On 2010-09-23, at 11:00 AM, Wojtek S wrote:
> ...examples of sacrificing economic
> interests for strategic gains are plentiful and one does not need to
> look very far - US policies provide many of them.
>
> I also think that a far more interesting question would be under what
> conditions decision/policy makers prefer to sacrifice their economic
> interests for strategic considerations and vice versa.
What examples do you have in mind? Offhand, I can't think of any states in the modern era which have sought to acquire or to control territory other than to secure access to resources, markets, and labour - certainly none possessed with the foreknowledge that such expansion would be detrimental its economic interests. Capitalist states, that is. I suppose you could argue that Soviet control of Eastern Europe was primarily driven by political/military needs, ie. to gain strategic depth against the US and its allies, but others would point to the appropriation of East European assets and resources for the postwar reconstruction of the USSR which also accrued.
There will always be divisions within a ruling class over whether a particular strategy will advance or damage its economic interests. The decision to invade and occupy Iraq provoked sharp debate within the US defence and foreign policy establishment over whether that would result in control of the rich oil reserves of the Middle East and Central Asia, or a net drain on American resources and and wider damage to the US's global imperial interests.
Of course, the decision to go to war can be a huge strategic miscalculation with grave economic and other consequences, but this only becomes apparent to the losing side after the fact. The Japanese did not bomb Pearl Harbour, Hitler did not launch Operation Barbarossa, and the Bush administration did not occupy Iraq because they "prefered to sacrifice their economic interests for strategic considerations". They struck in each case because they believed it to be in their economic self-interest to do so.