Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy since 1938

In this section of Rise to Globalism, the authors discuss the dramatic change in the world order that took place in the late 1980s and early 1990s. This change was the collapse of the Cold War order in Europe in 1989 and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. As a result, the United States had to rethink its foreign policy and its place in the international arena as the only remaining superpower. However, America remained engaged in different parts of the world. Ambrose and Brinkley address the American actions in Latin America and the Middle East during the George H.W. Bush administration. The focal point of his foreign policy was the 1991 Gulf War. The next president, Bill Clinton, was primarily interested in foreign policy as a tool to advance American business interests abroad, for instance, in post-Soviet Russia and with NAFTA. Clinton also had to face crises in other parts of the world, including Haiti, Somalia, and the Balkans.

First, the authors describe the radical changes that occurred in Eastern and Central Europe in the late 1980s. Paradoxically, they argue, these changes were the result of the internal, systemic contradictions in the Eastern Bloc rather than direct American intervention. For example, the Berlin Wall came down in November 1989:

For twenty-eight years, the Wall had been the symbol of the Cold War. Suddenly it was gone. The unthinkable had become reality. At the beginning of 1989, the Communists had been in complete—and seemingly permanent—control of Eastern Europe (364).

The authors call this “the most momentous year in world history since 1945” (352). Former Eastern Bloc countries, such as Hungary and Poland, began their integration with Western Europe. Germany unified a year later. It was at this time that President Bush announced the end of the Cold War. However, 1989 was different from 1945 in major ways. For instance, Bush “could not offer help to emerging democracies desperate for the kind of aid the United States had extended after World War II in the Marshall Plan because the U.S. treasury was empty” (353).

Eventually, many of the former Soviet satellites joined the European Union. Ambrose and Brinkley discuss this post-Cold War order as the rise of multipolarity and different kind of regional superblocs. These blocs were in Europe, North America, and East Asia. The most integrated superbloc was in Europe because of its history of which began with the European Economic Community decades prior.

This seismic transformation of the international landscape made the Americans debate their new place in the world. They no longer had an ideological rival and could now cooperate with Russia and, indeed, help that country pursue a democratic path. They also questioned the reason for NATO’s existence. After all, this military alliance was founded to counter the Soviet Union which no longer existed. Neither did the Warsaw Pact. Both Americans and Europeans also discussed the status of Germany: “Western European politicians, and some from America, said it was necessary to keep U.S. forces in Germany as a way of reassuring her neighbors that Germany would not repeat the history of the 1930s” (368).

The authors also highlight the developments in other regions. George H.W. Bush sought to continue fostering an amicable relationship with China led by Deng Xiaoping, as a former ambassador to that country. However, the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident in which the Chinese government is said to have crushed the protesters damaged his plans and China’s image alike: “These shocking events horrified the entire world. Free world and Communist leaders alike condemned Deng and his government” (355).

The US was still heavily engaged in Latin America. For example, Bush continued to support the Contras insurgents—now in Honduras. The US also invaded Panama in late 1989, captured, arrested the former leader Manuel Noriega, and brought him to Florida to face multiple charges including drug trafficking. The Americans also installed Guillermo Endara as president:

Noriega, who was taken to Miami as a prisoner of war and held in a civilian jail, awaiting trial on his indictment for drug dealing, charged Yankee imperialism. So did Bush’s domestic political opponents and critics. Liberals who in the past had decried the use of the CIA for coup and assassination plots now asked why Bush had to use so much force to remove one man. Latin American leaders made pro forma complaints about the unilateral action (359).

The Europeans also accused the American administration of acting in line with the outdated Monroe Doctrine and the Roosevelt Corollary in the western hemisphere.

The Bush administration also faced two major crises after the Cold War. One crisis occurred in the Balkans as the former Yugoslavia splintered into smaller countries, and an inter-ethnic conflict arose. The other crisis occurred in the Middle East, as Iraq, led by Saddam Hussein, invaded Kuwait. Iraq’s recent opponent, Iran, allied with it. In turn, other countries, like Saudi Arabia and Japan, paid for much of the American presence in the Middle East. Bush sought for Hussein to withdraw his forces from Kuwait and to restore that country’s government. However, he exaggerated the nuclear threat from Iraq and publicly referred to Hussein as Hitler:

It was a brilliant way to fend off pressure to negotiate; one could not negotiate with a Hitler. But it was a two-edged sword. By comparing Hussein with Hitler, and by calling for war crimes trials, Bush was committing the United States to a policy of unconditional surrender by Iraq (387).

As a result, the Gulf War—and the Desert Shield and Desert Storm operations—turned out to be a brief war that accomplished expelling Iraq from Kuwait but stopped short of removing Hussein.

The next president, Bill Clinton, inherited many of the same international problems from Bush but pursued a rather different foreign policy. By and large, he showed little interest in foreign policy apart from pursuing American business interests: “Clinton emphasized enlargement over gunboat diplomacy, preferring to help American industry flourish abroad over dispatching Marines to quell civil unrest in a nation of marginal consequence to U.S. interests” (427).

Ambrose and Brinkley argue that a malleable foreign policy allowed Clinton maneuverability. However, critics “dismissed Clinton as an amateur juggler when it came to foreign policy, and they were half right” (426). At the center of his foreign policy lay the concept of enlargement. This policy argued that:

[T]he line between our domestic and foreign policies has increasingly disappeared—that we must revitalize our economy if we are able to sustain our military forces, foreign initiatives, and global influence, and that we must engage actively abroad if we are to open foreign markets and create jobs for our people (408).

For example, Clinton introduced the economic integration of North America through NAFTA in 1993.

However, prioritizing economics made Clinton pay insufficient attention to the crises in which the US got involved. For example, one of the biggest foreign policy blunders in the early 1990s was the American involvement in Somalia and the killing of US soldiers in a foiled raid in Mogadishu. As a result, Clinton withdrew the US troops from the region. The Somalian fiasco also affected the dispatching of American peacekeepers to Haiti after a military coup in 1993. The authors argue that the handling of these problems made Clinton appear weak.

In the post-Soviet sphere, the Clinton administration used a two-pronged strategy. The US helped the former Soviet republics dispose of nuclear weapons or nuclear waste, such as Operation Sapphire in Kazakhstan. At the same time, the Americans sought to transform Russia into a market economy through direct involvement in the Russian government, aid in the form of loans, and mass privatizations.

The biggest crisis for Clinton, however, was the Balkans. Indeed, the 1990s involved a complex, inter-ethnic series of wars in that region. In the first half of the decade, the Americans sided with the Bosnians in the Bosnian War (1992-1995) and targeted the Serbs whom they perceived as the aggressors. The 1995 Dayton Accords temporarily halted this conflict in the Balkans. In turn, NATO found a new purpose because its “credibility was enhanced by its performance in Bosnia, and the transatlantic link was suddenly touted as more important than ever” (421).