23rd December:

In 1997, a not-for-profit organisation called “The Project for the New American Century” appeared in the US, and its stated aim was to project American power and influence across the globe. Sounds a little Third Reich-y, doesn’t it?

The organisation’s web site boldly proclaimed that it was a non-profit educational organisation dedicated to a few fundamental propositions: “that American leadership is good both for America and for the world; and that such leadership requires military strength, diplomatic energy and commitment to moral principle”. The rest of the world not being able to make decisions for itself, so it would seem.

And thus the school of neo-conservatism was born.

The organisation’s mission statement, written in 1997 and signed by such luminaries as Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, set out a belief in a foreign policy that boldly and purposefully promoted American principles abroad. Whether those pesky Johnny Foreigners liked it or not, one assumes.

As has been noted elsewhere on these pages, this grand plan to secure America’s prominent place in the 21st Century fell down in a few key areas: it assumed that the rest of the world was interested in American principles and receptive to the message. Which has proven not to be the case. Much to the befuddlement of the current administration. It also assumed that the foreign policy message itself was worth listening to. Please see above.

America’s behaviour in the foreign policy arena over the last 20 years has been less than commendable - propping up a dictator here whilst funding rebels fighting to overthrow another dictator there, whilst all the time keeping a beady eye on anywhere there might be a strategically significant drop of oil or two. At times, America has reminded your congenial host of a child who joined his school in 1982 – a child who was significantly bigger than the other kids and, as far as we could work out, not quite right upstairs. Most of us kept out of his way and he was hastily moved on to another educational establishment after beating two of his classmates to a pulp one day when they teased him about being dim. Actions speak louder than words and America’s actions have made it difficult for the rest of the world to believe that US foreign policy has been based on anything other than self-interest, and woe betide anyone who happens to get in the way.

Bush’s plummeting approval ratings and the recent election mauling seem to suggest that neo-conservatism is crawling towards its deathbed. We can only hope that is replaced with a school of political thought that values engagement over interference and imposition, and knows how to use its brain more than its brawn.

America is not the centre of the civilised world and needs to stop behaving as if it was.