TheEconomistApril 4th 2020 671T
heunitedstates, AndrewBacevich
writesnearthestartofhisaccountof
post-cold-war America, is like the man
whowontheMegaMillionslottery:hisun-
imaginedwindfallholdsthepotentialfor
disaster.Thingsarenotquitethatbad.But
almost three decades after America
watchedtheSovietUnionfallapart,victory
feelslikea disappointment.
The end of the cold war established
Americaasthemostpowerfulcountryin
history. Its armed forces were unmatched
and its governing philosophy seemingly
had no rival. Yet it has struggled either to
prevail against illiterate tribesmen and tin-
pot dictators or to get to grips with a newly
assertive Russia and a rising China. In a
pandemic its allies might have expected
America to co-ordinate a planet-wide re-
sponse. Instead, it has turned inward. Just
as startlingly, America itself fell prey to bit-
terness and division, culminating in the
presidency of a man who won office by re-
jecting many of the values which had
helped bring about that original victory.
This is the sombre backdrop for three
very different books about America’s place
in the world. Joseph Nye, a former dean of
the Kennedy School at Harvard, looks at
howpresidentshavestruggledtoembody
their country’s moral leadership. Michael
Kimmage, a fellow at the German Marshall
Fund, teases out the contradictions in the
idea of an American-led “West”. And Mr Ba-
cevich, a professor emeritus at Boston Uni-
versity, depicts the construction (and then,
he argues, the demolition) of a post-cold-
war doctrine of American power.
None of these books is the last word on
an important question. But each offers tan-
talising insights into how victory soured.The worried West
Before getting to the moral conduct of each
president, starting with Franklin D. Roose-
velt, Mr Nye takes on the argument of his
book’s title: “Do Morals Matter?” His target
is foreign-policy “realists” who claim that,howeverthey dress itup, countries are
amoralandputtheirown interests first.
MrNyeissurelyright to counter that
most American leaders have contrasted
themselves to cynical, balance-of-power
Europeans.HequotesTheodore Roosevelt:
“Ourchiefusefulnesstohumanity rests on
combiningpowerwithhigh purpose.” Mr
Nye—athinkerwhointhe 1980s formulat-
edthedoctrineofsoftpower—is also right
tostressthatthishighpurpose is itself a vi-
talcomponentofAmerican influence. The
internationalordertheUnited States con-
structed depends on legitimacy, he ex-
plains,andlegitimacydepends on values.
Everypresidenthashad his blemishes,
ofcourse.MrNyehasseen too much of the
worldtohaveillusionsabout that. But—
andhereyoususpectisthe real purpose of
thisbook—nonehasabandoned the rheto-
ricorthepracticeofright and wrong in for-
eign policy quite as shamelessly as Presi-
dent Donald Trump. No president has so
enthusiastically embraced both autocrats
and the Hobbesian idea that might is right.
Only Mr Trump and his officials have
sought to dismantle the international or-
der that his predecessors built and main-
tained, but which the Trump White House
sees as “Gulliverising” America.
Mr Nye takes the underpinnings of
America’s moral leadership as read. Not so
Mr Kimmage. For him the West is not a
place, so much as a set of ideas articulated
at the end of the 19th century in America as
it prepared to take on the mantle of a great
power. At its best, the West has stood for
capitalism, science, the Enlightenment,
the rule of law and human rights, all ofGeopolitics
Thevictor’scurse
Americawonthecoldwar.Whatwentwrong?
Do Morals Matter?By Joseph Nye. Oxford
University Press; 268 pages; $24.95 and
£18.99
The Abandonment of the West.By
Michael Kimmage. Basic Books; 368 pages;
$32 and £25
The Age of Illusions.By Andrew Bacevich.
Metropolitan Books; 239 pages; $27Books & arts
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