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Rogue Nation
American Unilateralism and the Failure of Good Intentions
Clyde Prestowitz describes how far the neocons have distorted
the basic conservative message. His
conservative credentials are assured, having served under various conservative
administrations in trade negotiations. But he sees dangers in the BUsh
policies that solidify tendencies towards unilateralism ans 'soft' imperialism.
Not just a screed against the current administration, he shows how many of
these tendencies have developed over the years. One of the biggest
problems is the American failure to see themselves as others do:
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“America is like a
‘rogue wave’, a large swell that, running contrary to the general direction of
the eaves, takes sailors by surprise and causes unexpected destruction. America is a big and unpredictable nation
and has a long history of an alternately generous and uncaring approach to the
rest of world. While we think of
ourselves as the ‘good guys’, we are blinded tour own sometimes irritating
behavior by the strength of our mythology and the dominance of our culture….
Right now we are attributing criticism of American policies to envy of our
success and power and to chronic anti-Americanism. That is certainly some of the trouble, but not all of it. Perhaps we should also look at how we deal
with some key issues and how our behavior is perceived and comports with our
values.”
While Americans deride globalization as the sucking away of jobs,
much of the world sees globalization as Americanization and debates whether it
is to be embraced or resisted. Energy
use and global warming are intrinsically linked issues; particularly when
viewed with America’s growing dependence on foreign oil. This dependence also
affects basic issues of war and peace.
Connected still further are our varying attitudes towards Israel,
Palestine, Taiwan and Korea. With Cold War relationships over, tensions are
building as we sort out what our new relationships will be.
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“This dramatic new
doctrine of supremacy and preemptive attack not only reversed years of American
national security policy, it also struck at the heart of the
Treaty of
Westphalia, which has underpinned the modern international system of nation
states… Signed in 1648 to end the Thirty Years War, this agreement
acknowledged, as a fundamental principle of inte4rrnational relations, the
sanctity of national sovereignty and noninterfe4rence by one state in the
internal affairs of another. Bush’s
doctrine also seemed both to contravene the Charter of the United Nations,
which outlaws the ‘threat or use of force a against the territorial integrity
or political independence of any state’, and to contradict the conclusions of
the Nuremberg trials that treated ‘preemptive war’ as a war crime.”
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