Chumpsky suddenly has nothing to complain about.
You would miss that, wouldn’t you?
Bandit:
Damned if i can find a cite, but i would be surprised if the USA was not in fact a net importer of food. Even if they are actually an exporter, i doubt the developing world buys much of it from the US.
North Korea would be a hell of a lot better off without the US, as they would not have so many sanctions slapped on them. This would probably not be a good thing, as their most lucrative export is weapons, and they’ll sell to anyone at all.
I realise that the US is the only superpower and the author of the dominant culture across the globe, but there’s not a lot that ONLY the US does, and i think that to assume the rest of the world would fall over without America is rather presumptuous.
Why?
300 million people just disappear, worlds fourth largest country, third most populous , just dissapears? I think almost all major religions have some kind of end time or apocalyptic scenario. And Christians pretty much base their beliefs upon it. Even if science could come up with a logical explanation, many of the “proof seekers” would not need a more substantial example.
And as far as the US economic and agriculture impact.
The US is the largest producer of grains. Second largest of livestock. And largest producer of steel and other ores. The trade imbalance is not insignificant. Exports:$723 billion (f.o.b., 2001 est.), Imports: $1.148 trillion (f.o.b., 2001 est.). That is alot of income to deny the world anually. And alot of food that would take time to grow/raise. And since we are the worlds largest consumer, the products without buyers would bankrupt many industries.
Exports - commodities:capital goods, automobiles, industrial supplies and raw materials, consumer goods, agricultural products
Imports - commodities: crude oil and refined petroleum products, machinery, automobiles, consumer goods, industrial raw materials, food and beverages
As per http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/us.html
The UN would lose almost 25% of their income. And I do not think that the absence of the US would negate that shortfall. How many UN actions actually take place in the UN or because of it?
Besides the fact that Canada would lose a trading partner that buys 20% of their exports and sells even more of a percentage, they would have to increase their military spending or become the worlds largest nuetral country. Unless the Brits fill the void. South America would become the dominant power in the hemisphere.
Much more but this is just local and devastating global effects I could think of.
Besides the economic chaos that would result, I can see Japan and South Korea would probably start to a military build up to counter China and North Korea. With the US gone, they could probably integrate remaining American forces in their countries to help. I don’t think China would make a attack on Taiwan right away, but without US support for Taiwan China could wait 5-10 years and then have the firepower to invade Taiwan. The middle east would get even more chaotic; without the US buying all that oil world prices would drop and Saudi Arabia and other countrie’s economies would tank- Isreal would have considerable problems without US aid, but their nukes might prove a deterent to full scale invasion, at least until Iraq or some other nation in the area gets nuke for themselves.
What about all the U.S. naval forces, including aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines? Any one of these vessels, if it has nuclear warheads, is all by itself the second or third most powerful nation in the world. If the United States suddenly vanished, command would fall to most senior naval officer left, so some Admiral would suddenly be powerful enough to do pretty much whatever he wanted, at least until the navy started to break down for lack of spare parts.
…or fuel.
Well, the nuclear vessels will run out of food long before they run out of energy.
Assuming ballistic/fast attack submarines on patrol and a carrier group or two survive my scenario, I would expect them to immediately head for Britain, Australia, or Japan, whatever is closest, and remain allied with NATO. I hazard a guess Britain would be able to absorb most of the ships into the Royal Navy.
Canada has no large military ports that I know of offhand (although they’ll have some brand new ones after this!).
The American ranking officer might be understandably reluctant to hand over his command, but where the hell else is he going to go? All the real estate is taken.
Prepare to be surprised.
In 1995, the U.S. had a trade surplus of $14.94 billion in food and live animals.
In 1994, the U.S. had a trade surplus of $9.967 billion in food and live animals.
In 1993, the U.S. had a trade surplus of $10.82 billion in food and live animals.
Source: The Europa World Year Book 2001, volume II, page 4180-81, ISBN 1-85743-099-9.
I’m surprised Europa doesn’t have more recent figures, but check out U.S. Foreign Agriculture Service’s website. The figures up to 2001 show the U.S. as having a substantial trade surplus in agricultural products, although this isn’t quite dispositive as the figures include the value of timber as well as foodstuffs.
I’m surprised it took this long for someone to refute this statement.
Yes, the world economy would tank. However, without the US running the show, the IMF/World Bank might drop their policies of Structural Adjustment, that is, forcing countries to make reforms in their economies/infrastructure before they give that country a loan. This would allow countless 3rd World nations to develop in a way that they think is best, which we have seen is the best way to do things. Take a look at the US back in the late 1700’s. We had huge debts, and there were no restrictions put on them by our lenders. This policy stayed this way until the early 1900’s (when we didn’t really depend on loans as much), and look at our economy today. In the near term, the economy tanks. But if we can survive for about 25-30 years, I think we see a turnaround the likes of which we have never seen.