|
 |
Townhall...
In Search of the
Obama Doctrine
By Michael Gerson
WASHINGTON -- The search for an Obama Doctrine that unites and
motivates his foreign policy hasn’t turned up much. The administration
itself is dismissive of the idea of grand strategy, stating a
preference for flexibility over coherence. Supporters praise Barack
Obama’s subtlety and nuance, invariably contrasting them to the
simplistic certainties of George W. Bush. Obama’s fogginess, in this
view, conceals an admirable realism.
But Occam’s razor -- the superiority of the simplest explanation --
applies even in foreign affairs. As a candidate, Obama defined his
approach as the opposite of everything Bush. Whatever the issue, Obama
would be the photographic negative. But as president, Obama’s foreign
policy has been slowly evolving toward the views of his predecessor.
Obama’s pride will not allow him to admit it. His rhetorical
imprecision obscures it. But behind the fog is the Bush Doctrine.
Having had a hand in shaping that doctrine, I know it when I see it. It
begins with the idea of pre-emption -- confronting dangers to America
before they fully emerge. Obama’s 2010 National Security Strategy
downplayed the idea of preventive force and banished the language of a
“war” on terrorism. But Obama was adding about 30,000 American troops
to the Afghan War, on the theory that “it is from here that we were
attacked on 9/11, and it is from here that new attacks are being
plotted as I speak.” He dramatically increased the pace of drone
strikes in Pakistan, and continued to detain terrorists at Guantanamo
Bay, employing the same legal theories used by the Bush administration.
Obama’s opposition to pre-emption consists mainly of criticisms of the
Iraq War made years ago.
Another element of the Bush Doctrine is the promotion of democracy and
human rights as alternatives to Islamist ideology. Initially, the Obama
administration sneered at the whole idea, with Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton claiming, “Let’s put ideology aside; that is so
yesterday.” During Obama’s first year in office, funding for democracy
programs in Egypt was cut in half. The initial stirrings of discontent
in the Middle East were treated as unfortunate complications in the
administration’s strategy of engaging dictators.
But the spreading heroism of Middle Eastern protesters has been enough
to melt the indifference of even the most frosty realists. History has
pushed Obama toward a binary choice: Betray freedom or embrace it. With
reluctance, he has embraced it. So in his speech to the nation on
Libya, Obama said, “Wherever people long to be free, they will find a
friend in the United States.” Here is Bush’s second inaugural: “When
you stand for your liberty, we will stand with you.” It is not that
Obama sounds like Bush; it is that both sound like Americans.
The final element of the Bush Doctrine is an emphasis on fighting
global poverty and disease -- based on the theory that hopeless and
lawless parts of the world export problems such as terrorism, human
trafficking and the drug trade. Here Obama has acknowledged continuity
-- even praising Bush on AIDS relief -- but without adding much
boldness of his own.
There are, of course, large differences in approach and emphasis
between Obama and Bush. Obama talks with more enthusiasm about
multilateralism. This commitment, however, is yet to be seriously
tested. Would Obama have stayed out of Libya if the U.N. Security
Council had balked? Would he have accepted the reduction of Benghazi to
ruins in order to demonstrate his multilateral convictions? Based on
Obama’s own reasoning -- that he could not “wait for the images of
slaughter and mass graves before taking action” -- he would have acted
anyway.
It is tempting -- oh so tempting -- to observe that Obama is growing in
office. That he is learning on the job. That he is a good note-taker,
cribbing a bit here and there, but finally getting his lessons down.
But this wouldn’t be fair. Obama is not copying. He is responding to a
set of objective circumstances that have not changed. In the post-9/11
world, every president will seek to pre-empt terrorist attacks,
influence the milieu that generates them and encourage the advance of
hope against hatred. Perhaps it is needlessly confusing to call this
the Bush Doctrine. It is, instead, a set of rather obvious strategic
reactions to a continuing, undeniable threat. It is not a mystery that
Obama should share these commitments -- or that he should be so
uncomfortable in admitting it.
Read it at Townhall
|
|
|
|
