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During his campaign, George W. Bush's foreign policy platform included support of a stronger economic and political relationship with Latin America, especially Mexico, and a reduction in involvement in "nation-building" and other small-scale military engagements.

Bush's decision to impose a tariff on imported steel, and to withdraw from global initiatives such as the Kyoto Protocol, the ABM Treaty, and an international land mine treaty, has been argued as evidence that he and his administration have a policy of acting unilaterally in international affairs.

On December 14, 2001, Bush scrapped the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, a bedrock of U.S.-Soviet nuclear stability during the Cold War-era. Bush stated, "I have concluded the ABM treaty hinders our government's ability to develop ways to protect our people from future terrorist or rogue state missile attacks." This decision encountered wide skepticism in Europe and Asia, where it prompted fears of another costly arms race. The National Missile Defense project Bush supports is supposed to detect intercontinental ballistic missiles and to destroy them in flight. Critics doubt that the project could ever work and point out that it will cost US$53 billion from 2004 to 2009, being the largest single line item in The Pentagon's balance.

During his first presidential visit to Europe in June 2001, Bush came under criticism from European leaders for his rejection of the Kyoto treaty, which is aimed at reducing carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to global warming. He has asserted, for example, that the Kyoto Protocol is "unfair and ineffective" because it would exempt 80 percent of the world and "cause serious harm to the U.S. economy".

Many governments have criticized the failure of the United States to ratify the Kyoto protocol, which was signed by the previous administration. Former President Clinton recommended that his successor (Mr. Bush) not submit the treaty for ratification until the wording was altered to reflect U.S. concerns. Bush, who is opposed to the treaty, rescinded U.S. executive approval from the proposed treaty. It is doubtful that the treaty would become law in the U.S. if it were submitted to the U.S. Senate for ratification as, in 1997, before the Kyoto Protocol was to be negotiated, the Senate passed by a 95-0 vote the Byrd-Hagel Resolution, which stated that the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol that did not include binding targets and timetables for developing nations as well as industrialized ones or "would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States". Regardless, Bush is a firm opponent of the treaty.

In July of 2002, Bush cut off all US$34 million in funding for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). This funding had been allocated by Congress the previous December. Bush claimed that the UNFPA supported forced abortions and sterilizations in China. His justification came from a bipartisan group of anti-abortion members of Congress and an anti-abortion organization called The Population Research Institute, which claimed to have obtained first-hand video taped evidence from victims of forced abortion and forced sterilization in counties where the UNFPA operates in China. The decision was praised by many in the anti-abortion movement, including the conservative Christian women's organization Concerned Women For America. No funds were restored to the UNFPA in 2003 or 2004, which is already forbidden from performing or referring to abortion services under its charter and the global gag rule.

Many other women's rights groups criticized the decision and point out that the PRI refused to release information that would allow the team to locate the women, and thus no independent verification of PRI's claims was possible. Nor was it possible to confirm that UNFPA funding was actually behind the abortion and forced sterilizations alleged in the video. However, he sent a fact finding team to China to investigate the situation there, and the team reported that UNFPA funding did not go towards abortions or forced sterilizations. See for more information on the PRI.

The Bush presidency has also been marked by diplomatic tensions with the People's Republic of China and North Korea, the latter of which admitted in 2003 to having been in the process of building nuclear weapons and threatened to use them if provoked by the U.S.

Bush's foreign policy is influenced by the right-wing think tank Project for the New American Century, many of whose members have prominent positions in the Bush administration, including founding members Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and whose goal is to promote "American global leadership". Critics allege that its policies are hegemonic and excessively interventionist.

International Security

Afghanistan

On September 11, 2001 two hijacked planes crashed into and destroyed the World Trade Center in New York City. A third plane crashed into the Pentagon in Washington, DC. A fourth crashed in Somerset County, Pennsylvania. The attacks were greatly shocking both for their element of surprise and their subsequent horror. Over 3000 people perished in the destruction. Bush himself, along with Vice President Cheney and House Speaker Dennis Hastert were taken to secure, undisclosed locations for many hours on September 11th, as the extent of the attacks and the ambitions of the attackers remained uncertain for most of the day, and the following weeks. This was part of the plan that Richard Clarke, a White House adviser, had put into place for national emergencies.

A change of focus immediately followed the September 11 attacks. Through debate and discussion with his newly created War Cabinet on the weekend after September 11, Bush's foreign (and to a lesser degree, domestic) policy was subsequently defined, above all, by the War on Terrorism. This was first described in a special "Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People" on September 20, 2001 in which Bush announced that the U.S. was fighting a war on terrorism.

Once the source of the September 11 attacks was traced to Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda network operating out of Taliban-ruled Afghanistan, Bush gave an ultimatum to the Taliban to deliver Osama bin Laden to the United States as well as other demands. When the Taliban asked to see proof that bin Laden was behind the attacks the United States refused and instead threatened the Taliban with military action. As an attack became imminent, the Taliban offered to extradite bin Laden to Pakistan, where he could be tried under Islamic law. On October 7, the U.S. started the military campaign. Then, on November 13, 2001 with the help of Afghan warlords, U.S. troops seized control of the capital city, Kabul, and overthrew the Taliban government. Exiled President Burhanuddin Rabbani was returned to office, and was soon followed by a special interim government headed by former Afghani territorial governor Hamid Karzai. The government still has no means to control vast regions of the country. UN forces have helped to secure the area around Kabul and some other places. Osama Bin Laden, however, has not yet been found. Diplomatic relations between Afghanistan and the United States resumed, and Karzai became a close ally of Washington in the continued fight against terrorism.

The Bush administration has been criticized for holding several hundred individuals, including an undisclosed number of children, at Camp Delta in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba without trial. The great majority were accused of connections to Al-Qaeda or the Taliban. Several member states of the European Union and the Organization of American States, as well as non-governmental human rights organizations, have argued that the detainees must be treated as prisoners of war under the Geneva Convention and thus protected against indefinite detention as specified in international human rights law. Two federal U.S. appeals courts ruled that the prisoners should have access to lawyers and the U.S. court system. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that the U.S. courts have no jurisdiction over Guantanamo Bay. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the prisoners should have access to lawyers and the U.S. court system and that U.S. authorities did not have the power to detain José Padilla, a U.S. citizen seized on U.S. soil, as an "enemy combatant". The cases are pending review by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2004.

President Bush and his administration label the detainees as "unlawful combatants" deemed to pose a threat to the U.S. or to have information about terrorist structures, plans and tactics. The administration has said that such detainees can be held for "as long as necessary". Critics claim that anyone accused of a crime has a right to a fair trial and question whether people like Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, the former Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, can be called an "unlawful combatant". In the case of Zaeef they claim he cannot be a "combatant" because he was crippled during the Soviet occupation and that he wasn't "unlawful" because he was ambassador of his country. The Bush Administration and its supporters claim that the war against America by Al-Qaeda is ongoing, that it is unconventional, and that the "battlefield" extends into the U.S. itself.

Although the Bush administration released over 100 detainees and authorized military tribunals for the rest, the legal framework governing them has been slow in the making. According to Human Rights Watch, as of January 2004, "the public still not know who the detainees are, what they allegedly done, and whether and when they will be charged with crimes or released. There been no hearings to determine the legal status of detainees and no judicial review—in short, no legal process at all." In February of 2002 the United States began releasing several dozen detainees to their home countries, including many British and Pakistani nationals. The British detainees were briefly investigated and cleared of any British charges within 24 hours of their arrival.

The domestic political equation changed in the U.S. after the September 11 attacks, bolstering the influence of the neoconservative faction in the administration and throughout Washington. The conflict in Afghanistan, and the events that had launched the war, coincided with a reassessment of foreign policy by the administration, which President Bush articulated in his first State of the Union message on January 29, 2002. Previously, September 11 had underscored the threat of attacks from terrorist groups like al-Qaeda, as opposed to nation-states, and U.S. military intervention in Afghanistan targeted the ruling Taliban militia for having harbored al-Qaeda sponsor Osama bin Laden. Now speaking of an "axis of evil" comprising Iran, North Korea, and Iraq in his address to Congress, Bush claimed that he was preparing to open a new front in the U.S global "war on terrorism". Bush declared, "Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror." Announcing that he would possibly take action to topple the Iraqi government, he claimed, "The Iraqi regime has plotted to develop anthrax, and nerve gas, and nuclear weapons for over a decade." (The full text of Bush's 2002 State of the Union address can be read in BBC News Online at )

Iraq

Beginning with the Iraq Liberation Act signed into law by President Clinton in 1998, the U.S. government officially called for regime change in Iraq. The Republican Party's campaign platform of 2000 called for "full implementation" of the act and removal of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, with a focus on rebuilding a coalition, tougher sanctions, reinstating inspections, and support for the Iraqi National Congress. In November of 2001, Bush asked Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to begin developing a plan for war. By early 2002 Bush began publicly pressing for regime change, indicating that his government had reason to believe that the Iraqi government had ties to terrorist groups, was developing weapons of mass destruction and did not cooperate sufficiently with United Nations weapons inspectors. In January of 2003, Bush was convinced that diplomacy was not working and started notifying allies such as Saudi Arabia that war was imminent. Although no agreement authorizing force could be found with the United Nations Security Council, the war was ultimately launched in March 2003, after Bush in a speech March 17 effectively had declared war on Iraq, and had declared his objectives as "assuring national security" of the United States, and "no more poison factories, no more executions of dissidents, no more torture chambers and rape rooms."

Saddam Hussein was deposed and went into hiding on April 10 when Baghdad was captured, and was subsequently located and arrested in December. The occupation would ultimately prove difficult, with many Iraqis and foreigners launching attacks on U.S. forces stationed in the country. Eventually, the U.S. death toll in the post-war occupation surpassed that of the actual war itself. Thousands of civilians were killed during the invasion and by terrorists. Nevertheless, Bush remains optimistic, hailing the "victory" and such developments as the signing of the Iraqi Constitution.

Throughout the course of the Iraq war, Bush was often the target of harsh criticism. Both in the U.S. and in the rest of the world there were numerous anti-war protests, particularly before the war's onset. On February 15 2003 there were estimated to be over 10 million protestors in the streets all over the world - the largest protest in world history , as of that date. See Popular opposition to war on Iraq, Global protests against war on Iraq (pre-war), and Global protests against war on Iraq.

Criticism also came from the governments of many countries, notably from many on the United Nations Security Council, who argued that the war broke international law. (Article VI of the U.S. Constitution states that "…all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land…" and that "…all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution…", while Article III states that the judicial power of the US Supreme Court extends to "all … Treaties made". This makes a violation of international law also a violation of the "supreme Law of The Land" of America, and withholds immunity from government officials, including the president.) See Worldwide government positions on war on Iraq and The UN Security Council and the Iraq war. For its part, the U.S. administration soon presented a list of countries called the coalition of the willing which supported its position. A later aspect of the criticism has been the increasing death toll in Iraq; over 10,000 Iraqi civilians and 906 U.S. soldiers have been killed since the beginning of the war. In 2004, public assertions by Bush's former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill and counter-terrorism expert Richard Clarke raised questions as to the credibility of the Bush administration's pre-war claims. Both presented evidence that questioned how focused the Bush administration was on combating Al-Qaeda (operating out of Afganistan, not Iraq) before September 11. Specifically, O'Neill presented classified and unclassified documents indicating that planning for a war with Iraq and the subsequent occupation began at the first National Security Council meeting and continued with each meeting. Clarke presented testimony and witnesses concerning how Bush and much of his cabinet tried to find excuses to attack Iraq immediately after September 11, such as associating it with September 11, claiming that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, and claiming that Iraq posed an imminent threat, which implied that a war against Iraq would be legal by Article 51 of the U.N. Charter. On February 3, 2004, the CIA admitted that there was no imminent threat from weapons of mass destruction before the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Testimony at the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (ongoing during March 2004) has included claims of how much of the Bush administration's immediate post-9/11 emphasis on Iraq was appropriate and proportional to the overall picture of terrorism, especially in light of the administration's subsequent decision to pursue military action in Afghanistan first, the fact that organizations accused of 9/11 are in Afghanistan, not Iraq, and that no links have been found between these organizations and Saddam Hussein. The Commission's report is expected to be released before the Presidential election. On June 16, 2004, the USA's 9/11 Commission filed an initial report on its findings, stating that it found "no credible evidence" of a "collaborative relationship" between pre-invasion Iraq and al Qaeda or of Iraqi involvement in the 9/11 attacks.

The inability of the U.S. to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has led to greater domestic criticism of the administration's Iraq policy. Several of the statements that Bush and his administration made leading up to the war in Iraq, especially those involving claims of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, have been criticized as misleading or inaccurate. Particularly controversial was Bush's claim in the 2003 State of the Union Address that British Intelligence had discovered that Iraq was seeking to buy uranium from Africa. Officials and diplomats disputed the evidence for this claim, especially after a document describing an attempted purchase from Niger, which was presented to the United Nations Security Council by Colin Powell, was found to be a forgery. This led to a public embarrassment for George Tenet, the director of the CIA, as well as the Valerie Plame scandal. Much criticism on these issues has come from political opponents of Bush. The Iraq war was a significant issue in the 2004 Democratic primary, including the campaigns of Howard Dean, John Kerry, Al Sharpton, and Dennis Kucinich.

On March 24, 2004, Bush joked about the weapons of mass destruction issue at the annual White House Correspondent's Dinner. While showing slides of himself searching the Oval Office, he joked, "those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere … nope, no weapons over there … maybe under here?" Some found it tasteless of him to be joking about the issue. Others defended the joke as being in line with the self-deprecatory sort of humor that has come to be expected of Presidents when they speak at that event.

The governments of allied countries such as Spain, France and Germany, as well as the U.S.-based organization Human Rights Watch criticized the Bush administration's refusal to sign the treaty for the International Criminal Court, thereby refusing that court's jurisdiction for war crimes prosecutions of U.S. nationals. Under the ICC, several U.S. soldiers photographed abusing Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison might be prosecuted in this manner if the U.S. refused to do so. (cf. Human rights situation in post-Saddam Iraq

Palestinian/Israeli conflict

Bush has maintained a desire to resume the peace process in Israel, and openly proclaimed his desire for a Palestinian state to be created before 2005. He outlined a roadmap for peace in cooperation with Russia, the European Union, and the United Nations, which featured compromises that had to be made by both sides before Palestinian statehood could become a reality.

One particular proposal was his insistence on new Palestinian leadership; a stance that saw the appointment of the first ever Palestinian Prime Minister on April 29, 2003. The roadmap for peace stalled within months after more violence and the resignation of the new Palestinian Prime Minister, Mahmoud Abbas.

By the end of 2003, neither side had done what was outlined in the plan. In April 2004 Bush announced that he endorsed Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to disengage from the Gaza Strip but retain Jewish settlements in the West Bank. He also announced agreement with Sharon's policy of denying the right of return. This led to condemnation from Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, Arab and European governments and was a major departure from previous U.S. foreign policy in the region. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak commented Bush's policies had led to an 'unprecedented hatred' of Arabs for the U.S.

Criticism from Former Diplomats and Military Commanders

Bush's foreign policy has been criticized by Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change, a bipartisan group of former ambassadors, foreign policy experts, and four-star generals. In a brief statement signed by 27 members, DMCP stated that:

From the outset, President George W. Bush adopted an overbearing approach to America’s role in the world, relying upon military might and righteousness, insensitive to the concerns of traditional friends and allies, and disdainful of the United Nations. Instead of building upon America’s great economic and moral strength to lead other nations in a coordinated campaign to address the causes of terrorism and to stifle its resources, the Administration, motivated more by ideology than by reasoned analysis, struck out on its own…

The Bush Administration has shown that it does not grasp these circumstances of the new era, and is not able to rise to the responsibilities of world leadership in either style or substance. It is time for a change.

Domestic security

Following the September 11 terrorist attacks, the Bush administration proposed and Congress approved, a series of laws that it stated were necessary to prosecute the "war on terror". These included a wide variety of surveillance programs, some of which came under heavy fire from civil liberties interest groups that criticized the new regulations for infringing upon certain civil liberties. The administration has also been criticized for refusing to back various security measures relating to port security in 2003 and 2004 and vetoing all US$39 million for the 2002 Container Security Initiative.

Bush security initiatives

• Through an act of Congress, the creation of a Department of Homeland Security (DHS), a cabinet-level agency designed to streamline and co-ordinate the various agents of federal government bureaucracy charged with protecting domestic soil from terrorist attacks. (The White House had opposed the creation of this department for several months.)
• A Total Information Awareness (TIA) program was proposed by the Defense Department. The TIA program did not receive funding from Congress, however, and is not currently operating. (Reports of similar program surfacing)
• The USA PATRIOT Act which greatly expands the government's powers of surveillance and arrest. The act passed soon after September 11, 2001.
• Creation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review which will review government acts of domestic spying.
• "Project Lookout", which distributes "watch lists" of people alleged to be suspicious, or have ties to terrorist groups to a variety of different organizations and institutions. These included specific "No-fly" lists of U.S. residents who should not be allowed to board any aircraft into or out of the United States.
• "Operation TIPS", which would encouraged people who have access to U.S. homes, like plumbers, to report suspicious activity. This proposal was rejected after an initial outcry.
• The Worldwide Attack Matrix, an intelligence document describing covert operations abroad to defuse terrorist threats to U.S. interests.
• "NewRuleSets.project", which provides a strategic framework for intervening in countries to move them into the "functioning core" of world societies and out of the "non-integrating gap" from which national security threats arise.
• "Policy Analysis Market", a program that was intended to help better predict major global political events. The idea was almost immediately retracted.

Some accused the Bush administration of using the threat of terrorism as an excuse to clamp down on political dissent; many of Bush's critics were quick to allege that they were being unfairly targeted by the new security measures. Defenders of the president's security policies have said that the continual criticism of his policies in both print and visual media shows there is no such crackdown.

Others accused the administration of over-reacting to the threat of terrorism, and participating in Big Brother style tactics with little justification. Critics of that view say that the prior administration under-reacted to the World Trade Center bombing on February 26, 1993, treating it as a criminal matter rather than an act of war.

Currently, a major controversy in the United States Congress is the debate over whether or not to expand the USA PATRIOT Act into a new Act known as USA PATRIOT Act II (and whether or not to repeal some or all of the PATRIOT Act itself). This proposal would increase government surveillance on people in the United States suspected of terrorist activities and reduce judicial oversight over surveillance; authorize secret trials; and give the Justice Department the authority to revoke U.S. citizenship of anyone who belonged to an organization that the government deemed subversive.

Supporters of the law cite the potentials of large-scale terrorism as justification that Americans need to shift their priorities more from civil liberties to security. Additionally, they point out that against earlier predictions, nearly two years have passed without a single terrorist act in the United States. Opponents allege that the new law enforcement powers have resulted in arrests of people who have not been publicly charged with anything, in violation of the U.S. Constitution and basic human rights.

In any event, the debate over the proper role of government in people's lives will continue. Ultimately, the U.S. Supreme Court and lower Federal courts may rule on the constitutionality of the new laws.

International Trade

Bush supports free trade policies and legislation but has resorted to protectionist policies on occasion. Tariffs on imported steel imposed by the White House in March 2002 were lifted after the WTO ruled them illegal. Bush explained that the safeguard measures had "achieved their purpose", and "as a result of changed economic circumstances", it was time to lift them.

On August 31st, 2004, WTO arbitrators authorized the European Union and other leading U.S. trade partners to impose economic sanctions against the United States for violation of global trade laws. The decision by the WTO is the latest example of several recent cases where Washington has been found to be in breach of international trade rules.