There are numerous competing theories about the principles which should underlie foreign policy. Let us first dispose of one of the most despicable. It is represented in the UK by Clare Short and in the US by the more substantial figure of Bill Clinton. It seems to include virtually all the people who strongly advocated military action in the former Yugoslavia, but opposed the liberation of Kuwait, and/or the liberation of Iraq. Their analysis seems to go like this: Human rights are important. Human rights deserve to be defended. Sometimes the most egregious breaches of human rights demand the mobilisation...