Carl Pedersen
Den lange krig og det amerikanske imperiums nedgang og forfald

- English summary

This essay looks at the status of what the Bush administration acknowledges will be a long war against terrorism. In 2006, three statements—Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice’s speech on ”transformational diplomacy” at Georgetown University in January, the Department of Defense’s Quadrennial Defense Review in February, and the National Security Strategy in March—reflected the confidence of the Bush administration in ultimate victory in the war on terrorism. However, a number of academic and policy studies published at the same time presented an entirely different view—of a wrong-headed policy that would contribute to the decline of US power and has already given rise to a ”crises of confidence” similar to that outlined by President Jimmy Carter in 1979 in the wake of Watergate, Vietnam, and the energy crisis. I argue that the age of triumphalism is essentially over, despite the Bush administration’s pronouncements to the contrary.