Abstract
Most of the americans who voted for George W. Bush in 2000 had no idea they were voting for a foreign policy that was unlike anything they had previously encountered. But by now they are in a strong position to evaluate it. Time to review:
Early on, the Bush administration announced a policy of preemption, asserting its right to start a war anytime, anywhere. Americans reacted with mild amusement, not realizing the Bush team wasn't kidding.
In another early move, Bush ditched the Kyoto Protocol, which he disparaged as a “flawed treaty,” with “unscientific goals.”
A month after taking office he turned his back on negotiations with North Korea, a serious embarrassment to South Korea's president, who was visiting the White House at the time. In the process, the administration extended indefinitely the now 50-years-and-counting temporary truce on the Korean peninsula.
Next, Bush looked into Vladimir Putin's eyes, declaring that the Russian president was a man he could trust. He showed that trust by scrapping the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, while agreeing with Putin to sign the non-binding Moscow Treaty, which allegedly reduces nuclear stockpiles but expires on the same day it is to reach its goal.
When it comes to the United Nations, there has rarely been a conference the administration hasn't wanted to disrupt. Only the Bush administration and its buddy-in-human-rights, Somalia, objected to a protocol to the U.N.'s Convention on the Rights of the Child condemning the use of child soldiers. It didn't much like the International Criminal Court, either.
It would have been so girlie-boy to do anything to hinder international gun-running, so the U.S. delegation took the National Rifle Association along to the U.N. conference on small arms. The administration also put the kibosh on the new protocol to the Biological Weapons Convention and announced that verification plans for the Chemical Weapons Convention could not be made to work–even though the Chemical Manufacturers Association had said they could.
Instead of waging a successful war on Al Qaeda and helping to stabilize Afghanistan, the administration rushed to war in Iraq, supposedly in pursuit of nuclear proliferators–all the time knowing the real proliferators could be found in Pakistan and Iran.
Today, those who campaigned on a promise to “restore honor and integrity” insist that the practice of indefinite detention and torture of prisoners is acceptable because their enemies do it.
This administration has repudiated the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and concluded it need not pay attention to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which the United States signed nearly 40 years ago. It is now taking steps to resume nuclear testing while publicly proclaiming it has no plans to do so.
It is possible that Bush advisers do not understand that U.S. tests will provide just the excuse nuclear wannabes (a group grown larger on Bush's watch) have been hoping for as an excuse to pursue their own bomb programs. But I suppose that's okay–the administration will just start more wars or fry their latest enemies with new, “more usable” nukes. Peace and cooperation are for sissies.