This was bandwagoning of a peculiar sort, however. The threat the United States posed (and still poses) to Palau and FSM is unlike a conventional one because it did not (and does not) directly threaten the power of the state, that is, the government and its apparatus. That is, even an abrupt and total termination of US ties to these countries would not have had any direct effect on actual state security, per se. This is the critical distinction that brings us to the boundaries of neorealism, for according to strict neorealist doctrine, Palau and FSM would have only aligned if state leaders thought it would minimize an entirely external security risk.

There would be, of course, a security risk to the governments of Palau and FSM if the United States slashed aid or burdened these nations with unreasonable anti-terrorism restrictions—an internal risk that would arise indirectly and would depend upon domestic conditions. Both countries, particularly FSM, lag behind world standards for material well-being. Life expectancy and infant mortality measures have not significantly improved in FSM for thirty years. Palau is in the process of moving its capital city (or, more appropriately, its capital settlement) to a town with no roads. It has also struggled notoriously to provide basic law enforcement; the methamphetamine trade is prevalent, corruption scandals abound, and politically motivated assassinations and firebombings have practically become the norm. A withdrawal of US aid or a reprioritization of domestic spending to meet US anti-terrorism demands would likely sound the financial death knell for these governments, particularly in Palau, where the history of drastic political upheaval—especially shocking given the country’s size—has essentially destroyed the concept of governmental legitimacy anyway. From a theoretical perspective, then, considering the particulars of the domestic situation is necessary to understand why the indirect US threat was sufficient to motivate joining the US-led coalition.

In more general terms, alignment choices may take into account both the less conventional and indirect threats posed by foreign powers and the qualities of the national environment that make these threats pressing enough to compel action. Analyzing foreign policy behavior requires more than the discussion of the purely external, more than the assumption of an unconstrained actor. The test case of small states, in addition to grounding the idea of bandwagoning in empirical reality, reveals the contributions of domestic and institutional characteristics to foreign policy choices. While neorealism is clearly a vital component—maybe the vital component—of a theoretical model of international relations, it has its limits. Studying Palau and its marginal counterparts cannot answer the imperative foreign policy questions of our time. It can, however, move us toward a more comprehensive and inclusive theoretical discourse—the only language in which we can pen our answers when we find them.