The presidential race in the United States works as a sort of screening process; it helps voters figure out which candidate seems to serve their interests. In this election, Republicans and Democrats have made it a point to highlight the differences in ideology between the two parties. But on foreign policy, it seems we have an illusion of choice; our establishment frontrunners aren’t as different as we’d expect. In many respects, they’re singing the same song.
Marco Rubio has a vision for the world that can only be described as aggressive interventionism. He has self-titled his doctrine “Restoring America’s Strength,” and to justify his stance, he repeats platitudes about the United States’ weakness, painting the United States as waning in power, acquiescing to a position of subservience in the global order. The solution, therefore, is an expansion of the military, and more aggressive interventionist policies, to “reclaim” America’s glory of the past. Over the past 16 years, Presidents Bush and Obama have embarked on numerous interventionist adventures in the Middle East. What have these overseas interventions brought? Violence and discord. Intervention in Libya, which itself was a departure from the dovish Obama Doctrine, and the disaster that was the Iraq War have left the people of the Middle East less safe, and endangered the United States. “The United States,” Rubio claims, “by its presence alone, has the ability to … promote stability and enhance liberty.” So much for that.
Rubio isn’t the only hawk in this election. Across the aisle, Hillary Clinton’s record on foreign policy tells much the same story. Former Secretary Clinton’s foreign policy credentials are unrivaled in the field. And yet, despite this, her insistence on a no-fly zone over Syria is a moderated form of her history as a hawk. Clinton also voted for the Iraq War, a military action that is unrivaled in American history for its shortsightedness, mismanagement and resounding failure. The only interventionist calamity that could rival Iraq in irresponsibility is the Libyan intervention, which was supported and sold to the American people by then-Secretary Clinton. “I’ll say this for the Libyan people,” Clinton said as recently as October 2015. “I think President Obama made the right decision at the time.” If she’s already talking for the Libyan people — arrogance if I’ve ever seen it — perhaps she should mention that the country has been completely torn asunder since the intervention, and that Libya no longer even exists as a unified state. Failed states like Libya are incubators for terrorism and global unrest; and yet we’re led to believe interventionism makes us safer.
The establishment frontrunners are essentially saying the same thing; America does its best work when it intervenes. Consequently, we are left with no choice. Hawks have monopolized discussion about American self-interest, and good liberals and conservatives have fed this horrific beast by refusing to question prevailing orthodoxies. Right-wing hawks like Rubio will say: of course, we must act in our self-interest, and therefore we must intervene to benefit ourselves. But nobody questions whether intervention even serves our interests. Left-wing hawks will say: of course, acting in our self-interest is immoral, so let us intervene selflessly in order to help spread “liberal democracy,” whatever that may mean. But nobody questions whether our so-called benevolent interventions actually help the people they’re supposed to help.
Ted Cruz, Bernie Sanders and, until recently, Rand Paul have rightfully questioned the established foreign policy. Anti-establishment candidates have changed the scope of discussion on domestic policy on both sides. Yet Cruz and Paul on the right, and Sanders on the left, have failed to bring their respective hawks to accept a more nuanced and experientially based approach to foreign policy. What has resulted is an election where those who want moderate domestic policies are forced to accept a singular, monolithic, entrenched foreign policy orthodoxy that jeopardizes the United States and makes it, and the world, a more dangerous place to live.