"Courage First" : dissent, debate, and the origins of US responsiveness to mass killing

Abstract

The United States has developed a reputation for consistently failing to respond to mass killing and genocide throughout history. The conventional wisdom is that the United States has the resources and intelligence to act, but fails to do so because of a lack of political will. However, a closer examination of history reveals that although the modal response of the United States is indeed to refrain from devoting significant resources to these crises, at times the United States reverses course to pursue policies aimed at assisting victims of atrocity. Previous analyses have not fully explained the sources this policy variation. Drawing on extensive archival research, this dissertation proposes a theory explaining when these shifts in US policy occur. I suggest that three factors-the level at which dissent occurs within the government, the degree of congressional pressure, and the direction of a variable that I term political liability-are responsible for shifting US policy toward a more robust response. I illustrate the theory with case studies covering US responsiveness to the following cases: the Holocaust (193 8-1945) under presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman; mass killing in Bosnia (1992-1995) under presidents George H.W. Bush and William J. Clinton; and mass killing in Rwanda (1994) under Clinton. A comparative analysis of US responsiveness to the