David Newsom
Senior Fellow
Miller Center of Public Affairs
University of Virginia
"The Imperial Mantle: The United States, Decolonization and the Third World"
March 23, 2001

David Newsom: Books tell stories. Now this book is, in part, my story but it is also the story of one of the traumatic events in world history, the breakup of major European empire, and in little more than half a century the changeover from those empires to more than 100 independent states. Two-thirds of the population of the world saw old flags lowered and new flags raised and their governance and often their fortunes changed. This group of new nations, which is variously called developing or Third World, has since its creation presented some special problems for U.S. foreign policy and for the American people, because still in the view of many in the third world, they threw off one imperial mantle only to be enveloped by another called the United States of America.

In preparing my book, I invited a group of international students from the University of Virginia to solicit their views on how they regarded the United States. One young man from the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent spoke up very bruskly and said, "Yes, it’s the new East India company", referring to the company which had colonized India. In this country we greeted the march to independence as if it were 1776 of a global scale. But that early enthusiasm dimmed as nations emerged that were neither pro-Western nor democratic. And we lost control of the United Nations. We have been continually surprised by political upheavals and conflicts that have often affected our basic interests. We have been shocked and angered by attacks on American citizens and U.S. installations, and some who we thought were friends have been reluctant to condemn terrorist acts against our embassies and ships. And we have been frustrated by our seeming inability to control events.

For 60 years, I have been an observer of this process. In 1940 I received a Pulitzer traveling fellowship from Columbia University, and with a check for $1500 I spent nine months circling the world. The world I visited at that time was a world of empires, except for Japan which was my first stop which had an empire of its own, and Argentina, Chili, and Brazil which were my last stops which had been freed from the Spanish a century before. Every port I called at, Sorta Baya and the Dutch East Indies, Batavia and Jakarta, British Singapore, Saylan, India and East Africa, Portugeuse, Lorenzo Marks, and British South Africa, everyone was part of an empire. And out of sight were Belgium’s Congo, our own Philippines, Italy’s East African and Libyan holdings, and the mandates of the Middle East, that of course the vast Soviet Empire. But that was about to change.

By the mid-20^th century, the European empires were doomed. World War II gave impetus to the independence movement in India. The Japanese during their occupation of Asian lands armed and encouraged independence movements. And the war sapped the will and resources of the imperial powers. Whatever the circumstances they might face, new leaders and new elites wanted their own opportunities for patronage, power, and prestige. I have had the opportunity subsequently as a traveler and diplomat to witness that change and aftermath from various vantage points in Africa, Asia, London, and Washington.

During a visit to India in late 1940, I met some of the leaders of that change, members of the Indian National Congress Party, including Ghandi. In a letter home I wrote:

In studying the breakup of these empires, it is fascinating to observe the repetitive cycles, whatever the imperial power. First came a phase in which the imperial power denied any pressures or desires for independence. I visited Angola with the U.S. National War College in 1960. A Portuguese official addressed us and said, "We have been here for 500 years, and by God’s grace we will be here for another 500." It was just 14 before the Portuguese empire collapse, and the Congo next door was collapsing that very year.

Then the second phase, if the possibility of independence was accepted, colonial powers argued, "Yes, but the natives are not ready." Then as independence movements became more virulent, in a third phase, they attempted to suppress the movements by arresting, exiling, and sometimes killing the leaders. But ultimately they moved to the fourth phase, and in every case the European power was forced to negotiate, often with those same leaders it had imprisoned or exiled not long before. Some, like the Belgians in the Congo, left so precipitously that they had very little time to prepare in any reasonable way. Independence in many areas came fitfully and often over the opposition of significant political groups and European capitols. Winston Churchill was bitterly opposed to giving up India. His famous phrase, "I did not become the King’s first minister to preside over the liquidation of the British empire."

Independence was untidy. It left not only questionable boundaries, in Africa particularly, but it bequeathed the world at least three, still, unresolvable problems — Palestine, Cashmere, and Cyprus. And seeds of trouble were planted in the Middle East by the very nature of the political presence. For European nations that exercised control through mandates and treaties claiming that they were dealing with independent countries, and so in the Middle East you had the fiction of independence without the reality. And with no fixed dates for independence, removal of European and Germany often came only through revolution. Egypt is one particular example.

Now China and Iran are not normally considered colonies, but they too felt the humiliations and pressures of the imperial powers. They were never fully colonized, but given their later manifestations of anti-Westernism, they might as well have been. Now it’s true that in many cases, peoples of the new nations merely changed autocratic rule from abroad for oppressive oligarchical rule at home, planting further seeds for continuing instability.

But the story is not over. The profound effects on the world of the European and North American colonialism of the preceding five centuries are still with us today. The new nations, born of decolonization, will not let us forget. Just read the papers. Hardly a week goes by that they do not disclose a vestige of the colonial era in issues or attitudes. Ethnic rivalries in Asia and Africa represent tensions that were suppressed during colonial times but then, with the release of control, have erupted in bloody and internal conflicts. Robert Mogavi, Prime Minister of Zimbabwe, seeks to reverse the land grabs of the 19^th century, even at the risk of destroying his nation’s economy. When a sudden influx of U.S military personnel came in to Aden after the U.S.S. Cole disaster, it awakened memories of the British troops on their soil. Indonesians openly resented the presence of White Australian forces in the United Nations contingence that went into East Eymore. Again echoes of Western forces that sought to reclaim that country for the Dutch after World War II. A Hindu nationalist party in power in India seeks to reverse two millennia of Christian conversion. A U.N. conference on racism this summer will face demands from representatives of newer countries for reparations for colonialism and slavery, reminding the rest of us of a period that for them was harsh and demanding.

Now it is often said to me, "But there is no third world. These countries are so varied in their size, their economies, their orientation that they cannot be grouped together." But still, I think you will find that they often reflect their solidarity of a common colonial experience, however unnatural such solidarity may seem to us. In the United Nations in particular, the new nations have joined to pressure the industrial world for a greater share of resources. Their actions reflect the view, not entirely unjustified, that they have been exploited in the imperial past. The transition to independence brought serious economic problems for them. Colonial burdens persisted as imperial subsidies fell off. And hope for massive assistance from outside either did not materialize, or it was deemed insufficient or onerous in its requirements. What we today call the North/South split, between the industrialized north and the less industrialized south has become a fact of international life dominating the United Nations and many international conferences.

Culture is also a factor. The new nations today seek to reclaim their cultures. If Europeans did not ban or discourage the cultural practices of the indigenous peoples, they created through example tempting models to imitate. But often by racial discrimination, they made that model difficult to follow. The result throughout the imperial world has been for many a crisis of identity. A Filipino once said to me, "I don’t know who I am. I spent 400 years in a monastery under the Spanish and 50 years in Hollywood under the Americans."

For many, and particularly for educated elite, the colonial period was humiliating, both personally and nationally. Memories of past discrimination lead to quick affronts over matters of status and race and nationally, whether in India, West Africa, or the Arab Middle East, recollections of past empires and past glories heighten the humiliation of colonial rule. We often think that the European countries went into an empty world, but they went into a world that had other empires and entities still remembered in areas where they existed. Indians today consider efforts to reclude them from the nuclear club another example of national humiliation. And Arabs speak of the humiliation they have suffered through the Western supported implantation of Israel on land they consider theirs’. Because the metropole powers were by and large democratic, the Western world assumed that the nations would emerge as democracies. And a few such as India did. But to our disappointment most followed colonial patterns, central authority, administrative dicta, controlled elections, and still today administrative laws and regulations that were established during the colonial period are used to curb dissent by ostensibly democratic governments in Malaysia, in Israel, and in Zimbabwe.

And having spent most of their lives fighting imperialists, anti-imperialism became the basis of politics in many of the new countries. During the Cold War, efforts to gain the support of significant third world nations for anti-Soviet policies often fell on deaf ears. Their oppression in their eyes had come from the West, not the East. Third world nations attach particular importance to sovereignty, and to the principle of nonintervention. Now they may interfere in each others’ affairs, but interference by Western nations is resented as a renewal of imperialism. Even offers of humanitarian and economic assistance have at times been criticized or rejected as violations of sovereignty. Criticism is unwelcome. Outside comment on such issues as economic viablity, human rights, religious freedom, or disaster, especially by Western powers, even if true and sometimes especially if true, are resented. Third world nations though carefully avoid criticism of each other, seeing criticism as a form of interference of internal affairs.

The impact of the vestiges of colonialism on today’s world can be exaggerated. After all, many years have passed, and not all of the problems of the developing world are the fault of former masters. Leaders and peoples of many badly mismanaged countries deserve their share of the blame. Yet the sensitivities that grew out of the colonial period, sensitivities about sovereignty, culture, race, and identity lie just beneath the political surface. They may vary in intensity from one nation to another, but they represent, as I think the Zimbabwe case demonstrates, the continuing temptation by leaders who face political crises to reawaken some of the emotions and feelings of the colonial period. Certainly the passage of time has modified many attitudes toward the West, but the abilities of a Sadam Hussein, a Komeinei, or a Kadafi to exploit latent resentments about side powers demonstrates that the antipathies have not disappeared. And like deeply held sentiments in our own country, these do not pass with a single generation.

But you may say, how does this relate to the United States? Empires and decolonization are history. And besides, we were not an imperial power, or were we? I used to shudder a bit as some of our notable statesmen used to say to emissaries from newly independent countries, "We understand you because we were a colony once ourselves." But there was a big difference between 1776 and the independence movements of the 20^th century. The American colonists fought off domination by people of their own race and color. They inherited a vast and rich continent and they had already in place established working democratic systems. But in the 20^th century the colonial peoples are seeking freedom from the domination of another race, and they are often inheriting national entities weak economically, and with political structures still to be formed. We were, it is true, only briefly a colonial power, and in our view a benevolent one. We gave early independence to the Philippines, but others have a difference view. Filipinos still recall what I think most Americans tend to forget — the bloody war we conducted against the Philippine nationalist forces of Emilio Aguinaldo. Manifest destiny, in which we claimed degiminy over the lands to the south, was a North American term. We may not consider the conquest of our West imperial, yet it’s fascinating to see how it paralleled chronologically and in methods the European conquest of Africa. Our treatment of the indigenous population on our continent was not greatly different in attitudes and actions from the way Sesel Roads treated the Africans. We deposed the Queen of Hawaii just two years after the French had deposed the Queen of Madagascar.

Now in contrast to those today who say we do not wish to be the world policeman, let me quote President Theodore Roosevelt’s 1934 Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine: "Chronic wrongdoing, or an impotence which results in a general loosening of the ties of civil society, may force the United States, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence to the exercise of an international police power."

Our support for independence movements was often in conflict with other objectives. In the immediate post-World War II era when countries such as Vietnam and Indonesia were seeking independence, we were deeply concerned over the weakness of our European allies, the threat of communist parties in France and Italy. And as a result, we were often in our actions seen by the newly independent leaders as opponents of independence. After independence our rhetoric gave hope of strong support to new nations, but the complexities and limitations of our aid programs brought them down to reality and to disillusionment often with the United States. In the United Nations we were faced throughout the 60s and 70s with a series of third world resolutions on colonialism, on Palestine, on economic inequality, resolutions which we considered unbalanced and unrealistic. And yet we continually voted against resolutions that the new countries considered expressions of their anti-colonial moves. And during the Cold War, our efforts to make countries stand up and be counted ran counter to the non-alignment of most of the new countries. And our resort to covert action in Asia and Latin America awakened memories or colonial manipulation.

In many ways we have inherited the imperial mantle of the Europeans of the past. But does that make any difference? Today we face a variety of foreign policy objectives. The U.S. International Affairs Strategic Plan published by the Department of State in 1997 listed 16 objectives, which included security for this country and its citizens, nuclear nonproliferation, combating terrorism, narcotics and crime, opening markets, preventing the production of weapons of mass destruction, promoting global economic growth, democracy, human rights, and a sustainable global environment. Every one of these objectives, if they are to be fully realized, will require effective relations with many of those nations that were new in the 20^th century. And in seeking those relations we encounter the deeply held attitudes and sensitivities that grew out of colonial and post-colonial experiences.

Now the U.S. response to third world sensitivities is not easy. Little sympathy exists among most Washington policymakers, whether in the Executive or in the Congress for the weaker nations of the globe. And as one who has tried to do it, I can say neither does much sympathy exist for those who try to explain the policy and circumstances of these nations. And there are at least two subjects of special importance to the third world nations — foreign aid and the United Nations that are an athama to many in the nation’s capital.

And then there is a continuing communications problem. We listen to what others say, but secure in our own view of the world, we often do not hear. We can envelop ourselves in our own imperial mantle and stand aside, declare, demand, probe, prescribe and manipulate, or with a degree of humility throw off the cloak and recognize that effective power comes through understanding, listening, and relating to others, as difficult as that may sometimes be.