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Wednesday, 12 December, 2001, 14:19 GMT
Analysis: The new bogeymen
![]() Saddam Hussein's Iraq is still seen as a potential threat
By world affairs correspondent Nick Childs
The term "rogue state" really emerged during the Clinton administration. Following the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, Washington was looking at what new challenges might emerge to the interests of the United States and its allies.
In Washington's view, the core "rogue states" have always been Iraq, Iran, North Korea and Libya. But prior to the 11 September attacks on the US, at various times other countries - including Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Syria, and Sudan - may also have been added to the list. The term was useful in many ways for Washington. Controversial approach It helped simplify for the American people what might otherwise have seemed a complex world. It also seemed to satisfy what many see as a deep need among Americans to be able to focus on "bogeymen" as a way of galvanising policy.
Critics have argued that it smacked of US chauvinism and arrogance. It has caused friction with allies. The main aim of the US approach was to isolate and "contain" the rogue states. But many other countries, including key allies in Europe, preferred policies of what became known as "critical engagement". Some in the United States were just as critical of the Europeans, arguing that they were pursuing dialogue for narrow and selfish reasons of their own, often to try to win commercial advantages for themselves. Either way, there was a very different outlook across the Atlantic. Tougher approach But Washington too, under the Clinton administration, also came to find that demonising the rogue states was not useful when it too tried to engage in dialogue with, for example, the authorities in North Korea, or moderate elements in Iran. As one US State Department official put it, the term rogue state "made for a good soundbite, but not for good policy". In the latter days of the Clinton administration, the words "rogue state" were supplanted by the rather less confrontational term "states of concern". But the rogue state has come back again with the arrival of the Bush administration in Washington, a reflection of the tougher approach to national security concerns which the Bush team is seeking to convey. Again, though, some critics argue that President Bush and his advisers have revived the term because they need a rationale to pursue their plans for ballistic missile defence. The key rogue states:
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