In the international jungle, the United States remains the 800-pound gorilla—a creature of commanding and unparalleled strength, able to quash anything underfoot. But the United States’ military and economic might does not always translate into easy attainment of US objectives. Even before the war on terrorism, US foreign policy repeatedly demonstrated the importance of multilateralism and public diplomacy—witness the vigorous campaign conducted by President George Bush and his administration in Europe and Russia to win support for missile defense, the delicate coalition-building in Kosovo by the administration of President Bill Clinton, and the post-1998 stalemate of US policy toward Iraq. In each of these instances, US success or failure depended on its ability to manage its own internal politics, to build and sustain political coalitions, and to restrain itself when tempted toward unilateralism. Understanding these limits to US power—some self-imposed, some forced on the United States by second-tier powers, and some cleverly applied by weak states—is crucial to uncovering what power itself means in today’s international system and to making policies that will succeed in that system.

A Pattern of Weakness

First, the domestic politics of the United States limit its international freedom of action. Although the president may have the world’s finest military at his command, he often lacks the combination of public and congressional support he needs to maximize its advantages. Foreign policy surveys show that US citizens remain casualty-averse unless vital US interests such as preventing terrorism seem to be at stake. And except for a brief period of bipartisanship after September 11, the notion of politics stopping at the water’s edge now seems as quaint and obsolete as Cold War air raid drills. Internal divisions frequently prevent the United States from acting as quickly, decisively, or forcefully as its material resources would allow. This reality does not go unnoticed by other nations: what seems like democratic debate to US citizens may appear to others as a lack of resolve or an opportunity for political manipulation, further complicating the execution of US foreign policy.

Second, the complexity of international politics poses a serious challenge to the exercise of US power. Despite its military prowess, the United States remains fundamentally dependent on support from local allies when it operates abroad. The geographic position of a weak state may endow it with a powerful bargaining chip when the United States needs basing rights or access to airspace. This leverage requires diplomatic finesse and sensitivity to those foreign leaders’ own domestic constraints. Political skill turns out to be just as important as military strength—and, unfortunately for the United States, much more evenly distributed. Even relatively weak states can often exploit political cracks in the United States’ relationships with its allies, providing third parties with leverage over the United States despite their material inferiority.

Third, even when the United States is capable of capturing an advantage by acting unilaterally, it often finds itself trapped in what Bruce Conin has called the “paradox of hegemony.” The United States certainly has the ability to act as a great power and pursue its short-term interest in a particular case: for example, by intervening in a foreign country to secure oil. Actually doing so, however, would undermine its role as a hegemon trying to lead the international system according to a set of rules (in this case, the UN Charter) which benefit its long-term interests and help legitimize its power. Moreover, in pursuing its short-term interest of securing oil, the hegemon would undermine its provision of the public good of law and order that helps other states tolerate the hegemon’s power. Other states might then begin to balance more actively against the hegemon, hastening its decline. To stave off this type of backlash, which would damage broader US interests, the United States often imposes limits upon its own actions or gives in to the demands of weaker states. In order to remain the sole superpower, the United States avoids acting like one.

These three seemingly abstract constraints appear quite concretely in three sets of recent US decisions related to missile defense, Kosovo, and Iraq. In each case, US domestic politics, international politics, and the paradox of hegemony all help explain why the United States’ tremendous power did not immediately produce its desired foreign policy outcome. If such a pattern exists across such different yet important areas of turn-of-the-century US foreign policy, then the relevance of material factors such as economic and military strength in determining how the international system functions may be substantially less than some observers would claim. Indeed, evidence of such a pattern would force a reconsideration of the notion that the status quo is functionally unipolar at all.

Missile Politics

The Bush administration entered office vowing to construct massive, multi-layered missile defenses, regardless of Russian and European objections to any breach of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. However, only a few months later the administration changed course, actively engaging in a diplomatic campaign to win international approval for its missile defense plans. Bush promised “real consultations” on the issue, insisting that US allies would not be presented with “unilateral decisions already made.” Bush toured Europe in June 2001 to garner support, and during that summer and fall he met several times with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss the future of the ABM Treaty.

When in December 2001 the United States did announce its intention to withdraw from the treaty, Russia and Europe were not thrilled. But they did not denounce the US plans as they had nearly a year earlier either. The charm initiative, combined with a sense of post-September 11 unity, had succeeded in muting opposition to the US proposal. Why had the administration decided to launch such an initiative in the first place? Certainly neither Russia nor Europe had the physical capacity to block US plans, so why did the United States bow to their pressure?

Domestic politics offers a partial explanation. Throughout early 2001 members of US Congress attacked the administration for its perceived unilateralism on a range of issues, including missile defense. The administration may have seen consultations with Europe and Russia as one way to quell some of these critics at home. By mid-May, consultations became an absolute political necessity due to Vermont Senator Jim Jeffords’ defection from the Republican Party, which gave the Democrats control over the Senate and tremendous leverage over missile defense funding. The administration suddenly paid attention to Russian and European concerns, not because of those countries’ power but because of the Senate’s control over defense spending.