We are again in the early stages of a new international system, but without a unifying challenge to raise foreign affairs resources much above 1 percent of the federal budget.
The Kosovo issue is far from resolved, and acceptance and imposition of the Settlement Plan by the Security Council could lead to renewed violence and instability, and have repercussions far beyond the Western Balkans.
In August 2001, a former chief terrorism expert at the Department of State wrote in the New York Times that the Bush Administration was obsessed with terrorism and using it to persuade the American people to build missile defenses.
