Imperial by Design
The National Interest
From the Jan-Feb 2011 issue
December 16, 2010
Summary: The author discusses the intellectual but not the ethical underpinings of the failure of US foreign policy and national security since the first Clinton Administration. He touches on alternative policies such as isolationalism, offshore balancing, selective engagement, global dominance, and then settles on offshore balancing as the way to go: pulling back the Army and Marines from overseas, sharply reducing their budgets, and restoring budget to the Air Force and the Navy.
John J. Mearsheimer is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. He is on the Advisory Council of The National Interest, and his most recent book, Why Leaders Lie: The Truth About Lying in International Politics, was published in January 2011 by Oxford University Press. He is also the co-author of the deeply practical The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy and The Tragedy of Great Power Politics.
