USA as Policeman of the World
THESIS STATEMENT AND OUTLINE FOR A PAPER ON THE HISTORICAL ROOTS OF AMERICAN MILITARY ACTIONS ABROAD, 2009-2014
The industrialization and imperialism that followed the U.S. Civil War would have a permanent effect on American military and foreign policy. Yet the aspect of American policy during the Civil War that has had the most relevance during the past five years of American history is particularly unexpected -- we must look to President Abraham Lincoln's most controversial act during the conflict, which was the suspension of habeas corpus, for a proper point of comparison with American military policy in the new millennium. To borrow a phrase from Glenn Greenwald, the Al-Awlaki killings demonstrate that "the due-process-free assassination of U.S. citizens is now a reality." (Greenwald 2011). Tracing these events to U.S. foreign policy during the Civil War will necessarily entail a focus on two...
Navy Seals killed Osama Bin Laden in Abbotabad, Pakistan, and the 2011 killings of Anwar Al-Awlaki and his son Abdulrahman Al-Awlaki by Predator Drones in Yemen. The significance of these events indicates a gradual erosion (justified as part of the "War on Terror") of habeas corpus rights and recognition of international law -- this significance will be established more completely with the Al-Awlaki drone killings than with the Bin Laden killing, as both Al-Awlakis were born in the United States and were thus U.S. citizens who had been classified as enemy combatants…
