A realists view of the Vietnam War

The Vietnam war was one of the biggest conflicts that permeated the “Cold War”. This particular conflict in a series of global conflicts over a substantial amount of time in the second half of the 20th century, was what defined the cold war. If we look at this conflict through the lens of the IR Theory, Realism. As we have seen realism in essence focuses on power and security especially in the international system. With these ideas in mind we can look at the Vietnam conflict in the eyes of a realist. The question is why would a country like the US invade a country that is roughly the size of Florida? The answer is: Power.

With the world in a bipolar state between the USSR and US, they used proxy states to further their cause. The US above all feared the spread of communism and had the belief that if countries in and around the USSR’s sphere of influence began to assimilate into Soviet’s ideology then slowly all countries would do the same, as they called it; the domino effect. This fear led the US to take the foreign policy of reacting anywhere communism began to fester. This can be seen as relative gains, in the way that they can not allow the other power in the world to gain any more power than they already have.

Realists believe that the international system is in a state of anarchy, not chaos, but no overarching sovereign to govern the rest of the countries in the system. This belief leads them to look out for themselves and only themselves. As such, with the US hiding behind the statement that they were trying to help the free South Vietnamese was merely a cover for their foreign policy of intervening in the USSR’s expansions.

I have found this video that better explains Realist theory by a professor from the University of Ohio.

Does democratization lead to war?

For this post i have chosen to comment on an article found in Foreign Affairs entitled, “Democratization and War” written by Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder. I have chosen to write on this topic because of our discussion regarding the argument that democracies do not make war upon each other. After reading the article this thesis has its limits. The authors start their argument by mentioning that this idea is the “law” in international relations, only because the United States used it to further their aggressive foreign policy of promoting democracies across the globe. They also bring into the argument of history playing an important factor, in saying that after the Napoleonic wars, the elite halted the rise of  democracy and nationalism and there was a time of relative peace until the Crimean War. What does this mean to us today? While we see the creations of democracies outside of the west as progress, it it is not always so cut and dry.  Their results found that newly democratic states are more likely to take part in an interstate war. This can be attributed to a multitude of ideas. The one I find most supportive of their data is that in this turmoil, leaders strike a nationalist propaganda and need to solidify the regime change. While I agree with the idea of citizens gaining their right to vote and choose their own leaders, the west cannot push to hard.

The idea of democracies do not fight each other does hold true at the most stable of states, but newly democratized can be volatile and unstable to begin with. So the question is; Do the ends justify the means? This topic is very interesting to me and one i would like to learn about further if given the chance, especially with the growth of China capturing our gaze.

My favorite vacation spot

I’ve visited a lot of places in the world, but I’d have to say this is my favorite.