America's New Course

William G. Hyland

From Foreign Affairs, Spring 1990

Summary:  Analysis of the USA's post-Cold War security interests, seeing a decline in military and ideological issues, and growth of interest in trade and economic policy, the environment, terrorism and drug trafficking. FA editor.

William G. Hyland is Editor of Foreign Affairs.

The contrary position was summed up in congressional debate by New York Democratic Representative Stephen Solarz:

It is the view of the House and the American people that our relationship with China will be influenced by the extent to which the Chinese authorities respect the fundamental human rights of their own people.10

Which side is right in these two debates is not the only issue; the broader question is whether the United States should now realign its foreign policy, leavening the older concerns over national security and geopolitics with greater concern for moral values, namely democracy and human rights.

In fact this clash may not be as sharp as it seems in the abstract. As the Cold War recedes, the interests of geopolitics and human rights may actually come to coincide in American policy more than at any time in the past. Consider, for example, two recent unrelated but instructive incidents-the intervention of the U.S. Air Force in Philippine politics in support of the Aquino government, and the invasion of Panama. Neither action was taken to suppress a communist threat, but both actions received strong American popular support. Both were justified as a defense of democracy, but at the same time these two areas, Panama and the Philippines, would fall clearly within any definition of U.S. security interests.

The promotion of democracy is a laudable American ambition, but could become a perilous guide to policy. If applied indiscriminately, such a policy could invite interventionism in the 1990s much as anticommunism did during the Cold War. It is one thing to support the new democracies of Eastern Europe that have liberated themselves, but it would be another matter to intervene to institute democracy in, say, South Africa or Iran.

There will also be instances where democratic alternatives are simply lacking (e.g., currently in Cambodia), and the United States will still be forced to accommodate itself to some unpalatable partners. Americans must decide to what extent the United States should intervene to support rebellion in the name of democracy. It is ironic that the regions where progress has been minimal in human rights are areas where direct U.S. involvement either would be ineffective (in most of Africa) or dangerous (China, Indochina and the Middle East).

Nevertheless, present evidence suggests that the realism of geopolitics is giving way to the idealism of human rights. If, after all, this turns out to be the new thrust of American policy it should not be too surprising; at the base of its motivation, containment was always intended as a means to this end.

IV

During the Cold War every administration was concerned with the high cost of a global strategy of containment. But in almost every instance where there was a clash in priorities between economic policy and national security, the latter prevailed. As a result, after almost fifty years of containment policy the United States has emerged from the Cold War in a precarious economic position. Just how precarious is open to debate, but there seems to be a consensus that, "the new force in the world is neither arms nor political ideology; it is economic power."11 There also seems to be a consensus that the United States has lost its economic hegemony, and to correct new imbalances it must put its fiscal house in order. Unfortunately there is no agreement on how to do this.

Reducing the budget deficit seems to be the starting point of every plan. This always leads to the question of reductions in defense spending, for it is in the Pentagon's budget that large sums of money can be saved by making even modest spending reductions; some experts envisage a fifty-percent reduction over the next several years.12 But budget reductions ought to reflect a military strategy, and there has not yet been enough time to work out a new military strategy that supports post-Cold War foreign policy goals and priorities. Hence the budget debate and the strategic debate feed on each other-and end in stalemate. The way out of this dilemma is through a new policy that reflects a realistic appraisal of the near- and long-term threats of the post-Cold War era, and a new consensus on the balance between commitments and resources.