Various Topics

First Names

One of the projects I shall never finish is a cultural history of Latin America as manifested in given names. Traditionally they were Catholic, but since independence Indian names like Cuauhtémoc have been popular. Then the names of military, political and cultural figures, like Napoleon, Wilson and Victor Hugo showed a certain cosmopolitan interest until they were chosen simply because the sounded nice. I doubt that Hugo Chavez of Venezuela is well informed about Victor Hugo. When my wife and I were touring Latin America, a dean at the University of Belo Horizonte took us out to lunch. To make pleasant conversation, my wife asked if he had any children. "Yes, two". "What are their names?" "One is Ronald, the other is Hilton". Clearly he or his wife listened to my daily broadcasts in Spanish and Portuguese, and decided that they liked the sound of the names.

As for Christian names, we get this information from "Alejo de Jesús Orvañanos (yes, my middle name is Jesús)". From the website http://www.elalmanaque.com/santoral/enero/1-1-jesus.htm, he extracted the names of those who are celebrated on January !, "the rite of the circumcision".: Jesus, Manuel, Manuela,. Agripino, Frodoberto y Justino obispos; Almaquio y Concordio mártires; Beatriz y Eufrosina vírgenes; Vicente Mª Strambi confesor; Odilón y Guillermo abades". I don't know anyone named "Frodoberto". Alejo de Jesús has a problem. Jesus celebrates his feast day on January 1, but Alejo (Alexix) celebrates his on July 17. Alezis was a fourth century hermit. Do people give their sons the name Alexis because they admire the hermit, because the boys were born on July 17, or simply because they like the sound of the name?

Dwight Peterson writes: "I always thought that the South American people had a penchant for picking strange names, particularly Uruguayans and Brazilians. I know many Washingtons, Roosevelts, and Wilsons. The middle name of a close Argentine friend's daughter is Shakespear (with no "e"). It seems the phenomenon is not limited to the Southern Hemisphere. I had business dealings last year with a young Mexican man whose name is Filadelfio. Apparently his father admired Philadelphia for some reason, but neither he nor his son has ever visited it.. I am seated almost every Sunday after church at brunch by a lovely Mexican girl whose name is Argentina. Frankly, I find this refreshing, and it always leads to a lovely conversation·". RH: Before the abolition of slavery in the US, the name Philadelphia was a Mecca for slaves escaping to the north by crossing the Mason-Dixon line. Apparently the magic of the name Philadelphia reached Mexico
Alejo de Jesús Orevañanos explains: "My great grandfather on my paternal grandmother's side was from Ahinoa, a little border town in the west south of France, Basque country, who came to México around 1850. His name was Alexis Harán. When my father was born, in 1913, he was named Alejo, after his grandfather. I was named Alejo, being the first son in my family, the same is true of my son Alejo and his son. We dropped the de Jesús since all my life I have had problems with school certificates and other oficial papers that show my name only as Alejo Orvañanos. My sons, Alejo and Gerardo, and my grandsons Alejo and Patricio have no middle names, to avoid the problem.
I only celebrate my saint´s day Alejo, on July 17. I do not celebrate my middle given Jesus name".

RH: So on July 17, Alejo, Alejo and Alejo celebrate their saint's day. The question is: how do you celebrate a hermit's day? Do they lock themselves in their rooms and live on bread and water? Do they read the life of St. Alexis? A more important question is: why was the second Romanov Tsar named Alexis (1629-1676)? Perhaps Cameron Sawyer can tell us. Alexis is a fairly common Russian name. Alexis was a popular name in France; cg, Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1869). Incidentally, de Tocqueville was born in Verneuil, France, where I lived as a youth, I never heard him mentioned once. It was only much later that his Democracy in America (1835) became famous in this country. Now he is scarcely mentioned. As a first name.Alexis is unknown in the English-spèaking world. How come?

English war correspondent and author George Alfred Henty ( 1832-1902) is almost forgotten today. His books for boys, such as The Young Bugler (1880) and With Clyde in India (1884) were supposed to instill Victorian virtues. Of In the Reign of Terror, which was inspired by Charles Dickens A Tale of Two Cities, he says: "This time only a few words are needed, for the story speaks for itself. My object has been rather to tell you a tale of interest than to impart historical knowledge, for the facts of the dreadful time when "the terror" reigned supreme in France are well known to all educated lads. I need only say that such historical allusions as are necessary for the sequence of the story will be found correct, except that the Noyades at Nantes did not take place until a somewhat later period than is here assigned to them". RH: Does anyone know someone in the US or the UK with the first name Robespierre? I doubt it.

RH:When Marco's father, Niccolò, his uncle Matteo, and the 17-year old Marco left for China ,they were accompanied by two priests, who deserted them. I wonder if they disapproved of the hypothetical children?

Born into a middle class Venezuelan family, as a student Ms. Burgos became a Marxist and clandestine revolutionary. Later married to French Marxist Regis Debray, who became French President Mitterrand’s top advisor on Latin America, she received extensive training in urban guerrilla warfare in Havana alongside him from Fidel Castro’s personal aide. Both she and her husband were then involved in the ill-fated Bolivia campaign of “Che” Guevara and its aftermath. Ms. Burgos’ most recent book, Memorias de un soldado Cubano - Comandante Benigno (Memories of a Cuban Soldier), is the personal story of a fellow revolutionary, Cuban peasant Darilo Ramirez Alarcon, who was a commander with Fidel Castro in the Sierra Maestra mountains of Cuba, later became “Che” Guevara’s top lieutenant and was one on only three survivors, of Guevara’s expedition.

RH: I fight continually to get people to spell Mitterrand's name correctly.- The name of Rigoberto Menchu puzzles me. Saint Rigobert was a bishop of Rheims, who died in 740. His feast day is January 4.. It ix amazing that a girl born in the highlands of Guatemala should be named after him. Was she born on January 4? Should a girl named after Saint Rigoberto be named Rigoberto or Rigoberta? Perhaps Alejo Orvañanos can clarify this.

Alberto Gutiérrez from Cuba is no admirer of the speakers featured at Tim Brown's upcoming symposium: "As it could be expected, I dislike the whole bunch. When I was a boy I read a little about Alfred Nobel. Then as I grew old I understood all the manipulations, politics and vested interests related to the Nobel Peace Prize. As far as I am concerned, the prize lost its luster long ago. Just about two years ago I wrote a complaint to Oslo because a Swedish official proposed Castro for the prize. As for Rigoberta Menchú ( actually her name is Rigoberta), frankly I never bothered to read Yo,Rigoberta. I have had enough with her commentaries on behalf of the Cuban tyrant. She was launched as a champion of the oppressed Guatemalan Indians, but curiously she has never said a word against the oppression in Cuba. According to Cubans in Miami, the book includes some lies , but nobody else seems to mind. Long live the printed word!

Adriana Pena says: "Alberto Gutierrez has a perfect right to abominate of the manipulation of Rigoberta Menchu, the one that she participated in, and the one that she committed herself, if he is willing to accept what there was of truth in her story, which was the massacre of Indian populations by the Guatemalan army, with the knowledge, and in some cases the complicity of the US Government.

It is curious how those who are gratified at the discovery of Menchu's fraud forget that the one who uncovered it affirmed that those massacres and other abuses did take place. It was not that long ago that a mass grave was found containing men, women, and children, bearing on their neck bones the marks of the knives used by the army to slaughter them. Those bones are not a fraud. Those children had done nothing to deserve being murdered as they were.

Rigoberta Menchu lied. But so did Ronald Reagan when he heatedly denied that any such abuses were happening. Why does Mr. Gutierrez condemn only Menchu? Is it because Mayan Indian blood is not so valuable as white Cuban?"

RH: A common position is that, while Rigoberta Menchu and Elixabeth Burgos lied, the story of he massacre of the Indians remains true.

Willis's pioneering work entitles him to be considered the father of neurology. Along with his scientific investigations, Willis conducted one of the largest medical practices in the London of his day. He also made time to participate in the meetings of the learned men's club that later became the Royal Society of London for the Promotion of Natural Knowledge. His anatomical dissections of the brain and associated nerves and blood vessels were artfully illustrated by drawings of the famous architect Sir Christopher Wren.

I congratulate John Gehl on digging out this information about the 17th century English physician Thomas Willis (1621-1675), who goes virtually unmentioned in American reference works, although the eleventh edition of the Britannica has a nice article on him: "He made original contributions to medical knowledge in the areas of human anatomy and the function of the brain and the nervous system.

Willis's pioneering work entitles him to be considered the father of neurology. Along with his scientific investigations, Willis conducted one of the largest medical practices in the London of his day. He also made time to participate in the meetings of the learned men's club that later became the Royal Society of London for the Promotion of Natural Knowledge. His anatomical dissections of the brain and associated nerves and blood vessels were artfully illustrated by drawings of the famous architect Sir Christopher Wren.

Francis Adams

We should congratulate Francis Adams, author of Deepening Democracy. Global Governance and Political Reform in Latin America (Praeger, 2003, pp. 170). The back cover says he is an Assistant Professor of Political Science and Geography at Old Dominion University, , whereas inside at the back cover he is described as Associate Professor; He must have been promoted on the basis of his earlier book United States Economic Assistance to Latin America (2000). The theme of Deepening Democracy is that change in Latin America has been stimulated from the outside, and more importantly by a whole series of international organizations whose acronyms are listed at the beginning. Some are well-known, like UN, but others much less so, like ONUVEN, UN Observer Mission to Verify Elections in Nicaragua. Of the five chapters, 3 is devoted to the UN, 4 to International financial Organizations, and 5 to the OAS. The US tends to think of Latin America as its back yard, but thus book shows that it is more attuned to international organizations. The good bibliography lists an item by WAISer Bill Ratliff, and then one by King Juan Carlos of Spain, indicative of Spain's interest in Latin America and evidence that the King of Spain takes a more active role in politics than do other European monarchs. For example, he presides at cabinet meetings. We welcome this book which puts Latin America in an international perspective. Americans who view the word "liberal" as dangerous and subversive may be disturbed by the picture on the front cover, which shows a political demonstration featuring banners proclaiming "PARTIDO LIBERAL" and "JUVENTUDE LIBERAL". They can relax: the word is used in its harmless Brazilian sense,

The meaning of the term "liberal" is so distorted in the US that for many Americans it is close to "subversive". Alberto Gutiérrez writes: "Unfortunately the meaning of the term "liberal" has been distorted. In Cuba many years ago we had a Partido Liberal which was rather nationalistic, but not dangerous or subversive. Its founders were "mambises", Cubans who fought against Spanish troops during the last war of independence". RH: A comparative study of the political meanings of the word"liberal" would be interesting. It had great prestige in the 19th century, but now few news parties call themselves liberal, perehaps because it is so imprecise.

RH: Indeed, the outsourcing of the US merchant marine to flags of convenience (Liberia,Panama, etc,) is an early example of US capital abandoning the US because of its high wages and strict safety standards and taking advantage of the low wages and safety standards of other countries. The excuse is always the same: competition. It is hard to argue that this has benefited the US.

We mentioned the outsourcing of the US merchant marine to flags of convenience, and the danger that presents to national security. From Moscow, Cameron Sawyer writes: "Not counting flags of convenience Liberia and Panama, Russias merchant marine is the largest in the world -- 1,513 vessels over 1,000 gross tons, more than the U.S., U.K., and Germany combined (http://www.heritech.com/sea/foghorn/mmstats.htm). The Russian merchant marine went through some very hard times after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the once-proud shipping agency Novoship, based in Novorossiysk, once the largest in the world, is a mere shadow of its former self. But the Russian merchant marine seems to be flourishing again now that Russia has got plugged into the world economy and is now shipping vast quantities of goods and raw materials in and out of its ports.

There are some funny problems associated with all these changes. The grain port at Novorossiysk was built to import the huge quantities of wheat which the Soviets had to import to feed their people. In the last few years there has been a dramatic turnaround in Russian agriculture, and not only is Russia now self-sufficient in grain production for the first time since 1914, but has actually become a large grain exporter. So the ships are lined up in Novorossiysk to load up Russian wheat for export, but all the docks and equipment was designed for unloading ships, not loading them. This is such a bottleneck that large shipments of grain have had to be routed by rail to Finland, to be shipped out of Kotka and Helsinki.

Novorossiysk on the Black Sea coast was a significant port since the 19th century, and was the scene of important battles with the Germans in WWII (Brezhnev became a war hero there). But no one could predict that the Soviet Union would collapse so fast, and that Russias traditional leading port, Odessa, would wind up as part of the Ukraine. The burden of all the freight which went through Odessa fell suddenly on Novorossiysk, where for the last few years frantic construction and renovation of dock and transshipment facilities has been going on. Next year, Novorossiysk will overtake Marseille to become Europes seventh largest port.

The picture shows a mixed-use development, consisting of Novotel and Ibis hotels, office, and retail space, which my firm is building in the center of Novorossiysk on the waterfront".

RH: We should mention that the name Novorossiysk indicates that the town in new, like Novosibirsk, the largest city in Siberia, which was founded in 1896.

President's Day Nuclear Perspectives

David Krieger's Nuclear Age Peace Foundation presents "perspectives from past and present US presidents, as well as from candidates running in this year's election. Despite calls from past Presidents, nuclear weapons have assumed a far more central role in US security policy. As the past presidential statements make clear, it is patriotic to the country and the world to oppose policies of nuclear annihilation and to call for US leadership toward ending the nuclear weapons threat to humanity and all life. In this election year, we encourage you to examine what candidates have to say about nuclear weapons policy. As a US citizen, you have the power to voice your concerns and challenge nuclear policy decisions". Then comes a long list of quotes from past presidents, including Dwight D. Eisenhower, who said ""Let no one think that the expenditure of vast sums for weapons and systems of defense can guarantee absolute safety for the cities and citizens of any nation. The awful arithmetic of the atomic bomb does not permit any such easy solution."

These anti-nuclear statements by previous presidents are contrasted with statements by President George W. Bush: "The Bush 2001 Nuclear Posture Review called for the development of new, more "usable" nuclear weapons; for developing contingency plans for the use of nuclear weapons against nuclear and non-nuclear states; and for reducing the time required for the United States to resume nuclear weapons testing. Below are statements taken from the Review:

"Nuclear weapons play a critical role in the defense capabilities of the United States, its allies and friends. They provide credible military options to deter a wide range of threats, including WMD and large-scale conventional military force. These nuclear capabilities possess unique properties that give the United States options to hold at risk classes of targets [that are] important to achieve strategic and political objectives."

"Advances in defensive technologies will allow U.S. non-nuclear and nuclear capabilities to be coupled with active and passive defenses to help provide deterrence and protection against attack, preserve U.S. freedom of action, and strengthen the credibility of U.S. alliance commitments."

"Nuclear weapons could be employed against targets able to withstand non-nuclear attack, (for example, deep underground bunkers or bio-weapon facilities)."

"The need is clear for a revitalized nuclear weapons complex that will: ...be able, if directed, to design, develop, manufacture, and certify new warheads in response to new national requirements; and maintain readiness to resume underground nuclear testing if required."

Finally, David Krieger quotes the position on nuclear weapons of the presidential candidates,including John Kerry: "George Bush is taking the world in the wrong direction. He is poised to set off a new nuclear arms race by building bunker-busting tactical nuclear weapons -- smaller and more usable nuclear bombs. I don't want a world with more useable nuclear bombs. I don't want America to turn its back on half a century of effort by every President to reduce the nuclear threat. I'm running to put America where we rightfully belong -- leading the way to a new international accord on nuclear proliferation to make the world itself safer for human survival."
To find out more on presidential candidate's position on US nuclear weapons policy, go to ttp://www.wagingpeace.org/menu/action/urgent-actions/us-nuclear-weapons-policy/index.htm

David Krieger spoke of the plans of President Bush to develop a new nuclear weapon. Daryñ DeBell says_ "I'm curious to know whether any member of WAIS approves of or agrees with President Bush's stated intentions to develop usable "nucular" weapons. It seems to me to be ample reason for the suspicions and animosity of much of the rest of the world". RH: While the US and Israel develop new nuclear weapons, the US scours the globe to hunt out any country which has plans for developing a simple one. If the US were on the receiving end, there would be a huge uproar in this country.

Tim Brown
I do not know what to make of the fact that Tim Brown lives in or near a place called Slippery Slope in the sierras.. His main interest concerns repentant terrorists and revolutionaries, four of whom he has invited to speak ar a conference in Slippery Slope. He says: " The histories of former guerrillas and revolutionaries form the foundation of much of my research into the causes and cures of organized armed sub-state political violence. The men and women I find most informative are those who engaged in violent and dangerous actions in the field, not those who just talked because I focus not on the why as described by politicians, propagandists or ideologues but on the who, what, where, when and how of this type of violence in hopes of mining the information I collect for data and ideas from which can be extracted a greater understanding of the internal dynamics of such movements. The ultimate objective is, of course, to develop methods to recognize its symptoms as early as possible in order to avoid conflict, to limit those that do break out and ideally to eliminate the causes of organized armed political violence so that they do not recur. As a member of the board of directors of the new European Union Centre internacional d'etudes et du reserche sur le terrorisme e l'aide aux victimes du terrorisme I hope to make this one of their primary focuses" Four bios are attached-.

Valentine's Day

John Gehl properly reminds us that Valentine's day commemorates the early Christian martyr Saint Valentine (d. circa 259), whose February 14th feast day has become the occasion for lovers to exchange expressions of affection. The Valentine's Day holiday probably derives its origins from the ancient Roman feast of Lupercalia celebrated February 15th as a spring festival, one custom of which was the drawing of a Roman girl's name in a lotto for the purpose of becoming the year-long sweetheart of the young man who drew her name.

Legend has it that the Lupercalia holiday became Valentine's Day in honor of a priest named Valentine who defied the order of Emperor Claudius II that Roman soldiers not marry or become engaged. Against the Emperor's
decree Valentine secretly married many young couples. He was eventually arrested, imprisoned, and put to death on February 14th, the eve of the Lupercalia holiday. After his death, Valentine was named a saint, and the Roman spring holiday was moved from the 15th to the 14th of February, transforming it into a Christian feast day honoring St. Valentine.

The Lupercalia lottery ceased being a means for pairing up young men and women. Instead they drew the names of saints whom they would then emulate for the year. For Roman men, the day continued to be an occasion to seek the affections of women, and it became a tradition to give out handwritten messages of admiration that included Valentine's name. During the Middle Ages it became a conventional belief in Europe that birds chose their partners in the middle of February, and St. Valentine's day was again dedicated to love, and people observed it by writing love
letters and sending small gifts to their beloved. Legend also has it that Charles, Duke of Orleans, sent the first real Valentine card to his wife in 1415, when he was imprisoned in the Tower of London. Because thos history of Valentine's Day is more legendary than historically authentic, the Catholic Church no longer officially honors St. Valentine as a worldwide feast day. Many local parishes, however, continue to celebrate the day in various ways, and, of course, the day is widely celebrated as a non-religious observance, a celebration highly appreciated by florists, jewelers and candy makers".

RH: St. Valentine's Day has been globalized into an annual competition to see which country can produce the largest crowd of young couples kissing vigorously for the longest period of time. Last year Chile won. This year the Philippines seem to have won, with many thousands involved in this unhygienic activity. They chose to celebrate on the evening of Friday, February 13, an inauspicious time. The Roman lottery explains why marriage is often described as a lottery. Poor forgotten Saint Valentine. One more Christian holiday secularized beyond recognition. Saint Valentine's bones must be creaking over in their grave.

Poor Saint Valentine! I sought to show my respect by telling him that Americans marked the day with gifts of red roses from Colombia. The only word he understood was "red". He has never heard of roses, America, or Colombia, Thinking that he might be impressed by numbers, I said that thousands of young filipinos honored his day by a massive exchange of saliva. The saint became more puzzled. Thinking that he might be a history buff, I said that his day marked the anniversary of the 1865 mortal shooting of Abraham Lincoln. I said that the assassin, John Wilkes Booth, deemed the handsomest man in America, was a very successful actor, thus disproving the theory of Connor Cruise O'Brien that terrorists are poor young men who have nothing to lose. On the other hand, his accomplices were a motley crowd who would bear out that theory. Some think that John Wilkes Booth got the idea of killing Lincoln from playing in Shakespeare's "Richard III", which means that we should add drama to our study of history textbooks, etc., He wanted to go down in history, which he certainly did. The saint looked blank. Feeling that I had not made a real impression, I played my trump card, the St. Valentine's Day massacre, which I explained was a fight among gangsters (another word he did not understand). With fear and anger in his eyes, he crossed himself and said "Is that the way you celebrate my day? Either you are mad or your are the devil incarnate". "Neither", I replied. "It is the world which celebrates your day in that way". "God damn it!" said the saint, crossing himself again.

Anne Oxford: Reading Humanitarian Intervention

Anne Oxford, Reading Humanitarian Intervention. Human Rights and the Use of Force in International Law (Cambridge University Press, 2003, pp. 243) is the latest volume in Cambridge Studies in International and Comparative Law. The series now has 29 volumes, proof that international law does exist, despite the article by Anthony D'Amato "Is International Law Really "Law"?". The series emanates from the Lauterpacht Research Center for International Law at the University of Cambridge. Its director. James Crawford, is the General Editor, with John S. Bell, also a Law Professor at Cambridge. There is a large international Editorial Board, and also an Advisory Committee, all of whose members, except one, are QCs.

Anne Oxford is an Australian woman., now at the University of Melbourne but formerly at La Trobe University, which she describes as "the home to a community of many of the most exciting and feminist and creative critical and feminist legal scholars in Australia". The stress on feminism made me wonder if La Trobe was a woman, but no: the university is named after Charles Joseph La Trobe (1801-1875), who in 1851 was appointed as first Lieutenant-Governor of the new colony of Victoria. Even more important is that Anne Oxford is in Australia: the first of the six chapters is titled "Watching East Timor", and East Timor is a prime example of humanitarian intervention in which Australia was deeply involved. WAIS strongly supports geography, but there is something whimsical about chapter 3, titled "Localizing the other: the imaginative geography of humanitarian intervention". The last section of the chapter is titled "the cartography of intervention". Chapter 4 deals with self-determination after intervention, while the final chapter (6) deals with "Dreams of Civil Rights",

The subject is of immense importance. There are many references to ex-Yugoslavia and some to the Gulf War, but not to the invasion of Iraq, which occurred after the book was written. It may be because of Rwanda/Burundi that French writers like Louis Althusser, Jacques Derrida, Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault, Jacques Lacan, and Jean-Paul Sartre are quoted, but they seem to me too much of a good thing.. They may be included because the authors
quoted cover a vast field. To name a few of the best known: Madeleine Albright, Paddy Ashdown, Tony Blair, Charlotte Bronte, Laura Bush, Noam Chomsky, Franz Fanon, Sigmund Freud, John Locke, Thomas Macaulay, Karl Marx, Colin Powell (who wrote about Afghan women), The Spanish theologian Francisco de Vitoria is mentioned twice in the text, but he fails to appear in the bibliography. Clearly the net of international law is wide and catches both big and small fish. Ann Oxford has written on a number of subjects.

The subject of her book is vast and important. We inevitably think of the war in Iraq. It could be described as humanitarian intervention, although I have never heard the term used for it. I assume that Anne Oxford is keeping a careful eye on it. Whether history will describe it as humanitarian intervention remains to be seen. Anne Oxford wrote an article titled "Muscular Humanitarianism...the New Interventionism". That might be a better description.

John Lewis Gaddis,SURPRISE, SECURITY AND THE AMERICAN EPERIENCE

General Sullivan sends this review of John Lewis Gaddis, Surprise, Security, and the American Experience by Tony Blankley. The title "George W. Bush -- grand strategist" is a summary of the book. Here is an excerpt: "The Boston Globe -- the respected, liberal newspaper owned by the New York Times -- ran an article last week that Bush critics might wish to read carefully. It is a report on a new book that argues that President Bush has developed and is ably implementing only the third American grand strategy in our history.

The author of this book, Surprise, Security, and the American Experience (Harvard Press), which is to be released in March, is John Lewis Gaddis, the Robert A. Lovett professor of military and naval history at Yale University. The Boston Globe describes Professor Gaddis as "the dean of Cold War studies and one of the nation's most eminent diplomatic historians." In other words, this is not some put up job by an obscure right-wing author. This comes from the pinnacle of the liberal Ivy League academic establishment.

If you hate George W. Bush, you will hate this Boston Globe story, because it makes a strong case that George Bush stands in a select category with Presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt and James Monroe (as guided by his secretary of state, John Q. Adams) in implementing one of the only three grand strategies of American foreign policy in our two-century history.

As the Globe article describes, in reporting on the book and an interview with Professor Gaddis, "Grand strategy is the blueprint from which policy follows. It envisions a country's mission, defines its interests and sets its priorities. Part of grand strategy's grandeur lies in its durability: A single grand strategy can shape decades, even centuries of policy."

According to this analysis, the first grand strategy by Monroe/Adams followed the British invasion of Washington and the burning of the White House in 1814. They responded to that threat by developing a policy of gaining future security through territorial expansion -- filling power vacuums with American pioneers before hostile powers could get in. That strategy lasted throughout the 19th and the early 20th centuries, and accounts for our continental size and historic security".

RH; Gaddis is indeed well-respected, but it is a mistake to view him as a "liberal", He remains a Cold Warrior after the end of the Cold War. The Monroe Doctrine is hated in the rest of the hemisphere; this last week the presidents of Argentina and Brazil have protested against US intervention in their affairs. Is the US policy to fill power vacuums and globalize the Monroe Doctrine? Incidentally, when will Americans learn that the burning of Washington was in retaliation for the US burning of Yorktown, now Toronto? It seems premature to so eulogize the foreign policy of Bush. Let us see how things turn out. Historians do not usually make such hot assessments. They wait until things have settled, and preferably until the essential documentation is made public.