America’s Aggression Has Come Home to Roost

For the last 25 years, the United States has wielded its power across the globe with a mixture of arrogance, hubris and violence. From Iraq to Afghanistan, from drone strikes in Yemen to regime-change efforts in Libya and Syria, America’s military and political machinery have projected dominance with impunity. But today, as the second Trump administration consolidates power with an increasingly authoritarian bent, many Americans are discovering that the aggression their government so casually inflicted on others is now being turned inward.

This shift feels less like a sudden change than an inevitable consequence. For decades, the United States has treated aggression, both military and political, as a legitimate tool of statecraft. The so-called “War on Terror” normalised surveillance, indefinite detention and drone strikes without trials. Torture at black sites, secret CIA prisons and the erosion of habeas corpus became not just strategies but accepted practices in the name of national security. The assumption, of course, was that these measures were necessary evils directed at enemies abroad, that the United States could keep its imperial ambitions separate from its democratic ideals at home. That was a fantasy.

Exporting violence and domination overseas was always going to lead to these same tactics being deployed at home. The militarisation of American police forces over the last two decades is a direct consequence of wars fought abroad. Weapons and equipment designed for Fallujah and Kandahar now patrol American streets. SWAT teams armed with surplus military gear respond to domestic protests and drug raids with the same aggression that once targeted insurgents. The language of counterterrorism — surveillance, infiltration and pre-emptive strikes — is now being used against political activists, journalists and dissenters.

The second Trump administration appears determined to complete this transformation. Trump's first term laid the groundwork, fanning the flames of nationalist sentiment, demonising immigrants and political enemies, and encouraging violent responses to protest and civil unrest. Now, with the levers of power firmly in hand and a judiciary shaped to his liking, Trump and his allies seem poised to push America's post-9/11 playbook to its logical endpoint: domestic authoritarianism under the guise of law and order.

The Bipartisan Consensus on Aggression

What makes this moment especially damning is that the road to domestic authoritarianism was not paved by Trump alone. For all the liberal outrage about Trump’s rise and his brazenly anti-democratic tendencies, the core mechanisms of American aggression, and their gradual extension into domestic life, were built and maintained by both Republican and Democratic administrations alike.

Barack Obama, for example, campaigned on ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but instead expanded the use of drone warfare to unprecedented levels. He oversaw the extrajudicial assassination of American citizens overseas and dramatically increased the surveillance state’s capacity through the NSA's global monitoring programme. His administration prosecuted more whistleblowers under the Espionage Act than all previous administrations combined, a clear signal that transparency and dissent were threats to the state.

Joe Biden, despite his more measured public persona, largely maintained continuity with Trump-era foreign policy. He conducted drone strikes in Syria and Afghanistan, supported Israel's brutal military actions in Gaza and authorised military aid to authoritarian regimes under the guise of strategic alliances. His handling of domestic protests mirrored the aggressive posture of foreign conflicts. During the George Floyd protests, Biden, much like Trump, endorsed militarised policing and the deployment of the National Guard to suppress unrest. The message was clear: force, whether used at home or abroad, remains the preferred tool of governance.

The continuity between Democratic and Republican administrations on matters of war, surveillance and policing exposes an uncomfortable truth. Trump is not the aberration that many liberals wish to believe. His rise is not a break from America's political trajectory but an acceleration of it. The American empire has always functioned through violence, intimidation and control. Trump merely stripped away the thin veneer of moral justification and exposed the underlying machinery.

Why Americans Are Finally Paying Attention

The irony, of course, is that much of the American public has only now begun to object, not because these tactics are new, but because they are finally being felt at home. When drone strikes annihilated wedding parties in Yemen, when Guantanamo prisoners were held for decades without trial and when police in Baghdad fired on protestors with American-made weapons, there was little mass outrage in the United States. After all, these actions were committed in the name of “national security.”

But now, the same militarised police forces are turning their guns on domestic protesters. Surveillance technologies once deployed against suspected foreign terrorists are now being used to monitor American citizens. Laws designed to combat extremism abroad are being rewritten to apply to domestic political dissidents. The strategies refined in Iraq and Afghanistan — counterinsurgency, psychological operations and the criminalisation of resistance — are now being deployed not in Kabul, but in Portland, Chicago and Washington, D.C.

The discomfort that many Americans now feel is not about the morality of these tactics; it is about proximity. When Black Lives Matter protesters were teargassed in Lafayette Square, it was not a new kind of violence. It was the same playbook that the United States military used in Fallujah. The difference was that this time, the violence was directed at Americans.

Public apathy towards America’s foreign aggression was built on the assumption that this violence could be contained, that it would remain directed at brown and black bodies in faraway places. Americans tolerated drone strikes, torture and extrajudicial killings because they were happening to “other people.” Now that the guns and surveillance systems have turned inward, the public is awakening to the reality that aggression, once normalised, cannot be confined to distant shores.

The Empire Turns Inward

The second Trump administration is not creating anything new; it is simply accelerating a long-standing imperial process. America has been an empire for decades. The consequence of empire is that eventually the methods of control used abroad must be applied at home. Surveillance, militarisation and suppression are not anomalies; they are the predictable outcome of a state that has relied on aggression as its primary mode of engagement with the world.

If Americans are finally awakening to this reality, it is not because the system has changed; it is because they are finally feeling the consequences themselves. The state’s violence has come home. The same justifications that allowed the United States to kill, imprison and monitor foreign nationals without consequence are now being deployed against Americans. The empire, in other words, is finally feeding on itself.

The question now is whether Americans, having ignored this violence for decades when it was inflicted on others, will resist it when it is directed at them. The signs are not encouraging. After all, the tools of empire — fear, division and militarised control — remain as potent as ever. Americans may now understand what it feels like to be on the receiving end of American power, but whether that understanding will lead to meaningful resistance or simply deeper submission remains to be seen.

Why Free Speech Shouldn't Be An Absolute Right

Bear with me here. 

I was born and raised in the UK where I still live; throughout my entire life I have never shied away from speaking my mind and saying what I wanted to say for fear that I would get into trouble. To that end, "free speech" such as it is, has never really been something to think about for its own sake. 

Studying the Law however, made me realise that in a civilised society, we can only function as a whole society, when, to some extent, we either police and censor our own speech, or someone does it for us. 

When I say "speech," I'm not talking about the spoken word alone; I am of course referring to any medium by which we express ourselves and make our words known, whether that's through writing, speaking or otherwise, and be it through any medium - face to face, newspapers, online, broadcast media, radio etc. 

The interesting thing is that most of us, (I'd suggest, all of us), actively censor or police or own speech in our day to day lives. And I'm not talking about grand ideas of right and wrong, or morality and immorality etc. I'm literally referring here, to our day to day interactions, with the people we live with, those we work with, our families, friends and the people we bump into. There is always an element of censoring ourselves; no-one ever says exactly what they're thinking, at every minute of every day.

Part of us recognises, whether it's through our upbringing or because we've come to this realisation ourselves, that we can't do this. If we did, we'd literally have no-one to speak to. Every single person has things that they think, but will never say. And to my mind, that's perfectly alright because that's the only way we can live in communities - in our families, neighbourhoods or workplaces. 

The problem with saying that 'free speech shouldn't be an absolute right,' seems to arise in the specific context of politics, or when someone wants to say something hateful. At that point, the person making the remark feels affronted and censored from saying what they really want to say - and the classic line they tend to use, is that 'I have the right to free speech' or 'You're infringing on my right to free speech.' 

A few points to note about this. Firstly, certainly in the UK and Europe, free speech simply does not exist as an absolute right, and it never has done. And yet, no-one really seems to have had a problem with this, if they've even noticed at all, until recent years when hateful remarks have become far more common than they once were. All of a sudden, there are people up in arms about their 'right to free speech' when frankly, it hasn't made any impact on their life up to that point, and only then, because their 'right to free speech' has infringed on another's right not to be abused or assaulted, either through speech or otherwise. 

There has been an Americanisation of 'free speech' across the Western world. The US Constitution enshrines the right to free speech in the First Amendement:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

 The EU on the other hand, provides the Charter of Fundamental Rights. Article 11 states:

1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers.
2. The freedom and pluralism of the media shall be respected.

 When the UK translated Article 11 in to English law, via the Human Rights Act 1998, it did so with an amendment. Article 10 of the HRA 1998 states:

1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This Article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.

2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.

There was a clear recognition by the UK that yes, whilst you can say what you like for the most part, and the state is willing to let you say what you want, the state also has a duty to protect its other citizens from your freedom of speech, if, it's likely to lead to any of the harms outlined above. And this, my friends is the part that gets missed out so often in the free speech debates; that the right to free speech is not unqualified (in the UK/EU), and nor should it be. 

 To put it simply, there are far, far too many things that could go wrong if free speech was a fully unqualified right. The Law, aims to balance every individual's right to and against others. If one person were to have this unqualified right, how long would it take before this right began infringing on another person's rights not to be subjected to abuse or discrimination or prejudice etc. The answer, is, not very.

We can already see the state of the US with some groups ardently exercising their right to free speech, translating to other groups being harmed, being placed at risk of harm, being disadvantaged or discriminated against, and overall, creating a climate of hostility towards anyone or anything that is the subject of their free speech.

And here's the thing. The same people who have complete devotion to this unqualified right, don't offer the same right to others. There seems to be a disconnect between one person saying they hate someone (and this apparently being their exercise of freedom of speech), and not recognising that the person they're saying this to, or about, has an equal right to respond and say what they want to, too. The end result of all this being:  people are offended because someone's said or done something offensive to them; they've tried to retaliate or respond only to find that freedom of speech has ended somewhere before it reached them; and in the background, with one on one incidents increasing, and eventual societal collapse before our very eyes. 

It might sound dramatic, but just take a look at the state of America today.

The Tragedy of Immoral Law

This is a lifestyle blog. When I started it, I told myself that I would leave my wider opinions on law, justice, politics and morality at the door, and instead focus on my other interests that fit neatly within the “women’s lifestyle” industry. I should have known that I wouldn’t be able to keep that promise.

I discovered social justice, or rather social injustice, at a young age, long before I ever developed an interest in beauty and fashion and “nice” things. I knew who all the local MP’s were when my friends were still playing with dress-up dolls and started keeping track of who the Prime Minister was, and the main political parties in the UK, when I was around 7. That’s not to say that I didn’t do other things; I loved doing “kid stuff,” but a part of me was always somewhat aware of the wider world around me to the point that I remember asking my mother at the age of 9 whether she was planning to vote Labour in the general election in 2001. (I tried to get her to vote Liberal Democrat just because I liked saying “Liberal Democrat” so much. Didn’t work.)

I think it’s fair to say that my interest in all of these areas has always been motivated by fairness or lack of fairness. I’m not sure where it came from because I don’t remember my parents ever discussing politics or the law, certainly not with me, although they always voted in every election and were very much aware of current affairs. Somewhere in the midst of all this, I developed my own code of morality, justice, fairness and crucially to my mind, the idea that the law should always be working to achieve these three things in order that citizens are able to live their lives relatively free from state interference but with the backup of help as and when they needed it, and the ability to access recompense or restitution when the system failed them.

Years later, this led me to study Law formally at university which I absolutely loved. I think it’s unlikely that I will ever practice Law but for me, the academic debates around Law and how it affects our lives was enough. Tied into the Law, not only in the UK but also abroad, was politics, and the understanding that all Law is created, amended or repealed as a result of political influence. What I understood as a result is that not all Laws are created equal and most importantly, not all Law sets out to achieve the aims that I had thought were the purpose of having Laws in the first place i.e. to achieve morality, justice and fairness for citizens. The uncomfortable conclusion I reached as a young teen was that in many cases, Law can be created to directly oppose these objectives and therefore “just because it’s legal, doesn’t mean it’s right.”

More recently, I’ve been thinking about this again but this time in the context of US politics. Who could miss the debacle that the Trump presidency has created? Trump’s vision of the office of President as a “strongman” for his friends has caused uproar and misery to millions and the latest in a long line of actions has been to separate parents from their children at the US border. The policy of “zero tolerance” that has been touted to stamp down on immigration and those crossing the border has led to the detainment and imprisonment of parents with their children being taken away by the federal government through ICE, which has subsequently either posted these children thousands of miles away to end up goodness only knows where, or held at “tender shelters,” a euphemism for prison camps for babies, toddlers, children and young people.

In classic Trump style, he has insisted that this separation of children from their parents was as result of the Law being enforced as it should, whereas in truth, it came about as a result of an Executive Order he signed. Following the outcry in the US and abroad Trump backtracked and signed another Executive Order ending this policy of family separation but the problem is, it’s too little, too late. I understand why ICE and others acted the way they did – the issue I have is that it follows on from the principle that “just because it’s Law, doesn’t mean it’s right.” Admittedly, in this case, family separation wasn’t technically the Law, it was still an order by the leader of the nation to carry out something extremely morally reprehensible. And it was done.

Some have said, “if you ever wondered what you would have done during the Nazi regime, this is your chance,” and I have to say, so many people have failed the test. The attempted justification of “we were carrying out our orders” is literally the same justification that Nazi officers used to explain the Holocaust. It’s not good enough. There has never been a more crucial time in recent history than right now, for those on the right side of morality and justice to stand up. After all, there was a time when slavery was legal, as was human sacrifice. That didn’t make it right.

If you or someone you know is in a position to effect change, do it. Do it because it’s the right thing to do. Refuse to carry out orders, be subversive. There are times in human consciousness when simply disagreeing with the way things are is no longer enough. Get involved in your society and make a difference whether it’s immediate or long term. Stand for elections, galvanise the people around you. Hammer the point home that this is not normal, it is not okay, and you will not stand for it. If those who hold positions of power over in our societal structures are wrong, it is our job as citizens of our countries to make changes.