With the success of George W. Bush in securing a second term by a clear majority, it is perhaps an opportune moment to reflect upon the impact of his administration upon US foreign policy from a specifically South-centric perspective focused upon the Third World i.e. Asia, Africa, the Pacific and Latin & South America. Such a review of US foreign policy will highlight the huge chasm that exists between American perceptions of its moral leadership of the world and the contrary view of the vast majority of the Third World which questions whether the US has exercised moral global leadership, and if it did, whether any remnants of this legitimacy remains. This huge disconnect between the way America perceives its role in the world and how the majority of the world perceives its actions in the international arena, particularly in the Muslim World, poses a major threat to world peace and multilateral cooperation.
Historical Context
The Allied victory in World War II resulted in the emergence of the Cold War with the global division of power between the West lead by the US and the Communist Bloc lead by the Soviet Union. During the two decades of the 1950s and 1960s, while the North was locked in the battle for global supremacy between the capitalist west and the communist east, the Third World experienced the most momentous period of its collective history since the advent of European colonialism some two centuries earlier. This was, of course, the era of decolonization when most of Africa, Asia and the Pacific threw off the yoke of European colonialism and achieved independence. These newly independent countries were admitted into the community of nations to find themselves faced with a global political landscape characterized by competition between the East/West blocs for global supremacy.
This intense rivalry presented the emerging nations of the Third World with a Hobbesian choice between the US and the USSR as sponsor, principal aid giver, arms supplier and protector with the other, perforce, as adversary. The rash of coups d'etat and armed insurrections in many African and Asian countries during the 1960s and 1970s was, in large part, a direct result of this superpower rivalry which exploited intra and inter-country conflicts and disputes to advance their respective geo-political interests. The Third World rapidly became a chessboard upon which Washington and Moscow could compete vigorously without having to come into actual, direct conflict with each other, thereby avoiding the nuclear nightmare of mutually assured destruction (MAD - that most apropos of acronyms).
From a Third World perspective, both superpowers filtered their policy towards the developing world through the prism of their own self interest which was firmly rooted in their geo-political rivalry. They both wanted the support of the newly independent ex-colonies in their struggle for global dominance, but if this support was not forthcoming voluntarily, then it would be coerced through inducements, threats, coups d'etat and naked military force. The foreign policy pronouncements of both superpowers at international forums were couched in terms of freedom, self-determination, human rights and justice, but these were no more than fig leaves behind which were hidden the ugly truths of superpower domination and control.
The Collapse of Communism & The Rise of the Hyperpower
The collapse of the Soviet bloc as a competitor to the US-lead West in the middle 1980s, heralded a new era in global politics the likes of which had not been seen since the 19th century - namely a new world order in which the economic, military and technological power of one nation is so overwhelming in comparison to all others that there is no restraint upon its exercise of that power, save those that it chooses to accept.
Some simple facts demonstrate this towering dominance of American power, e.g. in 2001 the defense budget of the US, at some US$350 billion, exceeded the aggregate of the next ten highest national defense budgets (including countries such as China, UK, Russia, France); in economic terms the US accounts for some 25% of global GNP, the US Dollar is the international exchange & reserve currency and the US debt and equity markets dwarf their counterparts across the globe; in the technological arena, the US leads innovation across all sectors (engineering, pharmaceutical, IT, communications and bio-chemistry) and accounts for the lion's share of global patents registered each year, while the computer, internet and communications revolutions originated in, and are lead by America.
In this context, the characterization of the US as the “hyperpower” by Jack Lange, a French Culture Minister, is not surprising but rather apt. By the 1990s, the US bestrode the world like a colossus the like of which had not been witnessed since ancient Rome or since the zenith of the British Empire during the 19th century. In this new world order, America's preternatural power makes its imprimatur essential for resolution of any international conflict, or the adoption of any international treaty or accord. It is a fact of modern diplomacy that any international initiative, accord or agreement, be it concerned with trade, economic development, dispute mediation or any other matter, will not succeed if it does not have the support of the US.
Many in the Third World were apprehensive at this American global hegemony, since they feared unchecked US power. However, these fears seemed unfounded as Bush Senior carefully built up the largest alliance of nations ever seen to evict Saddam Hussein from Kuwait in 1991, and then observed international law (and the realpolitik of maintaining his coalition) by not invading Iraq. Bush Senior's next projection of American power was into Somalia for the noble and humanitarian cause of feeding starving people who were being preyed upon by local warlords after the collapse of Siyad Barre's dictatorship. As the American & UN mission in Somalia metamorphosed from a purely humanitarian one into a political one of 'nation-building', it inevitably became enmeshed in the internecine war between the various warlords, leading eventually to their ignominious withdrawal. By the time Bill Clinton came to power, the fears of many in the Third World regarding America's unconstrained power had been allayed, if not put to rest. The US interventions in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo skirted international law by not securing UN Security Council approval, but were supported by its allies and approved of by the great majority of world opinion since the aims were laudably humanitarian and not self-serving. Under Clinton the US maintained the active role in mediating the Middle East dispute pursued under the previous Bush administration.
9/11 & the Rise of 'Pax Americana'
From the beginning, the George W. Bush administration signaled its departure from the broad foreign policy perspective common to the Clinton and Bush Senior administrations. The administration spurned the Kyoto Protocol on global warming - the only major industrial power to do so. Meanwhile President Bush voiced the new bellicosity of his foreign policy by labeling Iraq, Iran and North Korea as the “axis of evil”. The choice of three Third World countries (including an Iraq already debilitated by over a decade of sanctions), which could not conceivably pose the kind of threat to the US and the West that the Soviet Union had done, as the betes noir of US foreign policy seemed somewhat excessive.
Thus, it became apparent that the Bush administration foreign policy perspective presented a definitive break with the US foreign policy paradigm since the Reagan administration. This was an assertive administration that chose to project US power in the international arena at the expense of multilateral cooperation. It was in this context that the attacks of 11 September 2001 took place. The horror that the motley group of nihilist zealots perpetrated upon the US, and indeed upon the entire world, that day must rank as the most pivotal, single political act committed by a non-state actor since the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914. The assassination of Ferdinand plunged Europe into the Great War, and the attack on New York and Washington DC launched the Iraq War and the rise of the American Empire.
In response to the attack on the US, the Bush administration has adopted a new foreign policy perspective characterized by preemption, unilateral action and repudiation of the sanction of international law (e.g. treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay prison), imperial diktat brooking no disagreement, only acquiescence (e.g. the edict 'you're with us or with the terrorists'). The Bush administration has made the qualitative shift in its foreign policy from aggressive pursuit of US national interests, to imperial dictum whereby allies are 'invited' to join America in whatever action it proposes, while foes are confronted head on diplomatically and militarily. There is no dialogue, merely a presentation of a 'take it or else' proposition to friend and foe alike.
This strategy has unnerved many of America's traditional allies, principally Western Europe with the exception of Britain and Italy, as well as its traditional adversaries, i.e. Russia and China, who all worry that American military adventurism will result in a major dislocation of global stability. The failure to transform the stunning US military victory in Iraq into an equally successful transition to a stable, representative and, above all, functioning state is a savagely eloquent testament to the limits of imperial power. The belligerent stance of the US to other countries in the region that are not bending to its will, namely Syria and Iran, is an ominous portent of what is to come for these future targets of America's imperial policy.
Conclusion
The claim of American moral global leadership based upon the legitimacy of its foreign policy either in the past or at present is a non-sequitur that does not bear serious consideration. The fact is that the collapse of the Soviet bloc presented a golden opportunity for the world to develop, for the first time, an international political order governed by respect between nations and peoples underpinned by the rule of law. The leadership of America, as the world's hyperpower, is absolutely vital to this undertaking since it alone can ensure its success not only by the force of its example, but also by bringing its formidable powers to bear upon transgressors. During the 12 years of the Bush Senior and Clinton administrations, it seemed that, however hesitantly, the US was waking up to this responsibility to provide wise and thoughtful leadership in a world made increasingly smaller and yet more fractious by the divergent pulls of technological progress and identity.
The Bush administration's response to the first attack on US soil since Pearl Harbour has been to seek to impose a Pax Americana upon an increasingly obdurate world. America has chosen to force imperial dictum upon its enemies and allies alike, in the mistaken belief that through the application of its unparalleled military might it can make America safe from the world. This resort to militarist imperialism will inevitably fail since the world of the 21st century is not amenable to such crude constructs in the international political arena. One cannot help but wonder why, at the dawn of the 21st century, that the lessons of the 20th regarding the limits of imperial power and the futility of imposing political structures and leaders upon vanquished and/or weaker nations have to be learnt yet again, and at such horrendous human and material cost.
* This article was submitted to Pambazuka News by the author, a Somalilander who grew up in Europe and presently works in Saudi Arabia. Egal has a BA (Economics & Politics) from Warwick University and an MA (Area Studies [African Development]) from London University. He is currently Director of Finance & Business Development for a business group in Saudi Arabia.
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