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American Realism Versus American Imperialism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Campbell Craig
Campbell Craig
Affiliation:
University of Southampton, U.K.
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Extract

This article reviews three recent books critical of America's new “imperial” foreign policy, examines whether the United States can properly be compared to empires of the past, and identifies three aspects of contemporary American policy that may well be called imperialist. It also addresses some of the main objections to recent U.S. foreign policy made by American realist scholars and argues that traditional interstate realism can no longer readily apply to the problem ofAmerican unipolar preponderance over an anarchical, nuclear-armed world.

Type
Review Article
Information
World Politics , Volume 57 , Issue 1 , October 2004 , pp. 143 - 171
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 2004

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References

1 For standard definitions, see Donnelly, Jack, Realism and International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Knutsen, Torbjorn, A History of International Relations Theory, 2nd ed. (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1997)Google Scholar. This brief description excludes a new variant of American realism, the “nuclear one-worldism” proposed by Daniel Deudney. See Deudney, “Nuclear Weapons and the Waning of the Real-State,” Daedalus 125 (Spring 1995). We will return to his version of realism at the end of this article.

2 The conflict in American realism between descriptive analysis and normative judgment of international politics is acute. For further discussion of this problem, see Craig, Campbell, Glimmer of a New Leviathan: Total War in the Realism ofNiebuhr, Morgenthau, and Waltz (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003), chaps. 6–7CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 Jervis, , The Meaning ofthe Thermonuclear Revolution (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1989)Google Scholar.

4 A realist explanation of unipolarity is William C. Wohlforth, “The Stability of a Unipolar World,” in Ikenberry (fn. 1), 98–118. Wohlforth argues that “the concentration of capabilities in the United States passes the threshold at which counterbalancing becomes prohibitively costly, and thus the dominant strategy for other powers is some form of engagement.”This insight informs my discussion of realism below. For standard realist discussion of the balance of power and its recurrence throughout time, see Morgenthau, Hans, Politics among Nations (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948)Google Scholar; and Waltz, Kenneth, Theory of International Politics (New York: Random House, 1979)Google Scholar.

5 For realist criticism of recent foreign policy, see Nicholas Lemann, “The War on What?” New Yorker (September 16, 2002); Hendrickson, David C., “A Dissenter's Guide to Foreign Policy,” World Policy Journal 2 (Spring 2004), 102–11CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and “The Perils of Occupation,” article posted on the Web site of the Coalition for a Realistic Foreign Policy, October 28, 2004; www.realisticforeignpolicy.org/. This latter article was signed by every prominent American realist scholar of whom I am aware.

6 See Schlesinger, , War and theAmerican Presidency (New York: W. W. Norton, 2004)Google Scholar.

7 “At 98, veteran diplomat declares Congress must take lead on war with Iraq,” interview with Albert Eisele, The Hill, September 25, 2002.

8 In 2002 at West Point President Bush stated: “We will defend the peace against threats from terrorists and tyrants. We will preserve the peace by building good relations among the great powers. And we will extend the peace by encouraging free and open societies on every continent. Building the just peace is America's opportunity and America's duty”; “Remarks by the President at 2002 Graduation Exercise of the United States Military Academy,” June 1, 2002, http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/06/20020601–3.html. A report of the Project for the New American Century, which is closely linked to members of the current administration, noted that the strategic goal of the twenty-first century is to “preserve Pax Americana,” and that “the failure to prepare for tomorrow's challenges will ensure that the current Pax Americana comes to an early end”; Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resourcesfor a New Century, September 2000, www.newamericancentury.org/RebuildingAmericasDefenses.pdf, 2,13.

9 “A Pentagon Plan Would Cut Back G.I.'s in Germany,” New York Timesjune 4, 2004; “U.S. May Cut Third of Troops in South Korea,” New York Times, June 8, 2004; “In Agreement with South Korea, U.S. to Move Troops From Seoul,” New York Times, July 24, 2004.

10 We will discuss the connections between American economic insolvency and imperialism further, below.

11 Waltz, Kenneth, Man, the State and War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1959), esp. chap. 5Google Scholar. For a seminal philosophical articulation of this point, see Niebuhr, Reinhold, Moral Man and Immoral Society (New York: Scribners, 1932)Google Scholar. Waltz applies Niebuhr's thesis systematically to modern international politics.

12 That record has emboldened realists like John Mearsheimer and Kenneth Waltz to suggest that we will miss the stability of the cold war. This seems to go too far, making realism simply an endorsement of stopping time whenever international politics happens to be orderly.

13 Ferguson's treatment of U.S. cold war history, and in particular American policy during the Korean and Vietnam Wars, suffers from an alarming disregard for current historiography. He makes several claims (such as the suggestion that the Vietnam War was more limited than Korea) that are, to be charitable, unsubstantiated, and he engages in dodgy arithmetic on U.S. casualties in Vietnam and surely misunderstands the conflict between Truman and MacArthur in 1951. These are only some of the objectionable points made in this section of Colossus (pp. 91–92, 94–101).

14 In support of his position, Ferguson cites an ominous study recently published by Jagadeesh Gokhale and Kent Smetters, government economists who have produced a technical work that coolly shows that the imminent retirement of the baby-boom generation means wholesale fiscal collapse unless draconian steps are taken today.

15 An estimated 3.8 percent of enlisted soldiers and 29.6 percent of warrant officers have completed college, according to the “Estimated Educational Level of Active Duty Military Personnel,” in Department of Defense, Selected Manpower Statistics, 2003, http://webl.whs.osd.mil/mmid/M01/fy03/m01fyO3.pdf.

16 Ferguson, Niall, The Pity of War (London: Allen Lane, 1998), 31–55Google Scholar.

17 Ferguson characterizes the idea that access to Iraq's oil reserves lay behind the American interest in war as a “conspiracy theory.” This term has become a slur used to cease argument; it should not be so casually used by such a serious scholar as he. See Colossus, 265.

18 Recent discussion of the analytical power of geopolitics can be found in Deudney, Daniel, “Geopolitics as Theory: Historical Security Materialism,” European Journal of International Relations 6 (Spring 2000)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For an excellent treatment of American geopolitics, see Henrickson, David, “In Our Own Image: The Sources of American Conduct in World Affairs,” National Interest 50 (1997)Google Scholar.

19 A fuller discussion of free security can be found in Craig, Campbell, “The Not-so-Strange Career of Charles Beard,” Diplomatic History 25 (Spring 2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Logevall, Fredrik, “A Critique of Containment,” Diplomatic History 28 (September 2004), 477CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20 The effect of America's diplomatic inexperience on its twentieth-century foreign policy is a central theme in Kennan, George F., American Diplomacy: 1900—1950 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), 91–103Google Scholar.

21 On this point, see also Stephen Sestanovich, “Not Much Kinder and Gentler,” New York Times, February 3, 2005, 15.

22 On this point, see Kagan, Robert, “Power and Weakness,” Policy Review 113 (June—July 2002)Google Scholar.

23 Cox, Michael, “Empire, Imperialism and the Bush doctrine,” Review of International Studies 30 (October 2004), 605CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

24 See, for example, Ikenberry, G. John, “Illusions of Empire,” Foreign Affairs 83 (March—April 2004)Google Scholar.

25 On this point, see Cox (fn. 23), 587.

26 See the dialogue between Gaddis, John and Kennedy, Paul, in “Kill the Empire (or Not),” New York Times, July 25, 2004Google Scholar.

27 Cox (fn. 23), 598.

28 Mearsheimer, John, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W. W. Norton, 2002), 29–54Google Scholar.

29 This is not to suggest that a nation cannot act imperially even if it faces plausible security threats.

30 Kennedy, Paul, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflictfrom 1500 to 2000 (New York: Vintage, 1989)Google Scholar.

31 The National Security Strategy of the United States of America, September, 2002, http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.html. The best treatment of the new Bush strategy is Jervis, Robert, American Foreign Policy in a New Era (New York: Routledge, 2005), chap. 4Google Scholar.

32 See Bacevich's, Andrew J. discussion of the “Wolfowitz indiscretion,” in Bacevich, American Empire: Tie Realities and Consequences of U.S. Diplomacy (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2002), 44Google Scholar.

33 On this notion of American containment, see Gaddis, John Lewis, Strategies of Containment: A CriticalAppraisal of Postwar American National Security Policy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982), 48–49, 100, 149Google Scholar.

34 Kennedy (fn. 30), 73–193.

35 Criticism of the unusual relationship between Israel and the United States is expanding. For a diverse set of examples, see Slater, Jerome, “Ideology vs. the National Interest: Bush, Sharon, and the U.S. Policy in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,” Security Studies 12 (Autumn 2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hoffmann, Stanley, “The High and the Mighty,” American Prospect 13 (January 13, 2003)Google Scholar; Sherle Schwenninger, “Revamping American Grand Strategy,” World PolicyJournal (Fall 2003), 28–30; Nikolas K. Gvosdev and Travis Tanner, “Wagging the Dog,” National Interest, no. 77 (Fall 2004), 5–10; New York Times, lead editorial, October 18, 2004, 14; “Ending the Israeli-Palestinian Stalemate,” Statement signed by dozens of leading American scholars, January 1,2005, http://www.realisticforeignpolicy.org/archives/2005/01/ending_the_isra.php. This statement also appeared as an advertisement in the Economist 374 (January 2005).

36 The percentage for Israel is calculated by Mann (fn. 7), 53—54. His figures are based upon several sources, including McArthur, Shirl, “A Conservative Total for U.S. Aid to Israel: $91 Billion—and Counting,” Washington Report on Middle East Affairs 20 (January—February 2001), 15—17Google Scholar.

37 General Assembly Resolutions A/RES/58/98 (2003) and A/RES/57/126 (2002) were opposed by Israel, the United States, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, Palau, and Nauru: Press Release GA/10219, Press Release GA/10121, http://www.un.org/documents/resga.htm.

38 “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm,” was prepared by a study group including Richard Perle and Douglas Feith for Benjamin Netanyahu in 1996; www.israeleconomy.org/stratl.htm. Perle and Feith played central roles in formulating U.S. foreign and military policy during the Bush administrations first term.

39 On this point, see also Robert Jervis and Michael Desch, “Ending the Israeli-Palestinian Stalemate Will Help with the War on Terror,” posted on Coalition for a Realistic Foreign Policy Web site, January 26, 2005; www.realisticforeignpolicy.org/archives/2005/01/ending_the_isra_2.php.

40 “In an audiotape obtained by the Associated Press [April 7, 2003] in Pakistan, bin Laden exhorts Muslims to rise up against Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and other governments it claims are ‘agents of America,’ and calls for suicide attacks against US and British interests. The CIA determines the 27-minute tape is likely authentic”; “Tapes from al-Qaeda Leaders,” New York Times, October 1, 2004.

41 Jemaah Islamiah, the terrorist organization blamed for the 2002 bomb attacks in Bali, had its roots in earlier Indonesian Muslim nationalist movements but was radicalized by contacts with al-Qaeda; “Some Facts about Indonesia's Jemaah Islamiah,” Reuters, September 9, 2004.

42 See Yergin, Daniel, The Prize: The Epic Questfor Oil, Money, and Power (New York: Touchstone, 1991), 450–78Google Scholar.

43 “Pushing Energy Conservation into the Back Seat of the S.U.V.,” New York Times, November 22, 2003.

44 According to the Environmental Protection Agency's 2004 report, “Light Duty Automotive Technology and Fuel Economy Trends, 1975–2003,” fully one-half of all new vehicles bought in the U.S. in 2003 were pickups and SUVs; see www.epa.gov/otaq/cert/mpg/fetrends/r03006.pdf, iv. The Bush administration has fought to subsidize this trend, most notably by supporting legislation that classifies these vehicles as trucks, which exempts them from “gas guzzler” surcharges. A thorough treatment of the bizarre American propensity for large SUVs and pickups is Bradsher, Keith, High and Mighty: SUVs—The World's Most Dangerous Vehicles and How They Got That Way (Washington, D.C.: Public Affairs, 2003)Google Scholar. See also Easterbrook's, Gregg trenchant review of this book, “Axle of Evil,” New Republic 228, no. 2 (January 20, 2003)Google Scholar.

45 On this point, see Bacevich (fn. 32); and Easterbrook, Gregg, The Progress Paradox (New York: Random House, 2004)Google Scholar.

46 Ferguson, Colossus, 279–85. See also Peterson, Peter, “Riding for a Fall,” Foreign Affairs 83 (September-October 2004)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

47 Stiglitz, Joseph has noted that “IMF programs are typically dictated from Washington”; Stiglitz, Globalization andIts Discontents (London: Penguin Books, 2002), 24Google Scholar.

48 See Kupchan, Charles, The End ofthe American Era: U. S. Foreign Policy and the Geopolitics ofthe Twenty-first Century (New York: Knopf, 2003)Google Scholar; Mearsheimer (fn. 28); and Waltz (epigraph).

49 Singer, J. David, “International Conflict: Three Levels of Analysis,” World Politics 12 (April 1960)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

50 Ikenberry, , “Liberalism and Empire: Logics of Order in the American Unipolar Age,” Review of International Studies 30 (October 2004), 614CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

51 See Deudney (fn. 1), 212.

52 Wendt, Alexander, “Why a World State Is Inevitable,” European Journal of International Relations 9 (December 2003)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Deudney, , Bounding Power: Republican Security Theoryfrom the Polis to the Global Village (Princeton: Princeton University Press, forthcoming); Craig (fn. 2), conclusionCrossRefGoogle Scholar.