In the first post-Cold War decade the international system has experienced a period of relative peace among the great powers not seen since the Concert of Europe made its debut after the Napoleonic wars nearly 200 years ago. The United States is enjoying a period of international dominance even greater than that after World War II, and there is no imaginable competitor on the horizon for at least a decade or two. The most economically and technologically advanced countries in Europe and Asia that aligned with the United States in the Cold War continue to bandwagon with US power. Decisions that the next US administration takes on key security issues, including nuclear arms reductions, national missile defense (NMD), and further North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) expansion, will have considerable influence in shaping the policies of existing and emerging great powers with ambivalent attitudes towards the US–notably Russia, China, and India. The system may look overwhelmingly unipolar today, but history suggests that such moments are ephemeral, and we should expect and prepare for a more complex and perhaps dangerous multipolarity to emerge in the first quarter of the new century. […]
Memo #:
165
Series:
1
PDF:
PDF URL:
http://www.gwu.edu/~ieresgwu/assets/docs/ponars/pm_0165.pdf
