Professor
Nyt has published some hypothetical Presidential speeches.
I wrote an intro which you kindly posted.
You have written this, in the context of the Russian invasion of Ukraine:
"...There is nothing wrong with the principles of international law, respect for frontiers, and respect for the rights of peoples to choose their form of government for which the United States stands — even though the United States itself has violated those principles for various reasons at various times. The world that Wilson and FDR dreamed of, in which all nations accepted these principles, would be a better one. Yet it is not clear that in a world of three great military powers, one of those powers can force the others to observe them. That is the issue that is now at stake in this crisis, and if Putin does seize Ukraine, we will have to face a new world of superpower competition and continual threats of local limited war...." DK
It would seem to be nice if our principles, here, were right for all men everywhere, as W mouthed, or right even just for us.
The British, then American, colonists did not actually subscribe, as you note.
They gave short schrift to the Dutch, French, Indians; did not include negro slaves, as even Bobbitt admits, as late as Dred Scott.
The ideal of self determination itself has countless problems, derives from American founding ideals of dissent and rebellion from the rhetoric and wars of religion.
It is in some ways the opposite of "the rule of law", and smacks of conflicts of laws, conflicts of religions, more than "law's" rule.
The so called world order was never the world's order in the first place.
Putin's invasion is hardly cause or explanation enough to change something that never was into something else that has long been instead.
All the best
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