This article originally appeared in German Economic News. Translated from German by Boris Jaruselski

The former chief of staff of US Foreign Minister Colin Powell, recognizes signs in the US military structure, indicating that the US is loosing significance as a world power. The increased use of mercenaries instead of regular soldiers is indicative of the decay of an empire. The US even financed terrorists as mercenaries in Syria.

The former chief of staff of Colin Powell, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, views the future of the US as a military power with pronounced pessimism. During a speech to students of the Lone Star College in Kingswood, Texas, he said: “Empires, shortly before their demise, focus on military power as the Alpha and Omega of power. In this phase of their decline, they rely on mercenaries instead on soldiers, which are drafted from the citizenry. Upon the attack by 'barbarians', who kill 3000 citizens mainly due to the Empire's negligence, they set out to kill 300000 people and spend three billion dollars doing it. They aggravate the threats wih their own actions. We know that from somewhere, right? That is what empires do – especially on the eve of their collapse.”

The author has a certain credibility: his boss, Colin Powell, provided to the world the decisive, but incorrect justification for the US war against Iraq. Powell apologized later for having stated, that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction. Wilkerson himself said to Democracy Now, that the lie came to be because all involved were so taken by their own propaganda, that they never questioned the intelligence reports. (interesting video at the beginning of the article)

Wilkersons elaborations remind of the very readable book by Cullen Murphy, “Are we Rome?”, which was several years ago, being handed around as must read literature among Obama's currently serving top diplomats of various prestige universities.

Murphy, like Wilkerson, recognized a principal non-interest of a world power at the rest of the world as a sign of decay. Hence, the drawing of attention to mercenaries is interesting: for example, US mercenaries of the private army Academy – former Blackwater – are on duty in the Ukraine and Iraq at present. How poorly these mercenaries are performing, can be observed in Syria: there as well, the CIA have allied themselves with terrorist groups, as the US military command refused a deployment of US soldiers in Syria.

In the meantime, even the classical US media is criticizing this development openly. CBS News, for example, reported: “In the year 2020, the Pentagon, according to current plans, is going to sing the 'Ave Maria' for a dying Empire. They will employ sophisticated lethal air and space robotics, which, despite the declining economic influence, will be viewed as the last hope for sustaining the Empire. However, but that time, China's global network of communication satellites, power by the world's most potent super computers, will be commissioned and fully operational. This development provides Beijing with a independent platform for the militarization of space and a powerful communication system for either airborne or cyber strikes on all quadrants of the world.”

The US operate over 500 satellites in space. China and Russia apparently are working on a anti-satellite weapons system. Washington fear Beijing's warlike intentions and is preparing for a possible “Starwars” scenario. The US commander for Space Command of the Air Force (AFSPC), John Hyten, announced this already in May.