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Chirol
Author

Chirol

Date

December 12th, 2005

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Team America World Police?

Cominatcha, some of ComingAnarchy’s favorite oldies. Today’s hit is:

True, we do live in a foreshortened world in which, compared with Washington’s day, time and space are relatively annihilated. But I still thank God for the two insulating oceans; and even though they be foreshortened, they are still our supreme benediction if they be widely and prudently used…

We all have our sympathies and our natural emotions on behalf of the victims of national or international outrage all around the globe; but we are not, we cannot be, the world’s protector or the world’s policeman.

The aforementioned words were spoken by Senator Arthur Vandenberg in Feb. 1939, just a few months before WWII broke out. Dr. Seuss would be ashamed.

Comments to this entry

Dan
December 12, 2005
8:50 pm
Shame all the social disruption that America went through, and Senator Vandenberg foresaw, because Europe couldn't put her house in order.
Chirol
December 12, 2005
8:58 pm
I'm not sure I would say that. World War II was also partially America's fault because it withdrew quickly from international politics after WWI and refused to help enforce the Versailles treaty allowing Germany to rearm. And once German moved and began recaputring territory, in clear violation of a number of agreements, we still did nothing. While it was indeed primarily Europe's responsibility, we were not totally innocent in the whole affair.

Besides, the US was destined to become the world leader anyway with the way things were going. This was just the trigger than finally led to it.
Dan
December 13, 2005
1:31 am
Chirol,

I largely agree.

If there would not have been world wars, we might have seen a world where the United States and the British Empire together fueled globalization in both the Core and the Gap.

Instead we got the 20th century.

Too bad.
Gollios
December 13, 2005
2:38 pm
I've got a conterfactual...without WW I, would the Bolsheviks been able to topple the Tsar? Would communism have been strangled in the cradle, or would some other country have tried that horrible experiment?
Sonagi
December 13, 2005
7:45 pm
China's Deng Xiaopeng and Zhou Enlai became Communists while studying in France in the 20s. If not the Soviet Union, then perhaps China would have been the first Communist country.
IJ
December 27, 2005
2:23 pm
Thomas Barnett stops short of recommending "Team America World Police", but only marginally.

In the "seminar series at John Hopkins University":http://www.cominganarchy.com/2005/12/15/the-future-nature-of-competition-conflict/, Barnett says the G20 could be the UN executive to authorise and legitimise the use of Leviathan force. More controversially, though, he suggests the US should be the world's sole enforcer; his notes tell us: "Leviathan force can't be stopped but is not brought out until US is committed".

The inference is that the US will effectively be the world's policeman, retaining a veto on UN enforcement. In an "After Words" interview, Republican Congressman Tom Feeney appeared sceptical about the scope for bias in this arrangement; Feeney asked Barnett about enforcement against Israel, the subject of many UN resolutions.
Dan tdaxp
December 27, 2005
3:13 pm
IJ,

Israel has never had a Chapter VII resolution against it pass. Chapter VI (non-binding) and Chapter VII (binding) resolutions should not be confused, if we wish to keep/make the UNSC as a meaningful institution.

Barnett's A-Z Rule Set won't work, anyway.
IJ
December 27, 2005
3:46 pm
Dan tdaxp,

In September 2005, UN members agreed to set up a mechanism based on the Canadian report: "Responsibility to Protect". One problem highlighted in the report was the regular use of the UNSC veto by some members to defeat the wishes of the international community, expressed in UN resolutions. It was recommended that the use of the veto should be discouraged - it was undermining global stability. But the details of R2P have still to be clarified.
Dan tdaxp
December 27, 2005
6:42 pm
I am familiar with R2P. If it is to be taken seriously, it marks the end of the Westphalian world and a focus on human rights not seen since the Wars of Religion.
IJ
December 27, 2005
8:53 pm
You are correct, Dan, along with the the Peacebuilding Commission and the Millennium goals it is another momentous change recently at the United Nations. However the veto still remains at present.

Incidentally, on the use of vetoes in the UNSC, the "position":http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0311-10.htm a couple of years ago was:

"That power [veto], diplomats say, can also provide a bully pulpit for rewarding friends and punishing enemies. In the United Nations' 58-year history, the Soviet Union and its successor state, the Russian Federation, have used the veto 117 times - most coming during Cold War decades. The United States is second with 73. Since 1990, America has cast more Security Council vetoes than any country, many of them favoring Israel, a longtime ally."