AMERİKAN DIŞ POLİTİKASI

The notion of manifest destiny is that it is the destiny of the United States and a God-given right to spread across the North American continent and create what Thomas
Jefferson called “the empire of liberty.” The basis of this “empire of liberty” (Wood 2009), according to Jefferson, is republicanism and democracy. The United States, Jefferson believed, is in a unique position having been “trusted with the destinies of this solitary republic of the world, the only monument of human rights, and the sole depository of the sacred fire of freedom and selfgovernment, from hence it is to be lighted up in other regions of the earth, if other areas of the earth shall ever become susceptible of its benign influence” (Jefferson 1809).

The four American foreign policy traditions (Hamiltonian, Jeffersonian, Jacksonian, and Wilsonian) identified by Mead (2013) are the patterns of behavior and ideas that are not limited to the presidencies of the presidents that they are named after.

Wilsonianism’s core feature is the belief of its proponents in the benevolent nature of American power. They argue that the American military, political, and economic power can and should be used to promote democracy and liberal values abroad. They argue that the best way to ensure American security and prosperity is to create an international system that is populated by states that share similar values and institutions like the United States. This liberal internationalism is best encapsulated in Woodrow Wilson’s famous phrase, “the world must be made safe for democracy” when he declared war on Germany in 1917 (Wilson 1917). Wilsonianism and internationalism in their different variations have been the dominant foreign policy traditions since the end of the Second World War.

The second is named after President Andrew Jackson. The Jacksonians are populist nationalists who argue in favor of a muscular foreign policy and strong military to defend American interests. However, unlike Hamiltonians who are in favor of strong relations between business and the federal government, Jacksonians are distrustful of business elites and are only willing to use American military might to defend the homeland rather than pursue commercial interests abroad. Unlike Wilsonians, they also oppose the use of American military power to promote democracy and liberal values abroad.

The Monroe Doctrine was a response to fear of re-conquest of Latin America by European powers. The major principles of the Monroe Doctrine are as follows:

The Louisiana Purchase was the first of several important land acquisitions that the United States carried out throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth. The other notable land deals that expanded the United States are:

The Mexican-American War from 1846 to 1848 that resulted in the annexation of California should be seen in this particular frame. The causes of the Mexican-American War are three-fold. First, President James Knox Polk embraced the idea of “manifest destiny” and offered the Mexican government to sell its large swathes of the southwest land in 1845, but Polk’s offer met with unequivocal refusal of the Mexican leadership (Bauer 1992). Second, Guardino (2017) avers that an increasingly large number of Americans marched towards the southwest of the country in search of fertile land and natural resources including coal, oil, and gold. Mass migration towards today’s California and the Mexican government’s refusal to sell southwestern lands to the US engendered tensions between the two nations. Last, Bauer (1992) argues that the Mexican-American War became inevitable in the wake of the Texas War of Independence, which began in 1835 as an uprising against the Mexican government in the south.

The causes of the 1898 Spanish-American War were the uprising in Cuba against the Spanish suzerainty and the sinking of the American battleship USS Maine (Chaves 2007). First, the Cuban bid for independence from Spain began in February 1895, which met with fierce clampdown by the Spanish forces on the island. Due to its proximity to the US, the Cuban struggle and Spain’s repressive measures to stifle the rebellion grabbed the headlines in American newspapers and engendered public sympathy for the Cuban rebellion. Furthermore, in accordance with the Monroe Doctrine, the US administrations had long intended to stave off any foreign interference in the continent’s backyard and the Cuban rebellion provided the US leadership with an expedient cause for a new war. Second, the public support for waging a war with Spain over Cuba skyrocketed when the American battleship USS Maine, which was sent to American property and citizens in Cuba in the aftermath of anti-Spanish insurrection in Havana, came under attack and sank (Quesada 2007). While the cause and culprits for the sinking of the USS Maine have remained a mystery to this day, such a provocative incident galvanized the public into support for war as warmongering and flexing American muscle in the Western Hemisphere became a popular chorus in the country.

There are three important implications of the US-led open door policy (Bucknall 1990:55-56). First, in the wake of the 1898 Spanish-American war, the US became an imperial power and supplanted its isolationist and regional foreign policy vision with a global one, and the open door policy was the first port of call for the newfound informal empire. Second, the open door policy pronounced the US recognition of China’s ascension to a major power status and of China’s territorial integrity as well as its sovereignty. Third, since the Congress of Vienna, the open door policy has been the first multilateral attempt to bring stability into international system by delineating each major power’s sphere of economic and political influence in the world including those of the new major powers, i.e., the US, Japan, and China.

Theodore Roosevelt’s Big Stick diplomacy is also known as the “Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine”. While the Monroe Doctrine was a passive US policy toward foreign powers in the Western hemisphere based only on rhetoric, President Roosevelt’s big stick policy signaled the US willingness to become a policeman of the region and its resolve to go to war with the imperial powers overseas. Although it was viewed as a diplomatic document couched in political and military jargon, the Roosevelt Corollary had Hamiltonian economic rationale, too. The Roosevelt Corollary of 1904 stated that the US would intervene as a last resort to ensure that other nations in the Western Hemisphere fulfilled their obligations to international creditors and did not violate commercial rights of the United States. That said, in the long term, the Roosevelt Corollary played lesser role in regulating the relations between the Western Hemisphere and Europe, yet the corollary did serve as a policy instrument for American intervention in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Hamilton believed that the US was destined to be the dominant power in the Western Hemisphere, but it was weak for the moment and therefore this weakness should necessitate the US to stay out of European wars and focus on domestic development. Hamilton argued that this required a strong federal government at home that focused on industrial development in alliance with England.

Thomas Jefferson also was suspicious of the alliance between commerce and industry. He was an idealist and pursued a pro-French foreign policy.

Washington argued that the United States should have no permanent alliances but develop commercial ties with all.

The presidency of Thomas Jefferson was different. He was seen as a universalist American nationalist, that is, he saw the US as the center of liberty in the world and equated American interests with the interests of the world.

Jefferson was a very strong proponent of land expansion across the North American continent, which he termed “the empire of liberty".

Wilsonianism’s core feature is the belief of its proponents in the benevolent nature of American power. They argue that the American military, political, and economic power can and should be used to promote democracy and liberal values abroad.

Liberal internationalism is best encapsulated in Woodrow Wilson’s famous phrase, “the world must be made safe for democracy”.

The Jacksonians are populist nationalists who argue in favor of a muscular foreign policy and strong military to defend American interests.

Jefferson engaged in one of the most important land deals in the US history when he purchased the Louisiana territory in 1803 from France, which effectively doubled the size of the United States.

The Florida territory is purchased from Spain in 1819.