Washington took a practical approach to United States involvement in the French Revolution and while he may have desired to send military help abroad, he showed restraint and acknowledged that the young republic had far more to lose than to gain if they did get involved. Washington embraced the idea of isolationism during these years because the United States was not yet the dominant world power that it would become. It was a small player on a world stage dominated by much more powerful forces in Europe, and by focusing inward rather than outward, he knew that the republic could build strength and muscle that would allow it to flourish globally in the near future. In his book, Flight of the Eagle, Conrad Black summarizes the thinking of Washington and the United States when he writes, "in the sage beginning of what would become a vastly successful policy for nearly 150 years, the United States would generally abstain from Europe's quarrels, and grow steadily stronger as Europe's penchant for internecine bloodbaths became even more sanguinary " (Black 102). Black is reiterating this notion that Washington accepted the situation for what it was, and was content to wait patiently and build the republic knowing that in a short period it would be able to be a dominant player on the global stage. Once again, it is not that Washington and his counterparts were firm believers in the idea of isolationism at its core, but only as a mechanism of foreign policy to be adopted because of the conditions of the atmosphere in which they were operating. .
As Kaufman notes, the isolationist strategy embraced by Washington was contingent on Great Britain remaining the great balancer of power in Europe during this time. During this period and up until the outbreak of World War I, the United States could always rely on Great Britain to function as a great power that balanced and maintained order in Europe.