Hall Gardner, American Global Strategy and the “War on Terrorism” (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2005), 231 p.  

Fatih BALCI, University of Utah

&

Arif AKGUL, Washington State University 

      Gardner’s book, American Global Strategy and the “War on Terrorism”, addresses a wide range of themes which are mostly based on the post September 11, 2001 crisis and American influence on the world global security. Gardner sees America at this point as the mythological half-man half-god character Hercules. The book criticizes the global events related with wrong readings of the events from the beginning of their roots. The author draws the “danger zones” as the results of these wrong readings. The role of neo-conservatives in the role of post September 11, and the policy of “war on terrorism” are criticized in the book. The author brings a new point of view to Fukuyama’s “end of history” thesis and Huntington’s “clash of civilizations” thesis. In this book, Gardner analyzes the nature of American domestic and international policymaking in the context of historical and structural constraints upon US policy. The book contends that US strategy needs to shift gears and work more diligently to minimize the risks of even wider regional conflicts, possibly involving major powers, through engaging in truly multilateral strategies and through 'strengthening' the United Nations (UN).

      Gardner explains his ideas in the eight chapters. In the first chapter, Gardner examines the new U.S. strategy to the war on terrorism after September 11. The Bush administration decided to invade Iraq regardless of whether the country was in possession of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), because of the assumption by the Bush administration that Iraq will eventually seek revenge for the defeat suffered in the 1990-91 Persian Gulf War. President Bush’s advisor mentioned on a television program that the policy of Bush administration was based on the invasion: “The USA could not find WMD in Iraq, but we knew that there were in Iraq”. United Nation’s American ambassador also said in a conference about the American invasion of Iraq that, “Nobody waits that we could believe Saddam, we could not”. So, all these declarations show that the invasion was already decided just after 9/11, but it happened later under some other causes.

      State strategies can change for the conditions, and American foreign policy on Middle East is the best example of this truth. The American position during the Afghanistan-Russia conflict was totally different than later regarding the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. The same people began to be called “terrorists”, while earlier they were calling them “freedom fighters”. The author explains this problem with the definition of terrorism. Actually, he mentions that a lack of an exact definition of terrorism causes this problem. There are more than one hundred definitions of terrorism, so in this complex situation. Without clarifying the exact definition of terror, it will be too hard to fight, because it can not be known for what or to what will it be fought.

      The Bush administration’s neo-conservatives contented that US military intervention, followed by ‘regime change’ in Iraq, would also initiate a process of democratization throughout the entire Middle East/Persian Gulf region. The Bush administration’s 2003-04 “Greater Middle East Initiative” claimed accordingly that its goal was to set the stage for the “democratic” reform of the entire region (p.21). However, the flaw of this argument is that democracy needs a long way to achieve it and it is difficult to adopt democracy while invading the states or providing free elections. The West has reached democratic system in more than one hundred years. As Joe Klein’s argument democracy does not mean just a purple finger¹.

      The author describes the origins of the new American interventionism and neo-conservatism in the second chapter. The author explains these policies as a reaction to a certain liberal and radical school of thought. Post-cold war era, American foreign policy divided in two: (1) Multilateralists, (2) Neo-conservatives.

      The author mostly focuses on neo-conservative ideology and neo-conservatives. Their ideology is global democratization and it can be reached with only three ways:

1- War on terrorism, 2- Eliminate WMD, 3- Democratization (p.27). Paul Nitze expresses the main purpose of neo-conservatives with his saying about cold war and Soviet Union. He says: “The purpose of the Cold War is not to break up the Soviet Union, but rather to democratize it and withdraw from Eastern Europe” (p.32). For neo-conservatives, there is one standard for democracies and one for the rest, except when the rest are one’s allies. Neo-conservatives accept the intervention to the evil states as pre-emptive rather than preventive. The Israeli attack on Iraqi Osirak nuclear reactor in 1981 and US military intervention in Iraq 2003 are pre-emptive in the sense of future Iraqi threat according to Richard Perle (p.36).

      Gardner draws the picture of neo-conservatives as their key thesis:

In many ways the historical debate between the power of the federal government and “state rights” within the USA itself, a debate that was at the roots of the US Civil War, in which Southern states used the concept of “states rights” to protect an agrarian economy and institution of slavery, is now being played out on a global scale with American Government challenging the traditional concepts of “state sovereignty” in a new wave of overseas imperialism- in the name of “global democratization” (p.43). 

      The author also deals with the political-ethical dilemma of a dilated war on terrorism, identifying four kinds of terrorism: (1) anti-state terrorism, (2) state-sponsored terrorism, (3) totalitarian terrorism and (4) street terrorism.

      The author examines the difficulties of dealing with terrorism because of several reasons. First, there is no exact definition of terrorism to conduct with it in global ways. Second, the declaration of “every terrorist group of global reach” and from the beginning of this point continues on “war on terrorism”. From this perspective, “war on terrorism” can be easily “war without end”. Third, the difficulties to separate the criminals and the terrorists. Fourth, terrorists’ policy has changed from “hit and run” to “hit but not run”. Fifth is the acceptance of some terrorists as heroes. The last, and most important, is that the terrorists believe that one time they will be understood and accepted by the world. For example, some people (Nelson Mandela, Yassir Arafat, Menachem Begin) got Nobel Peace Prize laureates while they were considered terrorists at one point in their careers.

      Dealing with terrorism is difficult without international cooperation. Before this cooperation, it is necessary to define “terrorism”. Otherwise, some states see terrorists as “freedom fighters”, while some others see as “terrorists”. The best example is US-Europe’s standing for Chechen fighters against Russia and Russia President Putin’s response to those two. Putin wanted from the USA and the European countries to accept Chechens as terrorists and they did not accept as their own definition of terrorism. Putin then gave advice to the others for dealing with Al-Qaide saying: “Why do not you meet Osama bin Laden, invite him to Brussels or to the White House, and engage in talks - ask him what he wants and give it to him so he leaves you in peace” (p.76).

      The fourth chapter describes US efforts to stop nuclear proliferation, studying current global and regional crisis, European, Russian and US policies and presenting some policy options, such as “regime recognition” in the case of Korea and Iran. The author generally explains the global security and balance of power on the bases of nuclear power and oil. American and Indian agreement on open Indian nuclear studies in March 2006 is a perfect example for American foreign policy on global security related with nuclear power. The American and Indian close relationship can affect the policies of the other countries in that region. The book also examines the historical relationship among the states for global security.

      Pakistan attempts to manipulate US policy. Pakistan’s position in the region during the Afghan-Soviet War and American invasion of Iraq is handles and the USA has been attempting to counter-balance a number of often conflicting policy and strategic objectives. Does the current policy help the current conditions on the region? I do not think so. The protests of President Bush during his trip to the region give the answer.

      Gardner analyzes the US strategy of military expansion. The USA has begun to expand its military forces in Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, Central Asia, Northern Africa and the Horn of Africa, as well as the Far East and Persian Gulf. America has found some economic and military allies in some other challenge states. For example, American-Indian relationship may have an important point to control the activities of China.

      The author also mentions that US invension of Iraq may cause to bring the Muslims under the ummah umbrella as it was in Ottoman Empire, but this time the conditions are different. As it is seen in Iraq, the Muslim people are also fighting each other, Shiites and Sunnis. These branches among Muslims do not allow for the pan-Islamism idea, even though there should not be any intervention outside like the case of Hamas in Palestine. The Muslim and Arab states decided to help Hamas, while nearly all Western countries decided to end up their supports to Palestine.

      The author draws a picture for the key pivot states of future, which are Turkey, Ukraine and the People’s Republic of China. Their conditions and changeable allies will play key roles in the global issues.

      On the other hand, the author handles an important issue on the new global concert and compares the US and European concepts of democracy hoping that a confederal world democracy can be created also through a radical restructuring of the UN Security Council. He criticizes Huntington’s “clash of civilization”, and mentions the problems among the democracies with using “clash of democracies”. Huntington’s argument is that there is the “West” and the “rest”. He assumes that Americans and Europeans would remain aligned, based on the fact that both the United States and Europe belonged to the same “western civilization”. In this view, clashes between peoples were supposed to take place mainly between different civilizations, and not within them. However, Gardner criticizes this argument with his example of different understandings of democracy between United States and Europe. He finds Huntington’s analyses ahistorical. He looks at the American Revolution and he says that both peoples belonged to the same civilization. When it is looked at the general view, Huntington’s argument is right, and also Gardner’s argument is true from the narrowed perspective. For example, the Arab states have some problems with each other, but when there is a problem involving Muslim people generally, they can not come together and react mostly with the same way. This is generally the same for the Western states, even if they have some problems with each other.

      The author examines the “clash of democracy” as mostly two types of democracy. He divides democracy from two views, American conceptions of “liberal democracy” and European conceptions of “social democracy”. He also mentions that there are several democracies behind these: consensual democracy, national democracy, democratic communitarianism, participationary democracy and world democracy (p.162). Democracy is a political philosophy and does not have a strict definition, so it can be changeable for the demands of the applied community.

      In the last chapter, Gardner sets forth some policy options to overcome the post-Cold War imbalance and foster a "more balanced" relationship between the United States and Europe. It invites the US to formulate a "truly concerted global strategy". Democracy can not be imposed by force under the global democratization idea. Real reforms can rarely be achieved in highly politically charged conditions in which parties have become polarized (p.189).

      The September 11 terrorist attacks gave a new lease to the Bush Administration about “the new global strategy”, and the new goal is “democratic globalization”. America behaves as the mythological character Hercules but it could be more difficult to cover the mistakes with manipulation of the global media. This may need greater assistance. The question is that the world needs more energy supplies and some zones of the world have gotten more importance than they had before.  The Middle East and the Persian Gulf areas have been getting more and more importance for the energy they produce, because these days oil exports make that region more important. In the future, water may be the most important issue in the region. On these conditions, superpower states have a role to play the protection role, because the world is not the same as before the industrial revolution. Most states have upper level military capabilities and nuclear weapons. The nuclear weapons can be either “war weapons” or “peace weapons”. To control them, it is needed a global strategy to global security and America plays the main role as the only superpower, but it has some mistakes on these policies. Hall Gardner analyzes American superpower role from domestic and international policymaking within the context of historical and structural constrains upon US policy.

June 2006