United States non-interventionism
Neutrality and non-interventionism found support among elite and popular opinion in the United States, which varied depending on the international context and the country's interests.
Due to the start of the Cold War in the aftermath of World War II and the rise of the United States as a global superpower, its traditional foreign policy turned towards American imperialism with diplomatic and military interventionism, engaging or somehow intervening in virtually any overseas armed conflict ever since, and concluding multiple bilateral and regional military alliances, chiefly the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
Non-interventionist policies have had continued support from some Americans since World War II, mostly regarding specific armed conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, Syria, and Ukraine.
It rejected non-interventionism when it was apparent that the American Revolutionary War could be won in no other manner than a military alliance with France, which Benjamin Franklin successfully negotiated in 1778.
"[8] Secretary of State William H. Seward declined, "defending 'our policy of non-intervention—straight, absolute, and peculiar as it may seem to other nations,'" and insisted that "[t]he American people must be content to recommend the cause of human progress by the wisdom with which they should exercise the powers of self-government, forbearing at all times, and in every way, from foreign alliances, intervention, and interference.
President Theodore Roosevelt's administration is credited with inciting the Panamanian Revolt against Colombia, completed November 1903, in order to secure construction rights for the Panama Canal (begun in 1904).
[11] A few months after the declaration of war, Wilson gave a speech to Congress outlining his aims for conclusion of the conflict, labeled the Fourteen Points.
The Treaty of Versailles, and thus, United States' participation in the League of Nations, even with reservations, was rejected by the Senate in the final months of Wilson's presidency.
Republican Senate leader Henry Cabot Lodge supported the Treaty with reservations to be sure Congress had final authority on sending the U.S. into war.
[17] In the 1920s, the State Department had about 600 employees in total with an annual budget of $2 million, which reflected a lack of interest on the part of Congress in foreign affairs.
[18] The State Department was very much an elitist body that recruited mostly from graduates of the select "Ivy League" universities, which reflected the idea that foreign policy was the concern of elites.
The debate about Prohibition in the 1920s also encouraged nativist and isolationist feelings as "drys" often engaged in American exceptionalism by arguing that the United States was a uniquely morally pure nation that had banned alcohol, unlike the rest of the world which remained "wet" and was depicted as mired in corruption and decadence.
In August 1928, fifteen nations signed the Kellogg–Briand Pact, brainchild of American Secretary of State Frank Kellogg and French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand.
[22] Briand had sent a message on 6 April 1927 to mark the 10th anniversary of the American declaration of war on Germany in 1917 proposing that France and the United States sign a non-aggression pact.
[citation needed][neutrality is disputed] Another reason for isolationism was the belief that the Treaty of Versailles was too harsh towards Germany and the question of war debts to the United States.
The rise of aggressive imperialist policies by Fascist Italy and the Empire of Japan led to conflicts such as the Italian conquest of Ethiopia and the Japanese invasion of Manchuria.
America also did not take sides in the brutal Spanish Civil War and withdrew its troops from Haiti with the inauguration of the Good Neighbor Policy in 1934.
[29] Such propaganda did not seek to challenge American isolationism directly, but the prevailing theme was that France and the United States as democracies had more in common than what divided them.
[32][33] In a 1940 speech, Roosevelt argued, "Some, indeed, still hold to the now somewhat obvious delusion that we … can safely permit the United States to become a lone island … in a world dominated by the philosophy of force.
"[34] A Life survey published in July found that in the summer of 1940, 67% of Americans believed that a German-Italian victory would endanger the United States, that if such an event occurred 88% supported "arm[ing] to the teeth at any expense to be prepared for any trouble", and that 71% favored "the immediate adoption of compulsory military training for all young men".
[39] Non-interventionists rooted a significant portion of their arguments in historical precedent, citing events such as Washington's farewell address and the failure of World War I.
[40] "If we have strong defenses and understand and believe in what we are defending, we need fear nobody in this world," Robert Maynard Hutchins, President of the University of Chicago, wrote in a 1940 essay.
[39] Propaganda activities conducted by German embassy staff such as George Sylvester Viereck, assisted by isolationist politicians such as Hamilton Fish III, were investigated and dampened by federal prosecutors before and after U.S. joined WWII.
In 1941, Fish was implicated in the America First Committee franking controversy, whereby isolationist politicians were found to be using their free mailing privileges to aid the German propaganda campaign.
William Power Maloney's grand jury investigated Nazi penetration in the United States and secured convictions of Viereck and George Hill, Fish's chief of staff.
[47][1] Ohio Senator Robert A. Taft was a leading opponent of interventionism after 1945, although it always played a secondary role to his deep interest in domestic affairs.
[54][55] A poll from late April 2013 found that 62% of Americans thought that the "United States has no responsibility to do something about the fighting in Syria between government forces and antigovernment groups," with only twenty-five percent disagreeing with that statement.
[56] A writer for The New York Times referred to this as "an isolationist streak," a characterization international relations scholar Stephen Walt strongly objected to, calling the description "sloppy journalism.
[63] Former Republican Congressman Ron Paul favored a return to the non-interventionist policies of Thomas Jefferson and frequently opposed military intervention in countries like Iran and Iraq.
