Robert Kłosowicz
THE ISSUE OF ARMED INTERVENTIONS IN THE FOREIGN POLICY OF THE U. S. A.
We, of America, have discovered that we, too, possess the su
preme governing capacity, capacity not merely to govern our
selves at home, but that great power that in all ages has made the difference between the great and small nations, the capac
ity to govern men wherever they are found.
Elihu Root, 1904'
Frequentresourcetoan armed intervention in the foreign policy of theUnited States has been the subject of repeatedconsiderationsandnumerous publications recently. Thebook
Why do People Hate America? published in 2002 contains the thesis that Americans’
inclination forinterventions follows from Washington’s belief that America’s interests shouldbecome the interests of the worldand all thosewho come out againsttheinterests, theculture and the outlook of America act in fact against well-being andsafety of the world. 12
1 United StatesSecretaryof War 1899-1904 and Secretary ofState 1905-1909.
2 Z. Sarder, M. Wyn Davis,Dlaczego ludzie nienawidzą Ameryki?, Kraków: WydawnictwoPOST,2004, p. 69.
3 T. Clancy, T. Zinni,Gotowość bojowa, Warszawa: Amber, 2004, p. 394.
4Z. Brzeziński, O Polsce, Europie i świecie 1988-2001, Warszawa: DomWydawniczyBellona, 2002, p. 126.
This view is confirmed by the wordsofone of the most prominent American officers of recent years TonnyZinni, General of the U.S. Marine Corps, commander-in-chiefof CENTCOM in 1997-2000and a special envoy of Colin Powell to the MiddleEast in 2002-2003.In his memoirs Zinni ascertains thatthe United States are not an empirein the traditional sense of the world, that is based on conquests,but an empire of influences, which,through the valuesthat it adheres to, exerts an influence on theworld. The world in turn demandshelp, instructions and leadership from the U.S.A.3
The one who chimes inwith him isZbigniew Brzezinski, who ascertains that we do notlive inthe world ofutopia but inthe real world and heputs a question if the world without any domination ispossible. 4
Ex-president of the U.S. A. George H. Bush has a similar opinion and he defines the role which the United States should play in the contemporary world. The U.S.A, asthe
leading democracy and a country endowedwith liberty, natural resources, as well as a good geographical location, bears the responsibility for using the possessed power to achieve thecommon weal. It is burdened with theduty ofleading theworld and if the United States shirk this duty, therewill not be anyleadership, which as aresult willthreaten withchaos ofunpredictable consequences.5
5 G. Bush, B.Scowcroft,Światprzekształcony,Warszawa:Politeja, 2000, pp. 577-78.
6R. W. Tucker,Exemplaror Crusader? Reflections onAmerica'sRole, “The National Interest, ” Fall 1986,p.64.
7 Message ofthePresidentof theUnited StatesCommunicated to theTwoHouses of Congress at the Beginning ofthe Third Sessionofthe Fifty-Eight Congress,December 6,1904,The Works of TheodoreRoosevelt’. Presidential Addresses and StatePapers, New York: Collier & Son Publishers, 1915, vol.3, pp. 176-77.
8 Diary ofJosephus Daniels,March 11, 1913, AStatement on Relations with Latin America, March 12, 1913 [in: ] A.S. Link (ed. ), The Papers of Woodrow Wilson (1913), New Jersey:Princeton UniversityPress, 1978, vol. 27,pp. 169-70, 172-73.
Since the beginning of theircountry, Americans havehad the feelingofexceptionality anda historic mission which theUnited States areto fulfil for the world, alsointhesphere of internationalrelations. Although this train has always been present in the American foreign policy beginning with the presidency ofThomasJefferson, who in 1801 called the U.S. A, the“Empire of Liberty,” this policy assumed the fullestshape during the presi
dencyofTheodoreRoosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. The first one saw the role of the U.S.A, mainlyasaguardofstabilization in the region, the otheroneasateacher of democ
racy. It is difficult not to have an impression thatthe political visions of both presidents entered for ever the political canon of the elite of Washington in its relations with the external world, withtheonly difference that then itmainlyconcernedthewesternhemi sphere whereas now it is world-wide.6
Theodore Roosevelt usurpedtheright to decide which of thecountriesinthewestern hemisphere conductsitself well and whichone requires supervision in theform of aninter vention: “Anycountry whose people conduct themselves wellcan countupon our hearty friendship[...]Chronic wrongdoing, oran impotence whichresultsin a general loosening of theties of civilized society, may in America, as elsewhere, ultimately requireinterven tion by some civilized nation, and in theWestern Hemisphere theadherence of theUnited Statesto the Monroe Doctrinemy force the UnitedStates, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of suchwrongdoing or impotence, to the exerciseofan international police power.”7 Wilson began his office inthe White House with anannouncementthat he would not accept the rule of the dictator of MexicoGeneralVictoriano Huerta, who attained power bymeans of abloody coupin 1913. This move initiated the Wilson Doctrine, proclaiming thattheUnited States will not accept anygovernment in Latin Americawho willattain power ina non-democratic way, i.e. bymeans of a coup. Wilson was ready to use armed forces to force democratic procedures of appointingauthoritiesinthecountries of the re
gion, soon, however,because of the international situation, the U. S. A,as theoutpost of democracywouldget achance to showthis visionto thewhole world.8
Because of theoutbreak ofWorld War I and the difficult situationof the Entente coun
tries during the operations inFrance, the U.S. A, decidedto support European democracies, entering at the same time the arena of international politics with itsvisionof“Wilson morality” in theforeign policy. Wilson himself in his speech before the Congress onJanu
The Issue of Armed Interventions in the Foreign Policy of the U. S. A. 371
ary 8, 1918, justifiedthe U.S. A. ’sjoiningthewar by “morality and liberation of man kind.” Since that time American armed forces accompany democraticchanges in the world and they often force democracy, believing in their historic mission. The U.S.A. is a world- -powerpossessing means which are indispensabletointroduce the world order and the ideology which is written onthe banners with the words: “liberty and democracy. ”It was not accidental when General AnthonyFishersaid that Americans were alsofundamental ists, but they were “fundamentalists of freedom,” and the British historian Eric Hobsbawm called the American hegemony an“imperialismof human rights. ”9
9G. Sorman, Made in USA:Spojrzenie nacywilizację amerykańską, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Prószyński iS-ka, 2004, pp.216-19.
10 J. Norton Moore, The Elephant Misperceived: Intervention and American Foreign Policy,“Virginia Law Review,” March 1970,vol. 56, pp. 364-70; N. Chomsky, American Power and the NewMandarins, New York:Norton and Company, 2002, pp. 31-36.
11 Z. Karabeli,Architects of Intervention: The United States, theThird World and the Cold War 1946- -1962,BatonRouge: Louisiana State University, 1999, pp. 4-14.
However, it was not always and not everywhere thattheUnited States werethepro moterof stabilisation and democracy and during theCold War theyevensupportednon- -democratic dictators, on condition thatthey were anti-communists, which was clearly reflected in Lyndon Johnson’s Doctrine. Washington called this type of intervention acounter-intervention, pointing out that theyare undertakeninresponsetotheexpansion of communism, asit can beguessed - the interferenceof Moscow in theThird World.
A keyexampleofit wastheinterventionsinLebanonin1958,in theDominicanRepublic in 1965 and inVietnam in 1965-1975. 10
After the endof the Cold War and the break-upof theSoviet Union the U.S.A,became the only superpower and believing in its power and superiority of democracy it began anewphaseof “arranging the world.” The American public opinion mostly shares this vision, and if we add toit a conviction prevailing among Americans that theircountry is a tool of an actofGod for playing a positiverole in the history ofmankind, we can easier understand why thecitizens of theU.S. A, mostly agree to frequentinterventions of their country in other countries’affairs. 11
Of course, it isonly partof thetruth, sinceoneshouldnot forget thatthe politicalelite of Washington is firstof all guided by the economicand political interestoftheirown country, willingly using argumentsfor their own as well as the foreignpublic opinion about the historicmission of the U.S. A, and the necessity of fighting indefence of the ideals of liberty.Skilful juggling with arguments about a necessity of ensuringtheir own national security as well assecurityof the world lets themcarryout interventions rela tivelyeasily and frequently. This scheme has been repeated by Washingtonfor over 100 years.The Americaninterventionism depended in particular phasesof history on the power of thecountry. That is why at the beginning theU.S. A,focused only onthe western hemi sphere, which wasexpressedin the doctrine formulated in 1823by President James Mon
roe, inwhich,from now on, every interference ofEuropean countries inthe affairs of the western hemispherewas to be perceived by Washingtonasa threat to peace and security.
Two hemispheres were differentiated - the western one,in which the United States and young Latin Americanrepublicsexisted and theeasternhemisphere-the European one,
which wasthe synonym of thereaction of the Holy Alliance, the fossilized monarchic order and invasivewars.12
12President Monroe's SeventhAnnualMessageto Congress, December 2,1823;D. Perkins,A History of the Monroe Doctrine, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1963, pp.3-26.
13 K. Bermann, Under the BigStick: Nicaragua and the United States since1848, South endPress Boston, 1986,pp.151-217;J.Pearce,Under the Eagle: U.S. Intervention in CentralAmerica and the Carib bean,South andPress, pp. 11-22.
14 H. Kissinger, Diplomacy, New York:Simon& Schuster, 1994, p.34.
AccordingtoAmerican politicians it wasthe necessity of defending the free world of the western hemisphere that gave themthe rightto intervene. However, because of the possibilities of the state at that time, it was not able to go beyond interventions in the nearestcountries of the region,mainlyinCentralAmerica. Those interventions were of shortduration and were executed inasmallway and their task wasfirst of all mediatory and stabilizing activities as well as protection of life and property of Americancitizens.
After the American-Spanish war in 1898 and the announcement of the Corollary to the Monroe Doctrinein 1904 byTheodore Roosevelt, the U.S. A, took the pathof imperial policy appropriating the right not only of the leader of the regionbut also the role of a policeman, judge and teacher of democracy. Interventions of the kind ofsmall sorties of theMarine Corps units tothe coasts of the countries where life and property ofAmerican citizens were endangered changedinto long-lasting interventions onalarge scale aiming at electing governmentsfavourable to themand creating suitable conditionsforthe Ameri
can capital in thesecountries.Inthe discussed period it was not only Latin America that became the object of intervention but also the countries of Asia and Far East.In spiteof the fact thattheseinterventions officiallyaimed at defendingdemocracy,human rightsand freedom, strangely enough, they alwaysended with securing interests ofAmerican busi
ness and at the same timethe price for ensuring profitable markets forAmerica wasoften givingpower todictators, whohad nothing in common withthe ideals of freedomand democracy.We can usehereexamples of the careersof bloody dictators suchas Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua or Rafael L. Trujillo in the Dominican Republic, who attained power after many years of bloody interventions of the American Marine Corpsinthese countries.
Besides, both of themweretrainedinmilitaryschoolssupervised and runby marines. 13 In thatcasethe question arises whether the United States’interventions are acynical realisation of imperial goals of this country under thepretence of the ideology ofliberty and democracy oran authentic belief in these ideals, which should be propagated at all costs, a peculiar “crusade of freedom?” Henry Kissingerclaims that contradictions be tween idealism and realism inthe foreign policy of theU.S.A, result from the fact that it assumed theform ofsuchacharacter inthe19thcentury,when the conflictbetween high- -flownprinciples andanecessity to survivedid notexist inAmerica:“In time, theinvoca tion ofmorality as the means forsolving international disputesproduced a unique kind of ambivalence and a very American type of anguish. IfAmericans were obliged to invest their foreign policy with the samedegree ofrectitude as theydid their personal lives,how was securityto be analyzed; indeed,in theextreme, didthismean that survivalwas subor
dinate to morality? [...]Tothisday,the push and pull ofthesetwo approacheshas been one of the major themes of Americanforeignpolicy.”14
The Issue of Armed Interventions in the Foreign Policy of the U. S. A. 373
This opinion gives the answer tothe question why the United States so often resort to interventions. The ideology entangled in diplomacy, whoseaimisaneffective realisation of raisond’etatproducedan “explosive mixture. ” However,isthere any alternative?Can the U.S. A, afford a different policywithout jeopardizing its own security? For General Zinni there isno alternative.Globalization and the explosion of information technology made theworldan even morerestrictedwhole,whoseparticularelementsdependonthe remainingones.Geographical barriers, suchas oceans and mountain ranges are not bor ders thatcannot be crossed any more and economic, politicalor social instability in remote parts of theworldwill influence also safety of theUnitedStates, as well as theirinterests and well-being. This intum causes the fact that reasonsof national safety of theU.S.A, willbringabout greaterand greater involvement inremoteunstable parts of the world. 15
15 T. Clancy, T. Zinni, op.cit., pp. 395-96.
16 H.Kissinger, American ForeignPolicy, New York: Norton and Company, 1974.
17 Instances ofthe United States Armed Forces Abroad, 1798-1999 [in:] CRS Report for Congress, Congressional Research Service, ForeignAffairs, Defense, andTrade Division,Washington 1999, pp.2-29.
18 http://www.zmag. org/CrisesCurEvts/Interventions. htm
It is nothingnew, sincealready 30 years before, Henry Kissinger inhis speechin 1973 stated that the world shouldbe based on acknowledging the fact that theUnited States have global interests and globalduties.It is worth pointing out that these words were said inthe period when global domination of theUnited Statesdecreased in comparisonwithits peak periodafter World War II and the country experienced the Vietnamese defeat, which recoiled bothon its internal situation and internationalstatus.16
According tothe report of the Congressof May1999,in 1798-1999 Americanarmed forces intervened outside their country 277 times. Until the outbreak of World War II they were mostly operations carried outwith the forces of the Marine Corps indefence of American citizens’life and property or theU.S. interests abroad. 17
Soon after the tragedyof September 11, 2001,Zoltán Grossman published a listen titled Century of U. S. military interventions: From Wounded Kneeto Afghanistan, cre
ated onthe basis of thematerials from the archive of the Congress. Grossman enumerates 134Americaninterventions comprising 111 yearsbetween 1890 and 2001. Asthe list shows, till the end of WorldWar II the United States intervened on average 1,15 times a year, during the cold warthe number ofinterventions increased to 1,29 and after the collapse of the Berlin Wall it reached thenumber of 2, 0 a year. 18
American interventions canbe divided into four stagesinthe 200-yearhistory of this country:
1. Interventions carried out in 1800-1898 ona small scale and of short duration -not longer thanaweek, mainly ofa pacificatory and mediatory character and in orderto pro tect property and life ofAmerican citizens.
2. Carried out in 1898-1934, mainly interventionson a large scale lasting from afew weeks toa few years,usually aimingat changing the politicalsituationin the country in which an intervention was carried out by giving power to politicians who werefavourable towards the U. S. A, and creating suitable conditions for American business. Themain area ofinterventions was Latin America (Nicaragua, Haiti, theDominicanRepublic).
3. Interventionscarried out in1945-1990 in the circumstances of abipolar divisionof theworld -East-West aimed at not admitting communistregimes to power or fighting against the ones being in authority. The area of interventions comprised mainly Latin America, Asia and the regionof the Middle East(Korea, theDominicanRepublic, Granada, Lebanon).
4. Interventions carriedout since 1990, i. e. after the collapse of theBerlinWallaim at ending the destabilisation in the Third Worldcountriesin which there isa civil war (Soma
lia,Liberia) or incountries supporting terrorism (Afghanistan), they comprise mainly the area of Africa and the Middle East.
200years ofAmerican interventions are symbolically bound with one purpose. From the intervention in Tripoli in 1801, whose aim was to overthrow abey- enemy to the United States and raiseto thethrone a man who was favourable to Washington, until the second warin Iraq, in which the UnitedStates forseveralyears after overthrowing Saddam Hussein have beentrying to stabilize the situation andkeep thegovernment favourable to them inpower.
General reasons for future interventions are:
1. America asthe biggest superpower is responsible for law and orderof the contem
porary world.
2. America asa superpower has interests on the whole globe and hastotake care of them for its own nationalsecurity.
3. America isto fulfil a historic mission of propagating liberty and democracy in the world.
Particular reasons which can cause interventions: 19
19 T. Clancy, T. Zinni,op. cit., p. 397.
20 A. Tonellson, Superpower without a Sword, “ForeignAffairs,” Summer 1993, pp. 166-80;C.Jean, Geopolityka,Wroclaw: 2003,Ossolineum,pp.286-87.
1. Aworld superpowerwith considerablemilitary possibilities.
2. Regional leaders with asymmetric possibilities suchasweaponsofmassdestruction and rockets,whowill takestepsin order to make itimpossible for theU.S.A, to have an access to regions and regional allies thatare important forthis country.
3. International threats suchasterrorist organizations, international criminal groups, including drug mafias.
4. Problems of countries in a stateofdecline, which require peacefuloperations or humanitarianaid.
5. Foreigncrises,whichare dangerous for Americancitizens and their property.
6. Threats to theresources and information carriers whicharecrucial to theU.S.A.
Itdoes not seem that the United States will avoid the policy of frequentinterventions in the21 stcentury, either as an independent superpower or as themilitaryarm of theUnited Nations,which would only give legalvalidityto Pax Americana, butat the same time the vision of co-operation with theUnited Nationsandother countries in military operations in thePersian Gulfloses importance, since the recent yearsof the occupationof Iraq show that the United States are not ableor notinterested in submittingto multilateral agree
ments.The U.S. A, will rather beinterested in subordinating armed interventions toAmeri
cannational interests and keeping them under strict control of Washington.20
The Issue of Armed Interventions in the Foreign Policy of the U. S. A. 375
In September 2002 President George Bush’sadministration announcedthe National Security Strategy, which grants Americathe right to use powerinorder to eliminate any noticeable threat toglobal domination of theUnited States. 21One of the known experts of international affairs,John Ikenberry defined this strategy as imperial.Noam Chomsky goes even further seeingagreat danger for the world order in this strategy, because the U. S.A, granted themselves the right to start a preventive war, that is, according to Chomsky, tousearmedforcesin orderto eliminate an imagined orfictitious threat. 22
21 The National Security Strategy of the United States of America, September 17, 2002, WhiteHouse, Washington, http: //www.whitehouse. gov/nsc/nssall. html.
22N. Chomsky, Hegemony or Survival:AmericasQuest for Global Dominance, New York: Owl Books, 2004, pp. 19-20.
23T. Clancy, T. Zinni,op. cit.,p. 395.
These opinions might beexaggerated,however, the fact is that theU.S. A, striving after hegemony takes on a burdenofplaying the guard of the world order, which has to lead to numerousarmed interventionsin different partsof the globe.Irrespective ofawide varietyof views on the policyof theU.S.A., both its opponents as the abovementioned Ikenberryand Chomsky and its supporters such as General Zinni,are unanimous about one thing: inthe nearest future theUnitedStatesarein for a period of many armedinter ventions. It is well renderedbythe words of General Zinni, who has no doubts that taking on the burdenof responsibility for thefate of the world, the United States willbeforced to carry out even more interventions. In hisopinion wewill observe more countries inthe state of collapse, such asSomalia orAfghanistan - and similarly dangerous. Moreand moreAmerican soldiers willparticipatein unsafe operations, in whichthemilitaryaspect willbemixed with the political, humanitarian and economic one muchmore than before.
People representing the UnitedStates - themost powerful countrywith the greatestpossi
bilities - will have tocope with everycomplicatedsituation and itwillhappen more and more frequently. 23
RobertKlosowicz, Ph.D., associateprofessor at the Institute of PoliticalScience and International Relations, Jagiellonian University, Kraków. He has written numerous ar
ticles onU.S. foreign policy andmilitary history, and is the author of several books,in cluding New Orleans 1815 (Warszawa 2000), The American-British War, 1812-1814 (Kraków 2003), and Inchon-Seoul1950 (Warszawa 2005).
