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Showing posts with the label Allies in International politics

What Is an Ally? And What Are Alliances For? ( Source- The National Interest / Author- Christopher A. Preble)

Image credits- Wikimedia Commons Source- The National Interest Author-  Christopher A. Preble In a recent discussion at the Center for the National Interest, the University of Chicago’s John Mearsheimer and former U.S. ambassador to Germany Richard Burt talked about the role of allies and alliances in U.S. foreign policy. Mearsheimer spelled out his familiar critique of the dominant grand strategy of liberal hegemony (which others have called primacy), and made the case for an alternative of offshore balancing, which I think bears a strong resemblance to restraint—though John might disagree. He explained that the defenders of liberal hegemony who dominate the bipartisan foreign policy establishment don’t worry much about allied free riding (aka buck passing). They might complain about it for public consumption—indeed, it has become something of a ritual—but most foreign policy elites privately prefer that America’s many allies follow Washington’s lead. And that isn’t