“I assure you, Trump, with his character and persistence, will restore order quite quickly. And all of them, you’ll see, soon all of them will stand at the master’s feet and gently wag their tails.” ~Putin commentary to Russian journalist, Zarubin.

~ Luis Lázaro Tijerina ~

The very historical root of the United States’ government was founded on an imperial quest by the founding fathers to exploit at will those peoples who did not kneel before them, and to exact force, and, even slaughter, if necessary, to achieve that desired conquest. It manifested itself in the bourgeois American class in its audacious revolution against British colonial imperialism, and it proceeded once victory was achieved. The British General Charles Cornwallis surrendered to the American forces under the command of Washington and the French officers at Yorktown, Virginia on October 19, 1781. Cornwallis’ surrender effectively ended the fighting in the American Revolution, and that surrender was ironically brought about by the French forces fighting alongside American colonial troops less experienced in European line-of-contact fighting. The massive usage of artillery also undid the British forces on the field of battle. In the final analysis, it was the artillery batteries, those gods of war, which determined the beginning of what would be the birth of American imperialism in its infancy.

The Anglo-Americans would proceed in their exploitative maturity to create an imperial expansionism which would first consist of bringing Africans to North America in the millions for the economic purpose of trafficking in human slave labor, a brutal enslavement that exists even in modern times with insidious racism and low wages for the African American workers as well as other national minorities. The enforced imperial labor concept also oppresses the dominant Anglo-American workers. It was not long after the ending of the American Revolution, in fact, five years after the ending of the international conflict that:

In 1786, the United States established its first Native American reservation and approached each tribe as an independent nation. This policy remained intact for more than one hundred years. Some argued against this policy, however. President James Monroe said, in his second inaugural address in 1821, that treating Native Americans this way "flattered their pride, retarded their improvement, and in many instances paved the way to their destruction."

But Monroe would later sound remorseful about the eradication of the Native American population but nonetheless “In addition, Monroe claimed that America's westward growth "has constantly driven them back, with almost the total sacrifice of the lands which they have been compelled to abandon. They have claims on the magnanimity and . . . on the justice of this nation which we must all feel." Despite these statements of concern for the plight of Native Americans, Monroe's administration successfully removed them from states north of the Ohio River”.

President Monroe played his active role in the first act of colonization of Native Americans in an internal colonizing process before moving outward toward an international colonialization ambition with the enactment of the Monroe Doctrine. This colonization act by Monroe would also play its role in the genocide of the Native Americans.

The Monroe Doctrine, created by Monroe and his aspiring imperial colleagues, was the first United States’ foreign policy position that opposed European colonialism in the Western Hemisphere, those imperial powers at the time being Great Britain and the French monarchy. The American doctrine adhered to the calculated and yet impetuous idea that any intervention in the political affairs of the Americas by foreign powers is a potentially hostile act against the United States. Ironically, in their stated position of opposition to imperialism, they were in the nascent stages of developing their own predatory imperialistic behavior.

The representatives of the American government, beginning with Thomas Jefferson, were already having dreams of imperial grandeur, not unlike the hegemony ancient Athenian leadership achieved over the city-states in the Peloponnese area bordered by the Ionian Sea to the west, the Aegean Sea to the east, and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. [further statement here about Athens and what occurred in the end.] It was the ambitious overreach of the aristocratic class in ancient Athens to dominate the known world which brought about their demise. Later, the Roman leadership in Rome brutally subjugated the Latin tribes in the north and south in what is now present-day Italy. This aggressive hegemonic behavior by Augustus and his legions increased their ardor to illegally invade other territories. There is a brutal history of American presidents who also encroached on foreign territories from Quebec City to Nicaragua, Panama, Vietnam, and Iraq, and, more recently, even lust to control the mineral resources in the Ukraine. Parallels can be drawn to ancient Athens and Rome and America of today with disturbing implications for America’s future and how long it will continue to exist in its current form.

It was the sword and shield, not to mention the Greek phalanx and Roman legion military concepts, that decided the ascendency of Imperialism in the ancient period. If we do not understand the early development of Anglo-American domination amidst the internal geography of the United States through various forms of barbarity, then we cannot begin to understand modern American imperialism and its genocidal contribution to the colonization or attempt at colonialization of world regions such as Europe, Africa, South and Central America, and vast territorial areas of Asia.

However, before American Imperialism could achieve international advancement, it had to deal with overall problem of how to eradicate the Native Americans from the lands and territories that the Anglo-American population coveted. We should remember that the political leadership of a nation-state or country directly mirrors the will of the people. The masses, whether they be Americans or any other people, should not be romanticized as simply being an oppressed people. Throughout history, the masses are continually involved in their own contradictions that can be socially insane and culturally beastly. The masses can also be richly creative in their historical community outlook and compassion for their fellow human beings.

I would state that the German people were in collusion with the genocidal aspirations of Hitler and the Nazi leadership. Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933. Hitler was appointed by the then German President Paul von Hindenburg, and it should be noted that in the German 1932 election, “More contentious has been the relationship between workers and the Nazi Party. Recent research has revised the impression of working-class immunity to Nazism: around 55 per cent of SA stormtroopers came from working-class backgrounds and the Nazis made substantial gains from working-class communities in parts of Saxony, especially around Chemnitz. Around 40 per cent of members of the Party seem to have been of working-class origins; similarly 40 per cent of the Nazi vote came from workers and one worker in every four voted for Hitler in July 1932”.

The German workers, no less than American workers, had a history of unconscious and conscious racist views of their communities. In the most recent United States’ presidential election, the class war that emerged within the country is a reflection of the continuation of American colonial expansionism. The election results revealed that “Exit polls from the U.S. presidential election indicated an approximate 15-point swing toward Donald Trump among voters earning less than $50,000 a year, the poorest block of voters in the United States. For the first time since the 1960s, the majority of Americans in that low-income bracket voted Republican. At the other end of the scale, the most affluent voters shifted to the Democrats. According to voter surveys and exit polls, Vice President Kamala Harris scored a majority of votes from those making above $100,000 a year—the top third of the income distribution.” It is this historian’s contention that to understand any reference to colonial imperialism whether it be American colonization or otherwise, one has to view the internal behavior and biases of the masses that allow such imperial policies in the first place.

I would like to call attention to two other examples of American colonization that is wedded to modern American colonial expansionism. President Andrew Jackson’s annual message delivered on December 6, 1830, informed the American Congress on the progress of the removal of Indian tribes living east of the Mississippi River all the way through to land in the west. In that message, he made the following imperious announcement:

The consequences of a speedy removal will be important to the United States, to individual States, and to the Indians themselves. The pecuniary advantages which it promises to the Government are the least of its recommendations. It puts an end to all possible danger of collision between the authorities of the General and State Governments on account of the Indians. It will place a dense and civilized population in large tracts of country now occupied by a few savage hunters. By opening the whole territory between Tennessee on the north and Louisiana on the south to the settlement of the whites it will incalculably strengthen the southwestern frontier and render the adjacent States strong enough to repel future invasions without remote aid. It will relieve the whole State of Mississippi and the western part of Alabama of Indian occupancy, and enable those States to advance rapidly in population, wealth, and power.

For many readers, the above arrogant commentary and assertion of manifest destiny by the racist president Andrew Jackson, may seem like a history, though dark, politically speaking, in and of itself, is not applicable to present day modern America in 2025. In February of 2025, the unstable and intellectually primitive, Donald J. Trump made the following suggestion on the colonization of Gaza. He is not so naïve as to use such an unflattering term as “colonization”. He was far more subtle in his signal of ethnic cleansing, not unlike President Andrew Jackson, for whom he has a great admiration.

He stated before the Israeli prime minister and the international press -

It's right now a demolition site. This is just a demolition site. Virtually every building is down…They're living under fallen concrete that's very dangerous and very precarious. They instead can occupy all of a beautiful area with homes and safety and they can live out their lives in peace and harmony instead of having to go back and do it again. The US will take over the Gaza Strip and we will do a job with it too.

We'll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings, level it out. Create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area. Do a real job, do something different.

Just can't go back. If you go back, it's going to end up the same way it has for years. I'm hopeful that this ceasefire could be the beginning of a larger and more enduring peace that will end the bloodshed and killing once and for all. With the same goal in mind, my administration has been moving quickly to restore trust in the alliance and rebuild American strength throughout the region and we've really done that.

Beyond the age of the internal colonization of the United States’ Native American tribes and their lands in the Jackson era, Trump moves outward to claim lands of the Palestinians as his own real-estate while at the same time pursuing a fascistic foreign policy of “rebuilding American strength” through colonial expansionism and the sheer unmentioned threat of military power in the Mediterranean by American naval forces which are present there to be utilized on a presidential political whim. Trump, with all his child-like impetuousness, thinks that he can make Gaza into his “Rivera of the Middle East” without understanding or caring about the consequences of the loss of American military and naval forces by such a nefarious colonial overreach.

Finally, I would like to refer to the other internal colonization and outward colonialization of territorial swaths of Mexico by the United States. The Mexican American War commenced on April 25, 1846, and continued until February 2, 1848. In that two-year conflict, within the boundaries of what is now known as North America, the maturing American army, whose troops were disciplined and robust but not quite yet professional, defeated the Mexican Army which did not have weaponry like the Americans. The Mexicans were also defeated because of vast class contradictions and squabbles amongst the Mexican officer classes regarding how to wage war against the belligerent American armed forces. Once the war ended, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was enacted in which the following land was conceded to the United States Government.

The boundary line between the two Republics shall commence in the Gulf of Mexico, three leagues from land, opposite the mouth of the Rio Grande, otherwise called Rio Bravo del Norte, or Opposite the mouth of its deepest branch, if it should have more than one branch emptying directly into the sea; from thence up the middle of that river, following the deepest channel, where it has more than one, to the point where it strikes the southern boundary of New Mexico; thence, westwardly, along the whole southern boundary of New Mexico (which runs north of the town called Paso) to its western termination; thence, northward, along the western line of New Mexico, until it intersects the first branch of the river Gila; (or if it should not intersect any branch of that river, then to the point on the said line nearest to such branch, and thence in a direct line to the same); thence down the middle of the said branch and of the said river, until it empties into the Rio Colorado; thence across the Rio Colorado, following the division line between Upper and Lower California, to the Pacific Ocean.

I ask readers to observe closely all that the Mexican Government gave up for ‘peace’ and how the might of colonialization by the American government exerted itself with no country or people outside the Anglo-American domains able to resist the inward and outward movement of imperial aggression not seen since the decline of the British Empire. Beyond that Empire, I think of Rome and its intractable move towards Gual and the British Isle. The Roman emperors were full of an unquenchable appetite. The determined and ruthless Roman legions ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. One should not romanticize the Roman era as its rulers conquered most of the territories outside of Rome proper during the time of the Roman Republic. It was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of effective sole rule in 27 BC. Although Tocqueville, the French historian, made a profound contribution to the understanding of the political underpinnings of American Democracy, he was unable because of his aristocratic background to understand that the American Republic, not unlike the Roman Republic, was not truly built upon democratic virtues but upon unconscious and conscious imperialist concerns and exploitative colonialization strategies by both civilian and military leadership. Nation-state colonizers have nothing but contempt for weaker nation-states that cannot oppose them through the barrel of a gun.

Now, let me discuss the American need for colonization across the territories of the world and the implications involved in such acts of masking outright brutal colonization of other foreign countries while masquerading as bringing economic, political and cultural “progress, freedom, liberty and democracy” to foreign entities and its peoples. Regarding the African Colonial Question, an American political organization named the Heritage Foundation wrote the following commentary in 2006. Here is an excerpt from the essay entitled, America's Growing Reliance on African Energy Resources:

Most Americans view Africa as a region plagued by instability, poverty, and poor governance. Although accurate for portions of the continent, this picture is far from complete and fails to recognize the region's growing importance to U.S. national security and economic interests. American interests in Africa range from traditional development and humanitarian problems to the more recent challenges posed by globalization and the opportunities for terrorists and other violent actors to exploit unstable countries. There is also a rising expectation by many in America and other countries that the U.S. will intervene in internal and regional African conflicts more frequently and actively, whether diplomatically or in support of military missions.

Moreover, as articulated in both the 2006 State of the Union address and the National Security Strategy, the importance of expanding and ensuring America's access to energy resources has transformed Africa from a strategic backwater into a priority region for U.S. economic, political, and military interests. However, pursuit of oil should not trump the economic and political reform necessary to sustain long-term economic growth and development.

The author never uses the term American colonization of Africa, but instead in subdued language discusses how American political leadership who once viewed Africa as a “strategic backwater” in terms of geopolitical interest now see it otherwise as mentioned by a Kofi Nsia-Pepra, Ph.D., LLM who has advanced degrees in philosophy and the field of law. Nsia-Pepra writes about the United States’ actual intentions in Africa -

U.S. policies toward Africa historically followed a “hands off”approach until the onset of the Cold War. U.S. anti-communist stratagem led to its involvement in Cold War African security issues, evidenced in the Angolan war and the militarization of some client states and factions. In the post-Cold War era, America had limited political, humanitarian, security, and economic interests in Africa. Expectedly, its interest in Africansecurity issues dimmed with minimal military involvement in Africa. Eastern Europe and Asia gained primacy in America’s foreign policy, demoting African security issues to the periphery of its foreign policy.

But such a foreign policy attitude by American regimes changed as the author states further into his essay -

In a realist world, countering the influence of its strategic rivals, especially China, reminiscent of the Cold War, has renewed U.S. interest in Africa. The rapidly growing economies of countries such as Malaysia and China strategically compete with America for Africa’s energy and other natural resources. China, in particular, poses a formidable challenge to U.S. interests in Africa. African leaders seem to cater to China because its aid and investment in Africa exclude conditionality such as good governance and human rights commonly associated with U.S. investment programs, which are viewed by African leaders as imperialistic and neocolonialistic. China’s investment approach offers Africa equal opportunity and stake in their development in view of China’s subtle diplomacy of noninterference in Africa’s domestic issues. China’s investment and aid programs have been well received because they include infrastructure projects, long ignored by the United States and other Western aid programs.

Nsia-Pepra admits certain reasons for the United States now being interested in the nation-states that comprise Africa, and those reasons are not humanitarian or democratic as they are more for the Realpolitik in terms of American military and economic domination of the African region. The People’s Republic of China and the Federal Republic of Russia are the primary threats to the actualization of American colonial domination in the regions of Africa where vast mineral and other natural resources have the potential to be plundered by the American military industrial complex.

Regarding human trafficking and the more hidden agenda of post-modern American colonialism, I will mention, for a short historical context how women, especially from India, are enticed to move to the United States and exploited, with their Indian and American traffickers promising a so-called better life in the United States. A commentary on the online site, Social Development Issues, revealed the allure and danger for Indian women from India coming illegally to a capitalist country, such as the United States:

For women who migrate to the United States based on education or in the highly skilled visa category, adjusting to the new forms of gender bias creates additional struggles. With the limited knowledge of work ethics and work culture of the new land, socio-cultural and new economic adaptations become a great struggle. Their identities of being women, immigrant women, and in some cases Muslim women, and being less educated and unemployed create a perfect environment for their exploitation (Balgamwalla, 2014). Many migrated women in the United States face domestic violence and exploitation in their families, with limited, if any, social support. If unemployed, their access to health care is also limited (Mallapragada, 2016).

To bring into awareness a more open grievance with American colonization and colonial overreach, it is vital to deal with the facts and not a biased left or right agenda regarding the exploitation of India’s female work force, for example. The following factual information was shared by the research center, Open Global Rights -

The textile and apparel industry contributes 2% to India’s US $2.6 trillion economy and 17% of its export income. It is the second largest employer in India providing employment to 45 million people. Critically, the industry is the largest employer for women in India as they make up for more than 60% of its workforce. Nationally, 60 to 80% of the workers are women in the garment sector with millions of them employed in informal, unorganised or home-based units.

It is important to clarify here that I am a military historian, not an economic or cultural historian. When I state a fact or analyze a global work force situation, such as the exploitation of India’s working-class women, it can only be in relationship to America’s labor exploitation and its colonization of other countries, and by extension, the introduction of exploitative labor practices into those countries, in many cases, and the purchase of goods from those countries and businesses which engage in exploitative labor practices. The American worker historically has suffered deprivations regarding wages, health care, working conditions, and retirement benefits. They have always had to fight in the courts or in the factories and streets against those who would colonize them as a labor force.

Through labor exploitation in India, the United States eventually gets a country to rely on American military and foreign policy aid as well. When India becomes suspicious of its perceived enemies, such as Pakistan and China, it is to some extent manipulated by the leadership in Washington, D.C., and thus plays into the hands of the American colonization agenda overall throughout South and Southeast Asia.

One of the most pressing territorial priorities for the Trump regime as it was for previous American regimes is the acquisition of rare minerals in the nation-state of Ukraine during a time of war with Russia. The appetite of the United States military industrial complex is unquenchable in terms of its desire to acquire minerals, such as titanium, which are located in Ukraine proper. The United States military industrial complex covets the titanium resources in Ukraine. However, the competition for such a highly valuable mineral is none other than the Russian Federation. As the news outlet, Al Jazeera commented online in regard to Trump’s crude way of blackmailing the neo-fascist Ukrainian regime into giving the United States access to the titanium mineral in Ukraine:

United States President Donald Trump has touted a deal to gain access to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals as payment for Washington’s wartime support to Kyiv during Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbour. Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday that he wanted “equalisation” from Ukraine for Washington’s “close to” $375.8bn in support.

“We’re telling Ukraine they have very valuable rare earths,” Trump said. “We’re looking to do a deal with Ukraine where they’re going to secure what we’re giving them with their rare earths and other things,” he added. According to the German Kiel Institute, which tracks the world economy, the US has allocated 88.33 billion euros ($92bn) to Ukraine from January 2022 to October 31, 2024.

However, more than 70 percent of the resources are in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern Ukraine, which Russia partly controls. Minerals are also found in Dnipropetrovsk, which borders the Donetsk and Zaporizhia regions, which Russia illegally annexed in 2022. Russian troops are currently advancing there. The Crimean Peninsula is also rich in minerals, but it was annexed by Russia in 2014.

In a Sanitized Copy Approved for Release on February 7, 2011, by the U.S. Department of Intelligence (CIA) it was revealed that in the 1980’s the Soviet Union was very interested in the output of titanium for its military industry, especially for the making submarine hulls. In that sanitized paper, it was quoted -

Moscow has created the world’s largest titanium industry, primarily to support defense industries that produce advance aircraft, missiles and submarines. We estimate that the USSR produced approximately 71,000 tons of titanium metal in 1984, roughly 70 percent of global output and more than five times as much as the United States… The USSR is the only country to use titanium in the construction of submarines.

Although the United States military industry uses mainly high-strength alloyed steel for the building of its submarine hulls, it does use titanium for its missiles and other miliary hardware components, including computerized military hardware. It is important not to underestimate how tariff wars can lead to actual war, and how wanting the assets of one’s enemies’ natural resources plays a pivotal role in a colonizing country’s strategy and quest for absolute hegemony. In the ongoing confrontation between the United States and the Russian Federation, it remains to be seen if Russian leadership will allow the Trump regime to simply take titanium and other mineral resources in the Ukraine. One can be assured that the Russian government is not standing at the present American regime’s “master’s” feet with a gentle wagging of its tail.

I shall end this rather long yet brief synopsis of American colonization from its past to its present history by quoting Karl Marx, - “The discovery of gold and silver in America, the extirpation, enslavement and entombment in mines of the aboriginal population, the beginning of the conquest and looting of the East Indies, the turning of Africa into a warren for the commercial hunting of black-skins, signalized the rosy dawn of the era of capitalist productions.”

American colonialism, modern or otherwise, is not a new phenomenon, but rather the commotion of a dying American empire who, like other empires before them, cannot accept the end of its existence and therefore wants to destroy the changing world it can no longer manipulate either through diplomatic language or through the intimidation of military force, even if that military force only has the illusion of being all powerful and world-dominating.

The American working class with all of their contradictions will eventually evolve as a future rising proletariat power once the American oligarchs and their class minions are destroyed from within by their sheer greed and lust for absolute power. American colonialization will end in fire and annihilation.

Editor's Note:

The views and informations expressed in the article are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect the views of The International. We believe in providing a platform for a range of viewpoints from the left.