Hillary Clinton Is Trying to Drive Democrats Into a Dead End on Foreign Policy
In recent weeks, Hillary Clinton has increased her attack on Barack Obama, arguing that foreign policy experience is essential to "being ready on Day One." Clinton thinks this argument will bring her closer to the presidency, but she is actually painting herself, and Democrats, into a corner in the general election, for, whatever one may think about her or Senator Obama's foreign policy credentials, they certainly are less than John McCain's. Democrats cannot run the general election campaign on the question of who has more foreign policy experience, or experience, in general, because the answer to those questions will be John McCain, even though most of his foreign experience is military. The Democratic campaign will have to be about which candidate has demonstrated the best judgment in foreign affairs, not who has the most experience. Which one endorsed and supported the greatest foreign policy fiasco in modern American history? Which continued to support this war long after every possible justification for it had collapsed? Whose belligerent statements would increase the chance of war with Iran? In answering these questions -- the questions Democrats will have to emphasize in a campaign against McCain -- Hillary Clinton doesn't fare so well.
First of all, it is not clear where Hillary derives the foreign policy "experience" advantage she claims, if not her eight years in the White House as First Lady. But when did the American Presidency become a monarchy? When did the First Lady role morph into the Queen? No First Lady, including Hillary, has been tasked with foreign policy assignments. As First Lady, the main purpose of her foreign travel was to engage in ceremonial events. There was nothing wrong with that, of course, but being hostess or guest at dinner parties is not "Commander-in-Chief" experience any more than Senator Obama's experience living abroad is foreign policy experience. In fact, it can plausibly be argued that living in a foreign country, which Senator Obama has done, provides a deeper understanding of how the rest of the world thinks than bopping into a country for a day or two to schmooze with a Saudi oligarch. If her foreign policy role was more than that, why has she refused to release her White House papers so voters could see evidence of what her "experience" claims are based on?
Whatever her actual level of "experience," since entering the U.S. Senate, Senator Clinton has been one of the most hawkish of Democrats, including, of course, her vote for the October 2002 Iraq Resolution which led to war with Iraq. She and Bill have tried to explain that vote on the grounds that President Bush's true intentions, and the debacle Iraq would soon become, were "unknown and unknowable." These claims cannot withstand scrutiny, however. Long before October 2002, there were abundant reasons not to trust anything Bush/Cheney said about Iraq. Long before October 2002, there existed a large body of scholarship that detailed the regional and religious conflicts that would erupt in Iraq if Saddam were removed. Two of the best predictors of the fiasco that Iraq would become, were President George H.W. Bush and his National Security Advisor, Brent Scowcroft, both of whom had written well-known articles and memoirs about why Baghdad should not be invaded -- in the case of Scowcroft, in a New York Times Op-Ed shortly before the vote on the Iraq Resolution. And these warnings were not lost on the large majority of Democrats in Congress; in fact, 148 Democrats in Congress (125 in the House and 23 in the Senate) saw through the smoke and mirrors, accurately perceived that Bush/Cheney would use the resolution to invade Iraq, and voted against the resolution. Hillary Clinton missed all the clues, took the Republican bait, and made one of the worst foreign policy decisions in modern American history. As recently as December 2005, Senator Clinton wrote a letter to her constituents defending her war vote. While she now favors troop withdrawals, her turn against the war followed the opinion of a majority of Democratic voters by more than two years. Is following public opinion the type of leadership that "experience" produces? If it is, maybe we need less of it.
Hillary Clinton fell into the same hawk trap by voting for the Kyl-Lieberman resolution [Senator Obama opposed it], which labeled part of the Iranian national army, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, "a terrorist organization." Aside from the fact that Iran has played a very cautious role in Iraq and seeks a long-term accommodation with the U.S. in Iraq, labeling the Iranian Revolutionary Guards a "terrorist organization" establishes the pre-conditions for a military attack on Iran, just as Bill Clinton's call for "regime change" in Iraq was the predicate for attacking Iraq. Once Democrats, like Hillary Clinton, label part of the Iranian Army a "terrorist organization," how can they complain when Bush attacks the Guards without appearing weak on "terrorism." The Clintons play chess one move at a time; they simply are no match for Republicans, who see the whole board and plan several moves ahead.
The problem of Clinton's poor instincts on foreign policy is compounded by the hawkish foreign policy advisors she has surrounded herself with, the most important of which are Madeleine Albright, Richard Holbrooke, Lee Feinstein and Sandy Berger. Former Secretary of State Albright is the person who Colin Powell's Chief of Staff, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, once said, "She never met a military option she didn't like. When I worked at Defense, she used to scare us." When Colin Powell urged the new Clinton Administration not to bomb Bosnia too hastily, she countered, "What's the use of having his superb military that you're always talking about if we can't use it?" "I thought I would have an aneurysm," Powell would later write.
Perhaps an even more problematic member of the Clinton foreign policy team is Richard Holbrooke, who Clinton insiders say would be the most likely Secretary of State in a new Clinton Administration. Holbrooke certainly is not short on foreign policy experience, having been an Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and Ambassador to the U.N., but his track record should cause all progressives concern. Holbrooke, described by pundits as, "The raging bull of U.S. diplomacy," cultivated and supported Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos, supported Indonesia during its brutal occupation of East Timor and backed the generals behind the Kwangyi massacre in South Korea. He supported Bill Clinton's signing a bill calling for "regime change" in Iraq -- the predicate for the Bush/Cheney led invasion. Thanks to Richard and Bill, Bush and Cheney were able to say "regime change in Iraq is American policy." In his last press conference as U.N. Ambassador, Holbrooke called Saddam Hussein, "a clear and present danger at all times," and said the incoming Bush Administration, "will have to deal with this problem." Supported by this push from the Clintons, Bush/Cheney and the neo-conservatives were only too happy to oblige. As late as December 2005, with the Iraq War collapsing around Bush/Cheney, when asked what he recommended in Iraq, Holbrooke responded, "I'm not prepared to lay out a detailed policy or strategy." Holbrooke provides lots of experience and a great resume, but outstandingly bad judgment.
Lee Feinstein is rumored to be in line for the critical position of National Security Advisor in a new Clinton Administration. Like many Clinton foreign policy advisors, Feinstein enthusiastically supported invading Iraq and in April 2003, shortly after the invasion, confidently assured CNN that, "U.S. forces over time will find weapons of mass destruction and also find evidence of programs to build weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq, even when it was becoming apparent they would not. Feinstein expanded his theories of unilateral, pre-emptive intervention in an article he co-authored in Foreign Affairs, where he championed the "duty to prevent." He argued that the U.S. should try to build coalitions, but that it can attack sovereign nations without support from allies. He went even further, arguing that Bush's controversial, and internationally illegal, doctrine of preemptive war "does not go far enough." The logic of his argument would be that his concept of widespread violations of international law is crucial to strengthening international law. We see, once again, that deep foreign policy experience is serving the Clinton advisors so well.
Other top Clinton foreign policy advisors, such as Kenneth Pollack, Jack Keane and Michael O'Hanlon, strongly supported President Bush's troop surge in Iraq. This could be why, during Bush's recent State of the Union address, when Bush claimed that the surge was a success, Clinton stood and cheered while Obama remained seated and silent.
It should be noted that not every one of Clinton's foreign policy advisors is a stone-cold hawk. General Wesley Clark and former ambassador Joseph Wilson have nuanced understandings of foreign policy, and neither supported the war in Iraq. Clark, in particular, understands not only the uses of military power, but also its limitations. I hope he will serve an important role in the next Democratic Administration, regardless of who wins the presidency. Experience is not always disabling.
In contrast to Senator Clinton, in the critical months prior to the launch of the war in 2003, with public opinion running strongly in favor of invading Iraq, Obama openly challenged the Bush Administration's exaggerated claims and astutely predicted that a war in Iraq would lead to an increase of Islamic extremism, terrorism and regional instability, as well as a decline in respect for America throughout the world. Obama is a case study of good judgment trumping a resume.
While nearly all of Senator Clinton's stable of foreign policy advisors were strong supporters of Bush's invasion of Iraq, almost every one of Senator Obama's foreign policy team opposed the U.S. invasion. Obama advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter's National Security Advisor, warned that the international community would consider invasion of a nation which posed no threat to the U.S. would be an illegal act of aggression. Bzezinski said "without a respected and legitimate law-enforcer, global security could be in serious jeopardy." Another key foreign policy advisor to Senator Obama, Joseph Cirincione, argued that containing Saddam already had been achieved, saying, "Saddam Hussein is effectively incarcerated and under watch by a force that could respond immediately and devastatingly to any aggression."
While Senator Clinton and most of her advisors have been strong supporters of virtually unlimited defense spending, some of Senator Obama's key advisors, like Lawrence Korb, have expressed serious concerns about the enormous waste from excessive defense spending. While most of Senator Clinton's advisors, like Madeleine Albright and Sandy Berger, have been strong supporters of globalization, some even being architects of it, Senator Obama's advisors have raised questions. Susan Rice, an Obama advisor and an expert on Africa in the Clinton Administration, has emphasized how globalization has led to uneven development that has contributed to destabilization and extremism.
Stephen Zunes, a foreign policy analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus, comparing Senators Clinton and Obama, has written:
On balance, it appears likely that a Hillary Clinton administration, like Bush's, would be more likely to embrace exaggerated and alarmist reports regarding potential national security threats, to ignore international law and the advice of allies, and to launch offensive wars. By contrast, a Barack Obama administration would be more prone to examine the actual evidence of potential threats before acting, to work more closely with America's allies to maintain peace and security, to respect the country's international legal obligations, and to use military force only as a last resort.
For those voters who want American foreign policy to continue to trend in the direction of muscularity and intervention, they have their candidate -- Hillary Clinton. For those who want change in American foreign policy, who think American militarism and interventionism need to be scaled back, Senator Obama, and his foreign policy advisors, appear ready to begin those changes.
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Thank you for your insightful article. In the context of global dependencies the solution is not using the simple "hardware" but the complex "software" that makes the difference! That calls for sensitivity, foresight, creativity, intelligence and integrity. And some of us have skills and traits to measure up, some of us don't.
In a quarrel I had with a Kerry hating colleague in the 2004 election, he argued that Kerry was too much of a gamble. I countered of course that George Bush, on the other hand was a sure thing. While Hillary Clinton would be a welcome, long awaited relief after the Bush years, Democrats are facing an analogous situation. Yes Obama is a gamble, but Clinton's foreign policy actions, advisors, and perspective speak for themselves. For me, despite being an admirer of Clinton on domestic issues, experience, and attention to detail for the most part, the candidates' statements and record on their differences when it comes to foreign policy are why I voted for Obama in the California primaries.
I agree that Obama or Clinton would be a relief, however small, from the Bush administration, but they will bring America down the same road towards financial ruin. As I watch every Presidential debate on both sides, I walk away at the end of the Democratic ones bewildered, wondering how much all their wonderful plans are going to cost me and my family. National health care? More nanny government? How much more are they going to cost me in taxes? I can't afford the government now, let alone adding all these so-called progressive programs onto the debt. If they don't plan on raising my taxes, then how are they going to pay for it? Are they just going to borrow more from China and Saudi Arabian Shieks? That will only drive the dollar farther down the path it is on. Will Washington finally wake up when our currency is on par with the Mexican Peso? Wake up people, We can't afford big government anymore. The value of the dollar is equal to dirt. Look at the cost of an ounce of gold. NO! Wrong analogy. Look at what an ounce of gold would buy 15 years ago, then compare it to what an ounce of gold would buy today and you find that within pennies, it would buy the same amount of the same thing. So, what has happened to the buying power of the dollar? That is the problem! The dollar has been made worthless! The Obamas and Clintons of this world will do nothing to help our poor economical situation. We need someone NOW who understands Economics and give strength back to the dollar so we can afford to feed and house our families. That's what we need, not more government answers to problems that they created in the first place. Bigger government will just give us bigger problems. Wake up America!
I could forgive Hillary"s vote to authorize use of force back in 2002. After all the Repukes were using McCarthy hysteria to push the war.
But I cannot forgive Hillary's vote for the Kyle/Lieberman Amendment. If she hasn't figured out that bullshit by now there is no hope for her.
War with Iran? Absolute insanity. Voting to authorize Bush again?
What the Hell was she thinking?
Hillary has lost her mind. Her recent public expressions of being proud to sit beside Senator Obama to shouting Shame on Obama to mocking him about the skies opening show how mentally unstable she is. She cannot be trusted to make sensible judgment on anything. She has blown millions of dollars of her campaign, she brings a tired but egocentric Clinton back into government and will only polarize and paralyze this country. she has nothing positive to offer. The sooner she is stopped, the better off the Democrats and this country will be.
Hillary Clinton is an unabashed hawk on foreign policy. Look at her military pork, her vote to allow the carpet bombing of civilians (against which military pork queen and wife of a military contractor Dianne Feinstein balked and which Obama voted against).
Excellent post Mr. Saperstein!! Inciteful, logical, and accurate. HillBill have a very long track record in politics - most of it scandal ridden (Monica gate, travelgate, Vince Foster gate, Mark Rich gate, white water gate, bomb an African pharmaceutical building to take the attention away from Monica gate, Wall Street miracle trade gate....). The American people are well past the point of being tired of it all. At this point, I suspect they would choose just about any other bulldog to smear lipstick on to call president - anybody but HillBill..
None of your post has anything to do with Foreign Policy.
I think the people charged with the responsibility of picking through the rubble of a bombed out pharmaceutical building in Sudan ( Sudan if memory serves correctly) would take issue with that assessment - yes, I know, it's Africa and a lot of people don't think Africa counts but perhaps you could indulge us a bit and acknowledge that Africa is a foreign country and that HillBIll bombed it in "tail wag the dog" fashion...
Furthermore, in the interest of brevity, I didn't mention the whole China gate thing - is China not a foreign country?
All those scandels were nonsense. Didn't happen, except in the fevered imagination of Repukes and Media whores.
I am not standing up for Hillary's Foriegn Policy experience. But those "scandels were fiction.
I suggest you Google Mark Rich if you think its all fiction. That's one of the easiest "gates" to prove. I grant you, I hated the Repukes for impeaching the idiot over a bj in the oval office. It never was a high crime or misdemeanor like taking a country into an illegal war on false pretense. But the point is, the Clintons were and ARE seriously flawed individuals whose controversies served as the backdrop for Repiglican manipulation. We don't need to and shouldn't go back to that crap. We can do better and should expect better.
Voting to fund the troops is not the same as supporting the war, no matter how many times Clinton's supporters bring it up. It is not at all clear what would happen if the democrats did manage to vote down a funding bill for the Iraq war. It could be a disaster for the troops since Bush has no intentions of withdrawing from Iraq.
On the other hand, it was very clear to people who believed in the rule of law that invading Iraq was pointless and illegal. Clinton's support for the invasion was an extension of her husband's policy of regime-change in Iraq. A policy, which ultimately undermined the more important goal (supported by the UN) of disarmament in 1998. It is hard to get cooperation from the Iraqi regime for weapons inspections when at home Ms. Albright is going around saying that the sanctions won't be lifted until Saddam is removed from power. The same woman who said 500,000 children deaths was an acceptable price to pay for isolating Saddam. Obama and his foreign policy team recognize that foreign policy requires both a carrot and a stick. All stick and no carrot doesn't get you anywhere except into quagmires.
These are all very interesting points to infer with innuendo and to cherry pick what might be the Clintons foreign policy.
It overlooks the overwhelming success of the Clintons in foreign policy during the 90s. America was loved and looked up to by the entire world, thanks to the Clintons.
I would go with results and proof over innuendo any day. Obama has been listening to too many of his own speeches. At least he listened to Hillary, when he moved closer to her position, when he thought it was ok to have the president meet with foreign leaders without any goals, preconditions or agenda.
To compare the Clintons with Bush is a stretch of credibility that borders on psychosis.
Whew, you disciples sure know how to crank up the smoke machine!
You can argue that Bubba kept his stable of hawk advisors in check during his terms in the White House. The point that you choose to ignore here is that Hillary was NOT part of the staff (of course, that could be contested.
It is illogical and irresponsible to contend that HRC will mirror Bubba's restraint (which has been challenged in a compelling way with respect to the Yugoslavian events in the 90s) if she were to get to the White House as prez. In fact, it's FAR more reasonable to conclude that she would NOT be restrained, given her zeal to "look tough" instead of 'being effective,' her unrepentent support for Iraq's invasion (which, per HRC, was due to being tricked - tricked by a gang of lying thugs, suggesting that she's not very bright and probably easily tricked by people she trusts), and her unblinking support of Kyl/Lieberman.
Most recently, HuffPo provided a post that contrasted the ineptitude of HRC's gang against Obama's team's well-considered press release over the occasion of Kosovo independence the other day. It further shows her lack of readiness for the job.
So keep inhaling deeply... that smoke machine must have some intense stuff in it for you to still cling to these unreasonable beliefs.
Excellent article. This just makes me more certain that Hillary Clinton is all wrong for the Presidency. I would even go further and say that a war hawk like her doesn't belong in the Senate.
The only part of your article I disagreed with was when you said that Hillary Clinton missed all the clues and took the Republican bait by voting for the authorization to attack. She's not stupid. She knew they were going to invade. I used to think she voted the way she did because she was afraid of looking weak on national security. But after reading this article, I'm convinced that she actually wanted war with Iraq. And you're right about her being a follower. She lets public opinion sway her thinking too much. That's not leadership. A true leader doesn't have to wait for the poll results to come in before deciding which way to turn.
This is old news and keeping the debate from moving forward. Obama wasn't in the Senate in 2003 and like MANY votes in 2007 (40 percent), he didn't show up to Kyl/Lieberman. Easy to say you were against something after your campaign has gaged the public reaction to it.
"Saddam Hussein, "a clear and present danger at all times,"-sorry, but about 600,000 Iraqis and I have to agree with you on this one. Doesn't justify Iraq but the cultivation of Hussein during the 80's by Reagan is one of the reasons we are in this mess and one of the reasons the Iranians dislike us so. Clark and Wilson deserve far more credit for advising Clinton than you give them. We need to look at how we are going to move forward. The American president has an immense amount of executive power-he or she makes decisions that none of us could imagine daily regarding foreign policy, security and domestic affairs. I for one, am not willing to leave that decision making process to a preachy freshman senator who thinks Canada has a president, was the most absent member on Senate Foreign Relations and never held a policy meeting when he was Chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on European Affairs.
Ahh, the standard damage-control program in play once again!
1.) Accuse the other side of digging up the past
2.) Change the subject
3.) Smear early and often
Thanks for playing, Karl Rove.
Great post.
It clearly shows that Hillary is Bush Lite with a brain, which makes her more dangerous.
If you like Bush you're going to love Hillary.
Go Obama!
This is the most cockeyed essay I've read on Huffpost and there has been some pretty stiff competition for that dubious honor. The record IS CLEAR. Obama, over many years, has been in support of the military effort in Iraq. That's okay - who (that matters) in Washington isn't? But Obama has also PUBLICLY threatened the sovereignty of Pakistan. If we naively (and insanely) go down that road 9-11 will seem like the good old days. And Brzezinski? Wasn't he the architect of Jimmy Carter's greatest hits? I can't wait to see him strolling around the west wing again.
Oh, for goodness sake. Something is certainly cockeyed here. Sunday morning on "Face the Nation" Senator Biden reminded us that the policy of the US for the last 20 years has been to strike at known terrorists based on good intel. Would you suggest the US not try to take out Bin-Laden if we know where he is and the country he is in refuses to act?
But perhaps your complaint is that Obama PUBLICLY reiterated this rather obvious part of our current policy. First of all, I highly doubt this is a secret policy. The missile attacks against Sudan and Afghanistan by the Clinton administration sort of tipped our hand as did the attack in Pakistan less than a month ago. Second, Obama said he would strike IF Pakistan refused to act on their own. Finally, it is much less provocative to warn other countries than surprising countries with a strike as you seem to recommend.
All the other candidates on this issue feign outrage at Obama's frank words and they pretend they wouldn't do the exactly the same thing. Are you really suggesting that McCain or Clinton (or just about anyone) wouldn't launch a strike if they absolutely knew where Bin-Laden was?
The only difference I see is that Obama is honest about it and tells the American people what the need to hear instead of lying to them and feeding them what they want to hear.
Under Clinton, we actually had an opportunity to take out Bin Laden in SUdan, and Clinton didn't act.
What a nasty person is Hillary. The NYT said she resorted to sarcasm; the HP says she mocked Obama.
How can she be such a heartless person indeed. Perhaps she should be more forward as Barack was when endorsing Joe Lieberman.
"I am absolutely certain Connecticut is going to have the good sense to send Joe Lieberman back to the U.S. Senate so he can continue to serve on our behalf." Barack Obama, March 30, 2006,
http://bos
No sarcasm there, no mocking, just the facts, just the facts.Perh
That should change some votes.:p
Another good fact is that Ned Lamont endorsed Barack Obama for President:
http://www
I have long argued that those who like George Bush's foreign policy will find Hillary Clinton's very similar. Bush-Lite.
Heck, Hillary is mean spirited with about half the people in OUR country -- imagine how she'll treat folks in other countries who don't see things her way!
In an effort to keep things on a lighter note, here's a link to a song by folksinger "Trainwreck Jerry" that's a musical fantasy about a conversation between Sens. Clinton and Obama regarding a "deal" involving the VP slot.
http://www
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