One aspect of American exceptionalism is undoubtedly true. American policymakers believe that they have been anointed by heaven to rule the world. Just as God cares if a sparrow falls to earth, U.S. officials believe anything anyone does anywhere on the planet is a matter of Washington’s concern. That is reflected in a foreign policy which essentially has turned the Monroe Doctrine into a global strategy: the US, and only the US, is entitled to intervene everywhere on earth.
Admittedly, the policy is not entirely consistent, with Uncle Sam sometimes implicitly delegating its authority. For instance, Washington cares little if, say, France sends its troops to Francophone Africa. Libya became a military mishmash involving several European and Middle Eastern allies, while Washington stuck with diplomacy. American officials did not object when Saudi Arabia used its military to bolster Bahrain’s minority Sunni monarchy, crushing largely Shia pro-democracy protests; worse, the US actively aided Riyadh’s murderous invasion of Yemen.
However, the US has tried, often at great expense in blood and treasure, to generally keep order and transform societies in Central Asia, the Balkans, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific. Washington’s moralistic arrogance and imperial pretensions often proved breathtaking. Unfortunately, the result has been many costly failures, such as the Iraq invasion.
Even more intrusive, however, is US sanctions policy. Originally they were just restrictions on Americans. For example, the Cuban embargo, applied six decades ago, prevents (with some exceptions) Americans from dealing with Cuba. Other governments typically did the same, restricting only their citizens, not foreign nationals. No one imagined that Washington was empowered to unilaterally regulate global commerce and punish anyone anywhere who defied American dictates.
However, in the 1980s US policymakers discovered secondary and financial sanctions. Given America’s global economic dominance, Washington now can make other nations and businesses enforce US policies. Any bank that uses dollars or relies on transactions routed through America can be fined billions of dollars for conducting any transaction, no matter how minor, with a sanctioned person or entity. In this way Washington seeks to force the entire world to implement American policy.
This has caused allied states, most notably in Europe, to follow US policy even when contrary to their own interests. For instance, European firms and individuals are punished for investments in Cuba. Europeans long were effectively barred from dealing with Sudan. More recently US sanctions prevented European companies from serving the Iranian market under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action even as European governments attempted to save the accord from the Trump administration’s counterproductive “maximum pressure” campaign.
However, these steps, which triggered European resistance rather than acquiescence, did not go far enough for America’s hyper-interventionists and extremist hawks who, some suspected, hoped to create an excuse for war in several hotspots. (Many of them are cheerleading Israeli strikes on Palestinian civilians in the latest round of fighting between Israel and Hamas.)
The US also took a more hostile position toward Russia than did Europe. Washington policymakers, separated from Moscow by a large ocean, may have felt freer to risk conflict, since it would be primarily fought in Europe. After all, that was the case for both world wars in the 20th century. Nor had neoconservatives shown much concern for non-American casualties, which ran in the hundreds of thousands or more, during the nearly two decades of quasi-imperial conflict. The ever-egregious Sen. Lindsey Graham even dismissed the cost of a renewed Korean War since it would be “over there” on the Korean Peninsula. Why worry about a few hundred thousand or million South Korean casualties among allies, he apparently thought?
Believing that it was entitled to set its own energy policy, Germany agreed with Russia to build the Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline project. The US government then lashed out at Berlin directly. In December 2019 American legislators, convinced of their unique virtue and perspicacity, approved legislation targeting European companies involved in the project. The measure, with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz as one of the authors, also would have the convenient benefit of promoting American liquified natural gas exports. It is convenient when an American politician claiming to do good also does well for his favored interest groups.
Although the project was almost complete, the sanctions threat caused European firms to flee. Cruz, along with Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson and Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, appeared to enjoy writing letters threatening European enterprises with economic devastation and ruin. As Lord Acton warned, “power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” So it had with such sanctions supporters.
The GOP trio even threatened a German port owned by a local government: “This letter serves as formal legal notice that these goods, services, support, and provisioning risk exposing Fährhafen Sassnitz GmbH and Mukran Port, as well as your board members, corporate officers, shareholders, and employees, to crushing legal and economic sanctions, which our government will be mandated to impose. These sanctions include potentially fatal measures that will cut off Fährhafen Sassnitz GmbH from the United States commercially and financially. The only responsible course of action is for Fährhafen Sassnitz GmbH to exercise contractual options that it has available to cease these activities.” Unsurprisingly, Berlin’s reaction was anger and outrage, especially since officials believed Cruz’s participation was based on squalid economic interest.