It took nearly seven months and unfortunately a horrific and bloody conflict in the Middle East, but the aura of President George Bush as an invulnerable demigod has nearly overnight begun to fade. To politicize any regional conflict where innocent lives are being destroyed is to weaken the specter of tragedy, but this is the nature of our political world, and yes, what has been going on over there for the past several months is directly tied to the American political atmosphere, whether we like it or not. For Bush, the past year and a half has been a rather international wild ride - a circuitous journey from international idiot savant, to savior of the free world, and then back to the to international man of mistakes again. Along the way he damaged the reputation of America abroad, the credibility of the presidency itself, and his own political fortunes as well.
During the 2000 campaign, one of the best attacks the Democrats had against Bush was the relative lack of experience he had in the arena of foreign policy. Sure, he was purportedly reading former Secretary of State Dean Achenson's biography, from which he learned that the US must "must promote the peace," but for a man who was about as well traveled as your average Tequila delivery man transporting liquor from Guadalajara to Dallas, he was certainly not his father. And it showed. Remember, this is the same current international political sage of a President was once infamously asked "Can you name the President of Chechnya," to which he responded with a resounding "No, can you?" Albeit not many people could have answered this daunting question, but then again, many of us our not seeking to become the leader of the free world.
But these gaffes and miscues, which continued well into his presidency, were all wiped out of the American conscience on Sept. 11. Because of this date, what was previously an incoherent and inconsistent foreign policy emanating from the White House suddenly became galvanized and interestingly seemingly targeted. We had an enemy, we had a means to eradicate said enemy, and we as a nation went about our business ridding the world of terrorism. Bush came out as a shining star of international affairs, someone to rally around at a time when we as a nation were both vulnerable and afraid. But even here the leadership that Bush exhibited shielded a continually erratic if not non-existent stance on world affairs.
From the first day in his presidency Bush saw no need to have a presence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, going against nearly 30 years of concerted efforts on the part of all American presidents, regardless of political party, to find an endgame of peace in the embattled region. Unlike previous administrations, there was no overriding view of world affairs in the Bush White House, which made the administration seem lost, wandering throughout the international community from place to place in search of some semblance of a coherent strategy. If there was continuity in Bush's foreign policy, it was in how he handled foreign diplomats and dignitaries. W diplomacy: creating foreign policy with other heads of state by relying on personality traits rather than substance at informal meetings in Crawford, TX. Vladimir Putin was an "honest, straightforward man . . . who loves his family," primary discussions with Prime Minister Tony Blair were "pretty darn good," and the administrations unofficial nickname for Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien was Dino, short for dinosaur, reflecting the administration's belief the Canadian leader is behind with the times. Unfortunately, it is Mr. Bush whose foreign policy is a tantamount to a dinosaur, running around with its head cut-off. (Okay, maybe a bad analogy, though dinosaurs are the ancient ancestors of the modern chicken.)
What the current conflict in the Mideast should reveal to the American people is the relative simplicity and watered down approach to foreign policy the Bush administration has pursued, hitherto relying more on personal relations and ideological rather than substance. The reality of the real world is crashing down on Bush's approach to international affairs, crushing any successes and credibility gained directly after Sept. 11.
In fact on that tragic day, the President attained a great deal of significant, though somewhat superficial, support on all areas of foreign affairs. In one sense he does deserve accolades for his impressive leadership during one of the darkest moments in our lifetime, but it was as if the American people saw the relative narrow scope of the war on terrorism -narrow in the sense that it was both a unique situation and only one problem in a world beset by hundreds of problems- and gave the President a blank check in all areas of foreign policy. I'm not trying to minimize the importance of our response to the terrorist attacks, for it truly was a watershed event in American history, but just because the nation is fighting a so-called war against terrorism does not mean that that it is the only area in world affairs that demands our attention. For the moment it was the most important domestic and international event, and in many ways still is, but that attack did not somehow render all other areas of international import insignificant.
Today we find a Bush struggling to find cohesion in foreign policy. On the one hand he is an avid supporter of free trade, seeking to further trade communities in the Americas. But on the other hand, he recently decided to levy a protectionist tariff on imported steel, to which he has gained limited support from blue-collar America while putting the entire nations economy at risk from counter-tariffs from the European Union. Here Bush is trading political gains for common sense.
He bundled together an impoverished Korean nation, an Islamic theocracy struggling between extremism and political moderation, and a ruthless dictatorship under the singular heading "Axis of Evil." Sure, such rhetoric sounds great, especially against the backdrop of the "War on Terror," but to create a generalized statement that's only outcome has been to further alienate America from the rest of the world is the mark of an incompetent internationalism. In the words of an earlier President Bush, such an outlandish statement just wouldn't be prudent.
Our current President Bush has been bellowing about how this is a new world, full of risks strikingly different from the days of the cold war that necessitates modernizing of our military. Our enemy is no longer long-range ballistic nuclear strikes from the Soviet Union, but rather, international terrorists who hide in caves, cowards. The American landscape of today is vulnerable to bioterror, chemical weapons, and so-called dirty nuclear bombs, yet Bush is bent on scrapping the centerpiece of nuclear disarmament with Russia, the1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, in favor of spending $68 billion dollars of taxpayer money on a comprehensive system of missile defense once advocated by the Reagan administration. When our biggest nuclear threat comes from a man entering a New York City subway station with an atomic device hidden in a briefcase, spending money on an outdated missile defense system which already resides on shaky scientific ground again seems not be prudent and out of step with needs of the nation.
But the most glairing failure in Bush's rather disgraceful foreign policy resume is in his policy towards Israel, or rather, absence of a policy. He began with a strategy that disengaged our presence from the region, helping to destroy years of progress towards peace in the region. Yes, the conflict is one between the Palestinians and Israelis, but our disappearance from the peace process helped that same process to evaporate into renewed bloodshed. And once the violence began anew, suddenly we had a vested interest in the region. Again. It's rhetoric and action that has been empty, confusing, and reactionary.
What the recent flair up in Israel has exposed is a failure of the Bush administration to handle a multiplicity of international problems at once without stumbling from region to region without any substance. His international economic policies, international environmental policies, and regional policies in the Middle East and elsewhere have been contradictive and baseless. He has managed to alienate America from the rest of the world at a time when international cooperation is most needed. Though Bush has advocated the need for alliances, he seems willing to pursue unilateral policies on Iraq, the Kyoto Protocol, international trade, and energy concerns. What Sept. 11 hid from America is that this is the same Bush, with the same penchant for empty rhetoric, incoherent policy, incomprehensible speech, and a disillusioned view of the world in which we live in, that we "elected" on Nov. 7, 2000. It's a foreign policy that sets a dangerous precedent for future presidents, but is even more dangerous for the political destiny of the current president. Bush and his foreign policy has, up till now, been carousing the world banking on popularity enshrined in the most recent polls. He would be well-advised to temper such exuberance and reflect on the worldwide wild ride he has recently been on. If his policies do not begin to exhibit coherence and continuity, as well as substance and cooperation with other nations, than President Bush just might be fulfilling his instincts, living his hour, and reckless of what might come to him.
Adam Blickstein is a sophomore majoring in political science.
