Title: The Icarus Syndrome: A History of American Hubris
Abstract: Icarus Syndrome: A History of American Hubris by Peter Beinart New York HaperCollins Publishers, 2010 496 pages $27.99 The American Century is the idea, first formulated by Henry Luce in 1941, that the United States was the most powerful and influential state on the world stage in the 20th century. Theorists of international relations suggest that a hegemon like the United States is necessary for the smooth functioning of the international system, and that the United States supplanted the United Kingdom in filling this role during the Second World War. It arguably continues to do so in this century, even as China rises inexorably to replace America as the world's largest economy in the next few decades. In Icarus Syndrome, Peter Beinart writes a revisionist history of the American Century, arguing that the intoxicating idea of American power has often led the country to overreach through hubris. central analogy of the book is the Greek myth of Icarus, who flew too near the sun when escaping from Crete on wings made of wax and feathers; when they melted, he fell into the sea. Beinart applies the lesson of Icarus to explain three American decisions: Woodrow Wilson's pursuit of a League of Nations to abolish war in the wake of the First World War, a result of the hubris of reason; the hubris of toughness which prompted Lyndon Johnson's decisions to escalate the war in Vietnam; and the hubris of dominance that led to President Bush's decision to invade Iraq in March of 2003. When they advocated for the League of Nations at the close of the First World War, escalated the war in Vietnam, and decided to invade Iraq in 2003, Beinart claims that Politicians and intellectuals took ideas that had proved successful in certain, limited circumstances and expanded them into grand doctrines, applicable always and everywhere. They took military, economic, and ideological resources that had proved remarkably potent, and imagined that they made America omnipotent. In point of fact, these are hugely disparate cases, and the concept of hubris, powerful as it is, can only with great difficulty be stretched to explain all three; in fact, it is tempting to suggest that Beinart has himself taken an idea that has proved successful in certain, limited circumstances and expanded it into a grand doctrine, applicable always and everywhere. This book is ultimately about the decision to invade Iraq in 2003--or, rather, about Beinart's own decision to support the invasion of Iraq. He says as much on the first page of Icarus Syndrome, telling the story of a 2006 lunch with Arthur Schlesinger Jr., during which the grand old man of liberal foreign policy asked Beinart Why did your generation support this war? Beinart, who had used his perch at New Republic to accuse critics of a war with Iraq of abject pacifism, stammered to provide an answer at the lunch, and Schlesinger died not long after. He never got the chance to read Beinart's explanation that, just as Schlesinger had applied the lessons of World War II to advocate for American intervention in Vietnam, so Beinart and his generation applied those of the end of the Cold War, Bosnia and Kosovo, and Desert Storm to the case for invading Iraq in 2003. …
Publication Year: 2011
Publication Date: 2011-09-22
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 43
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