Diverging Paths

Political scientists Charles Kegley and Eugene Wittkopf define foreign policy as "the goals [a] nation's officials seek to attain abroad, the values that give rise to those objectives, and the means or instruments through which they are pursued."1 In the United States (US), political elites comprise the nation's officials, exceptionalist ideology best describes the values that give rise to strategic objectives, and the Military Instrument of Power (IOP) describes the preferred means through which those objectives are pursued.