There's an old saying among students of history: History may not always repeat itself, but it frequently rhymes.
Two nations that seem to rhyme, in human history, are Rome and the United States. The fall of the Republic and rise of the Empire are where I'm frequently drawing comparisons, but right now it seems like the apt comparison is between the United States and Europe to the dying years of the Western Empire. There are a lot of similarities, and a few of them are comforting, including but not limited to the Empire's dealing with growing debt by debasing their currency; in a word, inflation.
The comparison today, though, has to do with the Roman Army, how it encouraged recruits from outside the Empire, and what happened once those barbarians were, in effect, inside the city, or at least, integrated into the Empire.
Or so the Empire thought.
On Thursday, right here at RedState, we have two great examples of the parallel process in Europe and the United States today, written by my friend and colleague Bob Hoge and yours truly:
Read More: New: Israel Helps Europe Dismantle Hamas Network
Manhattan Moment: Mob Descends on 135-Year-Old NYC Synagogue Screaming, 'Globalize the Intifada!'
The problem? Mass immigration, legal and illegal, of people who have no intention of integrating.
In Rome, the problem began with the recruitment of people from outside the Empire - Goths, Visigoths, Vandals, and the like - into the legions. Rome called these people barbarians, and in many ways, they earned that sobriquet. They fought well, but the rank-and-file troops had little loyalty to Rome. No, their loyalty was to their co-ethnic commanders, such as King Alaric I of the Visigoths. The Visigoth king had served in the legions in the time of Emperor Theodosius I in the 390s. But when his service was done, he turned against Rome, his having been denied lands he had been promised was certainly a factor, and led his troops, many of whom had been trained by Rome, against the city. When Alaric's army arrived at the city gates in 490 AD, those gates were thrown open. Accounts vary as to who allowed Alaric's troops in; some reports say rebellious slaves, others say Visigoths already in the city.
Either way, the result was the same: Alaric's men spent three days in the sack of Rome.
This was made possible in large part because of Alaric's time in the Roman legions, the knowledge he gained of how those legions operated, Rome's strengths and its weaknesses, and that he was already, in effect, within the Empire.
The hardest-shelled creature, after all, is much softer on the inside. Rome was never the same after the sack, and in 476 AD, the last emperor, the teenage Romulus Augustulus, was deposed. The Western Empire was effectively ended.
While here in the United States, we aren't enlisting massive numbers of barbarians into our military (at least, not yet) we have, over the four years of the Biden administration in particular, allowed in millions of people from around the world. These people came in violation of our immigration laws, and why not? Nobody, from 2021 to 2025, was enforcing those laws anyway. Millions came in, an alarming number of them young, healthy, unaccompanied men of fighting age. Most of these people have no intention of integrating into the United States. Most of these people did not come here to become Americans. Millions of Visigoths, Goths, and Vandals are already within our city walls, and we have very little idea, even now, where many of them are or what they are up to, but we can and should assume the worst.
The fundamental issue is one of divided loyalties. I've had the pleasure of befriending a few naturalized citizens, and many of them are fiercely patriotic; they came here legally, they worked and studied and passed the tests, because they wanted to be Americans. But those who snuck in? Or just walked in, when nobody was stopping them? Where lies their loyalties?
We are forced, at this juncture, to admit something very unpleasant: Many American citizens, people born here of American parents, likewise have little or no loyalty to the United States. Just look at any of the various antisemitic protests on university campuses - or the masked goblins of Antifa. Our streets are filled, as Bob reports, with useful idiots shouting to "globalize the intifada," meaning they want to bring the purges here.
Europe, as I noted in the article linked above, has much the same problem, but more so; they have been even more open to the invasion, and seem less willing to try to halt the flood.
A nation cannot stand without a national identity. Not Rome, not the United States, not the nations of Europe. A nation also cannot stand when so many of its people have divided loyalties. Too many in the United States and Europe seem not only willing to let that national identity slip away, if not to destroy it outright, and that is because they have no loyalty.
I should stress that this is not a matter of race. It is a matter of national identity, not ethnic identity; anyone of any race can choose to become an American. It's a matter of culture, of national identity, and of loyalty. The lack of those things was in large part what brought down Rome. It could do the same here, and in Europe.
And, as far as the comparisons between the United States and Rome, I'll close with another old saying: Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose - The more things change, the more they stay the same.
