American Foreign Policy and Terrorism

Outline:

Introduction:

a) goals of the US foreign policy

b) US main alliances

US and terrorism:

a) The world after 9/11

b) Terrorism definitions

c) The realist school

d) The idealist school

Why terrorism against the US?

a) The illegal use of weapons

b) Millitary and political intervention

c) The role of the CIA

d) US as the largest weapons seller

e) The case of Bin laden

Conslusion

References

On a global scale, the United States of America enjoys a high political, economical an military leverage thus affecting our day to day lives which makes its foreign policy a subject of great interest around the world especially if we combine this study with the one on the impact of terrorism on the US policies.

Goals of US foreign policy repeatedly mentioned and stressed upon by U.S. officials are mainly the protection of the safety and freedoms of all American citizens, both within the United States and abroad than the Defense policy related to force posture than for sure we have Promotion of peace, freedom and democracy in all regions of the world. On the economical level it is more about furthering free trade and economic obstacles, and advancing capitalism in order to foster economic growth.

The United States is the founder of NATO, the world's largest military alliance. Under the NATO charter, hence, it is bounded to defend any member state attacked by a foreign power. The United States also has a number of Major Non-NATO allies such as Israel and Japan for example.

Critics of U.S. foreign policy tend to respond that these goals regarded as dignified were often overstated and point out contradictions between the real American intentions and what is truly occurring; mainly the 1st criticism is that the promotion of peace contradicts with the long list of U.S. military involvements as well as that the mention of freedom and democracy contradicts with all the dictatorships that receive American support.

I. US and terrorism:

The sentence "After September 11th the world is not the same as it was before" has become a slogan since a surprised world witnessed the attack against the United States.

Countless debates have followed the attack against the Twin Towers and scholars, politicians, journalists and historians have written thousands of pages trying to give an answer to the question whether it was an event that definitely changed the previous world order and international politics or only a fact that will have soon been classified as another event of human history.

Undoubtedly, the attacks of 2001 have the responsibility to have increased people's awareness about many negative aspects of globalization, such as the difficulty to manage illegal migrations and human trafficking and especially the difficulty to track and stop international terroristic organizations such as al-Qaeda. In fact, 9/11 brought to a new phase of international relations: Bush's administration has been brutally compelled to abandon its initial unilateralism and apparent disinterest in world issues and forced to be part of a multilateral cooperation among states. (Foreign Relations and International Aid )

Terrorism has been described as both a method and plan; an offense and a sacred obligation; a vindicated response to repression and an indefensible atrocity.

Terrorism is a illicit behavior that influences an audience beyond the direct casualty. The tactic of terrorists is to commit violence to attract public attention, the government, and the world concern to their cause.

9/11 wasn't the first terrorist attack that the US was a victim of: in October 1983, the Marine Battalion Landing Team Headquarters at Beirut International Airport was bombed: The attack caused 241 US military killed.

Terrorism can have in some cases a positive national impact as well as a negative one: It unites the nations as well as separates them. They unite on the common agenda of dealing with it and split evermore due to it.

Countering terrorism has become the ultimate priority of the world's major powers:

Some parties argue that of course the US has done bad things abroad but it's a dog-eat-dog world, and everyone is doing grubby things. "We've done, they argue, what we've done not only to survive but also to make sure we're the top dog in the world--and it's a good thing that peace and freedom-loving people like us are the ones directing the show." (Office of the Historian, Bureau of Public Affairs, United States Department of State , 2011)

The realist school argues that anyone adopting other than an "ends justify the means" approach is making the wrong assumption that peoples and nations tend to be good not evil.

Of course, the critics of US foreign policy see things differently. They believe in the importance of peace and human rights promotion. The idealists argue that the realists make unnecessarily unconstructive statements and then adopt competitive policies that turn those assumptions into self-fulfilling predictions. (Office of the Historian, Bureau of Public Affairs, United States Department of State , 2011)

II. Why terrorism against the US ?

After having seen the different points of view concerning the American foreign policy and the main points about