[casi] Bush Unveils First Strike Doctrine

[SPREWELLAIEC5MI@DELETETHISaol.com]

Here we go. Nobody can catch up to the US in power because "Our forces will
be strong enough". (Hint, hint. Try to catch us, get bombed.) "Compelling"
states to go along with the war on terrorism. Ditch any idea that the Kyoto
Agreement will be agreed to by the Bush administration. No support for the
International Criminal Court. Increasing foreign aid to countries that allow
"economic freedom"...is that nothing more than a veiled code phrase for "open
your markets like the IMF says OR ELSE"? The article about this follows.
                                Andrew
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/09.21B.1st.strikes.htm
Bush Unveils Global Doctrine of First Strikes
By David E. Sanger
New York Times
Friday, 20 September, 2002
WASHINGTON, Sept. 19 -- On Friday, the Bush administration will publish its
first comprehensive rationale for shifting American military strategy toward
pre-emptive action against hostile states and terrorist groups developing
weapons of mass destruction. The strategy document will also state, for the
first time, that the United States will never allow its military supremacy to
be challenged the way it was during the cold war.
In the 33-page document, Mr. Bush also seeks to answer the critics of growing
American muscle-flexing by insisting that the United States will exploit its
military and economic power to encourage "free and open societies," rather
than seek "unilateral advantage." It calls this union of values and national
interests "a distinctly American internationalism."
The document, titled "The National Security Strategy of the United States,"
is one that every president is required to submit to Congress. It is the
first comprehensive explanation of the administration's foreign policy, from
defense strategy to global warming. A copy of the final draft was obtained by
The New York Times.
It sketches out a far more muscular and sometimes aggressive approach to
national security than any since the Reagan era. It includes the discounting
of most nonproliferation treaties in favor of a doctrine of
"counterproliferation," a reference to everything from missile defense to
forcibly dismantling weapons or their components. It declares that the
strategies of containment and deterrence -- staples of American policy since
the 1940's -- are all but dead. There is no way in this changed world, the
document states, to deter those who "hate the United States and everything
for which it stands."
"America is now threatened less by conquering states than we are by failing
ones," the document states, sounding what amounts to a death knell for many
of the key strategies of the cold war.
One of the most striking elements of the new strategy document is its
insistence "that the president has no intention of allowing any foreign power
to catch up with the huge lead the United States has opened since the fall of
the Soviet Union more than a decade ago."
"Our forces will be strong enough," Mr. Bush's document states, "to dissuade
potential adversaries from pursuing a military buildup in hopes of
surpassing, or equaling, the power of the United States." With Russia so
financially hobbled that it can no longer come close to matching American
military spending, the doctrine seemed aimed at rising powers like China,
which is expanding its conventional and nuclear forces.
Administration officials who worked on the strategy for months say it amounts
to both a maturation and an explanation of Mr. Bush's vision for the exercise
of America power after 20 months in office, integrating the military,
economic and moral levers he holds.
Much of the document focuses on how public diplomacy, the use of foreign aid,
and changes in the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank can be used
to win what it describes as a battle of competing values and ideas --
including "a battle for the future of the Muslim world."
The president put the final touches on the new strategy last weekend at Camp
David after working on it for months with his national security adviser,
Condoleezza Rice, and with other members of the national security team. In
its military hawkishness, its expressions of concern that Russian reforms
could be undermined by the country's elite, and its focus on bolstering
foreign aid -- especially for literacy training and AIDS -- it particularly
bears the stamp of Ms. Rice's thinking.
A senior White House official said Mr. Bush had edited the document heavily
"because he thought there were sections where we sounded overbearing or
arrogant." But at the same time, the official said, it is important to
foreclose the option that other nations could aspire to challenge the United
States militarily, because "once you cut off the challenge of military
competition, you open up the possibility of cooperation in a number of other
areas."
Still, the administration's critics at home and abroad will almost certainly
find ammunition in the document for their argument that Mr. Bush is only
interested in a multilateral approach as long as it does not frustrate his
will. At several points, the document states clearly that when important
American interests are at stake there will be no compromise.
The document argues that while the United States will seek allies in the
battle against terrorism, "we will not hesitate to act alone, if necessary,
to exercise our right of self-defense by acting pre-emptively." That includes
"convincing or compelling states to accept their sovereign responsibilities"
not to aid terrorists, the essence of the doctrine Mr. Bush declared on the
night of Sept. 11, 2001.
The White House delayed releasing the document this week so that its lengthy
discussion of conditions under which the United States might take unilateral,
pre-emptive action would not dominate delicate negotiations in the United
Nations or the testimony of administration officials who appeared at
Congressional hearings to discuss Iraq.
The new strategy departs significantly from the last one published by
President Clinton, at the end of 1999.
Mr. Clinton's strategy dealt at length with tactics to prevent the kind of
financial meltdowns that threatened economies in Asia and Russia. The Bush
strategy urges other nations to adopt Mr. Bush's own economic philosophy,
starting with low marginal tax rates. While Mr. Clinton's strategy relied
heavily on enforcing or amending a series of international treaties, from the
1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty to the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban
Treaty to Kyoto protocols on the environment, Mr. Bush's strategy dismisses
most of those efforts.
In fact, the new document -- which Mr. Bush told his staff had to be written
in plain English because "the boys in Lubbock ought to be able to read it" --
celebrates his decision last year to abandon the ABM treaty because it
impeded American efforts to build a missile defense system. It recites the
dangers of nonproliferation agreements that have failed to prevent Iran,
North Korea, Iraq and other countries from obtaining weapons of mass
destruction, and says that the United States will never subject its citizens
to the newly created International Criminal Court, "whose jurisdiction does
not extend to Americans."
The document makes no reference to the Kyoto accord, but sets an "overall
objective" of cutting American greenhouse gas emissions "per unit of economic
activity by 18 percent over the next 10 years." The administration says that
is a reasonable goal given its view of the current state of environmental
science. Its critics, however, point out that the objective is voluntary, and
allows enormous room for American emissions to increase as the American
economy expands.
The doctrine also describes at great length the administration's commitment
to bolstering American foreign aid by 50 percent in the next few years in "c
ountries whose governments rule justly, invest in their people and encourage
economic freedom." It insists that the programs must have "measurable
results" to assure that the money is actually going to the poor, especially
for schools, health care and clean water.

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