A distinct period of the United States of America Foreign Policy, is the period between 1991 and 2001, a period of ten years also known as “The Unipolar Moment”. If someone tries to describe it with one word that would be, “Dominance”. In that period, two US Presidents served in office George Herbert Walker Bush (January 20, 1989 – January 20, 1993) and William Jefferson Clinton (January 20, 1993 – January 20, 2001). One can add also a small period of President George Walker Bush from January 20, 2001 till September 11, 2001 when the terrorist attacks on US soil took place.
In December 1991, the Soviet Union dissolved and the era of Cold War came to an end, leaving the United States in a strong position with unmatched power in comparison with other states. President Bush served as a Vice-President in the Reagan administration for eight years and he was an experienced President in foreign policy. He had to manage the collapse of the Soviet Union, the end of the Cold War and the issue of nuclear weapons in former Soviet states. Although many people were celebrating the collapse of a hostile empire, the risk of an unmanaged resolution was a serious issue that demanded careful handling. He reassured the Russians that he would not take advantage of the situation against them. As the political scientist Francis Fukuyama speculated “the humanity had reached the end of history”, as that liberal, capitalist democracy had permanently triumphed over communism.
During that period in terms of foreign policy, President Bush managed the re-unification of Germany, he signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I) with Gorbachev and the (START II) with Yeltsin two agreements in order to cut their strategic weapons. In December 1989, Bush ordered the invasion of the United States in Panama, the first large-scale operation after more than 40 years not related to the Cold War, because he was worried about the status of the Panama Canal. Moreover, President Bush was in office in the first Gulf War after Iraq invaded Kuwait. At first Bush tried to use diplomacy, he created a big international alliance, he had an approved UN Security Council resolution to use force if Iraq did not withdraw from Kuwait by January 15, 1991 and he achieved the Congress support with a resolution. He created a big alliance to invade Iraq, a big force but with limited objectives and evicted the Iraqi forces from Kuwait by the end of February 27.
There is a question whether the military campaign should continue to turn down the leadership of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Of course, the lenses in which you see the world have vast consequences in how you understand the world and foreign policy. Realists see the invasion in Iraq as a failure, but if you just think of oil and energy, it can be in many ways a success. Generally, Bush is considered a successful President and it should be noticed that he had an approval rating of 89 percent in a March 1991 Gallup poll, the highest presidential approval rating in the history of Gallup polling.
President Clinton followed, applying a model of democratic capitalism in a period of blind optimism. The essence was to coerce and push countries to follow the American model, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Trade Organization (WTO) were two vehicles designed by the United States, as tools for other states to adopt the US policy framework. Clinton’s foreign policy could be described as liberal (Wilsonianism), a policy to shape the world. In parts of the world that they do not accept liberalism, the US tries to intervene with a mix of hard and soft power.
Furthermore, in the foreign policy arena President Clinton had one major intervention in military terms in the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. First, the United States bombed Bosnian Serb targets to halt attacks on U.N. safe zones and put pressure to end the Bosnian war. After that, the U.S. led coalition intervened in Kossovo, under the NATO umbrella to prevent Serbia from taking over Kossovo. It should be mentioned, that President Clinton has admitted as his main failure in foreign policy the decision not to intervene in the genocide that broke out in Rwanda, in April 1994.
The end of the Cold War opened a new era in American foreign policy. In the Quest for a new world order, Hamiltonians and Wilsonians believed that the fundamental task of American foreign policy was the construction of a global order. From the one hand to promote the rule of law, democracy, protection of human rights (Hamiltonians) and from the other worldwide trading and the American based finance system. The other two schools, the Jeffersonians and Jacksonians, opposed each other but united believed that globalism went too far.
Post 1991 foreign policy proved that it did not work very well. The United States suddenly became the only superpower, they misused their power, the internal checks and balances failed and many believe that inequality inside the US started in this period, it was the beginning of the social and health crisis that today’s middle-class people face. In addition, the expansion of NATO in that period has been highly criticized, realists in the US saw that when Russia recovers that will constitute a big problem, as we see these days in the case of Ukraine. Another example was the participation of China in the WTO, because they did not pose to China strict rules, China took advantage of the situation and it seems today that it is changing the structures in its own preference.
US Foreign Policy is impressive and dangerous; it has major implications and consequences for the entire world. It is often characterized as a kaleidoscope. Foreign Policy is global in scope, it is not isolating in mindset and of course it is consequential, but also it has a tradition of renewal. It is also a fact that, US as a superpower finds it very difficult to retrench itself or to sustain a period of retrenchment. It seems that that amount of power that the US has and the lack of any serious antagonism misguided its foreign policy. Maybe the time has come, after the rise of China in the last years, for America to guide itself more wisely as it has already done in many difficult moments in human history.