| isolated freak |
Posted
on 11-Apr-03 01:57 AM
According to the Realist school of International Relations: World Politics represents a struggle for power between states each trying to maximize their national interests. Diplomacy and other mechanisms somehow help in safeguarding nations' interests but the ultimate tool to implement foreign policies is the military force. This simple yet most debated theory explains the reasons for wars: Each nation state is guided by its own interests and when it experiences some other nation state or states creating obstacles in achieving its national interests or in implementing its foreign policy, there is a war. The recent war on Iraq is a good example of nation states pushing and finally fighting for their national interests.
In Iraq, the US fought for its and its allies interests. The US cares less for the Iraqi people because its not on their national agenda. The war in Iraq was a show-of-US power and a warning to all other states that have declined to succumb to the US pressure. "Either you are with us or against us" and "multilateral if we can, unilateral if we must" seem be the mantras of the Pentagon these days. Resorting to the military operations is, if looked at from the Realist perspective, unavoidable because military force is the only tool to resolve all differences. Therefore, war in Iraq can be best understood as the US and the coalition of the willing fighting for their own interests and ths is nothing new in IR. According to Noam Chomsky, a Prof at the MIT: The United States will continue to act as it always has, safeguarding the interests of its allies, its clients and the masters of the global economy, to the detriment of the rest of the world.
The Realist theorists of IR such as Morgantheu and Waltz argue that Power is always good. Henry Kissinger once remarked, "Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac" The more power you have, the safer you are. According to John Mearsheimer, "What money is to economics, power is to international relations." This explains the billions and billions of dollars that are being spent on developing weapons and weapon resistance shields. Richard Betts, a Prof. at the Columbia University thinks that nuclear and chemical weapons are "strategic equalizers" and there is always this quest for power, power and more power among the nation states including the ones who are "isolated, weak and who are at odds with the super-powers". Furthermore, having Nuclear and Chemicals weapons at their disposals, gives the nation-states what they long for: Sense of security and supremacy.
Power is good, its appealing and it leads to regional and global hegemony. And that's at the core of foreign policy of many nation-states. Mearsheimer believes that todays international system does not have a 9-1-1 number. for the nations states to call in case of a war. Nation states need to amass power, and then move towards regional and global hegemony for their survival. And the US has embarked on the hegemonic journey, let's see how far and for how long they can continue with this adventure . It will be interesting to see who will follow the USs footsteps, who will oppose the US and its followers and who remain neutral in the global quest for Power and Hegemony.
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