The End of America's Postwar Ethos

National security policies reflect the culture of the society creating them. Each society’s forms of war and politics express its unique culture. The United States has taken this truth as its own. From the beginning this nation imposed upon itself a self-conscious identity distinct from the European world. It was a New World torn from the Old. Americans continue to seek to strengthen our self-described uniqueness, and our national security policy has always been asked to reinforce our identity.

More than other modern societies, America relies, even depends, on myth to cement its confidence in current policies. Americans are profoundly ahistorical; we do not share a coherent sense of our own history in formal, academic terms. Popular culture, not an educational system, shapes our common sense of identity.

Our national myths are not tall tales, nor are they untruths, but they are both representations of identity and the actual instrument of acculturation. Myths give each of us our sense of belonging, our actual membership as Americans. This process of acculturation through myth, moreover, is achieved through what many believe is simply entertainment: television and movies. Even the way in which we choose to represent ourselves is uniquely American, however chaotic and random in appearance.

It is nonetheless extremely effective. The American ethos is no less entrenched for its lack of a formalized historical-literary tradition sternly taught in state schools. The imagery of American myth, one might argue, is actually more passionate and more powerful given its screen presentation. The problem for Americans is the translation of inchoate images of self into a coherent mental concert for the development of foreign and national security policies. The culture of a society—its ethos—defines distinctive patterns of individual and group behavior. Culture shapes the way we look at the world. Whatever our immediate group membership, our final sense of identity is shaped by larger cultural patterns.

If we define ourselves according to myth, what kind of worldview has it given us?