Foreign Policy and the Republican Future
FOREIGN POLICY AND THE REPUBLICAN FUTURE Bill Clinton's foreign policy is in tatters. Republicans are pointing this out, and they're right to. But can they go beyond criticizing Clinton? Can they...
...But the most significant intellectual and political battles in the next two years won't be between Republicans and Clinton...
...Republicans ought to remind Americans of that—as well as of the fact that Reagan succeeded Jimmy Carter, whose foreign policy Bill Clinton's increasingly resembles...
...policy had aimed to nurture a democratic, pro-Western society, past successes are in jeopardy...
...But the American people have always differed from the elite in their insistence that our foreign policy reflect our principles...
...Military strength...
...Ironically, Bill Clinton has followed the same course, especially in his dealings with the Chinese dictatorship: He's managed to combine the strategic vision of Jimmy Carter with the moral vision of Richard Nixon...
...now it's building them...
...No one today can doubt that support for democracy was profoundly in our strategic interest, as well as consistent with our principles...
...In addition, after years of trumpeting its success in managing the global economy, the administration seems unable to contain the Asian economic crisis...
...IT IS TIME NOW FOR REPUBLICANS TO GO BEYOND SNIPING AT CLINTON AND EXPLAIN WHAT WOULD BE THE UNDERPINNINGS OF A REPUBLICAN FOREIGN POLICY...
...And in Russia, where U.S...
...Morality in foreign policy should be, as well...
...The meltdown of administration foreign policy is undeniable...
...After all, it was a Republican president, Ronald Reagan, who (over the opposition of much of the Democratic party) carried out the most successful foreign policy of any administration in the last half-century...
...With the exception of the Reagan years, recent Republican administrations have tended to pat themselves on the back for how "hard-headed" and "realistic" they are about the moral complexity of the world in which we live and the limited possibility of grounding our foreign policy on moral principles...
...It is no accident that the most serious threats to American interests today come from dictatorships, in China, Iraq, Iran, Serbia, and North Korea...
...Our forces are stretched desperately thin and are probably incapable of meeting even one major crisis, let alone two...
...To his credit, Senate majority leader Trent Lott has called for hearings in September to reexamine defense spending...
...North Korea promised in 1994 not to build nuclear weapons and was rewarded with U.S...
...Meanwhile, even the mainstream press now acknowledges that American military capabilities have been allowed to erode to a level that should prompt serious concern...
...Some Republicans think that what is needed is merely better "management" of foreign policy, a more "adult" approach to the world...
...We need to spend much more on our armed forces...
...In the Balkans, Milosevic is once again engaged in ethnic cleansing, while Washington, having threatened military action, does nothing...
...Mastery...
...Under Reagan, democracy bloomed in Latin America, in the Philippines and South Korea, and eventually in Central and Eastern Europe...
...Reagan and Bush had rallied our allies to victory in the Cold War and the Gulf War...
...Foreign policy represents a huge opportunity for Republicans over the next two years, if they have the wit to seize it...
...For the last six years, Republicans have occasionally supported and frequently sniped at Clinton in each of these areas...
...It is obviously important to point out the particular errors and deficiencies of the administration's policies in different parts of the world...
...What is needed, now as in 1980, is a complete reversal of the current failed foreign policy and a restoration of a foreign policy of American leadership and, yes, mastery...
...And it is not too much to say that on the outcome of these battles will hinge the possibility of successful American leadership for the 21st century...
...We need more money for readiness, more for R&D, more for procurement, more for troops, more for missile defense, more for everything...
...Can they articulate a coherent alternative to his policies...
...They will have to realize, though, that taking advantage of this opportunity requires rethinking some of their own presumptions and prejudices...
...When Bill Clinton took office, the United States was the world's preeminent power...
...We are now at a tipping point...
...The rest of the Republican party should follow Lott's lead, shun the dodge of claiming to be "cheap hawks," and honestly tell the American people that a lot more spending is going to be needed...
...The three M's of American foreign policy should be: Military strength, Morality, and Mastery...
...But now it is time to go beyond that critique and explain to the American people what would be the underpinnings of a Republican foreign policy...
...Either we are going to be endlessly trying to "cope" with problems that are increasingly difficult to cope with—to "manage" situations that become inherently less manageable—or we are going to move aggressively to shape the international environment...
...power, a rise in world chaos, and a dangerous 21st century, on the one hand, and a Reaganite reassertion of American power and moral leadership, on the other...
...Morality...
...And the American people are right...
...As for President Clinton's new "war" on terrorism, it is becoming less and less clear that the cruise-missile strikes against Afghanistan and Sudan made a dent in the terrorist networks, or that the administration really has the stomach for such a "war...
...India and Pakistan have exploded nuclear weapons, punching a huge hole in the administration's non-proliferation policy...
...There is no middle ground between a decline in U.S...
...Morality at home will be an issue over the next two years...
...We wish there were already a conservative and Republican consensus on this agenda...
...But there isn't, any more than there was a consensus in support of Reagan's agenda in the late 1970s...
...Let's keep them simple...
...Republicans can't and shouldn't run for the presidency in 2000 promising to increase defense spending by only a few billion a year...
...Our principles are fundamental to our national strength...
...The world looked to the United States for leadership, and the United States had both the strength and the will to provide it...
...Republicans should be real hawks...
...In China, Clinton's appeasement has produced no results except alarm among our Asian allies and demoralization among the advocates of democracy...
...They will be for the mind of the Republican party...
...Let Clinton be the "cheap hawk...
...Republicans in Congress and elsewhere need to criticize and attempt to correct Clinton's foreign policy over the next months wherever possible...
...To present a real alternative to Clinton-Gore and to build the kind of military we will need in the years to come, Republicans must advocate a reversal of the cuts that have been made in defense since the end of the Cold War...
...Republicans should articulate the broad principles of a Reaganite foreign policy...
...In six years, Clinton has squandered this inheritance...
...But they are wrong...
...It so happens that their political interests coincide with the interests of the nation...
...In Iraq, whose regime President Clinton once rightly declared the most serious danger confronting the world, the American policy of denying Saddam Hussein the ability to build weapons of mass destruction has collapsed...
Vol. 3 • September 1998 • No. 49
