How Should America Behave Internationally?

America been responsible for some great things in history, from the form of our civil governments that provide our citizens unusual levels of freedom, to feeding untold millions of people around the world. It has also been responsible for some terrible things in history, from unilaterally breaking established treaties with native American Indians to sustaining oppressive dicators in foreign countries.

Most Americans are proud and grateful to be Americans, while a few focus so intently on our misdeeds that they fail to appreciate our noble attributes. No matter what we do, some people around the world will like us, and some will not. However, we as a nation can endeavor to do the things that we can all be proud of -- things that will cause civilized people to like us, and we should do none of the things that we will be ashamed of.

What are those things? We should think about what that list should be. We should create a list, constantly reexamine and improve that list, and constantly strive to fulfill it. Here I propose an initial list, and I invite suggestions from anyone, anywhere, to post suggestions for improvements:

• Generosity. As long as America has a prosperous economy, we should continue to help feed the poor around the world, and help them develop their abilities to feed themselves.


• Military Force. Our military should protect us from invasion by other nations and from attacks by anyone. We should work with other nations to protect the innocent. We should not equate economic prosperity with national security -- as long as nations are willing to sell us oil at some price, we should not use force in other countries for the goal of acquiring oil less expensively.


• Global Stability. Peace is good, war is bad. We should promote peace wheverever we can, and avoid war except as necessary to defend ourselves and protect the innocents in other counties as we are able. Economic stability is also highly valuable to civilization, and we should continue to work with all nations to promote stable economic systems and fair trading practices.


• Leadership. America can and should provide global leadership in freedom, education, health, technology, international goals, prosperity, and conservation. This means helping all nations that would appreciate our assistance in any of these areas; It does not mean forcing them to adopt to our ways of doing things.


• Nuclear Power. We should not only approve of other nations developing nuclear power, we should help any nation to do so, as long as they refrain from developing nuclear weapons and comply with oversight requirements by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to ensure that they limit themselves to peaceful use of the technology.