George Bush saw the spreading of American freedoms and democracy abroad as “the mission that created our nation,” connecting America’s freedom with empires abroad (18). Immediately after WWII, the United States was at the top, controlling ⅔ of the world’s gold and the most powerful naval and air military force. In many Americans’ eyes, this meant that the US was the strongest, richest, and freest nation (24). However, there were many issues still occurring within the State,s especially for marginalized groups. Despite this, politicians in the US sought to spread America’s influence, power, and most importantly, democracy and values of freedom to other countries. The Vietnam War marked a turning point within the US and its foreign affairs as it showed how increasingly problematic the spread of America’s power could be (29). By the 70’s, the increasing need for foreign oil caused the US to become involved in the Middle East. While the terrorist threats that come from extremist groups in the Middle East may seem to explain why the US is trapped in this never-ending conflict, it is actually the US’s dependence on foreign oil from the Middle East that has forced us into this situation. Jimmy Carter believed the US could be independent from foreign powers in terms of energy sources, and he promoted this energy independence (35). However, Reagan and those who followed him, while agreeing with Carter that oil dependency on foreign countries was bad, did nothing to help stop this dependency. Instead, they focused on military power to ensure our access to foreign oil (41). This dependency caused conflict with foreign powers that held access to the oil we wanted, and this gave power to extremist groups to then attack the US (45). The 80s and Reagan’s ‘freedom fighters’ in Afghanistan continued to push this idea that US freedom should be spread to empires abroad. However, this just led to a vicious war with the Taliban (46). Reagan and his policies spread to violence in Lebanon, then to Iran and Iraq. He believed that America’s military power, if spread to these oil-producing countries, would cement America’s energy source for the future (51).
I think the US has gotten itself stuck in this situation, and likely could get out of it. We are dependent on oil from the Middle East and have been stuck in these never-ending wars with terrorist organizations, likely due to our presence in those countries. I think, and hope, there is a way out of these conflicts. I don’t think we should be reliant on a non-renewable resource to begin with. I really think we should be putting our energy towards finding renewable energy sources that are better for our Earth. I think across party lines, everyone agrees that the dependency on foreign oil is a problem, but I don’t think the solution should be fracking on public lands or increasing the amount of drilling for oil in the United States. In the long run, it won’t help us. However, if we focus on renewable energy and green power sources, this conflict we have put ourselves in can hopefully disappear. Also, it will be better for the Earth, its future, and future generations.
Will Wright 