A Smaller Military To Fight the War on Terror

The defense budget can be reduced and the U.S. military downsized because (1) the nation-state threat environment is markedly different than it was during the Cold War, and (2) a large military is not necessary to combat the terrorist threat. In fact, the Islamist terrorist threat is relatively undeterred by the U.S. military presence abroad, and U.S. forces abroad, particularly those deployed in Muslim countries, may do more to exacerbate than to diminish the threat. The arduous task of dismantling and degrading the terrorist network will largely be the task of unprecedented international intelligence and law enforcement cooperation, not the application of large-scale military force. To the extent the military is involved in the war on terror, it will be special forces in discrete operations against specific targets rather than large-scale military operations.     

The American Way of Going to War: Mexico (1846) to Iraq (2003)

Prior to the Iraq War, there had been a long series of American wars in which U.S. leaders often maneuvered the other side into “firing the first shot.” This strategy of “passive defense” amounts to an American way of going to war, and it dates back at least to the U.S.-Mexican War. The United States thus retained the moral and legal legitimacy, an asset which is especially important in a democratic political system. The Iraq War represents a fundamental departure from this American way. It might be the worst crisis since Vietnam. but that war was just another entry in the U.S. playbook for how to go to war. The Iraq War not only contradicts longstanding practices in American foreign policy, but it has the potential to issue in far greater international disorder than the Vietnam War. This catastrophe may make future presidents more heedful of John Quincy Adams’ prophetic words: go not abroad in search of monsters to destroy.     

Stuxnet and the Limits of Cyber Warfare

American foreign policy analysts have generally viewed World War II as the most important of the six wars the country fought in the twentieth century. By entering this war, so the argument goes, the United States prevented the gravest geopolitical threat to its security—German and Japanese hegemonies in Eurasia—from materializing. Careful reexamination of the best case for U.S. entry into World War II, made by Nicholas Spykman in 1942, demonstrates that the traditional view is misplaced: the United States could have remained secure over the long term had it not entered the war and had it allowed Germany and Japan to win. Its standard of living and its way of life, however, would most likely have suffered. Avoidance of those two outcomes was the real reason to have entered the war. The implications of this analysis for balance of power theory and current American grand strategy are spelled out.     

New Complexities in the Middle East since 9.11

The Middle East has been a hot spot in international politics since the mid-20th century owing to its special geostrategic position and its abundant resources of oil and natural gas. These contributes have made it an area of contention for any state with a global overview. During the Cold War,the sharp differences between two superpowers,the U.S. and the Soviet Union,could have brought the situation to the brink of a third world war. After the Cold War,the U.S. became the dominant power in the Middle East. ...     

Global Threats and American Strategies: From Communism in 1955 to Islamism in 2005

America's current security threats—the insurgency in Iraq, Islamic terrorism, and Iran's efforts to obtain nuclear weapons—seem strange and unprecedented. Parallels can be drawn, however, between the security threats of 2005 and those of fifty years ago. The U.S. foreign policy developed to confront the communist threat offers lessons as we develop strategies to combat today's threat. Two contemporary perspectives on strategic issues—one conservative/realist, one neoconservative/idealist—apply lessons of the Cold War to today's U.S. foreign policy, but each has serious flaws. A third, neorealist perspective, suggests that by leveraging the divisions already present in the Muslim world, the United States can win the global contest against Islamic terrorism. However, this would require a transformation in American strategy that will not be easily achieved.     

Russian Grand Strategy and the United States in the 21st Century

Despite the initially cordial relationship between the United States and Russia following the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Iraq War became a turning point in what evolved into the worst relationship between Moscow and Washington since the Cold War. From that point onwards, Russia persistently has exhibited aggressive behavior toward the United States, resulting in numerous crises. This article argues that this Russian assertiveness is deliberate, arising from a mixture of domestic and international factors. In light of recent developments in U.S.-Russian relations, especially the decision of American President Barack Obama to abandon the Bush Administration's scheme to deploy national missile defense (NMD) system in Eastern Europe, it is important to understand that Russia's grand strategy is aimed at promoting multipolarity and that Moscow is willing to apply limited military force to achieve its goals. The Obama Administration should engage Russia, but be prepared to confront it if necessary.     

America,Britain, and Swaraj: Anglo-American Relations and Indian Independence, 1939–1945

In the years before and during the Second World War, the Roosevelt Administration played an important and often overlooked role in encouraging Britain's disengagement from the Indian subcontinent. Roosevelt's motivations in pressing for Indian independence were varied. They included a mix of principled opposition to colonialism, practical concern for the outcome of the war and pragmatic jockeying for influence with post-colonial nations when the war was won. Churchill's government was wary of being pushed by Washington to move more quickly to “quit India” than it thought prudent. U.S. policy and actions clearly influenced the direction of events toward independence, but U.S. caution as the war ground on led to disillusionment among nationalist leaders. This reaction would have consequences once swaraj was won and India came into its own, at a time when the Cold War was becoming the dominant factor in America's view of the world.     

论南海问题中的美国因素

在影响南海问题的外部力量中,美国是最重要的第三方。冷战时期,美国对南海问题主要采取不介入和不表态的中立政策。冷战结束以来,美国开始关注和介入南海问题,并逐步采取具有明显倾向的政治和军事干预政策。美国的介入和干预加大了南海问题的复杂性和中国解决南海问题的难度。     

Understanding the Unilateralist Turn in U.S. Foreign Policy

How should we explain the recent unilateralist turn in U.S. foreign policy? Some accounts treat growing American unilateralism as a passing aberration attributable to the neoconservative ideology of the Bush administration. This paper, by contrast, traces U.S. unilateralism to the structural effects, at home and abroad, of the end of the Cold War. Internationally, the removal of the Soviet threat has undermined the "institutional bargain" that once guided relations between the U.S. and its major allies. Absent Cold War imperatives, the U.S. is less willing to provide collective goods through strong international institutions and other states are less likely to defer to U.S. demands for special privileges that exempt the U.S. from normal multilateral constraints. Domestically, the end of the Cold War has weakened the ability of presidents to resist the appeals of powerful veto players whose interests are threatened by multilateral commitments. These factors suggest that American unilateralism may have deeper roots and more staying power than many expect.     

美国构建后冷战东亚安全模式

冷战结束以来，美国的东亚安全战略经过近20年的发展与调整，已初步形成和正在努力打造后冷战时期的安全网络模式，即：以保持前沿军事存在和海外基地为基石，以双边军事同盟与准同盟为轴心，以地区多边安全合作机制为辅助模式，以与区域内非同盟、准同盟国家和区域组织进行高层对话为补充形式，在美国的主导下交叉运用。     

美日同盟的转型与东亚安全秩序的建构

美日同盟是冷战时代的产物,在冷战中发挥了反苏反共的重要作用。冷战结束后,美日同盟在国际社会的角色转型、性质定位正逐步发生演变,并出现日益强化的趋势。冷战后时代,美日同盟的调整对东亚安全秩序产生了重要影响,一方面,它遏制和防范中国的发展;另一方面,它在一定程度上发挥了制衡作用,有利于防止东亚地区危机的爆发。以美日同盟为核心的东亚安全秩序并不利于东亚地区的和平与稳定,因此,要构建良性的东亚安全秩序,必须把以美日同盟为核心的美国同盟体系和作为新兴大国的中国并重,协调处理东亚安全事务。     

Stability and Change in U.S. Grand Strategy

Since the Global War on Terror (more recently termed the Long War) emerged as the centerpiece of U.S. grand strategy in 2001, the post–Cold War U.S. debate has narrowed significantly. Essentially three alternative strategies now compete for pride of place. Two are variants of a “primacy” strategy; one is a variant of “restraint,” sometimes termed “offshore balancing.” All three strategies take globalization as a given and as a positive development. None specifically connects U.S. military power to globalization. To the extent that globalization can be argued to have negative consequences, restraint offers a different remedy than either version of primacy. This article offers a brief characterization of globalization and speculates on its positive and negative results. The three grand strategies that remain visible in the U.S. public policy debate, and their suggested remedies, are then discussed. Finally, the U.S. military strengths and weaknesses are evaluated in order to gauge which strategy's remedies are most feasible.     

Foreign Policy in Transition? Human Rights, Democracy, and U.S. Arms Exports

During the Cold War, U.S. foreign policy was dominated by the strategic goal to contain Communism. Human rights and democracy were of secondary importance. In the post-Cold War period, the promotion of human rights and democracy as foreign policy concerns rose in prominence. In the spirit of Andrew Pierre, who once characterized arms transfers as "foreign policy writ large ," this study questions whether the transfer of U.S. arms mirrors America's foreign policy goals. To what extent do U.S. arms transfers reflect a concern for human rights and democracy? As a foreign policy instrument, do U.S. arms transfer patterns mark a transition between Cold War and post-Cold War worlds? To address these questions, I examine the empirical linkage between U.S. foreign policy goals and arms export agreements with developing countries for the years 1981–2002. I use a two-stage model to evaluate the decision-making process. The first-stage addresses whether a country is eligible to receive U.S. arms. If a country successfully passes through the selection stage, it progresses to the second stage where a decision is made about the amount of arms transferred. I use a Heckman model to estimate empirically the determinants of arms at both the initial selection stage and the subsequent amount stage. The findings indicate that during the Cold War years, human rights were not a significant determinant of arms transfers—although democracy was positively linked to U.S. arms in the selection stage. In the post-Cold War period, both human rights and democracy had a meaningful impact in determining the eligibility of a country to receive arms.     

Managing Military Transformations: Agency,Culture, and the U.S. Carrier Revolution

The marketplace of ideas within a mature democracy such as the United States is supposed to fairly reliably vet foreign policies through open, wide-ranging debate. It is widely recognized that the U.S. marketplace of ideas failed during the 2002-03 debate over going to war in Iraq. Examinations of this market failure have emphasized executive powers and public fear after 9/11 as the main reasons threat inflation succeeded; I show neither explains this case. The majority opposition was silenced throughout early 2002 and ultimately defeated in a struggle over the Iraq War Resolution by pressures to be patriotic. I contend that this silencing patriotism should not be considered ordinary patriotism for a democracy as it is anti-democratic. I discuss how two critical norms of behavior which silence debate of national security policies and cause deference to the executive branch on war powers became established as part of the militarized political culture that took root in the United States during the Cold War. Thus these norms, enforced by what I term to be militarized patriotism left over from the Cold War, silenced debate over Iraq and led to the failure of the marketplace of ideas.     

Reassessing U.S. Strategy in the Aftermath of the Korean War

This article examines the reassessment of U.S. strategy that Dwight D. Eisenhower directed after replacing Harry S. Truman in the White House in January 1953, as he worked to bring the Korean War to an end and then confronted the problems remaining in its aftermath. Despite much of the rhetoric of the early Eisenhower administration, the outcome of that reassessment fit more closely the objective of containment than key strategic formulations of its predecessor. Why was this so? How did the orientation apply to ending the war in Korea and sustaining the U.S. position there and elsewhere after the armistice? What insights, if any, do the process of reassessment and its outcome provide for the present? Answers to these questions serve to emphasize the dynamic and contingent nature of American strategy in the early Cold War and the importance of flexible, engaged leadership in the White House.     

试析中越关系中的美国因素

美国因素在中越关系中起着重要的作用。冷战结束以后，尤其是近些年来，越美关系发展迅速。两国在政治、经济和军事领域的合作，将不可避免地对中越关系造成影响。但是由于越美之间存在诸多矛盾和分歧，使得美国因素对中越关系的影响十分有限。对此，中国应积极应对，通过发展对越关系、对美关系和提升自身实力的方式，将美国因素对中越关系造成的不利影响降至最低点。     

从美对俄战略看当前美俄的紧张关系

美俄关系是世界上最重要的大国关系之一。美国弱俄、抑俄政策是冷战时期对苏“遏制”战略的继续，意识形态的对抗贯穿美苏和美俄关系的发展过程。近些年来，美俄不断形成相互挑战之势，今年俄格军事冲突又导致美俄对抗势头加剧。但两国不会回到冷战时代，非敌非友的两国关系将会长期保持。     

Book Review

During George Bush's presidency the Cold War drew to a close and his administration triumphed in the Gulf War. Some viewed these events as a harbinger of a new world order. Basking in the success of the Gulf War, Bush's approval ratings soared, and prominent Democrats reconsidered challenging him in 1992. Foreign policy themes might have seemed a natural emphasis in campaign rhetoric. Yet, on the eve of the election, Bush abandoned efforts to rally the public with such appeals.

This article identifies primary metaphorical themes employed by Bush to define foreign policy reality. Bush's rhetoric was fundamentally ordered by the orientational metaphor of war. Other themes reinforced central premises of the war metaphor and reflected enduring premises of American exceptional ism. However, critical constraints blunted Bush's rhetorical intentions, and perhaps nullified constraints presidents traditionally have harnessed to define rhetorical situations to fit a preferred world view.

A disjuncture between rhetorical expectations and intentions beset the administration as the 1992 election approached. The electorate turned an anxious gaze to domestic politics and the condition of the economy. Furthermore, the war metaphor met a public demonstrably leery of U.S. meddling in the internal politics of other countries. Preference for the war metaphor, finally, represented a significant challenge to the political identity of Bush and the Republican Party.     

古巴—美国关系50年四题

古巴革命是美国与古巴双边关系历史的重要转折点,美国对古巴革命及其后续发展的反应和政策则是冷战环境中美国战略思想的典型表露.全球冷战终结并没有改变古美之间的冷战式关系,凸显了美国政策的单边主义性质、意识形态色彩和国内政治主导倾向.     

20世纪70年代美国在鄂霍次克海的谍报活动探析

美国海军和美国国家安全局(NSA)等部门于20世纪70年代联合发起了在鄂霍次克海海域窃听苏联海底通讯电缆的谍报活动,它曾被认为是美国现代史上最成功的情报搜集活动之一,此即"常春藤之铃"行动。其起根发由、运策决机及东窗事发都有着比较深刻的历史背景。冷战后美国针对有关国家的类似谍报活动远未停止。