Imperial allies

Orbis

Volumn 50, Issue 2, 2006, Pages 209-221

  Grygiel, Jakub ^a  

^a JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 32944454392     PISSN: 00304387     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/j.orbis.2006.01.003     Document Type: Article

References (34)

1. There is a vivacious, and in my view inconclusive, debate on the terms to be used to describe the United States. Most agree that "great power" is insufficient to convey the scope and size of U.S. power and influence, but there is no agreement as to whether the U.S. is a hegemon, determining the rules of international relations, or an empire, shaping not only the international but also the internal situations of states. For some, the term "empire" carries negative connotations and is often synonymous with a colonial power that extracts tributes from its subjects. Here, I do not take a position on the semantics, and tend to use "empire" (rather than "hegemon" or simply "great power") to convey the idea that the United States is not just another great (or super) power, but a state whose influence and strength far surpasses that of a possible counterbalancing coalition, making it extremely costly and difficult to challenge its supremacy. See, e.g., Stephen G. Brooks and William C. Wohlforth, "American Primacy in Perspective," Foreign Affairs, July/Aug. 2002
2. "Hard Times for Soft Balancing," International Security Summer 2005
3. In international relations theory, this behavior is often called "bandwagoning." See, e.g., Randall Schweller, "Bandwagoning for Profit: Bringing the Revisionist State Back In," International Security, Summer 1994.
4. For a sample of a growing literature on this issue, see Stephen Walt, Taming American Power (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2005) and the essay version thereof in Foreign Affairs, Sept./Oct. 2005
5. Robert A. Pape, "Soft Balancing against the United States," International Security, Summer 2005
6. and T. V. Paul, "Soft Balancing in the Age of U.S. Primacy," International Security, Summer 2005.
7. See, e.g., U.S. Department of State, 2004 Report of the Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, at www.state.gov
8. For a list of typical activities, see "Public Diplomacy Activities and Programs" at www.publicdiplomacy.org.
9. For a critical view, see David M. Edelstein and Ronald R. Krebs, "Washington's Troubling Obsession with Public Diplomacy," Survival, Spring 2005.
10. See also Elaine Sciolino and Steven Lee Meyers, "U.S. Plans to Act Largely Alone," New York Times, Oct. 7, 2001.
11. Speech to the National Defense University, Jan. 31, 2002, at www.ndu.edu.
12. This at least is the Chinese perspective. See, e.g., Aaron Friedberg, "11 September and the Future of Sino-American Relations," Survival, Spring 2002, pp. 40-42.
13. For instance, Richard Haass has proposed a strategy of "integrating" the world's major powers so that they could cooperate with the United States to achieve certain objectives, such as fighting terrorism or WMD proliferation. Richard Hass "The Case for 'Integration'" The National Interest Fall 2005
14. see also Richard Haass, The Opportunity (New York: Public Affairs, 2005).
15. See Condoleezza Rice, "Promoting the National Interest," Foreign Affairs, Jan./Feb. 2000, p. 62.
16. To some degree, there may be a perceived necessity to couch an alliance in ideological terms (for instance, the alliance is aimed at establishing democracy or rid the world of a cruel regime), and by doing so, offer a common cause uniting the different members of the group. I do not deny this is a distinct possibility, and I do not argue that there is never a commonality of ideas between members of an "imperial alliance." But the idea of a common cause does not serve as the only, and main, source of strategic unity in such an alliance. In fact, the rhetoric of ideological unity (we, the democracies versus them, the dictators) masks the complexity and multiplicity of motivations spurring the different states to join the United States.
17. Perhaps the clearest statement was made by the Polish Minister of Defense, Radek Sikorski, who said that "we [Poland] supported the war in Iraq and have our troops there now not because we felt threatened directly by Saddam Hussein. . . . We are there because of our investment in a strong U.S.-Polish relationship. We want to show the United States we will be with them when we are needed."
18. Quoted in David Sands, "Allies See Benefits in Iraq Mission," Washington Times, Dec. 9, 2005.
19. Marcin Kaczmarski, "Bush patrzy w oczy Putinowi," Rzeczpospolita (Warsaw), Mar. 3, 2005.
20. "Feeling exposed: South Korea," The Economist, May 29, 2004
21. "Murder and its Consequences: South Korea and Iraq," The Economist, June 26, 2004.
22. A slightly different view is that Poland and other Central European countries support the U.S. because they want it to remain engaged in Europe; a European Union without, or even against, the U.S. is deemed as not only strategically weak, but also dangerous for Central Europe.
23. See Janusz Bugajski and Ilona Teleki, "Washington's New European Allies: Durable or Conditional Partners?" Washington Quarterly, Spring 2005.
24. Barbara Slavin, "U.S. builds war coalition with favors-and money," USA Today, Feb. 24, 2003.
25. Brian Knowlton, "Bush to Seek More Aid for Poland," International Herald Tribune, Feb. 10, 2005.
26. On multilateralism, see John Gerard Ruggie, "Multilateralism: The Anatomy of an Institution," International Organization, Summer 1992
27. John Van Oudenaren, "What is Multilateral?" Policy Review, Feb. 2003
28. "Unipolar Versus Unilateral," Policy Review, Apr. 2004.
29. Francis Fukuyama, "How Academia Failed the Nation: The Decline of Regional Studies," SAISphere, Winter 2004.
30. For the challenges of bilateral alliances, see also Bruno Tertrais, "The Changing Nature of Military Alliances," Washington Quarterly, Spring 2004
31. Kurt Campbell, "The End of Alliances? Not So Fast," Washington Quarterly, Spring 2004.
32. Ann Scott Tyson, "U.S. Bases Are Focus on Rumsfeld's Trip to Central Asia," Washington Post, July 26, 2005
33. Robin Wright and Ann Scott Tyson, "U.S. Evicted From Air Base in Uzbekistan," Washington Post, July 30, 2005.
34. See Arnold Toynbee, Hannibal's Legacy (London: Oxford University Press, 1965), vol. II, pp. 109-10.