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Do We Even Have A Foreign Policy?
Even The New York Times is piling on Susan Rice for this — so perhaps it’s unnecessary to pose the question — but her comments strike me as so wondrously stupid and terrifying that I’ve got to wonder whether there could be any charitable or vaguely reassuring way of reading it:
[Rice] was peppered with critiques of the president’s Syria and China policies, as well as the White House’s delays in releasing a national security strategy, a congressionally mandated document that sets out foreign policy goals. On that last point, Ms. Rice had a sardonic reply.
“If we had put it out in February or April or July,” she said, according to two people who were in the room, “it would have been overtaken by events two weeks later, in any one of those months.”
I get that she was being sardonic. I get it that this is not what she literally and officially thinks about this. But she’s an experienced public official who knew this would make the front page of The New York Times. It would therefore seem that she knowingly told the whole world — and not entirely in jest — the United States no longer has foreign policy goals because there have been a series of crises in the past year. Oh, and by the way, to hell with Congress.
Does that sound as epically mad to you as it does to me? Is there any way her comment could have been funny and appropriate at the time, or that she could have thought, reasonably, that it would never leak? I suppose it’s possible that I’ve lost my sense of proportion and this actually makes perfect sense. But even The New York Times is freaking out, so I fear it’s every bit as Under-the-Reign-of-Elagabalus as it sounds.
Published in Foreign Policy, General
No.
(This was too easy . . .)
If strategy should be enduring, then what’s the need for a new “strategy” document every year?
It should look the same as the one from the previous year.
Incidentally, they all do :)
And incidentally, they all say nothing of substance, because this is perhaps the most meaningless document in existence.
US strategy isn’t established by a pointless document. It wasn’t in GWB’s time, when just as many national security strategy reports were filed as under Obama. Nor is it now.
PS: Even if we take for granted the assumption that the US “lacks a strategy” (despite how unreasonable such a assumption may be): what is the alternative the GOP proposes here?
Because I’ve heard the GOP support, and then oppose, virtually all of its recommendations on foreign policy. Bomb Assad, bomb Assad’s opponents. Arm the Syrian rebels, bomb the Syrian rebels. Support the Arab Spring oppose the Arab Spring. Bomb Qaddafi, bomb those who replaced Qaddafi. And on and on.
Consistency, apparently, is not important when you’re the one making the criticisms.
uh…wow…you seemed to have assigned quite a straw man to me there so you could bat it down. Unpleasant to say the least.
Claire,
..hmmmm… let’s see. No Foreign Policy, No Budget, No Border…why yes their seems to be a pattern here. No answers for IRS, Benghazi, Fast & Furious, Bergdahl Deal, Obamacare lies,…etc.
Mr. Nobody
BY ANONYMOUS
@Swatter- “Then you have a President, who by definition is Muslim, get schooled by a gent in Hawaii named Davis and later, in Chicago by a terrorist named Ayers.”
Given his background as a Harvard English major, at a time when university English departments were pushing postmodernism, and his contempt for those who “cling to guns and religion,” I strongly suspect he is a postmodern atheist with Marxist leanings.
A logical extension of your argument, is a “straw man”?
I learn something new every day!
I think we have a wonderful foreign policy. We let five Taliban generals out of Guantanamo. Meanwhile, we withdraw our military personnel from Afghanistan and leave a generous stockpile of equipment and materiel for the repatriated kind-hearted generals.
Well, then the generals will need fighters. We can help with that, too. We’ve got 149 of ’em at Gitmo that President Obama would like to send to join the ones he’s already donated.
This just gets better.
I would love to feel proud of the contributions the United States makes to the world, but every time there are Democrats in office, they leave nothing but death and destruction behind them. As bad as they are inside our country, they are way worse outside. No wonder everyone hates us. I don’t blame them. And I pity the next Republican president. And it will be a Republican–I know that because the mess is soooo big now.
Don’t be too sure. Elizabeth Clinton an answer for big messes.
Her mentor says it best:
I’ve just finished reading the “Thirteen Gun Salute” where Abdul truly was peppered. Even Susan Rice doesn’t deserve that.
I didn’t say anything of the things you ascribed to me. Not one. Not sure how that is a logical extension, but then I’ve seen you use this tactic many times.
Don’t forget his years organizing communities.
Dev,
OK Ok, I’ll go to 7.5, especially if I can scrape the .5 points off the hide of a certain arrogant left wing American Jewish film maker who should have known better than to dis the mossad.
Regards,
Jim
PS Love the A10
Very good response and good points. For those curious, here’s the archive of National Security Strategies:
http://nssarchive.us
And some thoughts upon my further contemplation:
1. Congress insisted it wanted this in 1986, and from then on, received it annually and apparently more-or-less on time until 1999; we’re got two skipped years under Bush 1, two under Clinton, and then, as you say–Bush more or less ignored it.
2. Is it probably a dumb and useless document and why bother anyway? No, it shouldn’t be. This should be part of the way foreign policy is shaped, for obvious reasons–we want Congress involved in some oversight capacity, and this is about the level we want it, right?
3. Is it a hypocrisy/incoherent to be more concerned that this is being ignored now than it was under Bush? Probably.
let’s separate that from the questions of ..
4) What’s going on with this Administration’s morale? Did you ever have the feeling–even if it was true–that the Bush Administration was just signalling to the world, “We give up here, it’s just all too hard?” Which is what this as-much-as-on-the-record comment says to me. But maybe that’s me: that’s a real possibility.
and
5) Is the most recent document stupid,
and
6) Is our foreign policy in fact stupid (5-6 are analytically separate and independent sources of concern)
–I think to the extent I remain pretty alarmed by this news item specifically, it has to do with 4 and what strikes me as the dumbness of saying that. It’s just something leaders don’t say–even if it’s true.
By the way, for those of you who have a few hours to think about this question …
I of course got curious and started reading the old National Security Strategies in light of the question, “Is this a totally dumb document, anyway?”
Here’s the summary description of the first one, under Reagan:
That sounds a bit snide and dismissive, don’t you think? “Rushed,” “no attempt,” etc.
Well, tell me what you think when you read it:
http://nssarchive.us/NSSR/1987.pdf
And ask these questions of yourself:
1) Was it worth it to explain this strategy to Congress?
2) Was this, in fact, the strategy pursued by the Administration in 1987?
3) If so, what’s the verdict of history on this strategy?
I have to say, I wouldn’t have written such a dismissive description.
If I’ve got the time, I’ll keep reading them–I’ve probably read at least parts of most of them before, but couldn’t for the life of me really remember what they really say. (That doesn’t mean they had no effect on me: that’s something different. And it doesn’t mean I’m neutral on the subject of whether my elected representatives know or care what they say.)
One last comment–if anyone here from time to time asks him or herself, “Am I being unfair to the Obama administration,” “Am I applying double-standards,” “Is the problem simply that I don’t remember that things used to be as bad or worse?”-(and I submit that all fair-minded people should regularly ask such questions of themselves), I present to you the 2010 strategy:
http://nssarchive.us/?page_id=8
I will make no specific argument about it. I simply ask you to compare 1987 and 2010, side by side. There’s a range of possibilities, really, from A-Z: A. We are all suffering from extreme cognitive bias, hypocrisy, hysteria, and the effects of groupthink; Z. We’re doomed.
What’s your verdict, after looking at them both? Hard (impossible) to control for personal bias, but perhaps interesting if you’re consulting your own conscience.
A document purporting to be foreign policy strategy would be as anodyne as possible.
No one who actually has a strategy would publicly publish a document explaining that strategy, unless one is convinced that one’s adversaries are illiterate. If you know of anyone who doesn’t see why that would be, I would like to set up a poker date with them. Tell them to bring all of
mytheir money.Yes, Team, I do suspect he is more atheist than anything. When he was member of Rev. Wright’s church, that doesn’t mean he went to church. It was only used as a prop for his ambitions.
I don’t know much about Marxist leanings, but I think it is more basic like anti-colonial leanings learned from study of his father’s and mother’s and Davis’ radical leanings.
Clare, I wasn’t part of your first writings on ricochet, so I didn’t know what the readers were weeping about when you quit for a time.
However, this article you wrote and your questions really clears things up. You are quite talented on asking questions that require you to think.
Thank you.
Generically, Obama is one strange duck. I can’t figure him out. I have asked Milt Rosenberg (who told me to Google Epstein and Obama) and I have listened to Carol Platt Lebieu (who was editor of Harvard Law Review after Obama and has some interesting stories).
Anyways, can it be as simple as Epstein’s take on Obama- he listens but ignores, and like Chinese food, two hours later you are hungry (or wonder what Obama believes in the first place).
I totally want to disagree with these assessments, but lately, I am wondering if Epstein didn’t just nail it.
Claire,
I would say the two quotes in bold reveal the fundamental difference. Reagan was able to “define publicly the crucial moral distinctions between totalitarianism and democracy”. The Obama mentality doesn’t think that defining publicly the moral distinction has anything to do with it. Instead magically we can jump to “rights which nations and individuals deserve”. In short Obama inflates our mission end goal while being unable to define anything that we actually stand for.
This is why I have personally come to the conclusion that defining Jihad as the enemy is so important. Islam must take responsibility for itself. It can not go on reserving for itself the right to make unlimited war on all non-Muslims. There is an interpretation of Jihad that is mystical and reads the literal passages as referring to a personal internal struggle with evil. It is not our place to comment on Islamic theology. However, Jihad interpreted as it is in ISIS and a host of other genocidal groups is simply unacceptable. It is a matter of self defense.
This is the most I can glean from the two documents do to my own time constraints. However, I don’t think that the documents are doing justice to our criticism of Obama. Six years of experience tells us that this administration has no compass and is just reacting to events. They are as willing to throw American long term interests under the bus, as they are willing to throw American Allies long term interest under the bus, as they are willing to throw individual Americans under the bus to avoid responsibility for their incompetence and lack of vision.
In short, we are being fair. In fact we are being overly fair. Not to complain but who is paying my rent while I sort this out. How much are the likes of Josh Earnest and Susan Rice being paid to perpetrate their hopeless grasping lack of clarity. We can only stand to tolerate this level of parasitic governance so long.
Sooner or later it’s the parasites that die or we do. Sort of like Ebola.
Regards,
Jim
The only difference among the presidents would be what they actually acted upon. I assume the CIA had some input into whatever GW saw. The fact that he read it doesn’t mean he accepted it or that it affected his policy making.
swatter:
Clare, I wasn’t part of your first writings on ricochet, so I didn’t know what the readers were weeping about when you quit for a time.
However, this article you wrote and your questions really clears things up. You are quite talented on asking questions that require you to think.
Two comments, Claire.
1. My bias: I was directly involved in the drafting of the 1987 document. As the first one in a contemplated series, think of it as the pilot for a new TV show. Not all the characters are going to be fully developed. Plot lines may not be fully fleshed out. The writers may not agree on the direction(s) the show should take in the future. But you should get a pretty good idea of what the show is about.
The 87 document is a fair summary of the strategic national security view of the Reagan Administration, like it or not (and a lot of people, inside and outside of the government, did not). Col. Snider, if I recall correctly, was one of the NSC staffers coordinating the conflicting views of the various agencies with input into the document. Apparently he didn’t like how the sausage was made in 1987.
2. I doubt the process in the Obama Administration was better, and judging by the product, it’s worse. If you compare the 1987 and 2010 documents, what strikes me about the 2010 document is (a) the “kitchen sink” drafting approach (b) the pervasive use of anodyne, empty euphemisms and (c) the almost obsessive need to reject Bush Administration policies. For example:
It, like Obama, often seems to more concerned with telling you what it is not than what it is. It’s not really a “national security strategy” document, it’s a codification of Obama speech soundbites about how he’s going to change America’s perception and role in the world. It reflects the incoherence of the underlying policies and the thinking behind them.
I’ll go with A…simply because it is the more likely explanation.
Option Z I’ll leave for those who have a propensity to always say “we’re doomed” ;) (of whom we seem to have an abundance at Ricochet around election time)
Sure, you can compare with the 1987 document. But compare to the 2006 document under Bush.
Same thing.
So as I said earlier, why no criticism of Bush’s “foreign policy”, or lack thereof? (if we are to assume that the existence of such a document constitutes the existence of a foreign policy, while it’s absence shows the opposite)
Bush’s 2006 report mentions nothing about Russia or China in any negative light (the 2010 report, at least, does to a small degree).
Remember than only 2 years later, still under Bush’s presidency, Russia invaded Georgia and the US response (i.e. Bush’s) was…nothing. (compare the criticism against Obama in handling Ukraine, with that of Bush’s handling of Georgia.)
But of course the broader point is that this document isn’t the “foreign policy” of the US. It’s a very meaningless document filled with stuff you can hear in any press conference on foreign policy on a daily basis. It says things which barely ever change over decades, never-mind years.
Now of course, there’s a more general critique made here about Obama’s foreign policy which isn’t related to this report. That being whether it’s the “right” one or not.
Seems to me his foreign policy doesn’t differentiate from that of Bush very much at all…regardless of the talk. The US was going to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan anyway. Those countries were going to deteriorate anyway (as I said, Iraq was an Iranian proxy state long before Obama came around.) Bush wasn’t going to take any different approach to the Arab Spring or Libya or Syria. In fact, very many GOP leaders had/have exactly the same position as Obama on these issues.
Bush’s stance on Russia was no different. He did nothing in 2008 when Putin invaded Georgia. Obama’s response has equally been timid…but then again, what’s the alternative? Similarly with China. I don’t see any “softening” on China under Obama compared to previous administrations.
Same on terrorism. How many…thousands…of drone strikes were carried out under this administration on terrorist targets in Yemen or Pakistan or Somalia or wherever they may have been?
Everything seems more or less the same. And that seems to be because America’s foreign policy isn’t really subject to so much discretion from the President, as so many here seem to portray. It certainly doesn’t depend on a piece of paper issued every year.
PS: Now I may disagree with many of the foreign policy stances under this administration, but I disagreed with them even when they were the same stances under Bush!
You said that the foreign policy strategy should be “enduring” and be robust enough to endure changes that may happen from year to year.
I disagree with that somewhat (you can’t foresee things like ISIS, which change quite a big chunk of the strategy)…but if we take the “enduring” part of your argument, then the logical extension is: “why do we need a new document every year then?” It should look like the previous year’s one.
And they do.
PS: Now I know a lot of people get caught up in the…minutia…of foreign policy. Some do it simply because they need to grasp on to something, anything, to criticize the “other guy” from the other Party.
Like for example the criticisms that Obama has released Guantanamo detainees. Yes “he” has (he, as in this current administration. I don’t think the President makes these decisions).
But so did Bush! http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-18631363 Releasing Guantanamo detainees had been a standard practice long before Obama showed up!
How can we “accuse” the “other side” of lacking consistency in foreign policy, or of even having one, when many conservatives seem to flip-flop on virtually every issue in foreign policy?
These were not Taliban generals.
Seriously? You think the US traded 5 top Taliban for a deserter and the President didn’t approve the trade?
If this were true, I’m sure we would have read about his reaction when he read about the trade in the newspaper.