preemptive war
You need to be careful about Tom's framing technique. He has you responding within the "hegemony is simply self-interest" framework.
One of the nastier and certainly least-defensible strategies advocated by PNAC and translated into US policy in 2002 and reiterated in 2006 is the doctrine of preemptive war.
If necessary, however, under long-standing principles of self defense, we do not rule out the use of force before attacks occur, even if uncertainty remains as to the time and place of the enemy’s attack. When the consequences of an attack with WMD are potentially so devastating, we cannot afford to stand idly by as grave dangers materialize. This is the principle and logic of preemption. The place of preemption in our national security strategy remains the same. We will always proceed deliberately, weighing the consequences of our actions. The reasons for
our actions will be clear, the force measured, and the cause just.
I find it very disturbing that our official doctrine nowhere addresses the imminence of a threat. It's only about potential consequences, and there is way too much wiggle-room there...basically a matter of who scares us sufficiently to panic and let loose the dogs of war. Or to cold-bloodedly start a war and justify it on no more than a perception of a threat. If a threat needn't be imminent, then literally anyone in the world could be imagined to be a threat, someday.
I think that it's Bush's doctrine of preemptive war that scares and appalls the rest of the world more than anything else. Hegemony + preemptive war = ambitions of empire. I don't want that for my country.