United States foreign policy is sometimes driven by a single, dangerous "big idea," says a new publication, The Silence of the Rational Centre.

It was its all-consuming anti-communism that plunged the US into the abyss of the Vietnam war, and it is today's anti-terrorism fixation that has led to the conflagration in Iraq, say international affairs scholars Stefan Halper and Jonathan Clarke in the book, which is filled with what The New York Times calls "persuasive and valuable observations."

Washington's exclusive focus on fighting terrorism is also producing "disastrous" results in the Horn of Africa, according to two researchers for the Brussels-based International Crisis Group. "In everything but rhetoric," say John Prendergast and Colin Thomas-Jensen, "counter-terrorism now consumes US policy in the Greater Horn as totally as anti-communism did a generation ago."

Writing in the March/April edition of the influential Washington-based journal Foreign Affairs, the two analysts concede that the US has "legitimate concerns" about threats to its interests in the Horn, as demonstrated by Al Qaeda's attacks on the American embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in 1998.

"But," they add, "stemming the spread of terrorism and extremist ideologies has become such an overwhelming strategic objective for Washington that it has overshadowed US efforts to resolve conflicts and promote good governance."

American policy toward the Horn has a mainly militarist thrust, Prendergast and Thomas-Jensen maintain. They note that, in addition to deploying 1,500 soldiers at a base in Djibouti, the Bush administration is providing Kenya and other countries in the Horn with a total of $100 million for counter-terrorism initiatives.

Three strategies are said to steer the US approach to the sub-region: "Almost unconditional support for the Ethiopian government, extremely close co-operation on counter-terrorism with Khartoum, and occasional but spectacular forays into Somalia in the hope of killing or capturing Al Qaeda suspects."

This policy configuration is exacerbating rather than alleviating the Horn's many armed conflicts, which are clustered around Sudan and Somalia, according to the Foreign Affairs article.

The initial success of Ethiopia's US-backed intervention in Somalia has given way to renewed violence and chaos. "Somalia seems to be just shy of total collapse - again - because the Ethiopian troops who provided the muscle to throw out the Islamists are withdrawing, yet none of the peacekeepers promised from other African countries have arrived," the New York Times' correspondent for the Horn observed in a February 21 news analysis.

The strategic alliance with Ethiopia has in turn led the US to apply little pressure for a final settlement of the border dispute between Ethiopia and Eritrea, Prendergast and Thomas-Jensen suggest. At the same time, President Bush is calling for more US development assistance for Ethiopia in addition to a boost in anti-Aids funds from $110 million last year to $409 million next year.

Despite its ostensibly hostile relationship with the US, Sudan is also slated to receive a substantial US aid increase. Mr Bush seeks $246 million in economic support for Sudan in 2008, compared with $20 million in 2006. The US often rails against the Sudan government's human-rights violations, but the dominant dynamic between the two countries appears to reflect their convergent interests concerning counter-terrorism. Due in part to increased co-operation with Washington on intelligence, Prendergast and Thomas-Jensen say, "Khartoum has managed to avoid punitive action, stifle diplomatic efforts to reach durable settlements with the rebels, and resist international efforts to send a robust peacekeeping force to Darfur."

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