At Last, a Foreign Policy Issue: Bush, Gore and the Balkans
Critical differences between a Bush and Gore presidency flared into
the open over the weekend. It began when Condaleeza Rice, George W.
Bush's senior foreign policy advisor, said in an interview in The
New York Times that Bush would withdraw U.S. forces from the
Balkans if elected. She argued the peacekeeping burden should fall
on the Europeans rather than Americans. Another Bush campaign
official, Ari Fleischer, emphasized the statement, saying, "The
governor has made very clear the role of our military should be to
fight and win wars and not to be the peacekeepers around the
world.''
Vice President Al Gore struck back, saying Bush suffered from "a
complete lack of judgment and a complete misunderstanding of
history'' by advocating a diminished U.S. peacekeeping role in
Europe. He went on to charge that Bush's view would be "more than
an untested shift in America's foreign policy for the last half-
century. It would be one that could jeopardize fragile alliances
and damage NATO." Madeleine Albright added her weight, claiming
Bush's view was risky and could lead to instability in the region.
During our series on the elections, our position was that, while
there was fundamental agreement on U.S. foreign policy, there were
substantial differences on how to implement a national security
strategy. Gore's vision, derived from long Democratic tradition,
saw U.S. power operating in the framework of alliances and
multinational organizations, directed toward stability. Bush's
vision, derived from the Republican perspective, saw U.S. security
policy as more self-directed and more focused on limited national
security strategies and objectives. Gore was more committed to
multilateral action than was Bush.
Suddenly, this submerged theme rose, like Atlantis, from the
depths. It opened with a tentative probe from the Bush ranks.
Virtually tied with Gore, the Bush people sought to extend the
campaign to a new battlefield where they might have an advantage.
Obviously, their polls were indicating Gore might be vulnerable on
foreign policy. The polls were also indicating Gore's vulnerability
might be dangerous to challenge, and ultimately illusory. It might
be dangerous because Americans tend to react badly if they sense
politicians are using national security issues for political
advantage, while weakening the president's ability to act
forcefully. It might be illusory because voters, while dubious
about the current foreign policy trend, might not be all that
sensitive to the issue. In other words, when asked, voters might
give an anti-administration answer, but with such low intensity
that it might not affect their vote.
Nevertheless, the Bush people, needing a breakout issue, decided to
probe. Notably, the Bush campaign did not allow George W. Bush to
float his criticisms. Rather, attacks came from senior, but
publicly obscure, staffers and advisors, thus allowing Bush to back
off from the probe if it produced unsatisfactory results.
The Gore campaign immediately rolled out its heaviest guns. Not
only did Gore blast back, but his team brought the secretary of
state into the fray - not a common stratagem. It is usually
advantageous to have the State Department appear above the
political fray. Clearly, Gore either felt he could win an advantage
here or that he was badly vulnerable. Certainly the response was
massive, coordinated and intense.
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Now, it does not appear Gore's response meant he felt the
battlefield offered him an advantage. As the second debate showed,
Gore has tended to minimize his foreign policy differences with
Bush. More important, it was not Gore who initiated the battle. If
Gore's strategists had felt there was an advantage in raising
foreign policy issues, they would have raised them at a time and
place of their own choosing. They did not. Nevertheless, they
responded vigorously to a probe they could have chosen to ignore.
>From this, we can deduce the Bush camp's tentative probe hit a
nerve.
The question is whether Gore's camp struck back effectively. To
determine that, we need to consider where Bush chose to attack and
where he didn't.
Bush chose Yugoslavia as his first battleground. He did not use
Israel and Palestine. Superficially, it would appear Clinton, and
therefore Gore, is far more vulnerable over the near-catastrophic
Middle East explosion than he is over Yugoslavia. After all,
Yugoslavia appears to be an administration success story. Milosevic
has been toppled. A man the administration anointed as a democratic
savior is easing into control. The Yugoslavian adventure appears to
be moving toward success. Nevertheless, Bush views Yugoslavia as
the vulnerable point in Democratic foreign policy. The issue is
what the Bush people see and whether they are seeing clearly.
Bush and Gore are in general agreement on the need to intervene in
Bosnia and Yugoslavia. Although Bush seemed less enthusiastic than
Gore, he has not challenged Gore on the entry. What he has chosen
to challenge him on is the exit strategy. Gore and the Clinton
administration have positioned the United States for a long-term
presence in the Balkans. Bush has chosen this long-term presence as
the battleground.
This task should not be left to allies for several reasons. First,
the allies may not wish to undertake the mission. Second, by
themselves, they may not have either the political will or the
military resources to do so. Finally, as regional powers
themselves, they might have divergent parochial interests that
cause them to use intervention as a way to enhance those interests.
Instead of minimizing conflict, this could intensify it. Therefore,
the United States - a nation without any parochial interests on a
regional basis - must preside over the process. Or so goes the
Democratic reasoning.
There is another dimension to this. Long-term peacekeeping
operations cause a diffusion of U.S. forces. Scattering them
piecemeal around the world creates vulnerability should a major
power choose to challenge the United States militarily. Embedded in
the Democratic worldview is the assumption that this is not a
realistic threat. The view is there is no competing center of
politico-military power at the present time, nor is there a danger
of an emerging coalition of challengers
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The Democratic perception of U.S. foreign policy is that the United
States is not only the leader of a powerful coalition of nations,
but that it is the leader of a world coalition in which there is,
more or less, consensus among leading powers about the important
things. Most major nations are moving toward greater liberalization
of political and economic systems. Most major powers, and lesser
powers as well, have as their most important priority the
maintenance of international stability, in order to both enhance
liberalization and create an atmosphere of stability and order
necessary to facilitate free trade and, therefore, global
prosperity.
>From the Democratic perspective, the United States does not face
strategic threats from great powers. The greatest threats to the
international system come from tertiary, rogue powers. These powers
not only create internally repressive regimes, but also threaten
their regions with their politico-military adventurism. According
to this theory, the very fact that they are illiberal, repressive
regimes causes them to engage in regional destabilization.
Therefore, it is in the interest of the United States to destroy
the repressive regimes in order to create regional stability. It is
also in the interest of the United States to remain in the region
after the repressive regime is destroyed in order to create the
security necessary to allow new democratic governments to take root
and flourish.
The net result of this perspective is viewing the American
military's primary function as a force to be used against tertiary
powers that are either engaged in internal repression, regional
destabilization or, as is usually the case, both. U.S. forces
should not be used alone, but they should always be present to
prevent regional allies from allowing the mission to degenerate
into a regional squabble. Moreover, the presence of U.S. troops is
a means of compelling others to participate. The risk is low
because there are no global geopolitical threats. Therefore, U.S.
troops will be used in noncombat roles for extended periods of
time; indeed, for indeterminate periods of time.
Here Bush has struck. He has struck at the visceral American
aversion to open-ended interventions in other countries' internal
affairs. Part of this has to do with Vietnam, an American
intervention in a complex internal political conflict that involved
both foreign and domestic elements - leading to disaster. Part of
it strikes at a deeper sensibility. This is the idea embedded in
American political culture that the United States should serve as
an exemplar to other nations, many of these so deeply flawed their
problems cannot be solved. Intervening in these countries in an
attempt to improve them lead only to disaster. Arrogant as this
might be, it is a deeply held American perception. Bush is playing
to both the ongoing fear of Vietnam and the deep-seated belief that
nothing can possibly save the Balkans from themselves.
Embedded in this visceral message is a competing strategic vision.
Deep inside the Republican vision is a variant on the Nixon
Doctrine. This doctrine held that countries bordering the Soviet
Union had the primary responsibility for protecting themselves from
the Soviet Union. The United States would provide aid and support,
but would not take major responsibility. Bush's argument that the
Balkans is a European problem basically holds that the stability of
Europe is Europe's concern.
More than that, Bush is reminding the American public that Europe
is a prosperous, sophisticated and stable region with ample
resources to manage its own affairs. There is a deeply held feeling
among Americans that foreign allies have taken advantage of them.
They believe Europeans are happy to see U.S. troops bear the major
burden for stabilizing the Balkans, though the Europeans are the
major beneficiaries of that stabilization.
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The Gore vision - that unless the United States takes the lead in
managing the coalition, the coalition will fail to carry out its
responsibilities - is seen by much of the public as proof of
European irresponsibility and an argument against continued
presence. Thus, Gore might have played directly into Bush's hands
when he said NATO could collapse if U.S. forces pulled out of the
Balkans. That set the stage for Bush to argue that if the Europeans
are incapable of maintaining NATO without U.S. risk-taking, then it
is the Europeans' problem.
A fundamental geopolitical dispute lies beneath. Bush sees the
dissipation of forces in peacekeeping operations as strategically
dangerous. The Republican worldview, while close to the Democrats,
is ultimately not convinced the age of great power rivalry is over.
Chinese and Russian behavior is viewed suspiciously. Apart from
tertiary rogue states, such as North Korea or Iraq, Republicans
remain concerned about great power challenges. They see the primary
function of the armed forces as securing national security against
major powers, and see peacekeeping as a subsidiary function to be
terminated as quickly as possible. Gore sees great power challenges
as obsolete, and sees peacekeeping as the primary realistic mission
of the armed forces.
Ultimately, we believe the U.S. public will tolerate peacekeeping
operations in extreme cases; long-term deployments designed for
political rather than military purposes are unattractive. Moreover,
there is a sense NATO and other allies use American willingness to
bear the burden as a means for evading responsibility. There is
little fear of great power challenges, but there is also little
patience with the idea that European tranquility is an American
responsibility.
Bush's probe triggered a massive response from Gore. Gore has made
it clear that, in his view, NATO cannot function without the United
States. He also made it clear there is no exit strategy from the
Balkans. Here Gore is politically vulnerable. Bush will strike
back, saying Europe is Europe's problem, and that a permanent
presence in the Balkans is unacceptable. He will try to turn
Clinton's major foreign policy success against Clinton and Gore.
But underneath it all are the beginnings of a deep debate over
foreign policy. On the one side, there are those who see the end of
great power rivalry and view the military as a tool for policing
minor regional unrest. On the other side are those who see the past
10 years as a mere interregnum between great power rivalries and
think the armed forces should be preparing for major wars.
Whatever else Americans agree upon, this is a fundamental rift in
worldviews, and it has emerged in the campaign. Our sense is that
the Democrats are politically more vulnerable on this issue than
they might like to be. That is why Bush took a shot at it. That is
why Gore came out swinging.
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