"The US must, can and will lead in this new century. The third world war that many feared never came. And many millions were lifted out of poverty, and exercised their human rights for the first time. These were the benefits of a global architecture forged over many years by American leaders of both political parties."
Hillary Clinton
Oliver Stone's 10 part documentary "The untold history of the United States" is a bold attempt to challenge the conventional version of post-World War II history.
Stone fought in Vietnam as an infantry soldier, and was shocked by the misrepresentation of the war when he returned to the US. But more importantly, when Stone had children, he was struck by the way in which pupils are still taught a simplistic story of good guys and bad guys at school today. This provided the motivation to produce "The untold history of the United States."
The documentary begins with an overview of the Second World War. Stone charges that the American post-war period has been greatly shaped by two "founding myths:" that the US won the war, and that it was necessary to use the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Of course, the US played an important role, but 80% of the German forces were focused on the Eastern Front. Approximately 400 000 Americans were killed in the war, compared to at least 22 million people in the Soviet Union, and possibly up to 30 million.
Stone goes on to argue that contrary to popular belief, it was not necessary to use the bomb. 700 000 Soviet troops were pushing back the Japanese in Manchuria, and Japan was already heading for defeat. In addition to this, the number of lives saved through ending the war earlier has been revised upwards again and again. Stone sees Hiroshima as the moment the US lost its moral authority. As he puts it, "because we win, we are right, and because we are right, we are therefore good. There is no morality but our own."
The two founding myths led to the Cold War, and the frantic fight against communism both at home, and in proxy wars abroad. Millions of civilians were to die in the wars of Korea and Vietnam, while American history books continue to focus on the deaths of American soldiers, reveering them as dying to defend peace and democracy. The fear of communism was used to justify toppling democratically elected governments from Guatemala in 1954 to Chile in 1973, and some of the most despotic regimes were tolerated provided they were anti-communist.
The documentary continues up to the present day, with 9/11 and the launching of the "war on terror" based on the same principle of "you're with us or you're against us" as the Cold War. Nor does it let Obama off the hook, berating him for his expansion of drone warfare. In 2011, the US sold 78% of the world's arms, and had military bases in 151 countries. Meanwhile, the US navy proclaims itself as a "global force for good" and statements such as Hillary Clinton's above continue to proliferate. Stone invites the viewer to consider whether the people of Hiroshima, Vietnam, Laos, Guatemala, Chile, Cuba and many other countries, might see the US in a different light.
While Stone's documentary provides much food for thought, it is pretty depressing and whether intentionally or not, gives the impression that America's policing of the globe is making the world an ever more violent place. This is a notion which is very widespread - in a recent article on Syria in the Guardian, Nick Cohen claimed that the "world of tyranny and atrocity is no different now than it was 70 years ago", at the time of the Holocaust.
Steven Pinker's book "The better angels of our nature" and related TED talk, although not written as a riposte to "The untold history of the United States" offers a fascinating counter-argument to Nick Cohen's statement. Pinker certainly doesn't set out to defend American policy. His argument is that we currently live in the most peaceful era that humanity has ever known, and that violence has been consistently decreasing for the past 500 years.
He provides some fascinating statistics. The 20th century is commonly thought of as the most violent in human history. But while it is true that it was the century with the most violent deaths, this is due to the fact that the human population was at its highest. We have to look at the proportion of people who died in conflict to gauge the level of violence. In the 20th century, approximately 1% of the population was killed in war. In hunter gatherer societies of the past and present on the other hand, this figure ranges from 15% up to 60%. Pinker goes on to list the world's worst atrocities in terms of the proportion of the global population killed. Top of the list is the An Lushan revolt in 8th century China, in which 36 million people, 15% of the world's population at the time, were killed, the equivalent of 469 million people today.
Pinker is no American triumphalist, but his book challenges the pessimistic outlook of Stone's documentary. Totalitarian regimes were responsible for 138 million deaths in the 20th century, while democracies killed 2 million. Despite so many atrocities, the faults of the US simply cannot be put on par with those of Stalin and Mao. In 1950, the average conflict killed 65 000 people. By 2000, this figure had fallen to 2000 people. Parallels drawn between Iraq and Vietnam are false and unfair - dropping napalm is no longer an option.
None of this is to excuse the wars carried out by the US under the banner of fighting for freedom and democracy. Stone is right to criticize the standard rhetoric surrounding US history. But we should also recognise the decline in violence that has taken place, and refrain from regurgitating the pessmistic mantra that history just repeats itself, or that violence is getting worse. Instead we should embrace Pinker's conclusion that while there is still far too much war, the world we live has never been more peaceful, and this peace is likely to last and spread in the future.
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