How Reagan would've dealt with Georgia
When diplomacy isn't enough and force is too risky, a policy of conservative internationalism is best.
What is the right response to Russia's invasion of Georgia and the Duma's recognition this week of two breakaway enclaves within Georgia? A purely diplomatic response offers too little, and using force ratchets up the risks of wider conflict.
The question of whether diplomacy or the use of force is best to meet such foreign challenges and promote freedom is hardly new in American foreign policy. Two long-standing traditions offer some answers.
Liberal internationalism, which is identified with Woodrow Wilson, seeks to reduce the role of force by promoting peaceful diplomacy through multilateral institutions. It expects expanded trade and modernization to slowly defuse global tensions and advance freedom.
In contrast, the classical realist tradition, practiced most notably by Teddy Roosevelt, carries a big military stick, defends free countries by balancing foreign powers against each other and worries that modernization may not lessen tensions but rather strengthen adversaries that continue to oppose freedom.
The problem with both traditions is that they fail to integrate force and diplomacy.
The goals of liberal internationalism are the right ones for U.S. diplomacy, because Americans balk at using force unless it spreads freedom. Classical realism, on the other hand, is right to emphasize the use of military force. Tyrants exist, and because they use force against their people, they are more likely to retain it as a viable option in dealings with other countries.
There's a third tradition that pays more attention to combining force and diplomacy. Call it conservative internationalism. It's conservative because, like classical realism, it assigns a significant role to the use of force. It's internationalist because it seeks to spread freedom, a principal goal of liberal internationalism. Four U.S. presidents have successfully practiced conservative internationalism: Thomas Jefferson, James K. Polk, Harry Truman and Ronald Reagan.
Conservative internationalism integrates force and diplomacy by prioritizing goals. The Wilsonian goal of ending tyranny around the globe is far too ambitious, especially when it may require the use of force. Freedom advances best, with the least human cost, on the borders of existing democracies, not in distant neighborhoods where few democracies exist.
