The coordinated attack September 11th 2001 on the United States resulted in a prolonged war on terror; that is still active today. Many people are asking how this could happen. Others want to know how to prevent it from happing again. Some wonder if world peace will ever be possible. The United States does not think peace can be possible until the threat of terrorism becomes obsolete. There is no clear answer to the questions and concerns over terrorism although there are several schools of thought on how to respond to terrorism. This paper will discuss; realism, liberalism, and structuralism in an attempt to find a solution. I will offer Foreign Policy recommendations based on these theories; an examination regarding the application of these theories will show advantages and disadvantages of each, as well as how the United States applies them to combat and eliminate the threats of terrorism today.
Recommendations applying the Realist theory include sending a strong message to nations that harbor or support known terrorist. This strong message should include an increase of military power, sanctions and if necessary a pre-emptive strike. Recent threats from within our country for example, the plot to blow up the White House calls for a close look at immigration. The department of homeland security therefore, should review records of immigrants who are in America, focusing on those whose visas have expired yet remain in the states illegally. Advantages to following these recommendations are offense, increased security, and avoidance of a potential repeat of 9/11. Key beliefs in realism support these recommendations because security of state is the number one priority. Our military is the best in the world and feared b...
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...sm to combat terrorism. Realism is by far the method of choice in recent years. Thus far, the United States has avoided a repeat of 9/11 yet still has a long way to go to ensure security from terrorism in the 21st century.
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Followers of Realist school of thought argue the case of 2003 Iraq war from the standpoint of power and Security. The Bush administration’s rationale for launching a pre-emptive attack against Iraq was based on two misleading assumptions: firstly, Iraq had or was developing Weapons of Mass Destruction (along with Iran and North Korea) and secondly, that it was aiding and protecting terrorist organizations like Al-Qaeda. Such a conjecture based on unsubstantiated evidence helped Bush administration conjure up a dystopian situation which justified 2003 invasion of Iraq under the pretext of “security maximization”. This explanation was given in pursuance of the realist assumption that States’ as rational actors always act in accordance with their national security interests.
Realism ensures safety through out the country. By keeping ourselves safe other countries may decide to follow our example and thus world peace is spawned. Though total world peace can never be reached due to the imperfect world we live in realism can lead us closest to it because of its ignoring of morality. Trusting facts will produce a far more positive result in the long run than trusting feelings. Feelings can cloud our judgments, but the realistic view helps us avoid that. It helps us ensure peace throughout the country.
Mingst, Karen A., and Jack L. Snyder. Andrew H. Kydd and Barbara F. Walter, The Strategies of Terrorism. Essential Readings in World Politics. N.p.: n.p., n.d. N. pag. Print.
Secondly, in relation to the issue of security, the U.S administration should endeavor to spread a helping hand to counter terrorism-breeding points internationally. In addition, security perimeters of immigrants should be spread to ensure that it operates without hitches. Most terrorist will immigrate to the U.S posing as investors or students, and not commonly as job seekers. Thus, more policy measures should be reinstated in relation to this approach.
Tarrow, Sidney. “Transnational Politics: Contention and Institutions in International Politics.” Annual Review of Political Science, 2001.4.
“Realism emphasizes the constraints on politics imposed by human nature and the absence of international government. Together, they make international relations largely a realm of power and interest” (Donnelly 2000, 9). This concentration on power and lack of international government puts the focus on the States and their relation to each other. This is often summed up as the three Ss: Statism, Survival, and Self-Help (Lamy, et al. 2011, 66-67). States are considered the primary and only real players in the global arena and in International Relations themselves. It is assumed that these states will act only on their best interests and to perpetuate their own survival. Very few if any domestic issues actually impact the global level of international politics based on this theory. As Peter J. Katzenstein is quoted, for Realists, “culture and identity are, at best, derivative of the distribution of capabilities and have no independent explanatory power” (van Ham 2010, 46). Instead the global system structure is considered the prime and nearly only force that determines the state of politics and the actions available.
In conclusion, Realism is able to explain the outcomes, actual and hypothetical, of NK policies, since its common assumption matches the centrality of the nuclear issue to the agenda of the country. In addition to that, Neoclassical Realism also provides a valuable explanation for some of the nation more relevant foreign policy patterns of behavior.
John Baylis, S. S. (2011). The Globalisation of World Politics; An Introduction to international relations (Fifth ed.). Oxford.
Rourke, John T, and Mark A Boyer. 2010. International Politics on the World Stage. 8th ed. Boston: McGraw-Hill Higher Education
“In the place where idealism and realism meet, that is where there is the greatest evolutionary tension.” Idealism prioritizes ideals, social reforms and morals, by wanting to benefit not just yourself, but the world around you, believing people are generally good. On the contrary, realism gives priority to national interest and security with emphasis on promoting one’s own power and influence by assuming that people are egocentric by nature. Based on the definitions stated above, idealism and realism are significantly different from each other and their divergence of thought is more apparent when various proponents of each such as Woodrow Wilson, Henry Lodge, Barack Obama and George W. Bush have varied outlooks on comparable issues in politics. Subsequently, an idealist’s reaction to a particular issue would be a lot different than a realist’s response. Therefore, idealism deals with normative ideas and allows for improvements in the progress of not only a single state, but the whole world, however realism solely focuses on the benefits of one’s own nation.
National security undeniably has a preponderant place in the political, economical and military agenda of each state. Therefore, the state has a paramount responsibility in the contexts of its own domestic and transnational security. Whatever may be the way the state adopts in order to protect itself and its citizens, it needs to be accord with an international system. In this sense the state tends to follow a specific model in terms of international relations. Focuses in the case of western societies in general, and more specifically the United States as the iconic model of the western world, states tend to favour a realist perspective in terms of national security. Albeit, what is exactly the realism theory in the national security field? According to Glaser the realist view proposes the achievement of most high standard quality of national security focused on the acquisition of superior grades of power among the relative states sparking the idea of the presence of an anarchical international system .
To prevent tragedies like 9/11 from taking its toll on the United States, terrorism needs to be thought about still to this day. One quote that proves this point is, “ In 2001, the federal commission warned that terrorists could get weapons that can cause mass destruction. Congress needs to work on the integrated governmental structures to better the nation's security” (Augustine). The nation's security can help with the destruction of weapons that are dangerous to the U.S. This can cause more attacks like 9/11 and create a larger threat to the population. Another quote that shows this is, “Preventing further attacks required the U.S. to drop its law-enforcement approach to terrorism and recognize that we were at war” (9/11). To stop attacks like 9/11 from occurring, people need to see that the U.S. isn’t only under attack, but at war as well with the terrorists. Slowly, the country and its citizens are coming realizing this. The counterclaim for this argument is, “The work of public officials allowed us to ask if the country overreacted to 9/11. Providing counter terrorism has increased costs more than what was to be expected” (9/11). The oppone...
Baylis, Smith and Patricia Owens. 2014. The globalization of World Politics: An introduction to international relations. London. Oxford University Press.
On September 11, 2001, the destruction of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon changed the mindset and the opinion of nearly every American on the one of the most vital issues in the 21st century: terrorism (Hoffman 2). Before one can begin to analyze how the United States should combat such a perverse method of political change, one must first begin to understand what terrorism is, where it is derived from, and why there is terrorism. These issues are essential in America’s analysis of this phenomenon that has revolutionized its foreign policy and changed America’s stance in the world.