US Foreign Policy in the Middle East

US Foreign Policy in the Middle East First Name and Last Name Class Date Question 1 The US foreign policy describes the way the country interacts with foreign states as well as the sets of standards that are set for its corporations, agencies, and the country’s citizens. Faith played an essential role in the US foreign policy towards the Middle East before the civil war. There were several religious movements and ideas which informed the country’s foreign policy before the civil war, such as Oren's template of power. The US has been elegantly engaging the Middle East from the Barbary wars through the Second World War, during the cold war as well as in the current Syrian crisis. A historian from Israel known as Oren evaluates the unique integration of faith, power, and fantasy which has guided the country’s foreign policy towards the Middle East. Power On power, Oren demonstrates that unlike European powers, the US has initially been hesitant reluctantly using its military capabilities when vital interests were at stake or when it was directly challenged. For instance, Jefferson battled sea pirates from the North Africa Barbary Coast during the 18th century because they were a threat to the US, and they detained innocent US citizens for ransom. Similarly, Teddy Roosevelt promoted the freedom of American trade. Roosevelt favored Anglo-French policies and forcefully intruded Morocco on behalf of a businessman from the US that had been seized by a Berber chief. Teddy Roosevelt also stood for minority rights, making way for American support of independents movements in the future against the Ottomans.[Goldman, Shalom."US—Israel Relations." Jewish Quarterly Review 99, no. 4 (2009): 603-608.] All through the 19th and the 20th century, pushing the US foreign policies was limited by competing interests that included safeguarding American missionaries and business people, promoting regional stability, as well as protecting the American interests. Michael Oren guides the readers through the challenging course of the attitudes of the US up to the watershed events of the first and second world wars. Under the leadership of President Roosevelt during the Second World War, the US was more involved in the Middle East, aiming to help this region gain independence. After the end of war, it was clear that the US was replacing Great Britain as the most influential foreign power in the region. However, the US, supported by the apparent necessity to satisfy Arab nationalists, adopted anti-imperialist roles to counter the Soviet Union ambitions in the area during the cold war period. Therefore, the US had to support Nasser's 1952 coup in Egypt and had to rescue Nasser from the Anglo-French-Israel invasion in 1956. However, the US was disappointed by Nasser's actions to embrace the patronage of the Soviet Union as well as his efforts to destabilize the Middle East through the pan-Arab attempts. Oren evaluates how the US was entangled in the post-war politics of the Middle East, including the insoluble inter-Arab feuding of the Arab and Israel conflicts.[Oren, Michael B. Power, faith, and fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the present. WW Norton & Company, 2007.] Faith Michael Oren, in approaching the themes of hope and fantasy,...