America Unbound

Daalder and Lindsay do a fair job in their book, "America Unbound" of analyzing how this policy came about and some of its implications. To understand their perspective it is important to know a little about their background. Lindsay is a VP at the CFR (Council on Foreign Relations) and is at the Brookings Institute, Daalder is also a Fellow at the Brookings Institute. Both were appointed to the NSC in the Clinton Administration.

Their history of events is well written and fascinating. In it, we are informed off all the background events in the Bush administration that led to the current conflict in Iraq. Although their chronology helps bring American foreign policy into focus, some of their interpretations show a naivete' about how the world works as well as the forces of historical progress.

They mainly decry Bush Foreign policy on grounds that it is basically unilateralist. The authors seem to think that "collective security" ensures world security and any movement outside of that is somehow a failure or immoral. Yet a reading of modern history directly counters this analysis. The fact is that wars against totalitarian regimes have largely been successful when a lone state has had the courage to stand up against tyranny. In the past, this state has typically been Great Britain. In the Napoleonic wars (in spite of a slew of coalitions), Great Britain fought pretty much a lone struggle against Napoleonic Hegemony. Throughout the 1800s it would be primarily the power of Britainia that would keep relative peace on the planet (exceptions, of course, proving the rule). World War II would be a prime example of the failure of the notion of collective security as Nazi Germany would succeed in "bloodlessly" conquering the Saar Valley, Austria and Czechoslovakia. The failure of collective security could be summarized in four small words that proved to be a colossal lie, "Peace in our time!" This was how Prime Minister Chamberlain described the abject surrender, by the great powers of Europe, to Hitler when he insisted on destroying Chekoslavakia.

The only reason that Germany was finally defeated was because Great Britain led by Churchill stood virtually alone against the collective might of Nazi-ruled Europe. It seems that it is again a few courageous peoples who are willing to stand up to the horrors of terrorist regimes.

Thus the premise of the book, that George W. Bush is originating a policy that is somehow original or new to history, is somewhat fallacious. The policy is in the tradition of Great Britain's courageous stand for several centuries. (Note also that the British were very much a part of the coalition that would finally topple Saddam.) The U.S. has merely taken on the mantle of Great Britain's glorious role as protector of civilization. If anything is new it is the dramatic change from the Clinton Administration's policy of sticking its head in the sand every time we were attacked by terrorists. Second, the authors' assumption that the U.S. has not struggled mightily to bring in allies to help with the war is mistaken. The U.S. worked for 14 months within the framework of the United Nations to control Saddam Hussein. The problem was that the United Nations, like the League of Nations before it, never had the guts to hold tyrants to account for their actions, nor to back up their own resolutions. Collective security through such organizations as the U.N. have turned more into a slow retreat and even an encouragement of tyrannical powers.

My review copy of "America Unbound" is filled to the very brink with margin notes in my cramped and crowded hand. I found that the facts and descriptions were generally presented in a reasonable manner (refreshing for liberal writers). However, I was often amazed that these very facts led obvious intelligent men to spurious conclusions. I attribute this to the fact that their arguments are based on ideologies that are outmoded, and frankly impractical.

For example, the authors write briefly about the "Korean Nuclear Crisis". They write of the Clinton initiative that traded two nuclear plants for an unverifiable promise not to develop nuclear weapons. As conservatives noted at the time, this treaty was basically a free ticket to the North Koreans to create a threatening arsenal to blackmail the free world. This was a descendant of the Chamberlain policy of appeasement. It was obviously a failure as the North Koreans eventually did create this nuclear arsenal and it took a strong hand to deal with it. Yet the authors bemoan the fact that Secretary of State Powell was not allowed to "take up where the Clinton Administration left off."

In spite of its flaws "America Unbound" is a very readable book. It's details on the Bush response to foreign policy provide facts and insights not generally available in the media. The book is interesting and thought-provoking.

This book is available at Amazon.com.