We have entered a strange, late-stage Empire era, comparable to the Soviet Union’s Glasnost, in which elements of the US imperial braintrust can see with blinding clarity Washington’s entire hegemonic global project is stumbling rapidly and irreversibly towards extinction, and announce so publicly - but their insight does not translate into evasive governmental action at home. The RAND Commission report elicited no mainstream coverage or comment whatsoever, proof positive there isn’t a concomitant effort to manufacture consent for its radical, far-reaching prescriptions.

Were we living in a unipolar age, a multipronged PR campaign would immediately ensue to convince Americans of the righteousness of the Empire’s mission, and the necessity of investing in US “defense” to the tune of trillions. The media’s silence on the Commission’s findings definitionally reflects an omertà among the US political class. The fatal “disconnect” between the Pentagon’s operational and industrial planning identified by RAND will endure. So too ever-intensifying US military impotence. We’re spectating the Empire’s final acts in real-time.