Embattled Garrisons : Comparative Base Politics and American Globalism

by Calder, Kent E.

• ISBN13: 9781400835607
• ISBN10: 1400835607
• Copyright: 2010-02-10
• Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr

Summary

The overseas basing of troops has been a central pillar of American military strategy since World War II--and a controversial one. Are these bases truly essential to protecting the United States at home and securing its interests abroad--for example in the Middle East-or do they needlessly provoke anti-Americanism and entangle us in the domestic woes of host countries?Embattled Garrisonstakes up this question and examines the strategic, political, and social forces that will determine the future of American overseas basing in key regions around the world.Kent Calder traces the history of overseas bases from their beginnings in World War II through the cold war to the present day, comparing the different challenges the United States, Britain, France, and the Soviet Union have confronted. Providing the broad historical and comparative context needed to understand what is at stake in overseas basing, Calder gives detailed case studies of American bases in Japan, Italy, Turkey, the Philippines, Spain, South Korea, the Balkans, Afghanistan, and Iraq. He highlights the vulnerability of American bases to political shifts in their host nations--in emerging democracies especially--but finds that an American presence can generally be tolerated when identified with political liberation rather than imperial succession.Embattled Garrisonsshows how the origins of basing relationships crucially shape long-term prospects for success, and it offers a means to assess America's prospects for a sustained global presence in the future.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	p. ix
List of Tables	p. x
Foreword	p. xi
List of Abbreviations	p. xv
Introduction	p. 1
The Heritage of History	p. 4
Deepening Vulnerability Changing Profiles of Forward Deployment and Implications for Policy	p. 36
Base Politics A Conceptual Introduction	p. 64
The Nature of the Contest	p. 79
The Base Politics Environment Comparative Perspectives	p. 97
Base Politics Deconstructed Four Paradigms	p. 126
Base Politics Management The Micro-Dimension	p. 164
The Financial Equations Local Equities, Base Stability, and Burden-Sharing	p. 188
Bases and American Strategy Emerging Options	p. 209
Implications for Policy and Theory	p. 225
Appendix: Base Politics Paradigms: Specific Cases through 2006	p. 255
Notes	p. 257
Bibliography	p. 295
Index	p. 309
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