The Moral obligation of the United States

There are very few issues that divide Americans like the question of giving aid to other

countries. The United States has been a world superpower for many years, and in that time the

world has seen great good, but also great evil, but what should we do about the evil outside our

boarders? I will argue that the United States has a moral and ethical obligation to help other

countries in need either militarily or financially. Also, I believe that national borders are

insignificant when it comes to giving aid to other countries. There are 3 main reasons why I

have this belief: It would be financially detrimental not to, the U.S. has the most capable

military, and the U.S. contributes to the problems in the world.

One argument that isn’t commonly used when arguing for a more cosmopolitanism view

of the world his how much the United States can benefit from helping nations with their

problems. First off, having strong allies has always been in the best interests of the United

States. Secondly, helping developing countries financially can be a plus for the U.S. For

example, strong economic growth in developing countries became an engine for the global

economy after the 2008-09 financial crisis, accounting for roughly 50 percent of all global

growth. In addition, almost half of the United States’ exports now go to emerging markets and

developing economies. Also, providing aid to other countries is advantageous because. It also

helps establish stronger diplomatic relations between nations by enhancing the country’s political
and social image by increasing the supporting countries chance of receiving aid in the future and

improves the relations between countries.

When Americans hear that the government sends military aid to another country to

intervene in its problems, a large portion of the general public disapproves. Most citizens feel

like America should let those countries fend for themselves or allow another country to

intervene. However, most citizens like me feel that when you have the world’s largest and most

powerful military on the planet you should feel obligated to help out smaller countries. The $682

billion spent by the U.S. in 2012, according to the Office of Management and Budget, was more

than the combined military spending of China, Russia, the United Kingdom, Japan, France,

Saudi Arabia, India, Germany, Italy and Brazil — which spent $652 billion. I look at the

abundance of military resources that the U.S. has the same way I look at a very wealthy person;

it is your obligation to help people who are not in the position to help themselves.

In the introduction I talked about the evil that is in the world, what I didn’t mention was

that the U.S. has contributed to it. The citizens of the us like to see their country as a force for

good in the world, but the harsh reality is America is not a benevolent democracy as people like

to believe. America is actually more of a nationalistic, semi-imperialistic, and politically

fractured country. Like any other country, America couldn't care less about anyone else but

themselves. America's foreign policy has always been aimed at promoting American national
interests. America has installed dictators, funded terrorism, organized death squads, toppled

democratically elected governments. As you can see, America is quite the hypocrite, just like any

other major power. One person who would agree with me would be Iris Marion Young. I would

imagine that Young would use her “social connection model” to argue that America has an

obligation to help out other countries because they have contributed to the problems they face.

In “RESPONSIBILITY AND GLOBAL JUSTICE” Young says “The “social connection model”

of responsibility says that all agents who contribute by their actions to the structural processes

that produce injustice have responsibilities to work to remedy these injustices.”1 For example,

the U.S. helped destabilize the middle east, and made it easier for terrorist groups to come in and

wreak havoc. Young and I would argue that since the United States contributed to the problems

in the middle east, then they should also aid in the solution.

One objection to my argument would be that the U.S. is in debt, and they don’t need to

add any more to the debt by aiding other countries. I would respond to that by saying a relatively

unknown fact is that less than 1% of the United States' budget goes to foreign aid every year. If

you take into account personal, private donations, the United States fares a bit better in terms of

aid contributions. I would also argue that the moral obligation far outweighs any financial

concerns. For example, the us can:

 •Prevent the deaths of millions of people from preventable diseases that are easy to treat,

but go untreated, because it isn't profitable for drug companies

•Expand access to clean water and utilities

•Make sure that developing economies "leapfrog" dirty fuels by making key investments

in renewable energy

We can do all of these things and it would make virtually no impact on the overall federal budget

to drastically increase support for all this, and it would be a great moral failure to be in the

position to do this, and not do it.

One person who would disagree with my views is Thomas Pogge, he would probably concede

that there is some obligation to help others, he would question how strict that obligation would

be. Debra Satz summed up Pogge’s argument in his book “World poverty and human rights”, she

said” He asks us to consider whether upon finding people on Venus who were very badly off, we

would feel a stringent duty to aid them. He suspects that most people would not find themselves

to have very weighty duties in this context, and certainly less weighty than the duties would have

been had they caused the Venusians' condition.” Satz not only gave a detailed summary of the

argument, she also gave the perfect response to it, a response that I agree with. In the reading

“What do we owe the global poor?” she responds by saying “Our commitments to human beings

depend significantly on a sense of identification with them. Moral equality expresses an ideal of
human relations— that all people are of equal worth and share a common humanity that they do

not share with other higher animals.”2 She goes on to argue that “I cannot therefore, imagine

how I would react to "people" on Venus, if I would see them as having the same common

humanity. Suppose, however, that we change the example to malnourished children and families

in South Asia or sub-Saharan Africa, or to disabled Americans. Does Pogge want to deny that we

have stringent positive obligations to infants, to the starving, and to the disabled?”2 I think Satz

said that to say that she doesn’t want to get into hypotheticals like finding life on another planet,

she wants to use real life examples to show that we have a moral and ethical obligation to help

people who aren’t in a position to help themselves, a stance that I agree with.

As others have said, we have so many programs, churches, and organizations designed to

help those in need here in America. In too many other countries, people are left to fend for

themselves and their families with no help from their countrymen - not because their countrymen

are unwilling to help, but because they're no better off themselves. Humanity is a family; we

have to stop thinking of it as "them" vs "us." We are all created by the same God, and the

circumstances of a person's birth should not cause him/her to be cut off from our empathy.