which is inevitably barbaric. America is 
a place where the right wing despises Muslims for their faith and the left 
wing despises them for their treatment of women. Such seemingly differ­
ent perspectives are tied together in the certainty that their own values are
self- evidently best. And as with all barbaric cultures, Americans are ready to 
fight for their self- evident truths. 

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This is not meant as criticism, any more than an adolescent can be criti­
cized for being an adolescent. It is a necessary and inevitable state of devel­
opment. But the United States is a young culture and as such it is clumsy, 
direct, at times brutal, and frequently torn by deep internal dissension—its 
dissidents being united only in the certainty that their values are best. The 
United States is all of these things, but as with Europe in the sixteenth cen­
tury, the United States will, for all of its apparent bumbling, be remarkably 
effective. 

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