December 7th, 1941, “a date which will live in infamy”, was the day everything changed. With 3500 casualties, Pearl Harbor was publicly viewed as a barbaric and unprovoked act that would instill Americans with a long-lasting sense of hatred and mistrust towards foreigners. The aftermath was a widespread change in Americans’ ideologies, but this new viewpoint is one that could potentially harm the nation’s interests as a whole. The essential goal of American foreign policy is to hold the nation’s best economic interests at heart while avoiding unnecessary military conflict. The path we take to succeed on the international stage is not an obvious one, and is an important political debate. There are two major camps: isolationists and interventionists.
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Tracing its roots to the colonial period, Americans held that their perspective was different from those of their European brethren even before they were officially Americans. The colonies’ populations were mostly people who were trying to flee persecution of some sort or another. They wanted to believe that the New World was superior to the one they left behind and that they should not have to worry about Afro-Eurasian issues. Furthermore, the vastness of the Atlantic Ocean and the consequent physical distance between the two worlds played a large role in colonial …show more content…
In his Farewell Address, George Washington wrote a letter to “The People of the United States of America”, declaring that America should not be embroiled in other nations’ business.
“The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none, or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.”
In essence, it is of Washington’s belief that Europe and America have fundamentally different goals and interests. Because of the foreign nature of these interests, there is no justification for taking part, as we may only alienate or antagonize those that may otherwise be useful to be neutral with. Just two presidencies later, we ended our alliance with France in order to better adhere to these
Tracing its roots to the colonial period, Americans held that their perspective was different from those of their European brethren even before they were officially Americans. The colonies’ populations were mostly people who were trying to flee persecution of some sort or another. They wanted to believe that the New World was superior to the one they left behind and that they should not have to worry about Afro-Eurasian issues. Furthermore, the vastness of the Atlantic Ocean and the consequent physical distance between the two worlds played a large role in colonial …show more content…
In his Farewell Address, George Washington wrote a letter to “The People of the United States of America”, declaring that America should not be embroiled in other nations’ business.
“The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none, or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.”
In essence, it is of Washington’s belief that Europe and America have fundamentally different goals and interests. Because of the foreign nature of these interests, there is no justification for taking part, as we may only alienate or antagonize those that may otherwise be useful to be neutral with. Just two presidencies later, we ended our alliance with France in order to better adhere to these