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| THE UNITED STATES: GLOBAL EMPIRE OR GLOBAL HEGEMON? An assessment of the United States power status and the possible threats to power it faces |
 PRINTABLE VERSION |
HEGEMONIC SECURITY IN A GLOBALIZED WORLD
Now that the world is entering an era of hegemonic power and perhaps future challenges to this power, new questions of national security are posed: how will the United States respond to hegemonic threats, if they occur? Will the old systems of deterrence and containment work? As suggested by the United States National Security Strategy Doctrine of September 2002, the world has been fundamentally changed since the Cold War, thus, Cold War policies can no longer exist in a globalized, post 9-11 world. The threat no longer lies in nuclear annihilation by another superpower, and even if a state such as China rises to test hegemonic power, the rise will be gradual and the threat will be limited. The current threat comes from below; from terrorist organizations in particular. Since 9-11, every action America has taken in the Middle East has been in the name of eliminating the threat of terrorism, or eliminating regimes that may have terrorist connections or terrorist-like goals. Containment and deterrence absolutely cannot work in eliminating these threats, mainly because terrorist networks are transnational, underground operations. It is impossible to deter terrorist attacks; terrorists will forsake anything and everything to achieve their goal (as shown by the emergence of suicide bombings); and their attacks are often by surprise. Intelligence about terrorist attacks is hard to gather because the networks operate through covert communication systems. Thus, it is impossible to deter a threat that is not even known off in advance. As with containment, the trans-national terrorist networks make it impossible to contain their activity. The response to their activity is not meant for containment in the first place, it is meant for elimination.
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Comments
Tremendous piece of work. Enefe, | Dec 28th, 2003
This is a master piece. the organisation is perfect. Presentation a work of genoius. Please keep up the good work in keeping us informed in matters of world politics.
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