The key element of the Bush Doctrine was that it proclaimed the United States' unilateral right to wage preventive war—to attack another sovereign nation not because it directly threatened the United States but because it could potentially pose a threat. It gave the president discretion to determine what constituted a threat. Thus, if a nation "harbored terrorists," developed weapons of mass destruction, or otherwise acted in ways that went against the United States' interests, it would be subject to attack and invasion. Another key aspect of the Bush Doctrine was the imperative to put down the rise of any rival that might challenge US hegemony.

DEFINE: Defines the Bush Doctrine's core principles: unilateral preventive war, presidential threat discretion, and thwarting rival hegemony.

Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politi…, loc. 417