The US, diplomacy and being loved

This thread is based on the article below, and on recent news stories (and threads here) on Kyoto, NMD, the EP-3 incident and the like. It is not intended to be a US-bashing thread, and I’d really appreciate it if everyone can bear that in mind.

( The Guardian: The US must learn that to lead you have to be loved )

The article suggests that the US is taking an increasingly tactless approach to international relations. It also suggests that the decisions that have been made are not necessarily bad ones from the point of view of US self-interest.

(I know that there’s some fairly smug rhetoric in there, but bear with me)

The author finally claims that the uneasy debates within the US are a sign that the nation really does want to be loved, and that some Americans feel that this is a pre-requisite for being a world leader.

My question is this: **to what extent should the US **(or any other nation, for that matter) worry about how others see it? Obviously there’s a balance to be struck between self-interest and diplomacy (I hope that both ends of the political spectrum can at least agree on that), but where’s the line? And how can a government, or a people, change the perception it has internationally without compromising its own interests?

Ideally: Only inasfar as it causes substantial damage (i.e.- damaging something other than national ego) to itself or another nation.

Realistically: Right now, we should be a bit more concerned about SOME world relations. I think a lot of recent decisions (Kyoto, for instance), are based on a desire to show the world that “We’re in the lead, and we don’t take no guff from nobody”… which isn’t untrue, but it’s just really assholic.

However, if, say, the U.N. were to insist that the U.S. implement a certain type of legislation (say, one that restricts the Internet or something), the U.S. should definitely give a resounding “Hell no!” There’s a difference between making a small sacrifice for worldwide cooperation and making a rather large (in my opinion) sacrifice just because someone else wants to feel superior.

Like the average American even cares that there’s other parts of the world out there?

Personally, I think it’s just plain stupid, and very poor diplomacy. You can’t expect anyone to listen to you and be willing to compromise when you don’t listen to them and are never willing to compromise. I’m not sure what the current administration hopes to achieve, except making it more difficult for whoever replaces them in 2004.

I think Niccolo’s conclusions are borne out by Europe in general and France in particular.

We carry the burden of two world wars, the Marshall Plan, the Cold War, and the Balkans, and when we do turn to addressing our own interests in the world, we’re rewarded by a temper tantrum in the United Nations. Taking away our seat on the UN human rights commission and giving it to the bloody Sudan?

A more appropriate question might be how much should the world worry about how the US sees it. The biggest danger to world peace is not US “hegemony” but US isolationism.

I think the mistake a lot of people are making is in the assumption that self-interest and diplomacy are polar opposites. I’d argue that all of the incidents you cite have implications that are in the interests both of the US and of the world at large. The EP-3 incident? Recon against China helps forewarn against any belligerent moves by that country and maintains the military balance in East Asia. Kyoto? A fuzzy feelgood joke of a treaty that had no realistic chance of implementation and, if it had been implemented, would have only succeeded in shutting down the primary engine of the world’s economic growth. National missile defense? I suspect that the leaders of democratic Europe and Asia are secretly praying that the US comes up with a workable system posthaste. Iraq’s a lot closer to Paris than it is to Washington.

But to what extent should the US turn a deaf ear to international ingrates? Is isolationism a realistic approach given the impact of international trade? How should the US react – continue regardless, focusing openly on what the US leadership believes is best for their country, or make a few conciliatory gestures?

I think the problem is that while these decisions may have a beneficial effect outside the US, the way they’ve been presented appears somewhat ill-judged with regard to other nations’ concerns. To a large degree, it makes no difference what the US does, it’s how those actions are seen that counts. Is the US approaching policy presentation wrongly, or is this pure and simply a problem for other nations to deal with?

So, subsequent after a superficial reading of the prince, Zarathustra graces us with this:

I believe Great Britian and France would very reasonably disagree with this inane assertion. The US participated in two WW, tipping the balance in the last two years of the first and carrying a large burden but not exclusively in the second. However, in both the US was a Johnny come lately to the action, only after its allies were fairly bled dry in the conflict. Better late than never, however “carried the burden” of 2 WW is just a specious, self-serving reading of history. Myopic readings of history do not advance one’s understanding.

Firstly, while this was a positive thing, it also was in our self-interest. An impoverished Europe struggling with starvation and largely destroyed infrastructure would have served no one.

Of course, we have been repayed, by a good forty years of alliance and largely positive cooperation. However, apparently in Z. world lending a helping hand merits slavish devotion ad infinatum.

Well, we paid the price for playing the game the way we wanted to. The Cold War was hardly an act of charity and of course without W. European cooperation (also in self-interest certainly) things would have played out rather differently.

I don’t much see a reason for post-Cold War prostration to American interests. A mutually beneficial set of alliances were worked out to serve all parties self interest. Not particular grounds for giving up the farm later on.

Check you sources, the US has not been carry the majority of the load in the long term intervention in the Balkans.

This is rich. The whole history is one of addressing our own interests (and quite rightfully so mind you). What kind of impoverished understanding of 20th century history leads one to the ludicrous conclusion any of the above were acts of charity.

What’s happened is that without other pressures, the default case is

I believe this has been covered many times now in GD:

It’s a gross misunderstanding to say our seat was taken away and handed to Sudan. What happened is in the W. Europe/N.America group, our erstwhile allies, pissed at recent US diplomatic decisions which they felt unnecessarily trampled on common/joint positions/interests, did not withdraw a candidate to give us a place as has been tradition. So we had to go head to head with other WE/NA candidates, and given our recent diplomatic problems, we lost to Sweden etc. So strictly speaking, our seat can be said to have taken away and given to Sweden. Sudan wins in its category bec. our diplomatic cloat has been diminished by poor diplomacy recently and our allies with cloat in Africa (GB, Belium, Zaire, South Africa) decided not to help us out (refrained from action) by rounding up votes for our prefered candidates or to deny Sudan votes. That’s the game. We know the rules, we’ve long exploited those rules. This time we lost because of a number of factors, largely self-created.

As for the “temper tantrum” while this makes good, well mediocre really, rhetoric, it fails to understand the reality of the game, the fact that this “tantrum” is precisely how the USA has played the game in the past, rewarding and punishing actions. This time we lost, and now it’s “temper tantrum” – well that is rank hypocrisy.

What is to worry about is the “All or Nothing” or “My Way or the Highway” school of thought, or as I like to call it, the High School Playground level of political analysis.

Further the second message:

Once again, this has been covered in this forum. This characterization of Kyoto is fundamentally wrong and unfounded. I’m not a fan of Kyoto as anyone knows from the past discussions. However, the Kyoto treaty was not “a fuzzy feelgood joke of a treaty” – it has some flawed mechanisms and targets --as defined in original text and subsequent negotiation-- (but then nothing in this world is perfect) and needed to be modified in a number of areas. However, the treaty conception was fundamentally sound (multilateral with wide membership to address a serious problem). There is no reason it could not have been tweaked into shape. So, I see absolutely no factual support for asserting it would have “shut down” the American economy.

And I know otherwise. This is a crock. We’ve got no indication (as largely developed in other threads) that any missile defense system is workable or sustainable in a long run – which is what such a system requires to be a genuine strategic political option (as opposed to a short term band aid for a certain segement of a domestic political lobby).

And Iraq’s missiles can’t hit Israel accurately, let alone Paris. Plus, Paris has its own nuclear deterent.

As for the larger question, please see my comments on multilateral solutions in the second page of the “Hey Americans - isn’t democracy a Human Right too” thread.

There is nothing more short-sighted and blinkered than unilateral solutions as a general, dominant policy.

It’s not the presentation (heavy handed as it is) it’s the whole package. “The American way of life is not negotiable” is not a particularly helpful starting point for dialogue, nor is it a sustainable end point.

mattk and woolly: I think a lot of it boils down to the question of whether the US’s unique power in the world imposes a unique responsibility to be caring, considerate, and gentle in its policy presentation, if not policy formulation. Being as powerful as we are, almost any pursuit of frank self-interest on our part could be interpreted as “hegemony”. FTR, I agree that W might have come across as unnecessarily brash. However, I think a big part of diplomacy is telegraphing one’s intentions, and it’s better to have a diplomatic firestorm now than a shooting conflict later because our enemies misunderstand W’s determination to defend our interests.

collounsbury: you are an amusing little man.

Actualy I am quite medium in all things, including size. I presume you admit the factual deficiencies then?

I personally think that Russia would take MUCH offense to the “carried WWII” bit more than any other nation.

A couple of further corrections:

The Marshall Plan was classic Keynsian economic theory – the US needed a market, and quick, for it’s booming post-WW2 economy. Kick starting Europe served that purpose very well.

What makes you think Kyoto isn’t being implemented ? It is. Your response seems to suggest the world has to stand back and do nothing because Bush has decided to go in the opposite direction in order to satisfy his special interest backers. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

The Kyoto Protocol is representative of a work in progress – the wider agenda being to change effectively the way the world collectively addresses it’s problems. That agenda is being sustained by the international community without the US of Mr Bush.

I suspect the leaders of the Bush Administration and the Defence Industry are secretly praying Denmark and the UK don’t blow NMD out of the water. Hell of a thing to spend all that money and not be able to deploy the early warning systems.
I don’t mean to provoke you, Zarathustra, but you do come across as a particularly naive, close-minded and parochial individual. I hope you can learn a little by reading this board with a more open mind.
As an aside, one is tempted to believe the consequences of the Bush Administration’s ‘Policy’ of non-involvement are beginning to dawn on the President. The vacuum he has created has led to other entities, particularly the EC, filling the international diplomatic void (witness currently the Israeli / PA situation). The lights are burning late in Brussels over everything from Kyoto, the mid East, Human Rights, Landmines, the proposed International Criminal Court and anything other pie they can poke a finger into.

One imagines that at some stage the impact of waning respect, regard and influence on the international stage will begin to tell on Mr Bush’s isolationist (read: lack of interest) and special interest serving agenda.

It really is not in the interests of the US to continue on this path for very much longer.

Actually it was to prevent the spread of communism, the reason why congress approved of it was because Russia invaded Czechoslovakia.

I dissagree though that being loved has anything to do with leading. People follow power, not love. In fact almost all of the recent events have mostly been symbolic, without almost any real influence been taken away from US.

I’d say that Bush seems to be heralding us into a new era (probably not entirely intentionally) where the US plays more of a maverick role than a leadership one. For example, the US does not consider it in its best interest to agree to the Kyoto Treaty. Not just Bush, as Congress had no intention of ratifying it either. It gets implemented across most of the world, which probably has an easier time doing it than the US would have. My understanding is that the long term ecological effects of this are fairly minor.

Life goes on.

The US is strong enough to forge an independent course in international issues, not against the interests of its allies, but not in lockstep with them either. As long as the US has a certain measure of strength, it will have allies that it can join with to pursue mutual interests, and compromise on less major policy issues.

The important thing is to defend against outside interference a certain core of policies that are determined in the US alone. For example, the US should not abandon capital punishment because it offends the sensibilities of other nations (although I think it should abandon it), as it is a matter that rightly belongs within our borders. In short, the US is strong enough to defend its sovereignty, as long as it is willing to step aside and allow the EC to take some of its current roles on the international stage. But to lead, it must be a team player, and that would require sacrifices that won’t be accepted at home.

Zarathustra

::cough::
per capita contribution
::cough::

Zarathustra, I am surprised at how lacking in any factual support whatsoever your sweeping, opinion-driven assertions are. Collounsbury has addressed many of your errors. Please read his post and think about it. Recently there have been a few threads on the topics you addressed: we keep seeing the same misconceptions coming up over and over and over, and you seem to have picked up several of the worst misconceptions expressed recently. I suggest you study those threads and attempt to appreciate the situation for what it is rather than indulging in your current world-view, which strikes me as being very biased and rather uninformed.

Most recently:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=70927

and a little before that:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=69780

Both these threads develop into quite vigorous discussions on unilateralism vs multilateralism, the UN, international relations, common misconceptions in world politics, etc., and ought to be read by anyone who thinks the US–or any other country–can get by without the rest of the world’s cooperation and approval.

Collunsbury writes:

Not true. Your analytic capacity is nothing short of titantic. You’ve taught me shitloads, and I always read your posts with keen interest and a slight sense of awe.

Keep up the good work.

Each to their own, Asmodean. Care to share when you think the art of ‘spin doctoring’ entered politics ?