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Decades of post-colonial chaos

"Veni, Vidi, Vici, numquam reliquit - ego adduxit inimici mei !"

The agency's role in the coup d'état was carried out without prior approval from the high‐

level interagency group in Washington that monitors C.I.A. clandestine activities, these
sources said. That group, known in 1966 as the 303 Committee, had specifically rejected

a previous C.I.A. request seeking authority to plot against Mr. Nkrumah, who had angered
the United States by maintaining close ties to the Soviet Union and China."

"C.I.A. Said to Have Aided Plotters Who Overthrew Nkrumah in Ghana," 155
Hersh, Seymour M., The New York Times, (May 1978)
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Chaos & the m’zungu

American Imperialism

“ American imperialism consists of policies aimed at extending the political, economic
and cultural influence of the United States over areas beyond its boundaries. Depending

on the commentator, it may include military conquest, gunboat diplomacy, unequal
treaties, subsidization of preferred factions, economic penetration through private
companies, followed by intervention when those interests are threatened, or regime

change.

The policy of imperialism is usually considered to have begun in the late 19th century,
though some consider US territorial expansion at the expense of Native Americans to be

similar enough to deserve the same term. The federal government of the United States
has never referred to its territories as an empire, but some commentators refer to it as

such, including Max Boot, Arthur Schlesinger, and Niall Ferguson. The United States has
also been accused of neocolonialism, sometimes defined as a modern form of

hegemony, which uses economic rather than military power in an informal empire, and is
sometimes used as a synonym for contemporary imperialism.

***
Stuart Creighton Miller says that the public's sense of innocence about Realpolitik
impairs popular recognition of U.S. imperial conduct. The resistance to actively

occupying foreign territory has led to policies of exerting influence via other means,
including governing other countries via surrogates or puppet regimes, where
domestically unpopular governments survive only through U.S. support.

***
In an October 1940 report to Franklin Roosevelt, Bowman wrote that "the US government
is interested in any solution anywhere in the world that affects American trade. In a wide
sense, commerce is the mother of all wars." In 1942, this economic globalism was