The Essentials of an America First Foreign Policy

The Essentials of an America First Foreign Policy
by Ryan Setliff

America First!—should be the rallying cry behind an American foreign policy tailored to serve our vital national interests through strategic independence and armed neutrality. Speaking on the Old Right position on foreign affairs, Joseph Scotchie notes, "A post-Cold War foreign policy that combines a strong national defense and a nation free of such globalist organizations as the United Nations, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Trade Organization has been a good enough model for the Old Right." ¹ In relations with other nations, the Old Right is apt to question the logic of globalism and globalization, and affirms skepticism of interventionism abroad. Though, the Old Right's principled position is sometimes denigrated as isolationism by detractors, the Old Right readily concedes that "isolationism" is not the historic foreign policy of the United States. Nonetheless, a foreign policy geniunely tailored to serve the national interest eschews foreign entanglements, alliances and security commitments and reckless intervention abroad.

Patrick Buchanan warned in 1999 in his book Republic, Not An Empire that perilous consequences could follow the course of United States' interventionist foreign policy, which aggravated and kindled the flames of resentment at our nation:

The United States has unthinkingly embarked upon a neo-imperial policy that must involve us in virtually every great war of the coming century—and wars the death of republics... if we continue on this course of reflexive interventions, enemies will one day answer our power with the weapon of the weak—terror, and eventually cataclysmic terrorism on U.S. soil... then liberty, the cause of the republic, will itself be in peril.

This statement proved prescient in light of the tragic terror attacks of September 11, 2001, and while no one amongst the Old Right finds any legitimacy to the claims of those heinous terrorists; it should go without saying that their grievances point to opposition to an interventionist U.S. foreign policy, such as the U.S. stationing troops in Saudi Arabia.

As Ron Paul surmised the lessons from the 1983 Beirut bombing of the Marine base, he noted, "Ronald Reagan, when he sent the troops in, said he would never turn tail and run. Then, after the Marines were killed, he had a reassessment of the policy." It warrants quoting Ronald Reagan to surmise this reassessment, because it says a lot about the perils of interventionism. Reagan declared:

Perhaps we didn't appreciate fully enough the depth of the hatred and the complexity of the problems that made the Middle East such a jungle. Perhaps the idea of a suicide car bomber committing mass murder to gain instant entry to Paradise was so foreign to our own values and consciousness that it did not create in us the concern for the Marines' safety that it should have. In the weeks immediately after the bombing, I believed the last thing that we should do was turn tail and leave. Yet the irrationality of Middle Eastern politics forced us to rethink our policy there. If there would be some rethinking of policy before our men die, we would be a lot better off. If that policy had changed towards more of a neutral position and neutrality, those 241 Marines would be alive today.

Reagan was more realistic. We Americans can conciliate ourselves ourselves to the notion that terrorists are entirely irrational actors and simply hate freedom, but it does not eliminate the problems attendant to interventionism. What America needs is a foreign policy that does not engage the radical Islamic world, but isolates it. But if we live under the notion that we can uproot an abstraction like terror, and our policymakers constantly stir up the hornet's nest, we should not act surprised when we get stung.

Of the nature of the foreign policy in the Old Republic, Joseph Scotchie proclaims:

Republics mind their own business. Their governments have very limited powers, and their people are too busy practicing self-government to worry about problems in other countries. Empires not only bully smaller, defenseless nations, they also can’t leave their own, hapless subjects alone... Empires and small government aren’t compatible, either. ²

Historian Clyde Wilson makes a similar observation:

A republic goes to war to defend itself and its vital interests, including possibly its honour. Empires go to war because going to war is one of things irresponsible rulers do. The point of reference for a republic is its own well-being. An empire has no point of reference except expansion of its authority. Its foreign policy will be abstract, and will reflect on the vagaries of mind of the rulers, who might, for instance, proclaim that it is their subjects’ duty to establish a New World Order, whatever the cost to their own blood and treasure. Who can doubt that once-proud republican Union of the states is now an empire? ³

The Old Right coalition, recognizes from historical experience that the state that is interventionist and aggressive abroad will assuredly be interventionist and aggressive at home. As Nebraska Republican Congressman Howard Buffet said, "Our Christian ideals cannot be exported to other lands by dollars and guns. Persuasion and example are the methods taught by the Carpenter of Nazareth... We cannot practice might and force abroad and retain freedom at home. We cannot talk world cooperation and practice power politics." ⁴ The Old Right position is sharply contrasted against the neoconservative, New Deal liberal, and Wilsonian idealist persuassion. The Old Right generally stands aghast at the prospect of open borders immigration policy and the lack of enforcement against undocumented immigrants in the United States. Rampant illegal immigration foments social strife, crime, and makes America's security vulnerable.

Affirming the wisdom of America's Founding Fathers

The most salient case for the Old Right foreign policy preference for armed neutrality and non-interventionism is found in the wisdom of America's founding fathers. George Washington had declared, "It is our true policy to steer clear of entangling alliances with any portion of the foreign world." The Jeffersonian maxim was "[p]eace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none." Madison's warning in particular bears repeating:

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceeds debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few... No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.

James Madison wrote Jefferson on May 13, 1798, proclaiming, "Perhaps it is a universal truth that the loss of Liberty at home is to be charged to provision against danger, real or pretended, from abroad." John Quincy Adams avowed, "[America] goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own." The founding generation would undoubtedly object to the United States' contemporary proclivity for foreign meddling, intervention overseas and quixotic crusading in the name of democracy. In 2002, conservative statesman Patrick J. Buchanan could encapsulate the founding fathers' wisdom in this statement:

True patriotism is love of country for inexpressible reasons, simply for who and what she is. Young America was a weak country, but she was worth loving, worth defending, worth preserving, even at the cost of one's life, even then, because she was our country. U.S. foreign policy should, as it did for most of American history, reflect this truth and be shaped with one great purpose in mind: to preserve and protect America, and to hell with empire. ⁵

Opposition to the Messianic Humanitarianism of U.S. Foreign Policy

In America the Virtuous, Claes Ryn complains that American interventionism follows a "new Jacobinism." Contemporary American expositors of foreign policy have an uncanny penchant for discarding realism in favor of a messianic Wilsonian idealism, a Prussian obsession with national security, and mindless rhetoric about "world democratic revolution." As T.H. Pickett observes, this has given rise to an absurd enthusiasm for reckless interventionism abroad much to the detriment of liberty on the homefront. In turn, this idealism yields to nihilism:

The wartime establishment of a moralizing dichotomy between Americans and their opponents deeply affects the popular mind far beyond the temporal limits of the war itself, though its effect upon the leadership during the war is devastating as well. The hysteria bred finally constricts leadership freedom to manage the war as a series of defined and limited political acts. Insofar as the opponents are made to seem archvillains inaccessible to human emotion or reason, it becomes impossible to seek any reasonable settlement with them. The pursuant radicalization leads, therefore, to a rejection of any measured policy. The war aim becomes simply to annihilate the enemy. The war becomes a war of attrition, a merciless slaughter in which neither combatant nor civilian is spared. ⁶

The neo-Jacobin radicalism of neocon foreign policy tinkerers is well encapsulated in the words of Michael Ledeen, "Creative destruction is our middle name, both within our society and abroad. We tear down the old order every day... Our enemies have always hated this whirlwind of energy and creativity, which menaces their traditions... [We] must destroy them to advance our historic mission." ⁷ This neocon proclivity for warmongering is sharply contrasting with the position of Ronald Reagan, who avowed, "The defense policy of the United States is based on a simple premise: The United States does not start fights. We will never be an aggressor." ⁸

At its core, nation-building is a sham. History teaches that the Western institutions of ordered liberty are fragile, and a culmination of centuries of cultural development. Democracy or republican self-government thus is not some tangible commodity that can be boxed up, and readily exported and duplicated abroad. The true conservative position recognizes the failures of an activist, interventionist foreign policy and nation-building. Bruce Frohnen acquiesces on this point, noting:

[T]he constitutional freedoms of ordered liberty that have grown from the Western culture and religion, are not easily transferred to other societies. This means that conservatives, unliked their neoconservative allies, are loath to become greatly involved, particularly at the level of state action, with other cultures. While the saving of souls and the undertaking of charitable acts are worthy endeavors, to attempt to simply transplant Western political and cultural institutions abroad, in the conservative vision, is prideful and wrongheaded. Thus, while defending families, local associations, private property, and free markets may be conservative, attempting to export a particular version or combination of these natural goods may disrupt or even destroy a society and, by disturbing people's time-rested expectations, the exporter does evil where he should do good. It is essential to a the conservative temperament that, in poilitcs as medicine, one should first do no harm. ⁹

An End to Foreign Aid

One of the chief reasons for opposition to foreign aid is it's unconstitutionality. Secondarily, it has proven itself wholly ineffective. Both the United States and the United Nations (funded by our tax dollars) has propped up hundreds of kleptocrat, socialistic regimes that plunder their own people blind while impeding capital formation and the ordinary operation of stable market economies.

A July 4, 2005 interview with a Kenyan economist in the German newspaper Spiegel offered a hard-hitting dose of reality that the world needs to hear about foreign aid to Africa. Foreign aid and socialism in Africa, reinforced by naive Western powers and the United Nations, is at the root of Africa's social and economic problems. It held true in the 1970s. And it holds true in the twenty-first century. Intervention via foreign aid saps the quality of public policies instituted amongst the various recipient nations, and it further saps market vitality by creating bigger governments that are not sustainable from local tax base alone. In turn this, props up despots and dictators, who create a spoils system to dispense the foreign aid benefits, while impeding the market economy. In 2005, the Kenyan economics expert James Shikwati says that foreign aid to Africa does more harm than good, declaring, "For God's sake, please just stop." He elaborated,

Such intentions have been damaging our continent for the past 40 years. If the industrial nations really want to help the Africans, they should finally terminate this awful aid. The countries that have collected the most development aid are also the ones that are in the worst shape. Despite the billions that have poured in to Africa, the continent remains poor. ¹⁰

Spiegel then queried, "Do you have an explanation for this paradox?" Shikwati retorted,

Huge bureaucracies are financed (with the aid money), corruption and complacency are promoted, Africans are taught to be beggars and not to be independent. In addition, development aid weakens the local markets everywhere and dampens the spirit of entrepreneurship that we so desperately need. As absurd as it may sound: Development aid is one of the reasons for Africa's problems. If the West were to cancel these payments, normal Africans wouldn't even notice. Only the functionaries would be hard hit. Which is why they maintain that the world would stop turning without this development aid. ¹¹

Spiegel then queried, "Even in a country like Kenya, people are starving to death each year. Someone has got to help them." Shikwati declared,

But it has to be the Kenyans themselves who help these people. When there's a drought in a region of Kenya, our corrupt politicians reflexively cry out for more help... It's only natural that they willingly accept the plea for more help... before long, several thousands tons of corn are shipped to Africa ...and at some point, this corn ends up in the harbor of Mombasa. A portion of the corn often goes directly into the hands of unscrupulous politicians who then pass it on to their own tribe to boost their next election campaign. Another portion of the shipment ends up on the black market where the corn is dumped at extremely low prices. Local farmers may as well put down their hoes right away; no one can compete with the UN's World Food Program. And because the farmers go under in the face of this pressure, Kenya would have no reserves to draw on if there actually were a famine next year. It's a simple but fatal cycle. ¹²

The words of a native African economist says more than any American or European could on the subject. Foreign aid to the Third World represents a tyranny of good intentions. The Third World has become so dependent upon state-subsidized agricultural surpluses of Western nations that their subsistence economies find little need for productivity. These nations, in turn, stagnate in corruption, idleness, and poverty.