Is the Rice pot calling the Russian Kettle Black?

"Russia overreached, used disproportionate force against a small neighbor and is now paying the price for that because Russia's reputation as a potential partner in international institutions, diplomatic, political, security, economic, is frankly, in tatters," Rice told NBC's Meet the Press
Yahoo!News, August 17, 2008

Surely the United States is now paying more than the Russians in terms of our reputation because the Bush administration has used disproportionate force against a smaller nation and has eschewed its international partnerships in favor of unilateral actions.

The United States built enormous strength during the 20th century. Of course, the U.S.military power was built during the century, but even more important was the coalition of allies that it constructed and the trust it built within the community of nations. The people of the United States are anti-imperialistic, and during the 20th century the United States led the community of nations in its support for self determination of peoples, democracy, and human rights, and catalyzed an unprecedented global effort to reduce poverty.

The United States Government overcame popular antiwar sentiment to participate in World War I and World War II on the sides of the winning coalitions, doing so without goals of acquisition of land or wealth. President Wilson, unsuccessfully, in the aftermath of World War I and various U.S. leaders, more successfully, after World War II sought to develop international institutions that would prevent future wars among nations. Especially in the aftermath of World War II, the United States not only helped our allies to recover, the nation also went to the aid of the defeated enemies building strong and enduring alliances with them.

In the wars in Korea, Viet Nam and Desert Storm in Iraq the people of the United States and our allies believed that we entered on the parts of peoples attacked by other countries, and without imperial goals. In the latter part of the century the United States played a key role in building regional treaty organizations for mutual security. It also sought and achieved a series of landmark agreements for the control and reduction of weapons of mass destruction. In other situations, such as when Americans were held hostages in Iran or in terrorist attacks in the 20th century, the United States showed restraint, seeking always to make the response proportional to the attack, negotiating when possible. While mistakes were made, I believe that there was a justifiable global belief in American exceptionalism in international affairs.

Over the 20th century the United States built what Thomas Madden has termed an empire of trust. The result was an extraordinary national security, built not only and I would say not principally on America's considerable military might, but also on the trust of a global alliance of nations and peoples, linked through institutions built during the 20th century to meet the needs of security in the global system built in our newly small world.

The Bush administration has done great damage to that trust which so enhanced our national security. It has done so by refusing to participate in international negotiations such as those on climate change, and by an explicit policy of unilateralism. Most especially it has done so by using disproportionate force against Iraq, which it falsely accused of building weapons of mass destruction and negotiating with Al Qaeda. In six years of occupation of Iraq, the people of Iraq have suffered immeasurably more than have the people of Georgia during the current Russian incursion. That is by no means to minimize the pain and suffering of the people of Georgia, but simply to wonder about Secretary Rice's understanding of the international actions of the Government of the United States during the administration which she has served as National Security Advisor to the President and Secretary of State.

O wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae mony a blunder free us,
An’ foolish notion:
What airs in dress an’ gait wad lea’e us,
An’ ev’n devotion!

Robert Burns: To a louse