NYU Students: U.S. Should Support An Inclusive Global Community

Last week, I facilitated a class debate on U.S. policy toward East Asia for a class I teach at NYU called the "Rise of East Asia." (Click here to read the summary of the class from spring 2010 and here to read the summary from the class from summer 2009.) This semester's class was smaller than previous semesters but the debate was nonetheless fascinating. Perhaps one of the most striking elements of the debate was a widely shared view that the United States cannot lead the world alone. Rather the United States must lead in cooperation with other countries--a strategy of cooperative security if you will. In that light, the students stressed the need for relations between countries to be on equal footing and therefore they questioned the tradition of looking at U.S. foreign relations in hierarchical order.

Below are the impressions of Elizabeth Matsumoto, who participated in the debate:

"Rise of East Asia" Class Debate on March 30 2011

On March 30 2011, President Obama's 2010 National Security Strategy (NSS) provided the backdrop for a carefully worded but intense debate among six NYU SCPS students in Professor Devin Stewart's "Rise of East Asia" class. There were varied opinions but also overwhelming agreement on U.S. priorities in national security, a concern that preoccupied the better part of the debate, followed by recommendations for American policy in East Asia, a region defined as ASEAN, China, Japan, the Koreas, and Australia.

The goal of the debate was to prepare an in-class National Security Strategy by consolidating excerpts from the Obama document with newly derived conclusions. The class began by focusing on grand strategy, or the all-encompassing mission statement that could best be classified as a philosophical approach to national security. Obama's grand strategy focuses on "renewing American leadership," a reaction to the military emphasis of the Bush era. Evidence that this renewal involves the dual process of being strong at home, by rebuilding the economy, education system, while being influential abroad became readily apparent in a preliminary study of the document.

Class reaction was overwhelmingly positive to the Obama Administration's grand strategy, characterizing it as "a step in the right direction." The group also called for a policy of engagement that would "create more international organizations, and cooperation," that prioritized American leadership and "enlightened self-interest." The best means of pursuing leadership was also briefly debated, with an emphasis on collaboration, or co-leadership as the optimal means of engagement.

Class also argued that co-leadership on important global matters should be initiated while cautiously balancing security and openness, given that "safety and prosperity are bound by events beyond our borders." The Grand Strategy was subsequently revised to the following statement: "The United States should cooperate in redefining the international order, to support an inclusive community of nations with global responsibility." Class also stressed the grand strategy remain compatible with the general aim of engagement abroad: to give incentives to nations to act responsibly, while conveying they may face consequences if they do not.

With the grand strategy established, the class then began the task of defining the Interests of National Security. First came the security of the United States, its citizens and the "human rights of all people," an important clause directly correlated to the grand strategy’s notion of an "inclusive community." Next was international prosperity, an aim intertwined with rebuilding a strong economy, powered by "fiscal responsibility, education, and innovation" at home. Debate on whether to retain values, or ethical policy followed. Given the overarching ethical aim of the grand strategy, the class concluded this section redundant. An international order promoted by a participatory American leadership was also listed under the interests section of the document.

With a comprehensive security policy finalized, a discussion of U.S. allies in Asia followed. Talks began with a ranking. Japan's strategic importance placed it in the number one slot, followed by traditional allies South Korea, Australia, the Philippines and Thailand. In light of recent events, the class also noted the Great Tohoku Earthquake in Japan has strengthened the U.S.-Japan alliance, but emphasis on fostering more equal partnerships with not only America's allies but other willing nations was of growing importance.

This last policy suggestion tied well with subsequent discussions. Class recognized the significance of engagement with China, Asia's largest emerging power. Involvement in regional institutions ASEAN, APEC, the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership (TPP), and EAS (East Asia Summit) was also highlighted as a key step towards multilateralism. Furthermore, in alignment with Obama’s call for a more "positive, constructive, and comprehensive relationship with China," and to "encourage continued reduction in tension between the People's Republic of China and Taiwan" U.S. bilateral relations with Taipei was ranked below other policy priorities.

As discussion continued, the term "allies" also came under debate. If the chief aim of national security was to foster inclusiveness, some questioned the need to classify a few select nations as allies. The possibility the U.S. military presence in Japan and South Korea was polarizing, and could potentially undermine claims to inclusive cooperativeness was also briefly deliberated. As the debate drew to a close, emphasis was repeatedly placed on greater involvement in regional institutions, both existing ones such as the Six Party Talks, APEC, ASEAN, EAS, and TPP. There was also agreement a Northeast Asian Alliance analogous to ASEAN would be an impactful starting point.

- Elizabeth Matsumoto

Photo "Woolworth Building" by laverrue.

Is America Addicted to War?

The top 5 reasons why we keep getting into foolish fights.

Wikimedia Commons Image

Stephen M. Walt
Foreign Policy

The United States started out as 13 small and vulnerable colonies clinging to the east coast of North America. Over the next century, those original 13 states expanded all the way across the continent, subjugating or exterminating the native population and wresting Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California from Mexico. It fought a bitter civil war, acquired a modest set of overseas colonies, and came late to both world wars. But since becoming a great power around 1900, it has fought nearly a dozen genuine wars and engaged in countless military interventions.

Yet Americans think of themselves as a peace-loving people, and we certainly don't regard our country as a "warrior nation" or "garrison state." Teddy Roosevelt was probably the last U.S. president who seemed to view war as an activity to be welcomed (he once remarked that "A just war is in the long run far better for a man's soul than the most prosperous peace"), and subsequent presidents always portray themselves as going to war with great reluctance, and only as a last resort.


In 2008, Americans elected Barack Obama in part because they thought he would be different from his predecessor on a host of issues, but especially in his approach to the use of armed force. It was clear to nearly everyone that George W. Bush had launched a foolish and unnecessary war in Iraq, and then compounded the error by mismanaging it (and the war in Afghanistan too). So Americans chose a candidate who had opposed Bush's war in Iraq and could bring U.S. commitments back in line with our resources. Above all, Americans thought Obama would be a lot more thoughtful about where and how to use force, and that he understood the limits of this crudest of policy tools. The Norwegian Nobel Committee seems to have thought so too, when they awarded him the Nobel Peace Prize not for anything he had done, but for what it hoped he might do henceforth.


Yet a mere two years later, we find ourselves back in the fray once again. Since taking office, Obama has escalated U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and launched a new war against Libya. As in Iraq, the real purpose of our intervention is regime change at the point of a gun. At first we hoped that most of the guns would be in the hands of the Europeans, or the hands of the rebel forces arrayed against Muammar al-Qaddafi, but it's increasingly clear that U.S. military forces, CIA operatives and foreign weapons supplies are going to be necessary to finish the job.

Moreover, as Alan Kuperman of the University of Texas and Steve Chapman of the Chicago Tribune have now shown, the claim that the United States had to act to prevent Libyan tyrant Muammar al-Qaddafi from slaughtering tens of thousands of innocent civilians in Benghazi does not stand up to even casual scrutiny. Although everyone recognizes that Qaddafi is a brutal ruler, his forces did not conduct deliberate, large-scale massacres in any of the cities he has recaptured, and his violent threats to wreak vengeance on Benghazi were directed at those who continued to resist his rule, not at innocent bystanders. There is no question that Qaddafi is a tyrant with few (if any) redemptive qualities, but the threat of a bloodbath that would "[stain] the conscience of the world" (as Obama put it) was slight.

It remains to be seen whether this latest lurch into war will pay off or not, and whether the United States and its allies will have saved lives or squandered them. But the real question we should be asking is: Why does this keep happening? Why do such different presidents keep doing such similar things? How can an electorate that seemed sick of war in 2008 watch passively while one war escalates in 2009 and another one gets launched in 2011? How can two political parties that are locked in a nasty partisan fight over every nickel in the government budget sit blithely by and watch a president start running up a $100 million per day tab in this latest adventure? What is going on here?

Read the 5 Reasons Full Article Here

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The Fed Undermines Foreign Policy

Dees Illustration

Dr. Ron Paul

Last week I was both surprised and pleased when the Supreme Court upheld lower court decisions requiring the Federal Reserve Bank to comply with requests for information made by Bloomberg under the Freedom of Information Act ("FOIA"). Bloomberg simply wanted to know who received loans from the Fed's discount window in the aftermath of the 2008 financial market crisis, and how much each entity received. Surely this is basic information that should be available to every American taxpayer. But the Fed fought tooth and nail all the way to the Supreme Court to preserve their privileged secrecy. However, transparency and openness won the day. There are some 29,000 pages to decipher, but a few points stand out initially.

The Fed lent huge sums of our money to foreign banks. This in itself was not surprising, but the actual amount is staggering! In one week at the height of the crisis, about 70% of the money doled out went to foreign banks. We were told that bailing out banks was going to stave off a massive depression. Depression for whom? We now know that the Fed's bailout had nothing to do with helping the American people, who have gotten their depression anyway with continued job losses and foreclosures. But now we learn that a good deal of the money did not even help American banks!
In light of recent world events, perhaps the most staggering revelation is that quite a bit of money went to the Arab Banking Corp., in which the Libyan Central Bank owned about a third of its stock. This occurred while Libya, a declared state sponsor of terrorism, was under strict economic sanctions! How erratic the US must appear when we shower a dictator alternately with dollars and bombs! Also, we must consider the possibility that those loans are inadvertently financing weapons Gaddaffi is using against his own people and western militaries. This would not be the first time the covert activities of the Fed have undermined not only our economy and the value of the dollar, but our foreign policy as well.

Of course I can't say I'm surprised by the poor quality of the data provided by the Fed. The category of each loan made, whether from the "Primary Discount Window", the "Secondary Discount Window," or "Other Extensions of Credit," is redacted. Thus, we don't know with certainty how much discount window lending was provided to foreign banks and how much was merely "other extensions of credit". Also, some of the numbers simply do not seem to add up. We are of course still wading through the massive document dump, but it does seem as though several billions of dollars are unaccounted for.

As the world economy continues to falter in spite of -- or rather because of -- cheap money doled out by the Federal Reserve, its ability to deceive financial markets and American taxpayers is coming to an end. People are beginning to realize that when the fed in effect doubles the worldwide supply of US dollars in a relatively short time, it has the effect of stealing half your money through reduced purchasing power. Rapid inflation will continue as trillions in new money and credit recently created by the Fed flood into the commodity markets.

It is becoming more and more obvious that the Fed operates for the benefit of a few privileged banks, banks that never suffer for bad decisions they make. Quite the opposite - as we have seen since October 2008, under our current monetary system politically-connected banks are paid to make bad decisions.

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Ron Paul: Stop the Illegal, Immoral, Unconstitutional Afghan War (Video)

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The People's Choice: Carnegie Council Top Ten 2009

2009 was a hard year on many fronts and this feeling was reflected in the Carnegie Council audience favorites. Concerns include making sense of the financial crisis; predicting future risks; and coming up with new strategies for the 21st century.

No. 7 on the list, "Top Risks and Ethical Decisions, 2009," was so popular that on January 13 a similar panel will predict their "Top Risks" for 2010 (with live webcast).

1. The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World
Niall Ferguson, Harvard University (video, audio, transcript)
The economies of China and America are so entwined that neither can afford to let the other fail.

2. The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century
George Friedman, Strategic Forecasting, Inc. (video, audio, transcript)
Which nations will be the winners and losers? These predictions may surprise you.

3. Sex Trafficking: Inside the Business of Modern Slavery
Siddharth Kara, Free the Slaves (video, audio, transcript)
The biggest illegal business after drugs, sex slaves generated profits of $35.7 billion in 2007.

4. On Promoting Democracy
Michael Walzer, Institute for Advanced Study (article)
States are not the only, or even the most important, agents of regime change.

5. Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa
Dambisa Moyo, Economic specialist, Sub-Saharan Africa (video, audio, transcript)
Decades of international aid have only made things worse in Africa.

6. The Balance between Risk and Return Is Everybody's Business
Ann Rutledge, R&R Consulting (article)
Risk has shifted from corporations to individuals, and many ordinary Americans got burned.

7. Top Risks and Ethical Decisions, 2009
Ian Bremmer, Eurasia Group; Art Kleiner, Booz & Company; Michele Wucker, World Policy Institute; Thomas Stewart, Booz & Company (video, audio, transcript)
This expert panel predicts risks for what they agree will be a very tough year.

8. The Crisis of Islamic Civilization
Ali A. Allawi, former Iraq government official (video, audio, transcript)
What caused the decline of Islamic civilization and how can it be revived?

9. The Crisis of American Foreign Policy: Wilsonianism in the Twenty-First Century
Anne-Marie Slaughter, U.S. State Department (video, audio, transcript)
Who's right, the neocons or the liberal internationalists?

10. Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do?
Michael Sandel, Harvard University (video, audio, transcript)
A lively debate with the audience on what we owe to society.