Rhetoric, Media, and the Narratives of Us Foreign Policy: Making Enemies by Adam Lusk

Author:Adam Lusk [Lusk, Adam]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781032169958
Google: 1GeizgEACAAJ
Goodreads: 59141514
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2021-12-01T00:00:00+00:00

Due to military technology, the strategic situation was different than World War I.

This quotation also highlights the threat narrative that South America was the weak flank for the US. President Roosevelt constantly referred to the invasion of Germany from the South or at the least, the takeover of South America by totalitarian regimes that would undermine the economic interests of the US. Two articles in Foreign Affairs supported this idea of a Nazi threat to South America: “Totalitarian Inroads in Latin America” and “Latin America, Germany, and the Hull Program” (Beals 1938; Bidwell 1939). The argument about totalitarian regimes in South American revisited the argument about the Nazi German threat to European democracies, once again deploying democracy as an important rhetorical resource.

In his Annual Message to Congress, President Roosevelt persisted with logos and pathos rhetorical strategies and the rhetorical resource of democracy, arguing the “aid short of war” would both eliminate the Nazi German threat and prevent the US from going to war (Roosevelt 1939c). Democracies “cannot forever let pass, without effective protest, acts of aggression against sister nations…We, no more than other nations, cannot afford to be surrounded by the enemies of our faith and our humanity” (Roosevelt 1939c). These emotional appeals attempted once again to build a common identity between Americans and other “sister” democracies. This shared identity meant the German threat was much closer and immediate to the US. Moreover, if these democracies became totalitarian regimes, the US would be surrounded. By supporting democracies now with armaments, the US could prevent this strategic threat and eliminate the Nazi threat through a proxy war.

Non-interventionist Senators once again railed against revising the Neutrality Acts, revisiting the rhetorical resources of World War I and neutrality. Senators referenced their experience on the Nye Commission and their expertise about the Neutrality Acts to claim authority about how and why Germany was not a threat to the US. The US was being deceived, mirroring the experience of World War I. The failure of remaining neutral during World War I led the US into an “unnecessary” war in Europe. For example, Senator William Borah blamed the UK for the Nazi annexation of Czechoslovakia in a national radio speech (Borah 1939b). This matched the “Perfidious Albion” criticism about the US entry into World War I. Non-interventionists senators also used ethos rhetorical strategies to connect democracy with American exceptionalism, exploiting a rhetorical window in the interventionist threat narrative. Senator Hiram Johnson argued war would mean the end of democracy (Cole 1983, 313). World War I hurt American democracy, and another European war would lead to a garrison state. Moreover, European democracies had nothing in common with American democracy. Therefore, the US needed to distance itself from Europe, which was corrupted by years of empire building and power politics.

The Roosevelt administration attempted to counter by having former Secretary of State Henry L. Stimson, a conservative Republican, testify to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the Neutrality Acts should be completely repealed (Stimson 1939). President Roosevelt argued in

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