The eagle and the rattlesnake: Pluto and US global power

Another cycle begins

This post is written from an European perspective. It looks at the US rise to dominance on the world stage throughout the country’s last Pluto cycle and at what might happen next. I have never lived in the US and thus have an outsider perspective on the country’s history and politics. Please keep this in mind and feel free to point out my ignorance or anything I might have misunderstood or misjudged. I am reading up on US history, but I won’t have the same knowledge or first hand experience of living in the country as many of you have. Feel free to share your thoughts and opinions in the comments. This is simply one take and one overview of the US Pluto cycle.

Pluto, the planet of the fates, death and rebirth, can empower the small and tear down the powerful.

During the last 248 year long Pluto cycle the US rose up to become the dominant player on the world stage.

The dollar reigned supreme, American soft power saw the whole world consuming American movies, music, fast food and culture. And from having traditionally been non-interventionist the US became the so called world police.

Where do you tend to go from the top? When Pluto is involved, there is often only one way.

The US has recently had its Pluto return and a new cycle has now begun.

I believe Pluto is integral to understanding what the US is going through right now and what might happen next.

The first US Pluto cycle

Pluto first squared its natal position in the US chart between 1849 and 1851, this was during the Californian gold rush and the prelude to the Civil War.

During this period Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin, a book which changed the national discourse around slavery. Changing opinion erupted into the Civil War. And out of the war came a more modern and modernising country – a democratic country with a strong federal government.

And in America, unlike in old mouldy Europe, it didn’t matter if you hadn’t been born into wealth or power. The dream was sold to the world: in the US anyone could become rich and powerful and free from old constraints. Immigrants stared to arrive, turbo-boosting growth.

Over the next 50 years the economy boomed, coal production rose by 800 percent, railways were laid and the US surpassed Great Britain as a manufacturing powerhouse.

At the beginning of the 20th century the US had the world’s largest economy, but it was not yet a global power.

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The Pluto opposition occurred between 1935 and 1938. This was the lead up to the Second World War, towards the end of the great depression, when the Social Security Act was signed into law by FDR.

This created the first social security program in the country’s history, meaning there was for the first time state sponsored welfare, a safety net for older people, for mothers and for those who were too ill to work. Trade Unions started to become more powerful and workers were increasingly protected against exploitation by big corporations.

On October 5th 1937 with the New Moon near America’s 10th house Saturn, the North Node about to cross the Ascendant, Saturn on the IC and Uranus sextiling the Sun, and Pluto two degrees away from the opposition to itself, president Roosevelt gave his famous “Quarantine Speech” where he called for “an international ‘quarantine’ against the epidemic of lawlessness by aggressive nations”.

It was aimed at Nazi Germany, the Empire of Japan and Italy, countries that were all gearing up for the Second World War.

Roosevelt also called for economic sanctions against these nations, an approach he favoured instead of a more forceful response.

It was seen as the first time a US president suggested the country could take a more active role on the global stage. The speech was criticised by isolationists who wanted the US to stay clear of entanglements with the rest of the world.

We all know what happened next.

After the Second World War the old empires had fallen, the Cold War began and the US was one of two dominant global powers.

GDP grew from $200 billion in 1940 to $500 billion in 1960. And a big driver behind this growth was the Americans themselves – the American consumer.

What solidified America’s position as the world’s leading economy was the spending power of American citizens and the shift to a consumer oriented society. This was the beginning of the so called Golden Age of capitalism.

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The final Pluto square during this cycle occurred between 1982 and 1983. When Ronald Reagan became the first US president to adress both houses of the UK parliament and the Japanese national legislature (the former colony was now lording over the old and fallen empires).

This was also the beginning of the economic reforms of the 1980s – radical cuts to federal spending and deregulation of the markets, following the end of the consumer lead growth boom, which had come crashing down in the 1970s with Richard Nixon, the end of the Bretton Woods system and the oil crisis.

This Pluto square also marked the beginning of the decline of the US as an industrial nation and the start of the rise of a highly educated and well remunerated minority. Those left behind in former industrial areas saw their incomes fall and their quality of life get worse.

The first green shoots of the US tech industry could also be seen around this time, the first commodore computer was launched in Las Vegas, software company Adobe was founded and Apple released the first mass-market personal computer, IBM followed soon after with their own model.

Shortly after this period the world saw the collapse of the Soviet Union, leaving the US as the supreme power on the global stage.

This was described by political historian Francis Fukuyama as “the end of history”, and American liberal democracy was celebrated as “the final form of human government”.

The Pluto return

One cycle follows on from the next.

The US experienced its first Pluto return between 2022 and 2023 when the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs Wade and Elon Musk bought Twitter.

There was financial turbulence too with tech companies losing a lot of their value and interest rates going up. There were discussions around labour, unions and several strikes, among others the strikes in Hollywood. And Trump was indicted on four charges for attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

At the beginning of this Pluto return Russia was preparing to invade Ukraine.

On February the 20th 2022, with Pluto almost exactly on the US’s natal position, president Biden agreed to meet with Vladimir Putin as long as the Russian president promised not to attack Ukraine. The following day, as Pluto perfected the conjunction, Putin addressed Russia saying Ukraine had no independent statehood, he also accused the country of being a US puppet.

The war broke out on the 24th of February.

Pluto then retrograded back over its natal placement at 27’33 Capricorn in the middle of July 2022.

This transit was exact on July 13th 2022 when inflation rose to the highest rate in 40 years in the US, pushing up costs of food and fuel, among other things.

Around this time Biden met with Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, a controversial figure following the Saudi ordered murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The reason for the meeting, according to the BBC, was to push Saudi officials to increase oil production as oil prices in the US were near a record high. This was seen as a climb down from Biden who had previously refused to talk to Bin Salman.

Pluto once again crossed its natal placement at the end of December 2022.

Around this time a record number of aircraft entered Taiwan’s air defence zone, highlighting China’s ambitions in the region. Russia hosted peace talks to end the Syrian civil war. And Benjamin Netanyahu became Prime Minister in Israel.

On August 1st 2023 Pluto was one degree away, and separating from, its natal position. That day, as the Moon crossed the US’s Pluto, the country’s credit rating was downgraded for the second time in history. The reason was the attack on the capitol in 2021, leading to the credit rating agency having doubts around the stability of the country’s government.

Pluto didn’t cross its natal position in the US chart again, but it stationed near it on the 12th of October 2023.

Around this time the conflict in Gaza was well underway and a pipeline in the Baltic Sea between Finland and Estonia was sabotaged.

In the US the House of representatives was trying to find a new speaker and eventually settled on Mike Johnson. Chinese spy balloons were reported to be flying over the US.

There was also a banking crisis with several smaller banks collapsing, including the bank run on the Silicon Valley Bank. The US government had to intervene to stop the crisis from spreading.

There was also a solar eclipse on the 14th of October 2023, which could be seen from the southwestern parts of the US.

The New Moon fell in the US’s 10th house, opposing the country’s natal Chiron in Aries the 4th house of home.

What does that Chiron speak of?

It is a placement the US shares with Elon Musk. It’s the wound of the pioneer and the conquerer, the wound of the lone capitalist and the colonialist. Aries is the first sign of the Zodiac, it represents the individual.

And the US is a colonised land mainly made up of the descendants of brave men and women who left (or were forced to) leave their homelands, who struggled and rose up and built the country with their hard labour, blood, sweat and tears.

American power rests on the sacrifices made by these individuals. Which is perhaps why the US, a country with a 7th house Cancer Sun, became more and more powerful every time it looked after its people, when it took steps to protect and help the people – and gave its power and wealth (natal Pluto in Capricorn in the second house) back to the people.

During the first Pluto square the country rejected slavery, during the opposition there was social security for the first time in the country’s history and then came the final square, where many protections were removed and many jobs were lost.

The story is the story, and perhaps it was always supposed have played out this way. But, I wonder what the country might have become and what the story of the Pluto return would have looked like if the leaders at that time had chosen a different path than the one of funnelling the country’s wealth into fewer and fewer hands.

Donald Trump fits into this story. He is first and foremost a product of the economic project of the final Pluto square in the 1980s. But, part of his appeal, and what has given him the power he has today, is that he has said that he will look after the American worker. Whether he means it or not is not that relevant here as he is just one player in a larger narrative arc. The US would always have had a Pluto return.

There are perhaps a couple of different ways the next cycle could play out.

We might see a spectacular fall from grace from being the supreme global power, leaving the US friendless and alone and having to start to rebuild again during this cycle, or we could see a slower decline and retreat, playing out over the next 248 years.

This might ultimately not be a catastrophe for the American people or for the rest of the world. As always with Pluto it will simply mean change.

The eagle and the rattle snake

The first animal America chose to represent it was the rattle snake. A solitary animal, always vigilant and ready to strike. In 1775 Benjamin Franklin wrote that it was a good symbol for the American spirit, adding:

She never begins an attack, nor, when once engaged, ever surrenders … The Rattle-Snake is solitary, and associates with her kind only when it is necessary for their preservation.

Then came the bald eagle, adopted as the symbol for the country in 1782, of which Franklin was less fond:

For my own part. I wish the bald eagle had not been chosen the representative of our country. He is a bird of bad moral character. He does not get his living honestly ... besides he is a rank coward.

Two symbols and two competing visions.

Throughout most of its history the US didn’t really want to get involved with the rest of the world. It was inward looking, and in many ways still is.

But, almost without the country wanting it or wishing for it, the US became the proud and powerful bald eagle (of bad moral character?) soaring above the rest of the world.

Perhaps it is time to choose a new symbol for the next 248 years.

Another bird associated with the US is the turkey. And if you google turkey symbolism the following words come up: abundance, gratitude, the blessing’s of nature’s bounty, service, sacrifice and a connection to the earth.

Not a bad bird in my opinion.