A world government, be its center at the banks of the Potomac or the East River, with the capacity to give you all you want, will also have the capacity to take it all away.

U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater told us:

A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away.

That also goes for nations and peoples. The government that is powerful enough to give liberty and democracy – or perhaps rather liberty or democracy – to nations and peoples is also powerful enough to take it away.

We here in Europe are often told to be grateful to the Americans for their help to Europe during World War II and for their guard of Western Europe against the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

While I perfectly well understand the American “isolationist” position of not using taxpayers’ money to fight foreign wars and not go about fighting monsters around the world, I am grateful, but not without reservations. I certainly will not submit to servility under the United States federal government because of what the American military has done for Norway and Europe. Freedom, which we – to a considerable degree at least – got through the defeat of Hitler’s regime, includes the freedom of thought and expression.

By no means do I think what the Allies did to Dresden, Hiroshima, or Nagasaki was justified. Nor do I believe that the ignoring of internal German resistance was justifiable. Of the lasting concepts Hitler and World War II brought to world society, the reference to Hitler and his regime always being worse as justification for all sorts of violations is arguably among the most unfortunate – if not the most unfortunate.

So if I think it was alright for those United States to protect Europe against Nazism, Fascism, and Communism, why don’t others also have a right to democracy, i.e., by military intervention.

Firstly, there is no such thing as a “right” to democracy.

Secondly, without Woodrow Wilson’s intervention, we probably wouldn’t have had World War II or the Soviet Union in the first place. Bad American foreign policy put us in the situation in the first place.

Thirdly, it was democracy that put the Kingdom of Norway in jeopardy during World War II. Had Norway’s elected leaders listened to our non-elected Head of State, Norway probably never would have been invaded by Hitler’s Germany. With the level to which Norwegian defense had declined, the Germans were surprised at the resistance they met. They were surprised it took two months before the kingdom surrendered. Some more effort at keeping a reliable defense could have been a real threat of turning Norwegian fjords into a wet grave for the German naval fleet, something Hitler probably never would have risked.

So you think it’s alright for the U.S. to free Europe of a tyrant or dictator, but you would deny that right to others? Isn’t that racist? Doesn’t everyone have the right to liberty?

Firstly, I think there is a difference between World War II and policing the world in a general business of “tyrant deposing.”

Secondly, I think there is a difference between helping several exile governments of one’s own civilization – Western civilization – and generally policing the world. Taking care of one’s own, does not necessarily imply that one should take care of everyone. Such egalitarian thinking is a major cause of our big problems today. One could argue that one should stick to defense of one’s own country only, but still, helping Europe does not create an obligation to help everyone else. This is definitely not racist. What might be racist though is the thought that other civilizations always need the help of the West in order to progress.

Thirdly, I think Europeans should start managing on their own. The dependence on Americans that Europe has is not healthy. There are several problems with this dependence. There is the expected servility, especially expressed by neocons. There is the lack of balance. There is the lack of responsibility for one’s own affairs. When one knows that others will pay up, one tends not to take responsibility. When others do not pay up, one tends to take responsibility for oneself.

European reliance on America is very unhealthy indeed. It should be put to an end, sooner rather than later.

The Norwegian government also aims to recreate the world in its image, albeit not through militarism. Through subsidizing aid programs groups learn that they need not take responsibility for their own actions. When our foreign secretary tells us that “we” need to help farmers in Afghanistan to grow other plants than drug plants, and that “everything” affects “us,” there really is no limit to blackmailing options and lack of responsibility.

World War II ended relatively well compared to many other military enterprises. This success doesn’t pass without critique though. When advocating U.S. military intervention, World War II is the success story that is used for justifying just about everything. World War I is hardly ever mentioned. The complete story of U.S. military intervention should be considered, and the whole story tells us that it has been and is a fiasco.

Remember also what Randolph Bourne told us:

War is the health of the State.

It is argued that once one has gone in and created a mess, one must also clean up the mess. Keep in mind though that this can be used as justification for perpetual intervention. What about the economy? If the government has started intervening heavily in the economy, does it need to keep intervening until the mess is cleaned up? That almost guarantees that the government never gets out.

Dr. Thomas Woods tells us in his The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History about the two-phase story of American intervention in Vietnam. First there was an attempt at creating American modern, progressive social policy. It failed, and this led to the military intervention. It seems Vietnam was a repetition of European history. First one tries to make the world safe for democracy or create progressive social policy. Then one “has to clean up the mess.”

The Nobel Peace Prize for 2001 went to the United Nations and then U.N. Secretary-General, Kofi Annan. The latter said in his Nobel lecture:

The sovereignty of States must no longer be used as a shield for gross violations of human rights.

That may be a very good rule, depending of course on what one means by human rights. What should be noted though, is that if world government sovereignty is to replace national sovereignty in the name of individual sovereignty, one will have helpless individuals standing up against that new world order sovereignty.

A world government, be its center at the banks of the Potomac or the East River, with the capacity to give you all you want, will also have the capacity to take it all away.