End of Empires: who and what was responsible? (post WW2)

[jmm99]

The empires (British, French and Dutch) did end in SE Asia and South Asia. Ah, an end to colonialism and imperialism. The US became the major non-communist player.

It took over that role (if we take the Worldview of what its spokesmen said, wrote and presumably believed) for the most noble of reasons (e.g., GEN Westmoreland was only one of many Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson era spokesmen who sang the same song):

Indeed, history may judge that American aid to South Vietnam constituted one of man's more noble crusades, one that had less to do with the domino theory and a strategic interest for the United States than with the simple equation of a strong nation helping an aspiring nation to reach a point where it had some reasonable chance to achieve and keep a degree of freedom and human dignity. It remains a fact that few countries have ever engaged in such idealistic magnanimity; and no gain or attempted gain for human freedom can be discounted.

(link in post #13). That perception fit the Worldview of those times in both Dutchess County and Houghton County.

The Worldview of, say, the British, French and Dutch was quite different. Quite rationally in their perception they saw the US "takeover" as a coup - and the new US role as neo-colonialism and neo-imperialism (or other names, such as Pax Americana, American Hegemony, American Exceptionalism, etc.).

Regards

Mike