Conrad Black: America in a shambles

Many countries bordered by two or more other states have suffered indescribable misery these 200 years; Poland, a valiant historic nation, was divided up and annexed by the Prussians, Russians and Austrians, and in the last century, after 20 years of independence, Poland was brutally crushed first by Hitler and then by Stalin. I am not a reflexive cheerleader for the United States, and few Canadians have been more heavily inconvenienced by the corruption of the American legal system than I have, but the U.S. has not really bothered us these last two centuries and for the last century, has been more responsible for our security than we have ourselves.

The United States in the 244 years of its independence has enjoyed a swifter rise by every measurement of power, population and prosperity, than any nation or people in the history of the world, from a couple of million colonists at independence in 1783 to overwhelming pre-eminence in the world at the end of the Second World War, just two long lifetimes later. Canada, to avoid being subsumed into the mighty American updraft, had to strive hard throughout that time to keep pace with America’s rise. But Canada did keep pace with it, and in doing so its achievement, comparatively unpublicized and unglamourized by the American genius for showmanship, has been as or more remarkable than the rise of America, though obviously on a smaller scale and of less importance to the world. Our problem, a benign but intimidating neighbour, is the opposite of the problem faced by our nearest analogue in the world, Australia, a magnificent country that suffers from being a 12- to 20-hour airplane voyage away from any large country with which it has anything in common. The British imagine that the Americans are “our cousins” though the British still resent the rise of America and its usurpation of Britain’s place in the world. But because of the Gloriana of Churchillian Britain and that nation’s proverbial Finest Hour, and because of the benignity of America, Britain managed the smoothest and most elegant transition in the history of the nation state from the first rank of world powers to the second rank, but the premier ally of its successor as the world’s leading power. Canada, much influenced by both countries, better knows the distinctions between them.