American exceptionalism is an idea or, more precisely, a doctrine that believes that the US is inherently different from past and present countries as it has a transcendent moral purpose. Unlike the other great powers such as France, Britain, Japan, the Ottoman empire, Germany etc., who operated in brutal, barbaric ways, America is different in values, political systems, history. America is seen as the preacher of democracy, liberty, human rights, freedom, equality, but it’s also accepted that it does make innocent mistakes whilst advocating such a stance. Firstly, I have to say there’s nothing truly unique about this doctrine, as every great power with no exclusion took the same stance to justify its action. For example, the Soviet Union, under Lenin leadership, viewed itself as advancing human civilization. With its bloody history, Imperial Japan believed that they were bringing about paradise to the Chinese and protecting them from the Chinese bandits and barbarity; France and its “mission civilisatrice”, and I could go on.
The doctrine of American exceptionalism seems to be immune to criticism. As Noam Chomsky pointed out about the fine scholar Hans J. Morgenthau, who believed that the US, unlike other past and present countries, has a transcendent purpose, he documented that the US consistently acted in ways that violate its purpose. Then Morgenthau says criticism of American exceptionalism is like the arrow of atheism which criticizes god munificence on the ground that evil exists. This clearly shows that such doctrine is of a religious nature immune to facts and scrutiny. Furthermore, when a person investigates such doctrine as scholars like Marilyn Young and Howard Zinn did, you’ll unravel the un-uniqueness and flawed history of the US relating to slavery, civil rights, and social welfare issue. In addition, the US claims to preach democracy, yet it has a long record of inconsistent support of democracy; as documented by the Washington Post article “The long history of the US interfering with elections elsewhere”, the US has intervened in foreign electoral over 80 times. A deeper look shows that the US only advocates democracy when it suits their interests. This’s seen in the US contradictory support of brutal leaders like the Iranian shah, General Castelo in Brazil, general Pinochet in Chile, and the list is long.
This week the doctrine of American exceptionalism is facing another blowback by the civilian casualty files. “A New York Times investigation found that the American air war in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan has been plagued by flawed intelligence, poor targeting and thousands of civilian deaths.” This isn’t the first blowback but one of many. For instance, the Afghan War Diary, the pentagon papers, recently the 2019 bombing in Syria in which dozen civilians have been killed. The New York times investigation drawing from more than 1,300 files has finally stated the obvious: this isn’t an irregular phenomenon. As the files reveal, since 2014 American air war has been plagued by “flawed intelligence, rushed and imprecise targeting and the deaths of thousands of civilians, many of them children.”
I could dive deeper into the atrocious stories mentioned in the article of schools and hospitals bombed, but it’s all written there. People have to realize that the US isn’t different from any past great power. It operates only within self-interest and will do anything for it no matter how brutal the measures have to be. Yet movies, novels and the culture exported tries to create and construct this imagery of the US being this golden city upon a hill which we from other countries are graced by its values. If looked at with an objective eye, such constructions and creations are very flawed.
