President Obama’s Foreign-Policy Report Card, Part II

Two notable events in the news this week showcase the Obama Administration’s foreign policy.  First, the Taliban’s top military commander, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, was captured by Pakistani authorities at a madrassa near Karachi.  Here the Administration’s efforts to cultivate a bore fruit. Second, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was in Saudi Arabia, ratcheting up pressure on Iran.  She declared that Iran is fast becoming a military dictatorship under the boots of that country’s Revolutionary Guards.  If nothing is done to curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions, warned Clinton, then the entire Middle East may find itself in a nuclear arms race.  Here the Obama Administration continues down a well-chosen road to isolate the Iranian regime.

Afghanistan / Pakistan, on the one hand, and Iran on the other, are the binary-epicenters from which US interests are most threatened.  It is on these focal points and the related areas spreading outward that the Obama Administration has wisely concentrated its attention.  President Obama deserves high marks for creating a foreign policy that moves in a concerted diplomatic fashion, deploys American military power appropriately, and focuses on the objectives most critical to US interests.

The prudence and coherence of the Obama Administration’s foreign policy stand in sharp contrast to that of its predecessor.  The sorry state of American diplomacy during the Bush years cannot be over-emphasized.  It was a time, perhaps like no other in American history, in which arrogance was perceived as the principle characteristic of US foreign policy.  This was diplomatically debilitating, and with US military spread thin in Iraq and Afghanistan, the foreign-policy tool chest was left just about empty.

The mere election of Barack Obama re-inflated American prestige in many parts of the world, especially in Europe, where American political campaigns are followed closely and where Obama’s professorial style and rhetorical skills are highly appreciated.  And of course his message for a more cooperative and less confrontational United States resonated with the European public.

Obama surprisingly won the Nobel Peace Prize for doing nothing except win an election with a political message welcomed by Europeans.  Many have argued that the award was a political gesture, which of course it was and always is.  Yes, there are individuals more deserving than Barack Obama, a point the President emphasized in his bully acceptance speech at Oslo.  The prize might better be seen as one awarded to the American people for turning away from a foreign policy too often based on unilateral action, or inaction as the case may be.

The foreign policy of the new administration began with what conservatives derisively called Obama’s international “apology tour.”  While the tour can be nit-picked for some unnecessary contrition  (before Venezuelan strong man Hugo Chavez for example), it was imperative to demonstrate that the United States is now a country willing to listen, negotiate and compromise.

The Obama Administration understood from the outset that a reservoir of international goodwill based on public relations, as well as on traditional deal making, would have to be built up in order to eventually achieve American strategic objectives.  President Obama obviously appreciates the need for meaningful help against our Islamist enemies in Afghanistan and Pakistan.   On Iran, the Administration has been maneuvering to establish effective international sanctions.

The President deserves credit for his deliberative decision to send 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan.  European goodwill toward the new administration in Washington paid immediate dividends with the announcement that an additional 7000 non-US NATO forces would be sent to Afghanistan.  To command US forces in Afghanistan Obama chose General Stanley McCrystal to lead a surge-like campaign based on the anti-insurgency doctrine developed since the Viet Nam war, with an emphasis on protecting and serving Afghanistan’s major population centers.  Like the surge in Iraq, the Afghanistan surge seems to be working.

The courting of Pakistan by the Obama Administration is an especially important aspect of the struggle to root out Al Qaeda and its allies.  The Administration has vigorously pursued high-level negotiations and relationship-building with Pakistan’s political and military establishments.  Secretary of State Clinton made a high-profile visit to Pakistan last fall.  From this fascinating piece published in The New Republic, it is clear that US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Michael Mullen has formed a important bond with Pakistan’s most important military figure, Army Chief of Staff, Ashfaq Parvez Kayani.  This week’s capture of the Taliban is almost certainly a product of the full-court US diplomatic press on Pakistan.

In related effort, the Administration’s only State dinner was served for Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, signaling the importance of India in the scheme of US foreign policy.  India must show a peaceful face to Pakistan, in order to encourage the Pakistani’s to use military resources against the Islamists within their borders.   India is also an important democratic counterweight to China.

In the case of Iran, the world needed to see that the United States was completely open to negotiating with the regime in Tehran.  Before sanctions could have any hope of being established, the Islamic regime’s intransigence needed to be established beyond any reasonable doubt.

In the meantime, the Obama Administration made concessions to Russia on strategic defense in Eastern Europe.  As suggested here, setting the “reset button” with Russia and winning its support against Iran is no easy task, but clearly there will be no Russian cooperation against Iran at all without concessions to perceived Russian interests.  It now seems that Russia may go along with sanctions, though China will be another and still more difficult matter.  Russian cooperation is crucial in the case of Iran, and helpful in addressing the challenges in the Afghanistan / Pakistan theater.

As the diplomacy unfolded about Iran, the formidable domestic unrest within Iran caught the outside world by surprise.  The Obama Administration was criticized for not speaking out forcefully enough, or taking some action, in support of the protesters.  But in fact there was very little the US could do.  Associating too closely with the dissident movement inside Iran would only give credence to the regime’s charges that the opposition was manipulated from abroad by the US, the UK and Israel.  To limit the harm that sanctions may do to ordinary Iranians, the Administration is designing punitive economic weapons targeting the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s substantial business interests.

The US relationship with China rises to the level of importance of the challenges the United States faces in the Middle East.  With China however, there is a certain predictability with regards to the divisive status quo issues that exist from one US Administration to the next:  the inflated Chinese currency pegged to the dollar, inaction over North Korea, human rights, Tibet and Taiwan.   Added to these, the Obama Administration has tried to convince the Chinese, who hold vast amounts of US debt, that the US is serious about getting its fiscal house in order.   It is not an easy sell. In this case, domestic fiscal policy spills over into foreign policy, and threatens American credibility.

Beyond the epicenters of US foreign policy in Afghanistan / Pakistan and Iran, a sideshow opened in Latin America, where the Obama Administration placed the United States on the wrong side of the so-called coup in Honduras.  The Honduran legislative and judicial branches were clearly trying to protect Honduras against leftist dictatorship of the sort found in Cuba and festering in Venezuela when they ordered the removal of President Zelaya.  In the end, official scholars at the Law Library of the US Congress found the actions of the Honduran military consistent with the Honduran Constitution.  The US ultimately backed a compromise endorsing this past autumn’s elections, and the crisis was resolved with no harm done, except maybe to US democratic principles.  As if to acknowledge that the US Administration really does appreciate who its true friends are in Latin America, the President singled out Columbia and Panama in his State of the Union speech in January.

The enormous complexity of the questions facing US foreign policy makers would boggle the minds of Bismark, Metternich and Grotius.   There is danger in expecting too much from any American administration. Fortunately, President Obama has had the wisdom to rely on former rival Hillary Clinton at State, the shrewd Bush-era holdover Robert Gates at Defense, former Marine General James Jones at National Security, and many other competent and even-tempered officials.  In the face of multiple difficulties, President Obama and his Administration are gamely pursuing a realistic foreign policy in pursuit of American interests.  On foreign policy, President Obama has earned high marks, and the overall grade of A-.

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Author’s Note:

This is the last in CenterMovement.org’s series grading President Obama’s first year in office (see “Obama’s Foreign Policy and Defense Report Card, Part I: Terrorism” and “Taking Stock: Grading Obama’s Domestic Economic Policies His First Year in Office”). Adele Wick suggested a grade of C- for the President’s performance domestically.  I would have been even tougher and given him a D.

Why the large gap between Obama’s domestic and foreign policy performance?

President Obama’s mode of operation for foreign policy is everything his domestic policy is not:  deliberative, non-partisan, open-minded, far-sighted, flexible, mostly non-ideological, deferential to policy expertise and not politics, well-coordinated and well led.  These qualities have made and are making all of the difference.