Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire What will post-Imperial U.S./Rome be like?

I am not an expert on Rome but I recently read Will Durant, "Ceasar and Christ". The fall of the Roman Empire sure seems like us today, almost down to the gnats proverbial arse...

Will we enter a dark-ages? Will we go to little warring kingdom's all over the country-side, arming up to protect ourselves from other little kingdoms, living close to the castle to flee in case of attack... barely getting by on subsistence farming?

Perhaps I need perspective, I admit I can be a tad negative. But this latest news concerning the amnesty for illegals just seems so suicidal. Forces are in motion that cannot be stopped that will gut us to the bone and there will be no healing, no turning back, no revival of nobility or greatness or a return to our golden age.

I just cannot get my arms around it all in my head. Where are we headed? What is really truly coming down the pike?

Once we are totally converted to socialism and the masses become ever more hedonistic it seems the only historical outcome is the French Revoution followed by Napolean. Is that our future?

War with Iran looms, which means 10 dollar per gallon gas, increased national debt, more dead and dying... more unrest at home drummed up by the left.

Will the dollar go into a free fall? When will that happen and so what if it does?
Then we won't be able to buy junk cheap and we sure can't make shoes, shirts or ball-bearings anymore at home.

What are you thoughtful folks thinking concerning all of this? I am thinking; buy a small subsistence farm. Somewhere further away from where I am and get ready for implosion and upheaval.

I just don't know. Sometimes things do seem very dark and discouraging. Maybe I'm in denial, but I still have great Hope. Most of the problems were are experiencing in this country are created by ourselves. The American spirit and ideal is that common people can get together and rule themselves & make a better life for their families in Freedom, - - rather than be the subjects of a king. (This idea was unique in human history. Nobels had rights. Kings had rights. Common people did not have any rights.) The country was founded on the idea of individual rights and responsibility. Unfortunately, especially since the 1960s, the idea of 'value relativism' has taken over - - - there is no right or wrong - - - its all relative. Anything goes - - as long as you grab the money and the power. If you have neither money or power - - - - you sell your support to whoever will give you the most goodies or promise you the illusion of 'security'. If the people in this country woke up - - if they spent just a bit less time wasted in front of the boob tube and woke up,(and picked up and read a subtantial book or two per your example) there's almost nothing we couldn't do together. As the old character from the newspaper comics used to say "We have met the enemy . . and he is us." - - -

Dixie,

If that happens, I doubt that we who live on subsistence farms will be allowed to hang onto them. I am certain sure that in a SHTF scenario, the beef and horse flesh in my pastures will soon become nutrients for some starving masses rather than for my family as it was intended.

Even the farmers, in the West at least, are dependent on a functioning infrastructure. Our irrigation water is delivered by the Federal Bureau of Reclamation. Our power to pump that water is delivered through the national grid.

Our fertilizers and tractor fuels are delivered through a national transport system and must be paid for with dollars.


My thoughts on the subject are that it behooves us, the voters, to elect a government which will assure a soft fall from power such as Great Britain's, rather than a cataclysmic crash.

Man, you guys are wearing me out. I guess everybody has to feel like they live in terrrible times to avoid, well, I don't know why. The parallels between Rome and the US are strained, at best, and require you to ignore differences which are far more significant than the similarities.

I'll point out one, real quick....Rome never got chased out of anywhere with 3000 casualties in four years.

Rome never permitted more than a tiny fraction of the population to vote. Rome was based on a slavery and tribute economy. Rome collected taxes and tribute from its empire and conquered peoples. What America-haters like to call the American empire is simply countries who are allied with us militarily or aligned on some particular issue. We don't govern them ane we don't tax them...we spend our money on foreign aid and military spending which benefits them....that's a mighty funny kind of empire.

The parallel of decadence and the collapse of public morality seems to be a a peril of affluent society....particularly one with no apparent imminent external threat. But even if, God forbid (literally) somehow judge-made gay marriage or some other abomination spreads beyond the Peoples Republic of Mass., I doubt it will cause the collapse of the United States government.

If you want to see a real threat, talk to somebody who was alive in 1942 when the Allies were losing WWII. Or read the shocked commentary of the time about the collapse of morals in the 1920s. I don't think a nation that survived war and real depression, even if its people have degenerated some in the last two generations, is going to collapse anytime soon. If anybody wants to short their government bonds, let me know and I'll wire funds Monday.

We won't collapse all at once but over a period of time. Rome did not collapse all at once but over a period of time. Western Rome about 500 years; Eastern Rome about 1500 years. What we are seeing is the collapse of the nation-state replaced by small private communities. However, as I've been saying between the collapse of the nation-state and the founding of private communities will be the white reservations. The white reservations will be the foundations of the private communities. The Democraps and the Republicraps are selling out the country for their own self-interest. You young pups are going to be living in interesting times.

federal troops could provide an iron-fist to resist any invasion if leadership so desired??

First we will have to learn to speak Spanish and then, after the dark ages, Japaneese.

We got to this circumstance, because we allowed it to happen. We have the ability to stop it at any time. But some how I doubt that there are many who are willing to sacrifice life, liberty and fortune to do so, so I'm betting that we will continue the slow slide into irrelevance.
In the unlikely event that a leader should step forward and ask us to resist an ever increasingly abusive, intrusive, oppressive central government, how many would turn off the boob tube and respond? Not many.
Have a look at recent elections and see how many supported dolts and traitors like Gore and Kerry. Darned close to 50%.
The politicians have subverted us.
Sort of puts me in mind of the old saw of how do you cook a frog you put him a pot and raise the temp slowly.
Jim

If it survives another 50 years, America will be something like a 21st century soviet union,... with a tiny elite controlling class and a very large working class peasantry made up of Mexican immigrants and domestic residents which have been reduced to their standard of living.

Most of it's resources will be funneled to the maintenance of a large, powerful military,... which will be necessary in order to ward off the tecnological advances of China,... which America provided.

I had an outstanding history instructor at Command and General Staff College that posed this "The nation state as we know it today is a relatively recent development in the context of history. What if the time of the nation state as we know it today has run its course and may soon be over?" What if?

Expat

Individual liberty of the level we currently enjoy is an even more recent innovation. For the vast majority of human history, men have existed in various states of feudalism and in various other authoritarian regimes. What if individual liberty has run its course? Have we had the best there is? Will we slide back into a type of feudalism more in keeping with the vast majority of human history?

I'm noy saying that I consider the idea attractive, but considering the ineptitude and corrupt nature of contemporary federal leadership, I wouldn't discount the possibility of a military coup in America's future.

It may someday be the only viable manner to hold the nation together as any type of sustainable entity.

As it stands,... there's no one in America today taking the country down a path which will lead to it's survival. Large aspects of it are simply adrift.

In fact, I sometimes wonder if it's intentionally being destroyed.

"Harvested" as it were.

You've never struck me as "the glass half empty" kind of man!

I think Bristoe makes a good point.

I do not compare America's empire with the Romans so much as I do the Brits, and the French and Portuguese before them.

We are right now and have been since WW II the worlds leading economy. Our trade and our dollars enrich the world and our military might protects those economic interests.

But I think that economic influence is waning, soon to be replaced by the burgeoning Chinese economy. I think that soon Chinese competition for a limited energy supply will elevate that price beyond what we could dream of today.

I predict that within less than fifty years the world will run on Chinese currency instead of dollars.

And once again we need leaders who will keep our nation strong and vibrant as we turn over this job of the world's policeman and big brother to the next world power.

These are truly good times for a few! They are the mouthy ones who have convinced the sheep they too are living the good times. THE PRINTING OF MONEY IS THE WORSE THREAT OF THE USA! Governments have only 2 ways of getting money. Taxes & printing worthless money. Yes, high taxes do hinder growth! The Romans cheapen their coins & Germany printed money to pay off their first World War I debt ! Ever since the 70's under Nixon was the dollar no longer backed by gold. It was to be printed so that a dollar then would only be worth 5 cents in 40 years! You can do some cute tricks by printing money! Pay back debts with dollar worth less & etc. ! The government no longer tells how much it is printing! This will continue until our dollar will longer be excepted as the major world currency! Then the free fall begins! When? Not in my life time I hope! I don�t want to be right on this one! Right now we are doing a good job of stiff arming other nations to play along! The printing of money is worse on people on fixed income, such as me! The dollar is worth a lot less now then it was in 98 when I retired. My savings can�t keep up with the rising costs! More on this on another post!

Folks
You can keep pointing fingers at the various symptoms of the problem, like a fireman pointing at all the fires started by sparks from steam engine. Until you shut down the steam engine the fires will continue to pop up every where the steam engine goes.
Jim

I hear what you are saying... nonetheless I think there are some similarities.

For one, Durant makes a point towards the end of his work that one primary reason the Romans fell was that they killed off their children. At the time they practiced exposure. Instead of widespread abortion they just took the newly born unwanted child and left it by the edge of the forrest or whatever and it was eaten by animals or died of the cold. In contrast the Barbarian Germans were copulating for all they were worth and multiplying like proverbial rabbits.

Secondly Durant makes the point that the Barbarians didn't have to invade suddenly they were already inside. Many had been recruited into the military, and they had also worked out some deal to cross the river??? right?

Another thing... the Romans came to despise serving in public office since it was a burden of civic duty and it kinda sucked.

And also the Senate had abdicated it's real responsibilities and had become a rubber stamp to Ceasar. Now it is the same think except they have abdicated not to Ceasar but to the oligarchy on the Court.

There was a huge welfare system of bread and circuses to keep the rabble in check in Rome.

But what I don't get...

Rome imploded, yet they conquered foreign lands and then came home with slaves and booty and riches and aquired new sources of taxes after the conquest. We go to war for others and come home broke... so how can we continue? The Roman war machine was not a non-profit endeavor, whereas ours is. I guess the Romans didn't print paper money either and had no Federal Reserve System that just created wealth at the stroke of the pen...

You know what they say, Nome wasn't built in a day.

The US has not become an Empire as yet. Rome fell from the inside as the citizens became more inept at doing simple thing to survive and even stopped serving in the Roman Legions turning the duties of protecting the Empire over to mercinary troops along with training and wepions technology. Educating officers or and soldiers who gave true allegence to enimy Governments, and tribes. The Gothic tribes were first annexed then trained in Roman tactics then used against the Huns who were then annexed and trained to conquer the eastern and northern tribes that threatened the Empires. These forgen tribes were also used in the civil wars that resulted in the Empires being devided between east and west. The Goths finally invaded Rome itself, over the next thee hundred years what was left of the learning and culture of Rome was disseminated throughout Europe, mainly by the Cristians who, while condemming the decadence of the Romans loved the Luxuries availible through trade routes established By the Romans. The eastern Empire lasted a few centuries longer, until the Mongols conquered the middle east, and Byzantium ( Constantinople) The Mongols in turn were absorbed by the middle eastern culture and even accepted the religion of the Muslims, although they had a Religion of thier own. So in effect the two warring religions Christianity and Islam conquered the Romans. The Dark ages came about because the unification of Rome was no longer in place, every litle kinglet was able to lord it over the "common " folks aided by the religions of choice dependant on the location. The Christians monks and Priests taught the uneducated common folks that they had a Duty to searve the Rulers who God had placed over them, ( devine right) the Muslim Imams are still doing that in the Middle east, and calling for a Jihad aggainst any unbelievers (US) invasion and conquest, of all lands not under the control of Islam. So in a way the Roman Empire is still falling, after digging out of eighteen centuries of ignorance and slavery, civilazation is still in great danger, from barbarians.