Daniel Immerwahr

try to urge European powers not to invade in Spanish America, which might be a kind of security threat to the United States, by declaring a sort of separate spheres.

It wasn't to say that Europe should have no presence in the Western Hemisphere, because Europe had colonies in the Western Hemisphere, and those were allowed by the Monroe Doctrine.

It was just to say, no further European expansion in the Western Hemisphere, please, and also we'll lay off Europe.

Well, in the press conference after they seized Maduro, Trump said this, American dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again.

This language that he used referring to the West and our hemisphere multiple times.

What does that say to you?

I think it's yet another example of him reaching back to older traditions in U.S.

foreign policymaking.

It is interesting.

I mean, A, the sort of naked force that is being appealed to, but B, it's also interesting that it's thought as hemispheric.

He's not saying our place in the world will never be challenged again.

He's saying our place in the Western Hemisphere will never be challenged again.

In some ways, it's a more modest understanding of U.S.

domain than other presidents have had.

How much of this is systematic and how much of this is chaotic?

I mean, I think the way I see it is that right after 1945, the United States was just producing most of the world's goods.

It had a majority of the world's oil and a majority of the world's gold.

It was just in such a staggering position of power that building a world system where it was the center made sense, at least to people in Washington.

And that's why the UN is located in New York.

The headquarters is...