Atlanticism and pax Americana 1989–2004
| Date | 01 March 2005 |
| Published date | 01 March 2005 |
| Author | Carl Cavanagh Hodge |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070200506000111 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
CARL
CAVANAGH
HODGE
Atlanticism
and
pax
Americana
1989-2004
•
I
INTRODUCTION
~
INDISPENSABLE
PREREQUISITE
in assessingthe foreign policy per-
formance
of
any administration in Washington is the measure
of
the
continuity and coherence
of
grand strategy.Subjected to this measure,
the foreign policy
of
the Bush administration, before
and
after
the
events
of
11 September 2001, is demonstrably nota radical departure
from the American grand strategic response to the crises
of
the
20th
century. Indeed, it is less a radical than a
reasonable
departure from
diplomacy
of
the Clinton administration, informed above all by the
demonstrated realities
of
world order since the collapse
of
the Soviet
Union. Such changes as it has
wrought-in
combination with
the
challenges imposed upon
it-have
nevertheless strained the Atlantic
alliance to the point where the alliance as we have known it no longer
exists.
Fighting power is at the core
of
grand strategy,
but
to dwell on fight-
ing power is to neglect both the comprehensiveness
of
grand strategy
and its very purpose. Even definitions
of
grand strategy now wrongly
thought by many
to
be outmoded stress the integral importance
of
the
Carl
Cavanagh
Hodge
is
associate
professor
ofpolitical
science
at
Okanagan
l.!niversity
College.
An
early
draft0/thispaper
was
presented
tothe
"Canada-us
rela-
ttons:
Do
borders
matter?"
conference,
Organization
for the
History
of
Canada,
Ottawa,
13-16May 2004.
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Winter
2004-2005
Carl
Cavanagh
Hodge
financial, diplomatic, commercial,
and
ethical instruments
of
state-
craft for the purpose
of
"avoiding damage to the future state
of
peace-for
its security and prosperity,"! Moreover, the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization
(NATO)
has always been more
than
amilitary
coalition.
It
is rooted historically in Anglo-American maritime tradi-
tion, political democracy,
and
commercial expansiveness,
and
has
incrementally evolved the notionthat Europe and
North
America have
acommon heritage
and
destiny. So long as these aspects
of
the much
broader Atlanticist culture adjust to new realities, the multilateral
deterrence machine
of
1949-1989 will not be missed.
The
rift current-
ly troubling longstanding members
of
the alliance is the American
conviction that its members have a "western vocation" and must either
have the collectivewill to act upon it or in the alternative accept its iter-
ation by the United States acting largely alone.'
II
THE
PRECOCITY OF AMERICAN GRAND STRATEGY
In the
20th
century two naval nations, Great Britain
and
the United
States, accounted for much
of
the policing
of
the high seas
and
the reg-
ulation
of
international trade.
The
American republic began
to
prosper
as a sovereign entity in a world dominated by British naval power,
and
its founding generation was astute in recognizing the opportunitythus
afforded. "Frederick the Great
thought
about
how
to snatch Silesia
from Maria Theresa," notes Walter Russell Mead, "Alexander
Hamilton thought about how to integrate the infant American econo-
my
into
the
British world system
on
the best possible terms."!
The
republic was alsoprecocious in securing its interests where thatsystem
would not. Among the reasons for the creation
of
a navy as early 1794
was
to
protect American merchant ships from corsairs raiding along
the Barbary Coast
of
Africa, for the United States refused to ransom
captive seaman from pirates in the custom common among European
powers. Whatever the changing meaning
of
the "special relationship"
1BasilLiddell Hart,quoted by Paul
Kennedy,
ed., GrandStrategies InWarand
Peace
(New
Haven:
Yale
University
Press,
1991),
2-3.
2 Ira
Straus,
"Atlantic federalism andthe expanding Atlantic nucleus,"
Peace
&
Change
24,
nO.3
(1999):
277-328;
MarkSmith,
NATO
Enlargement
duringthe Cold
War:
Strategyand
System
In the
Western
Alliance
(Basingstoke:
Palgrave,
2000),
162-n.
3Special
Providence:
American
Foreign
PolleyandHowIt
Changed
the World
(New
York:
AlfredKnopf,
2001),
38.
152
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Winter 2004-2005
To continue reading
Request your trial