Open Access Kent State (OAKS)

This article presents an intra- and inter-textual analysis of the 'Bush Doctrine,' the security strategy response to 9/11 which sanctions a policy of preventive war. Using Thibault's (1991) framework of 'critical, intertextual analysis,' I examine the Doctrine synchronically as it is articulated in the 2002 'National Security Strategy.' This analysis demonstrates the disjuncture created in NSS02 and the key discursive formations that underlie the Doctrine and link it to its earlier articulation in post-Cold War documents. I then examine the Doctrine diachronically by situating it within the context of these earlier texts and demonstrate the paradigmatic choices and linguistic transformations that occur across each document's security strategy. I argue that post-Cold War and post-9/11 security discourses comprise an intertextual system that has been suppressed by articulations of post-9/11 discourses. Within this system, 9/11 serves as the legitimating device that enabled the Bush Administration to sanction a security policy designed to maintain US global supremacy.