Its no doubt the United States at the moment enjoys an unchallenged hegemony in the world. For a few decades now the United States has been at the center of the international politics and economics . It has increased tenth folds the sphere of influence to areas key of its national interests.
This supremacy and domination has not been a smooth ride. It has not been without its price to a point that United States citizens have paid with their blood. The events of the September 11th attack remain fresh in the Americans’ mind.
The American dominance of the world’s events means that its foreign policies remain the most important in the world. It is at the forefront in shaping the world’s destiny and in rooting out any impediments on the way to securing its national interests. It has pioneered nuclear non-proliferation treaties; instituted democracy and governance, intervened militarily in unseating regimes it has felt are a threat to its national security.
It continues to shape events in both far and wide countries be it the Middle East, Asia or in Africa. Core to the United States foreign policy is in the intense war it has waged against terrorist organizations in the world. The September of 2001 put into question the impregnability of the United States and all systems have been put alert since.
The American government has channeled all its efforts and resources towards containing terrorist organization. In this way regimes have been toppled, thousands dead and a dictator executed.
This is not just an example of how the United States, under the foreign policy, responds to international issues, how it utilizes its resources to shape events that it believes are critical to its interests and an international unipolar image. This and more will remain the key focus of this paper. It will examine how the U. S has been responding to international crises, politics and economics (Stephen E, Flynn, 26).
One such period that can highlight on the U. S. foreign policies is thecold war. Never before in the history of the United States did the government commit so much to contain the threat of a rising hegemony and a threat to its dominance. The cold war was a war of ideologies and tension-full relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Although there was no physical confrontation between the two superpowers, the period from 1940-19900 was characterized by proxy wars, military buildup especially the nuclear arms race and supremacy intechnologyincluding the race to space.
The two countries were trying to prove their international dominion and hence furthered their respective ideologies and economic systems. While the United States was advocating for capitalism the soviet bloc was a propagating for communism.
In this period the United States government was using both military and financial resources to influence the political and economic trends in the world. This was the focus of its foreign policy.
Economic aid then was pegged on a categorical statements through words and actions that a government was supporting and operationalizing the tenants of capitalism, democracy had taken a back seat then, history is full of incidences when the United States waged proxy wars to unseat democratically elected governments on mere suspicions that they were leaning towards communism and replacing with dictatorial regimes (John L P. 49)
