Examines ten important and controversial U.S. presidential foreign policy decisions in the post-World War II period, including one major controversy for each president from Truman to Clinton.

The role of democracy promotion in US foreign policy has increased considerably in the last three decades, booming especially in the immediate years after the end of the Cold War. The rise of democracy promotion originated in a long historical tradition that saw exporting American political values as instrumental in securing US security and economic interests, an idea which was expressed freely once Cold War strategic constraints disappeared. Under Bill Clinton, there was an explicit attempt to do so by reframing American strategy in terms of ‘democratic enlargement’ and this book assesses the strategic use of democracy promotion in US foreign policy and its different outcomes during his presidency. Offering a comprehensive, global review of American democracy engagement with different regions of the world and key countries during a whole presidency, this book assesses how far the US has benefited from democracy promotion. It evaluates the instrumental value of democracy promotion for America by seeing whether the Clinton administration’s efforts in this field, and their varying impacts to democratization abroad, were matched by progress in securing US strategic goals defined under enlargement, in particular reducing international conflicts and spreading economic liberalization around the world. The book explores how democracy became central to US post-Cold War strategy, how the Clinton administration developed the concept of democratic enlargement and tried to implement it, and why it remained influential on foreign policy throughout Clinton’s presidency. With an analysis of the legacy of Clinton’s democracy promotion and its relevance to the subsequent policies of George W. Bush and Barack Obama, this book is essential reading for students and scholars interested in Foreign Policy, American History and Security Studies.

In light of the United States' "age of terrorism" and the controversial involvement in the war in Iraq, U.S. policies toward diplomatic peace education are coming under increasing scrutiny. This book evaluates the prospects for effective U.S. peace education in the context of post-1945 U.S. foreign policy. The work first documents the disparity between U.S. pronouncements about protecting human rights and the country's systematic erosion of those rights in the international arena. Second, it evaluates the challenges that the war on terrorism poses for peace education and explores the importance of international treaties in upholding security. A final section explores new ways of thinking and relating that are ultimately necessary for the realization of nonviolent peacekeeping efforts. Designed as a resource text for U.S. educators, the text offers concrete proposals for addressing contentious foreign policy issues in the classroom and includes an appendix of primary documents and sample questions for easy use.

This text explores the struggle between the President and Congress to shape US foreign policy from World War II, through Vietnam, Operation Desert Storm, to the Clinton Administration's policy in Somalia. Case studies are included.

This report offers an examination of U.S. Army force posture in Europe amid heightened tensions between the United States and Russia. The report explores the necessary components of a sustainable and credible deterrence posture in Europe and highlights key challenges—from the strategic down to the tactical level. It offers recommendations for how to best recalibrate U.S. defense and deterrence posture in Europe over the next decade.

The prosperity and national security of the United States depend directly on the prosperity and stability of both partner and competing countries around the world. Today, U.S. interests are under rising pressure from water scarcity, extreme weather events and water-driven ecological change in key geographies of strategic interest to the U.S. Those water-driven stresses are undermining economic productivity, weakening governance systems and fraying social cohesion in scores of countries and, in the process, undermining the vitality of rural livelihoods, fostering local and ethnic conflicts, driving broad migratory movements and contributing to the growth of insurgencies and terrorist networks. While the U.S. intelligence community has steadily expanded natural resource concerns in their global threat analyses, our overseas development assistance remains locked into provision of water and hygienic services rather than responding to the full sweep of global water challenges including governance and policy failures, growing conflicts over water and the need for promoting sustainable transboundary water arrangements in partner countries. A fundamental departure from the past is urgently needed. Based on 18 case studies, Water, Security and U.S. Foreign Policy provides an analytical framework to help policy makers, scholars and researchers studying the intersection of U.S. foreign policy with the environment and sustainability issues, interpret the impacts of water-driven social disruptions on the stability of partner governments and U.S. interests abroad. The book also delivers specific recommendations to reorient U.S. development and diplomatic engagements that can forestall and prevent social disruptions and ensuing threats to U.S. prosperity and national security.