CHAPTER NinEteen
 Foreign Policy

Exercises

What do you know about NATO?

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was formed in 1949 and today is comprised of twenty-six members from Europe and North America . Originally intended as a way to collectively defend Europe from the threat of the Soviet Union in the Cold War, how has NATO expanded its membership and redefined its purpose in today's new world?

    1. Go to the NATO web site. Explore the Frequently Asked Questions to see what NATO does, who its members are, and who pays for it.
    2. Examine NATO's chronology all the way back to 1949 by clicking on NATO Update.
    3. Click on e-generation to explore interactive maps, find out how to intern at NATO, and learn about Model NATOs. These mock conferences held in the United States and Canada simulate NATO proceedings and include preconference study and embassy briefings. They provides a unique opportunity for undergraduate students to study the role, structure, and activities of NATO and the issues facing the Alliance.

Explore the National Security Council

The National Security Council (NSC) was created by the National Security Act of 1947. Intended as a way to help provide foreign policy advice to the president, it has evolved over time to include a large staff that provides key assistance to the president in the area of foreign affairs. The staff process is run by what has come to be called the "national security adviser," who is also increasingly perhaps the most powerful foreign policy adviser to the president. But how is the NSC and staff organized? And who is on it? Who are these people advising the president on such important matters? And why aren't any of them confirmed into their positions by the Senate?

    1. Explore the White House NSC home page to learn much of the history of the NSC and the national security adviser.
    2. Go to the History of the National Security Council link and see who has held the position of national security adviser in the past.and who holds it now.
    3. For more detailed information about who is currently on the NSC staff, go to AmericanPresident.org. Find the staffer who runs Western Hemisphere Affairs, for example, and who is in charge of counterterrorism.

Check your attitude! Compare public attitudes toward foreign policy

What does the mass public think about foreign policy issues? What items does the public think are important? How does the public's assessment match up with that of foreign policy "elites?" The Chicago Council on Foreign Relations conducts a survey of foreign policy attitudes every four years and publishes the results. In 2004 the council published a study not just of U.S. attitudes but also of opinions from around the globe.

    1. Go to the Global Views 2004 report.
    2. Click on the U.S. report and open up the full report. Compare the public's assessment of major threats to the assessments of elites. Compare them to your own.
      • How does your view about when to use force stack up against the views of the public? Or against those of leaders?
      • What about other policy issues?

How can I find a foreign policy bill?

Ever want to look up the language of a piece of legislation, or check on the status of a bill you heard your representative had introduced? The Library of Congress has a web page that will allow you to do all that and more.

    1. Congress passed a key piece of legislation that tightened the economic embargo of Cuba in 1996, called "Helms-Burton" after its sponsors, but formally the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act, or just LIBERTAD for short. To read the bill, click on Search Bills and Resolutions. Because that bill was introduced in 1995, limit your search to the 104th Congress (see the right-hand side of the screen), and enter the search phrase "libertad" as a word/phrase, and press "Search." You'll see lots of links, but you want the one that was passed by both the House and the Senate, so click on that one. Read through the legislation, including its controversial Titles III and IV.
    2. Now, to see what the president says about the law, go to the Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents. Pick a year and enter "libertad" again as a search phrase and see what President Bush has said, or President Clinton before him.

How much do YOU know about how much the United States trades with and aids the rest of the world?

Ever wonder who the United States' biggest trading partner is? Ever wonder how much foreign assistance, or military assistance, we give to other countries? You can find this information via the Internet.

    1. For trade information, go to the U.S. Census Bureau web site for statistics on our top trade partners. For example, you can see the year-to-date numbers and see how much more we trade with Canada , for example, than Singapore .
    2. You can also see what countries the individual states trade with by clinking on the link for State Export Data. See who your home state trades with.
    3. For aid information, go to the U.S. Agency for International Development's Green book.
    4. First, click on Country Reports and see how much assistance we give to particular countries. You can get information on one year, over ten years, or have a ten-year graph made up for you. You can do the same thing for a region, not just a country.
    5. Click on Program Reports to find out how much assistance we give of different types. Under "Select a Program," for example, choose "Total Military Assistance" and ask for a report for the "Top Ten Recipients." Or search for "Total Economic Assistance," and ask for the "Standard Ten-year Report." That will show you the totals for all countries over the past ten years.

What do you know about Yalta?

You've probably read that one of the points of contention with the start of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union had to do with the agreements made between the war-time allies at Yalta in 1945-agreements that many people think the Soviet Union failed to honor in Eastern Europe when World War II ended. The Avalon Project at Yale Law School posts historical documents of all types from throughout American history.

    1. Go to the Avalon Project's 20th Century Documents page.
    2. Click on the link for the Yalta Conference; 1945 and read about the Declaration of a Liberated Europe.
    3. To see how things turned out, go to the companion web site that CNN made for its twenty-four-episode Cold War series a few year ago. On the page for "Episode 1: Comrades," click on the link for the Interactive Map, and you can point your mouse to show how the map of Europe changed from 1939 through 1947.

How much mass destruction in my hometown?

People talk about the devastating effects of a nuclear explosion all the time, but how bad would it be where you live? The Nuclear Terrorism web site has lots of information about the threat of nuclear terrorism and how to stop it, but it also will let you map the effects of a bomb blast onto your ZIP code.

    1. Go to the web site and click on Blast Maps.
    2. Click on "Create Blast Maps" and enter your ZIP code and see the rings of destruction. You can zoom in and out with the maps, too.