On Power: The Uses of American Power

There has been much discussion in the last few years about the decline of American power. While American military capabilities remain enormous thanks largely to persistent technological advance and while the American economy remains the most powerful in the world, many observers have noted the discrepancy between capabilities and achievements. As the fall of Indochina, the rise of OPEC and recent events in Angola attest, the United States has had difficulty shaping the movements and outcomes of world affairs.

American power has been inhibited by several factors. First among these has been the increase in the number of actors on the world's stage. This has led to a greater emphasis on multilateral diplomacy and has allowed many of the new actors, though weak, to form coalitions which have damped the use of American power, particularly in arenas where the resort to force is inapplicable. Second, the exercise of American power has been inhibited by the increased economic interdependence of the world. Measures aimed at hurting others can boomerang, injuring allies or those whose cooperation we might seek in other areas. Our very interest in preserving the open world economy from cartels or an epidemic of protectionist measures induces us to seek compromises even on efforts, such as the exploitation of the seabeds, which we could undertake on our own. Third, our chief adversary has increased his military might. It is difficult to show much of an effect of nuclear parity on U.S. policy, but the ability of the Soviet Union to project its conventional power (or that of Cuba) far away from its borders, has made possible interventions that were once our monopoly: compare Khrushchev's feeble attempts in the Congo in 1960 and Brezhnev's policy in Angola. While it has always been Soviet policy to exploit the weak spots in Western positions, what is new is greater Soviet ability to carry out this policy.