The Origins Of Overthrow

"Why has regime change recurrently figured in US foreign policy? Between 1906 and 2011, the United States forcibly intervened in at least sixteen states, targeting their domestic political authority structure. Extant accounts in International Relations scholarship fail to provide sound explanations for this pattern. Their premise that the US seeks national security, economic benefits, or target state democracy is put into doubt by studies that demonstrate the limited success of most US regime change interventions. Focusing on the emotional state of US presidents, this book presents a novel explanation for the recurrence of forcible regime change in US foreign policy. It argues that regime change becomes an attractive foreign policy tool to US presidents when 'emotional frustration' grips them. Emotional frustration, the book's core concept, is an emotional state that comprises hegemonic expectations, perceptions of hatred in target state obstructions, and negative affect. Once instigated, it shapes both presidential preferences and strategies, carrying with it both a desire for removing foreign leaders as the perceived source of frustration and a turn to military aggression. Based on a wealth of declassified government sources, the empirical part of the book illustrates how emotional frustration has time and again shaped US regime change decisions. Spanning two world regions - the Western hemisphere and the Middle East - and roughly hundred years of US foreign policy, the book traces the emotional state of US presidents in five regime change episodes - Cuba 1906, Nicaragua 1909-12, the Dominican Republic 1963-65, Iran 1979-80, and Iraq 2001-03"--