Thursday, October 17, 2013

Foreign Policy and Geographic Proximity

Johnson, Nixon, and Carter all had to deal with balancing foreign policy issues both close and very far from home.  In particular, Johnson and Nixon struggled with the conflict in Vietnam while attempting to apply containment and protect US economic interests in Latin America.  Although Vietnam was over by Carter's administration, he too had to deal with policies that concerned countries near and far.

Examine just one out of these three presidents.  What kind of balance do you see them achieving in terms of addressing foreign policy in areas much closer to the Soviet Union and places much closer to home?  Give examples. Why did you chose this president?

10 comments:

  1. I chose Jimmy Carter because his presidency "marked an initial shift away from what had become traditional Cold War foreign policy" as we see in Johnson and Nixon. Moreover, he embraced change, which I found interesting. Rather than being so concerned with foreign affairs, Carter wished to address environmental and human rights issues. But, these goals obviously did not come easy given that his own government became divided. However, this division, in a sense, created balance amongst the people with two very opposing sides (as we see in today's time). I also see balance regarding the Panama Canal, in which there was a treaty emphasizing "peace and war", remaining open to all countries. But although Carter aimed for significant change, his promises were not kept due to imbalance outside of the US.

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  2. I chose Johnson because I was particularly interested in how his foreign policies ideas shifted from Latin America to strictly VIetnam. I thought this was interesting because at first it seemed as if he was just literally filling in Kennedy's shoes after his assassination. Only until he was reelected did Johnson begin to implement his own ideas. The article states that in the beginning of his assumption of presidency he was committed to Kennedy's policies. However, just as he takes complete control in his own term he cut economic funding in anywhere other than Vietnam. All of a sudden foreign policy was zoned in on Vietnam and the balance was destroyed.

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  3. I chose Carter because of his non-traditional foreign policy. I like how he had the initiative to shift away from the same policies previous presidents used. It seems like prior presidents continued foreign policies and did not try to make any changes. His central focus was the Panama CAnal and human rights. I also liked how "military and economic assistance could be denied to countries that were seen as obvious human rights abusers". However, there was not much balance addressing foreign policy besides the Panama Canal. For example, the reading says, "The promises of Carter's inauguration were unfulfilled due to inconsistencies in his administration's policies and events beyond US borders".

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  4. Nixons time in office is sort of interesting to discuss in terms of "balance" because he really didn't accomplish much. He pulled out of Vietnam, which was fine, and this sort of lessoned the focus on the Soviet Union leading people's eyes a bit closer to home, to Chile. Although his involvement there was sort of a waste of money paying for a more brutal, and illegal, opposition to a democratically elected leader that the people there already opposed. and then he was forced to resign before resolving the problem he started leaving the rest up to Ford to deal with. So in terms of Balance, Nixon was sort of all over the place, I'm having a hard time getting a clear notion of what he really wanted to accomplish. For example, he decided that the Alliance for Progress was inefficient and ought to be improved, but then didn't do anything to change it. so i dont know, maybe he shouldn't have quit his day job as an actor. . .

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  5. I choose Johnson because he took office right after kennedy and the cuban missile crisis. the crisis was very scary for both sides and the way kennedy handled it was great. But the way Johnson took that attitude and put it into his own foreign policy as to not upset the soviets any more was better. He stayed away from direct soviet contact. Vietnam was (in my opinion) an overreaching of the American government and trying to containing communism to much. After the crisis, the american people had had enough stress and adding a war no one believed in fighting and having these terrible things happen like my lai only served to create anger and distrust in the american people and people around the world.

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  6. Carter was sympathetic to me immediately, because he asked America to "put aside their inordinate fear of communism" He withdrew a majority of troops from overseas and reduced on military spend - with which he also restricted the insane nuclear arming. He seemed very concerned about domestic policies also.
    I also liked that during his presidency, brutal dictatorships like Argentina, Chile and Guatemala lost support because of their violation of human rights, because doing this makes it seem hypocritical to me to interfere in Vietnam for people's well -being. It is to bad though that the Red Scare still prevailed.

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  7. I chose to look at president Jimmy Carter. As the passage says, he "marked an initial shift away from what had become traditional Cold War foreign policy." "When he took office in 1977, Carter asked the public to put aside their 'fear of communism' and embrace a new program." He acted like he defiantly knew what he was doing and that he was doing it well. And this I believe was crucial for the United States during that point in time. He set up new plans of action and basically started with a blank slate. He cut cut back on arms spending which is a major improvement from Nixon's 10 billion a year budget.

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  8. I looked at Carter because his policies really stood out to me. He seemed to change the way that people had looked at traditional Cold War policy, and acted decisively in his policy making. He reasoned with the public, saying that they should not fear Communism, but rather look beyond its reach in terms of accepting the policies that he was instating.

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  9. I picked Carter because he was unique. Unlike his predecessors he decided to make his own path and decisions regarding foreign policies. This is hammered home in the quote about his presidency that "marked an initial shift away from what had become traditional." Also He had plan that allowed him to bypass political surplus and turmoil to deny assistance that were "Clearly human rights abusers."

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  10. Carter was seen as one of the worst Presidents of all time, so I picked him. Carter had attempted to make his own kind of foreign policy, as Trent said, and he focused his public policy aim to focus on getting away from the widespread fear of Communism. He decreased military spending and got troops home, and the Red Scare ultimately won the battle.

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