Describe the U.S. Foreign Policy and how it affects the citizens - Essay Example

ternational education; and protection of American citizens abroad and expatriation”. The U.S. doesn’t really have a unified foreign policy goal anymore. The most recent unified foreign policy was the Cold War Strategy of containment of the USSR and of Communism, which pervaded its relation with almost virtually every country. Since then, however, there are different policies that are for different countries. Policies may be divided by continents, United Nations, Foreign Aid, Defense, and Allies and Enemies. The U.S.

has a strong foreign policy with The United Kingdom. Its foreign policy affirms this bilateral relationship with U.K. as its most important in the world, which is evidenced in the levels of cooperation in military planning, execution of military operations, nuclear weapons technology, and intelligence sharing with each other. These two countries also share the world’s largest foreign investment partnership, with the U.S. investing in the U.K. reaching $255 billion and U.K.’s investment in the U.S. reaching $283 billion.

Another alliance is NATO, or North American Treaty Organization, which is a national alliance that consists of twenty-eight countries. Under the NATO policy, the U.S. is compelled to defend any NATO state that is attacked by a foreign power (Cox & Stokes, 2008). There are also foreign policies on different issues, such as terrorism, worldwide health and disease, immigration, foreign aid and others. The foreign policy of worldwide health and disease targets globalized diseases, such as HIV/AIDS, malaria, TB, etc.

Different organizations have been formed to combat these diseases such as PEPFAR (President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), where the U.S. government spends fifteen billion dollars over a span of five years to combat HIV/AIDS. Foreign aid is also another foreign policy. This policy compels the U.S. to spend about 0.18% of its Gross Domestic Product on Official Development Assistance. Under this, there is also the Millennium Challenge Account, which is a government organization to which developing countries can apply for U.S. foreign aid (Cox & Stokes, 2008).

The average American doesn’t know very much about the U.S.’s foreign policies. Most of the public are uninformed, or misinformed. Despite this, it is still a fact that the U.S. foreign policy does affect almost every aspect of the daily lives of Americans. Take for example the price of gasoline. The U.S. gets its oil from other countries such as Libya, Egypt, and other Middle-Eastern countries. In April 2011, fears about the unrest in Libya and Egypt sent oil prices to $113 a barrel. Another example is the life and death of the nation’s soldiers.

NATO is compelled to defend any of its states that are attacked by a foreign power, meaning that there will be drafting of soldiers to go to war, which usually results in deaths and loss of resources (Irish & Frank, 2000). Most American citizens build lives