Foreign Policy
George Washington (1789-1797) Federalist
o 1796 Farewell Address: NEUTRALITY OF THE US
avoiding political and military alliances
cultivating trading relations with other countries
James Monroe (1817-1825) Republican today Democrat
o The Monroe Doctrine opposed European interference in Latin America
ISOLATIONISM and special mission in the world
America opposed any new colonies in the Americas NONCOLONISATION principle
European powers shouldn't involve in the affairs of New World nations
NON-INTERVENTION principle
The USA would accept the presence of the remaining European colonies in the
Americas and keep aside from European affairs NON-INTERFERENCE
principle
EXPANSIONISM
Frontiers moved further west
Early 19th century the USA tripled its territory (treaties, purchase)
MANIFEST DESTINY (by the 1840s the idea of Americas expansion to the Pacific
was being popularized as the nations Manifest Destiny) a phrase that expressed the
belief that the United States was destined to expand from the Atlantic seaboard to the
Pacific Ocean; it has also been used to advocate for or justify other territorial
acquisitions. Advocates of Manifest Destiny believed that expansion was not only
good, but that it was obvious (manifest) and certain (destiny).
Oregon fever, Mexico, Texas, the Southwest, California, most of the southern
mountain states
Territorially and economically imperialist at the end of the century (economic control
over Cuba and the right to intervene in its affairs; acquired colonies: Puerto Rico,
Guam Island and the Philippine Islands; Hawaii, Samoa and Wake Islands were
annexed)
1890 the western frontier closed
Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909) Republican
The Roosevelt Corollary the revision of the Monroe Doctrine the US was
justified in intervening in the internal affairs of Latin America nations if their
economies and politics become unstable
Woodrow Wilson (1913-1921) Democrat
The neutral pose towards the WWI reflected the traditional isolationist view of the US
electorate
Fourteen points American mission to create a new world order, Wilsons public
justification for participating in the war
All nations right to self-determination
Set of principles for governing international conduct (free trade, freedom of the
seas, global disarmament, forbidding secret alliances)
Proposal for a League of Nations
The Allies rejected all the 14 points but the League
Franklin Roosevelt (1933-1945) Democrat +
The Lend-Lease Act the president could sell, lend or lease war material to the Allies
it would be returned after the war (strong domestic opposition to open aid to the
Allies)
Pearl Harbor 7th December 1941 united the American people in their
commitment to war
Roosevelts vision of the new world order Roosevelts Four Freedoms : speech,
religion, expression, freedom from want and fear and his proposal for the UN
Yalta Conference in February 1945 Churchill and Stalin support for the UN
Harry Truman (1945 1953) Democrat
August 1945 Trumann ordered the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan: Japanese
city of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 with the nuclear weapon "Little Boy," followed
three days later by the detonation of the "Fat Man" bomb over Nagasaki
Churchill: the iron curtain
The Truman Doctrine (1947) asked in Congress for funds to fight communism
aggression in Turkey and Greece
Policy of CONTAINMENT to prevent communist expansion
Direct American involvement in international conflicts and wars
1947 the National Security Act country in the state of permanent military readiness
(National Security Council and Central Intelligence Agency)
Marshall Plan (Secretary of State) for funding the economic revival of Europe
Internationalism
1. OAS (Organization of American States in 1948)
2. NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization in1949)
Dwight Eisenhower (1953-1961) Republican
The USA would not intervene in countries within the Warsaw Pact (Truman Doctrine),
only for Western countries (e.g. in 1956 Hungary; in 1968 Czechoslovakia)
In the early 1950s Senator Joseph McCarthys hunt for Americans involved in unAmerican activities as spies of the Soviets (McCarthyism)
John Kennedy (1961-1963) - Democrat +
The Bay of Pigs Affair the Cuban Missile Crisis
Lyndon Johnson (1963-1969) Democrat
He escalated the Vietnam War, from 16,000 American soldiers in 1963 to 550,000 in
early 1968.
Richard Nixon (1969-1974) Republican resigned
In the 1970s - the dtente policy (peaceful coexistence)
Gradual reduction of nuclear arsenal
Talks with China
Watergate scandal - a 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee
headquarters at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. by members of the Richard
Nixon administration and the resulting cover-up which led to the resignation of the
President in August 1974
Gerald Ford (1974-1977)
James Carter (1977-1981) Democrat
supporting human rights in other countries, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002
Ronald Reagan (1981-1989) Republican
Mikhail Gorbachev; agreements with the Peoples Republic of China
The Iran-Contras scandal - It involved several members of the Reagan Administration
who in 1986 helped sell arms to Iran, an avowed enemy, and used the profits to fund
the Contras, an anti-communist guerrilla organization in Nicaragua.
George Bush Senior (1989-1993)
the fall of the Berlin Wall; reunification of Germanies
the Gulf War in 1991
William Clinton (1993-2001)
General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina, also
known as the Dayton Agreement, Dayton Accords, or Dayton-Paris Agreement, is
the peace agreement reached at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near
Dayton, Ohio in November 1995, and formally signed in Paris on December 14,
1995. These accords put an end to the three and a half year long war in Bosnia, one of
the armed conflicts in the former Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia.
