Supporters of Ukraine release a dove, a symbol of peace, during a protest in front of the White House in Washington, April 9, 2022. Aid for Ukraine is at risk if an isolationist Republican wins the presidency in 2024.KENNY HOLSTON/The New York Times News Service
Joseph S. Nye Jr. is a professor at Harvard University and a former U.S. Assistant Secretary of defence, and the author of Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy from FDR to Trump.
The first debate between the Republican Party’s candidates for next year’s United States presidential election revealed major schisms over foreign policy. While former U.S. vice-president Mike Pence and former UN ambassador Nikki Haley defended America’s support for Ukraine in Russia’s war of aggression, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy expressed skepticism. Former president Donald Trump skipped the event, but he, too, has objected to U.S. involvement in that conflict.
Polls show that rank-and-file Republicans are as divided as the candidates. That raises concerns that if an isolationist Republican wins the presidency in 2024, it could mark a turning point for the U.S.-dominated international order established at the end of the Second World War.
Historically, American public opinion has oscillated between extroversion and retrenchment. Having witnessed the tragic consequences of the isolationism of the 1930s, president Franklin D. Roosevelt launched the process that culminated in the creation of the United Nations in 1945. President Harry Truman’s postwar decisions then led to permanent alliances and an ongoing U.S. military presence abroad. The U.S. invested heavily in European reconstruction through the Marshall Plan in 1948, created NATO in 1949, and led the coalition that fought in Korea in 1950.
These actions were part of a realist strategy to contain Soviet power. But containment was interpreted in various ways, and Americans later had bitter, often partisan debates over interventions in developing countries like Vietnam and Iraq. Still, while the ethics of intervention were called into question, the value of sustaining a liberal institutional order was much less controversial.
Ukraine aid faces a stress test as some GOP 2024 presidential candidates balk at continued support
The liberal international order enjoyed broad support in U.S. foreign-policy circles for decades after the Second World War. But in the 2016 presidential election, Mr. Trump’s argument that the post-1945 alliances and institutions had benefited others at America’s expense resonated strongly with many voters. To be sure, his populist appeal rested on more than an attack on U.S. foreign policy. He also tapped into widespread anger over the economic dislocations caused by globalization and the Great Recession, and exploited polarizing cultural changes related to race, the role of women, and gender identity. But by blaming economic problems on “bad trade deals” and immigration, Mr. Trump successfully linked nativist resentment to U.S. foreign policy.
Of course, Mr. Trump is not the first to apply this formula. More than 15 million immigrants had come to the U.S. during the first two decades of the 20th century. In the early 1920s, a resurgent Ku Klux Klan helped push through the National Origins Act to “prevent the Nordic race from being swamped.” Similarly, Mr. Trump’s election in 2016 reflected, rather than caused, deep racial, ideological, and cultural rifts that had been developing since the 1960s. Some believe that Mr. Trump’s rise was caused by the failure of liberal elites to reflect the underlying preferences of the American people. But that is facile. Of course, there are many strands of American public opinion, but we do have a good sense of where the public has stood over time.
Since 1974, the Chicago Council on Global Affairs has surveyed Americans on whether it is better to play an active global role or to stay out of world affairs. Over that period, roughly one-third of the public has been consistently isolationist; that number reached 41 per cent in 2014. But 64 per cent of Americans said they favoured active involvement in world affairs in 2016, and that number rose to 70 per cent in 2018 – the highest recorded level since 2002.
Many analysts still worry that a failure to support Ukraine could signal a return to American retrenchment, auguring a serious weakening of the international order. If Russia prevails in occupying Ukrainian territory, it will have undercut the liberal principle prohibiting the use of force to alter a country’s borders. The solidarity among NATO countries in supporting Ukraine is thus not only moral, but also practical and realistic.
The outcome in Ukraine will have serious implications for the future of Europe and the wider world. Although Mr. Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping entered a “no-limits” partnership just before the invasion, Chinese leaders are doubtless concerned about Mr. Putin’s risk-taking and worried that the alliance is proving too costly. If Mr. Putin prevails, however, China may conclude that taking such risks pays off – a lesson that will not have been lost on the rest of the world, either.
Those arguing that America does not have an important national interest in helping Ukraine are wearing historical blinders. Their naiveté (if not bad faith) should disqualify them from seeking the presidency.
Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2023. www.project-syndicate.org