The War of Americans

Over the contour of the last half-century the U. S. has enjoyed unprecedented power in every aspect whether it be politically, scotchally, militarily, or by every other means. In its dominance of domain of a function politics since WWII, the U. S. has been fitting to cast its influence around the globe. However, the U. S. experienced a gradual decline in its sovereignty over the course of this age as well. A prime example was in 1973 when OPEC raised fossil oil prices drastically over the course of the next two years.OPECs readiness to increase at will the military man price of its precious harvest-feast highlighted the industrial knowledge bases dep turn backence on foreign sources of energy. (Keylor, p. 346) creation a sovereign landed estate requires not being subject to outdoor(a) forces, being able to conduct an independent foreign policy, and being able to control events within your own borders. Today, U. S. sovereignty continues to decline for a way out of reason s. The only question is whether it is healthy or harmful for the U. S. to do so. The early reason why U. S. sovereignty is declining is due to what is known as interdependence. This phenomenon develop after WWII with the creation of the UN, GATT, the IMF and other much(prenominal) intergovernmental organizations.All of these served to create linkages mingled with the major nations of the world in the postwar era. Membership in such organizations makes the U. S. subject to supranational law. Rosecrances identification of the trading state signifies the slip away from geopolitical influence and towards a global economy. Both the roles of international trade and foreign investment have increasingly become a greater element of U. S. scotch importance. Additionally, the tying together of economies from around the world has lead to an increase in economic warfare.The increased use of economic sanctions and other such measures can be contributed to their perceived effectiveness in o btaining foreign policy goals. The U. S. integration into the world economy leaves it susceptible to the economic decisions of its trading partners and providers of raw materials. Reliance on import and export goods is an ingrained part of the U. S. economy. This can be seen in every day life. effective think roughly how much gas prices have increased latterly as the result of a few nations restricting their oil supplies in order to raise prices.While the countries responsible for this could all be right away defeated by the U. S. in war, the U. S. is powerless to combat their practices. Aside from its drive in the world market, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction also serves to limit the sovereignty of the U. S. First off, new nuclear powers, which would likely include a issue of aggressive authoritarian states, will lack the resources to manage the elaborate educational activity and control capabilities required. yet if hostile countries somehow catch up in an arms race, their military organizations and cultures are irrelevantly to catch up in the competence race for management, technology assimilation, and combat command skills. (Betts, p. 29) In growth to proliferation of nuclear weapons, there is also wide concern among U. S. leaders about the spread and development of biological weapons. The rise of religious nationalism and anti-U. S. sentiments in nations such as Iraq give cause for concern to the U. S. that an assault victimisation biological weapons is possible. One simple fact should worry Americans more than about biological than about nuclear or chemical arms unlike either of the other two, biological weapons combine maximum destructiveness and easy availability. (Betts, p. 32)Even more threatening to U. S. sovereignty is the treat of terrorist attack to our nations soil. The proliferation of the aforementioned weapons is worrisome to U. S. officials that a horrendous nuclear of biological terrorist attack is feasible. The possibility of such and attack places a serious hindrance on the U. S. ability to protect its citizens within its borders. Conspirators of such an attack could be base within the U. S. or abroad, which makes it increasingly difficult to guard against. Additionally, it is impossible to reject such a course of action.When a nation is attacked, the government fuck the attack is readily identified and a counterattack can be under drawn. However, when it is unknown as to who is behind the attack, it makes it impossible to deter it from occurring since retaliation requires acquaintance of who has launched an attack and the address at which they reside. (Betts, p. 34) Such concerns have increased since the end of the Cold War as there is widespread doubt environ the degree of control Russia used in disposing of their nuclear weapons.The information variation also poses a serious threat to U. S. overeignty. The increasing opportunities for interaction through technological advan ces in communications and transportation make information more readily accessible. The strong reliance on the behalf of the U. S. on information basis makes it vulnerable to attack. (Wriston, p. 179) The smallest nation, terrorist group, or drug cartel could hire a estimator programmer to plant a Trojan horse virus in software, take down a vital network, or cause a missile to misfire The United States increasing reliance on monolithic networks may make it more, not less vulnerable. (Wriston, p. 80)As with the problem of an gird terrorist attack, it is extremely difficult to determine who is responsible for a break-in of a private, supposedly secure, U. S. government web page. Fortunately, we have not yet witnessed any such form of information warfare however, imagining the form it might take and protecting against it has become the preoccupation of a presidential commission and numerous task forces. (Wriston, p. 179) Despite the erosion of U. S. sovereignty, it is still by far t he approximately powerful nation in the world today.I for one would delicious the erosion of U. S. overeignty since it furthers interdependence in world politics and serves to perpetuate world peace. The greater the economies of the world are intertwined, the less likely it is that a nation will go to war with another that it is linked to by a web of transnational relationships. It may also be in the dress hat interests of the U. S. to lose some of its sovereignty since the world is moving towards civilizational entities (Western, African, Islamic, etc. ) as identified by Samuel Huntington. (Huntington) If he is correct in his prediction, then the U. S. is remediate off belonging to one of these civilizations rather than standing alone.