The United States claims to follow a values-based foreign policy, but is this really reflected in its handling of the war in Ukraine?
For many years now, the United States has claimed that their foreign policy is centered around its ‘values’, namely “[protecting] fundamental human rights” and supporting democracy to advance a greater “freedom agenda,” as written on the State Department website. The Biden administration, in particular, has emphasized the importance of ‘values’ to their foreign policy. In a speech in early 2021, then-newly appointed Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, declared, “The Biden administration’s foreign policy will reflect our values.”
In the Biden-Harris National Security Strategy, a 48-page document, released in October 2022, the word “values” appears 29 times. The document asserts that “Actions to bolster democracy and defend human rights are critical to the United States not only because doing so is consistent with our values, but also because respect for democracy and support for human rights promotes global peace, security, and prosperity” (emphasis added). It further claims that, faced with a “strategic competition to shape the future of the international order… the United States will lead with our values.”
The United States’ claim that its foreign policy decisions are derived from moral values is not new. When the US invaded Iraq in 2003, then-President George W. Bush portrayed…
