Maybe it's understandable what a history of failures America's foreign policy has been. We are, after all, a country full of people who came to America to get away from foreigners. Any prolonged examination of the U.S. government reveals foreign policy to be America's miniature schnauzer -- a noisy but small and useless part of the national household.
P.J. O'Rourke (1991). “PARLIAMENT OF WHORES A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government”