Weakness Of The American Foreign Policy Essay

After the Cold War, Soviets realized their vulnerability was growing for they were not as capable in “its foreign adventures.” They were seen to have setbacks in their endeavors in places such as Afghanistan, Nicaragua, etc., created a mindset in the Soviet leadership that they were

Postwar Soviet expansion had resulted in many Americans fearing the spread of communism and a world controlled by the Soviet Union. At the same time, the Soviets began to resent America’s interventionist approach

MacDonald’s article Communist Bloc Expansion in the Early Cold War, four schools of thought surrounding the origins of the Cold War are laid out. Specifically, MacDonald argues mostly in favor of the traditionalist school, which emphasizes the expansionist, offensive nature of Soviet expansion into Asia and Eastern Europe. Also, MacDonald makes an important point regarding the accuracy of information and historical texts regarding the origins of the Cold War, explaining that “The argument over the origins of the Cold War is important not only for historical accuracy, but also for the consequences it will have on theoretical questions and therefore on their implications for policy.” Not only is this true, but also extremely relevant to scholars studying the Cold War with regard to international relations, as it points out the importance of the correct application of paradigms and perspectives to the Cold War case study. In MacDonald’s argument in favor of the traditionalist school, he

Iran was a major supplier of oil and in 1977, President Carter went there to celebrate the shah’s rule. This caused internal opposition against America and in 1979, a revolution ensued, over-throwing the shah and declaring Iran an Islamic republic. Because of Carter’s close relationship with the shah, he allowed him to seek medical treatment in the US. As a result of this, Khomeini, Muslim cleric who over-threw the shah, followers attacked and invaded the American embassy in Tehran, seizing 66 hostages. This directly shows that Carter’s bleeding heart policy was not always successful and led to a rapid fall in this popularity. Another failure, sometimes referred to as a greater crisis than WWII, of Carter’s foreign policy also began in 1979 and was initially seen more as America losing power because of Carter’s policy, not a direct result of anything he did. In 1979, the Soviet Union sent thousands of troops to Afghanistan to support a government threatened by an Islamic republic. In the end, Afghanistan became Soviet Vietnam, “an unwinnable conflict whose mounting causalities seriously weakened the government at home.” However, when Carter funneled aid to Muslims in Afghanistan to fight against the Soviet Union, an alliance formed that had unexpected consequences. This aid essentially helped Islamic fundamentalists, also known as the Taliban, rise to power in Afghanistan and America has been fighting them ever

During the late 1700s, Adam Smith and Thomas Malthus each entered their predictions on the future of the world’s economies into the history books. In his writings in An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Smith theorized that national economies could be continuously improved by means of the division of labor, efficient production of goods, and international trade. In An Essay on the Principle of Population, Thomas Malthus predicted that the sustainable production of food in relation to population was vital to the mere existence of national economies in order to ensure an able labor force. Smith believed that the success or

After WWII, the USA and the Soviet Union faced a conflict as they competed for global power. Neighboring countries, like Afghanistan, were dragged into the conflict causing millions of people to die. Due in part to the high cost of waging this war the Soviet Union fell only four years after the conflict.

For the longest time America has been known to ally with foreign countries, or be involved with few disputes in other countries. Yes, we need to trade and keep peace. However, what is better peace or to not be involved at all? Now, is a circumstance where we are stuck in Iraq and Afghan over issues such as terroristic activities but why did they start? America does have its own gas storage, not only that but there are areas where oil can be dug up from and bought from within borders and it could be sold amongst the few of us, instead we bought it from the middle east and when they fought amongst each other we got involved to keep the trade going, when it was none of our business. Yes World Peace is a great concept, But it doesn’t work, there will always be problems and trying to fix them only seems to make it worst, American forces should serve to defend and only attack after we’ve been attacked not used to help end civil wars or so on, it’s not our business, and most definitely not our problem but due to us stepping in, it becomes one.

Imperialism has played a large role in U.S history and other countries. Factors that can be changed through imperialism are global power and trade investment in other countries. Imperialism is a natural way of expanding and is beneficial to the U.S. Although imperialism has caused wars, there are many positive results, such as annexation and involvement in other countries, better trade, and the rise of the U.S as a global power. Therefore people believe imperialism is necessary to make the U.S stronger.

The Truman administration was more influenced by balance of power considerations than any other considerations, including domestic politics. Because of the external threats to the United States between 1947-1953, it was inevitable that these policies would have been pursued. Most significantly, Stalin at this point was perceived by the Western powers as having expansionist tendencies. Truman saw the Soviets as highly motivated to dominate the world, and committed to aggressively exploiting all opportunities to enlarge their sphere of influence. Considering the context of Truman’s post-W.W.II

Partly out of fear of repeating the Vietnam experience, the United States went into a sort of containment funk and watched from the sidelines as the Soviet Union opportunistically gathered a set of Third World countries into its imperial embrace: Angola in 1976, Mozambique and Ethiopia in 1977, South Yemen and Afghanistan in 1978, Grenada and Nicaragua in 1979. However, far from whetting their appetite for more, these gains ultimately not only satiated their appetite for expansion but, given the special properties of the morsels they happened to consume, the process served to give the ravenous expanders a troubling case of indigestion. For almost all of the new acquisitions soon became economic and political basket cases, fraught with dissension, financial mismanagement, and civil warfare. In 1979 the situation in neighboring Afghanistan had so deteriorated that the Soviets found it necessary to send in troops, and descended into a long period of enervating warfare there. As each member of the newly expanded empire turned toward the Soviet Union for material support, many Soviets began to wonder about the wisdom of the venture.

After the civil war, United States took a turn that led them to solidify as the world power. From the late 1800s, as the US began to collect power through Cuba, Hawaii, and the Philippines, debate arose among historians about American imperialism and its behavior. Historians such as William A. Williams, Arthur Schlesinger, and Stephen Kinzer provides their own vision and how America ought to be through ideas centered around economics, power, and racial superiority.

American Imperialism has been a part of United States history ever since the American Revolution. Imperialism is practice by which powerful nations or people seek to expand and maintain control or influence over weaker nations or peoples. Throughout the years there has been many instances where the Americans have taken over other people countries, almost every time we go into we have taken over a new piece of land. The Americas first taste of imperialism came about five hundred years ago when Columbus came to America. We fought the pleasant inhabitants and then took over their land making them slaves. Americans over the years have been known to become almost selfish, no matter how much we have we will never be happy until we control the

Throughout the course of history, the United States has remained consistent with its national interest by taking many different actions in foreign policy. There have been both immediate and long term results of these actions. Foreign policy is the United States policy that defines how we deal with other countries economically and politically. It is made by congress, the president, and the people. Some of the motivations for United States foreign policy are national security, economics, and idealism. The United States entry into World War I in 1917 and the escalation of the Vietnam War in 1964 and the both had great impact on the United States.

Another important concept that is often associated with the contemporary globalisation is Americanisation, which describes “the propagation of American ideas, customs, social patterns, industry, and capital around the world … inclusive of forms of American cultural, institutional, political, and economic imperialism.” (Ritzer & Ryan, 2003: 68) The origin of such trend, in which a single nation has virtually become a centre of the global imperial order, can be traced back to the mid- twentieth century, where a series of the world wars considerably undermined the politico-economic status of conventional capitalist competitors in Europe and Britain (Berberoglu, 2003: 57-58). It became more feasible with the development in transportation and communication technologies, which has also brought changes in conceptualisation of spatial and temporal interactions (Reich, 1998) Therefore, what is commonly argued about Americanisation is the gradual tendency towards

The first paradigm of international relations is the theory of Realism. Realism is focused on ideas of self-interest and the balance of power. Realism is also divided into two categories, classical realism and neo-realism. Famous political theorist, Hans Morgenthau was a classical realist who believed that national interest was based on three elements, balance of power, military force, and self interest (Kleinberg 2010, 32). He uses four levels of analysis to evaluate the power of a state. The first is that power and influence are not always the same thing. Influence means the ability to affect the decision of those who have the power to control outcomes and power is the ability to determine outcomes. An example of influence and power