Five international organizations: G8 NAFTA NATO OAS OECD 

Isolated by two great oceans, the US has been able for much of its history to choose the extent of its participation in world affairs. Only reluctantly drawn into the two world wars, after 1945 it swapped isolationism for involvement. The US took its seat on the Security Council of the new UN, based in New York, and helped to set up NATO. For the US the Cold War was most immediate – and costly – in the Korean and Vietnam wars. The death toll and shock of defeat in Vietnam in the 1970s kept the US out of direct military involvement overseas for over a decade. Instead, it focused on diplomacy and on supporting the opponents of left-wing regimes in developing countries including Nicaragua, Cuba, and Angola.

Since the collapse of the Eastern bloc after 1989 the US has had to redetermine the scope of its foreign responsibilities as the only remaining superpower. Until 2001 policy remained cautious. It had led the intervention in the 1991 Gulf War, but a fiasco in Somalia and a lack of clear objectives in Bosnia & Herzegovina and Haiti showed its uncertainty about a role as world policeman. The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks provoked the Bush regime into reclaiming the international initiative. He is inspired in part by the right-wing doctrine of the "new American century," which advocates making use of unrivaled US power to shape world affairs to the country's benefit.

The first act of this new approach was the declaration of a "war on terrorism," which seeks to build a global, US-led consensus in the fight against nonstate combatants. The "successful" war in Afghanistan in late 2001 raised concerns in the Islamic world that Muslims were being unfairly targeted. Tensions increased in February 2002 after Bush declared Iran, Iraq, and North Korea to be an "axis of evil" states which sponsored terrorists.

Threats against Iraq culminated in the 2003 invasion. France and Germany led world opinion against the war, and were later dubbed "old Europe" for their efforts by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Even Russia, which had been welcomed into the heart of NATO decision-making in 2002, expressed strong disapproval. Many saw the war as an attempt to settle old scores and seize the riches of Iraq's vast oil reserves. The US made it clear that its relations with the UN and with Europe would not stand in the way of realizing its foreign policy aims.

As a result, global opinion of the US has grown increasingly negative, potentially fueling the ranks of anti-US terrorist groups. This ideological opposition is backed by a popular grassroots movement in the developed world which identifies US military and economic hegemony, as well as its dominant culture, with the perceived evils of globalization.

From "The Financial Times World Desk Reference" © Dorling Kindersley 2004