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The Making of George Obama W. Author(s): Christian Brose Source: Foreign Policy, No. 170 (Jan. - Feb., 2009), pp. 52-55 Published by: Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, LLC Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25462380 . Accessed: 04/06/2013 11:55
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THE MAKING

OF

was allabout not But that's what T'he we're 2008 U.S. election going change. to the fr Condoleea~a Rice. sqys getonfreign speechwriter longtime poligy, a lot more Instead ofa radical fomBush, we'relikejtoend departure upwith same. we need. IBy Christian Brose the And that what ma bejust
O \ n December 1, Barack Obama, who won theU.S. presidencyas the candidate of "change,"
announced his national security

team: W Bush's secretary President George of defense (Robert Gates), Secretary of StateCondoleezza Rice's specialenvoyfor Middle East security (James Jones), and thedoyenne of Democratic centrism(Hillary Clinton).Some saw this as the politicalcover Obama needs to leadU.S. foreign policy in an entirely dif ferent directionafter Bush. Perhaps.But I doubt it. My hunch,andmy hope, is that Obama will be a suc cessfulpresident,not because he'll totallychange theforeign policyhe'll inherit from Bush, but because he'll largely continue it. Until justa few weeks ago, Iwas a part of that foreign policy. As Rice's chiefspeechwriter and pol icyadvisor,I traveled with her to24 countries. And I helpedwrite (and rewrite) her remarks-a body of work I'd estimateto be northof 150,000 carefully
Christian Brose is a senior editor at FOREIGN POLICY. He served as chief speechwriter and policy advisor for U.S. m Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice from 2005 Powell from2004 to 2005. to 2008, and as speechwriterfor former U.S. Secretaryof State Colin

chosenwords. For fouryears, Iwatched as a for eignpolicy took shape that was quite different from thatof Bush's firstterm.Itwas a pragmatic inter nationalism based on enduringnational interests and ideals fora country whose global leadershipis still indispensable,even as the world is becoming more multipolar. Unfortunately, theelection didn'tshed much light onwhat thisinheritance means for Obama. The cam paignwas a two-year referendum on the Bush pres idencyin which Obama ran againsta caricatureof Bush's first termand John McCain ran desperately away fromthe whole thing. It was as ifthepast four yearsneverhappened. But because theydid, Obama will inherita foreign policy that isbetterthan many realize.Yes, there will be changes ahead-most likely, to energy and climate change policy (thankfully), to the war inIraq (windingitdown), to the war in Afghanistan (winding it up), and to the detention facilityat GuantainamoBay,Cuba (closing it, which some in the Bush administration tried todo but couldn't). But despiteall that, Obama's foreign policy likely won't depart radicallyfrom Bush's. Take thethree states Bush once labeledan "axis of evil"-Iran, Iraq,andNorthKorea.After changing the
JANUARY IFEBRUARY 2009 53

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The Making

of George W. Obama

Anotherpart of thisstrategy for Obama iscon tinuing Bush's engagement on the Middle East peace process.A real insight ofBush's first term had been conflict was more thana thattheIsraeli-Palestinian borderdispute,as Bill Clinton had framedit.Bush argued thatpeace requireda successful Palestinian stateand economy. But thefirst-term policyamount ed to tellingthePalestinians to put their house in order first, and then theUnited Stateswould talk about endingtheIsraelioccupation.Only in thesec were both efforts ond term pursued simultaneously. And because of it, Obama will inherit aMiddle East peace process finally proceedingon both tracksat once: state-building and peacemaking. Justas importantly, Obama will finda changing Middle East where freedom, opportunity, and the longingfordignity are bubblingup in ways thatno one can control, Washington included.Something me thatthe leaderof the tells Democratic Party isn't going to give up on supporting both in democracy, terms of institutions and elections. Obama may rebrand Bush's poorly named "freedom agen da"-he may expand it,as some of his advisors suggest, into a "dignity agenda"-but thebasic approachwill likely continue. So, too,will therebe little changeon issuesof global grand A refrain strategy. fromthecam paign was rebuildingdamaged tieswith America's allies. But those ties have largely been rebuilt already-in Asia, Europe, and Latin America. Obama can certainly improvetheserelations especially with realaction further, on climate change.But another change: As thereins Regime ofpower pass to Obama, don't expect a majorshift in US. foreign policy. challenge may bemanaging the expecta bubbles of overinflated sucha withdrawal isnow appropriate. to This effort tionsfor his presidency that will soon beginbursting end the war in Iraqwill enableObama to try inallied capitals. to save war in the Bushwill also bequeathto Obama a realistic strat Afghanistan, employing many of thelessons learnedfromthesurgestrategy he opposed in Iraq. egy for managing theriseof greatpowers. By push A challenge for Obama will be to knit the Iraq ingChina, India, Japan,Brazil, and others to be endgameintoa broaderapproach to the Middle East. responsiblestakeholdersin the international order, But here, too, it likely won't look all thatdifferent the Bush administration showed that"the riseof the from Bush's: support foran independent Lebanon; rest" neednot be synonymous withAmerica'sdecline. In attemptsto elicit responsiblebehavior fromSyria; In fact,it might actuallyenhanceU.S. influence. and security with Sunni cooperation Arab regimes that Asia, themost geopoliticallydynamic part of the zn may not love freedom, but definitely hatewhat Iran, world, the UnitedStatesnow has better relations with and al Qaeda, are doing to theregion. eachmajor power than theydo with one another.
54 FOREIGN POLICY

in thesecond regimeinBaghdad, his administration termfully committedto changing thebehavior of Pyongyang andTehran. As a result, Obama will receive thebaton on a multilateral negotiation withNorth Korea that has beenandwill be a frustrating marathon, but hewill likely pick upwhereBush leavesoff,sim ply because thereare no practical alternatives. On Iran, Obama will almost surely proceedwith Bush's a diplomatic of sticks and carrots that seeks solu policy tion-a third option between acquiescing to Iran's or attacking Irantochange it. To have a bet behavior ter this will need sharper chanceof success, policy sticks and sweeter carrots,including thedirectengagement Obama has advocated. And ifthatfails, Obama will have to weigh hisoptions-none of which,hehas said, he's taking offthetable. As forIraq,Obama will inherit a war thatIraqis aremostly endingforhim.The pace and themselves size of the U.S. troopreduction may be hotlydebat ed, but few inBaghdad orWashington dispute that

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Everystate wants tohedgeagainsttheothers, and the "softpower"-a goal thatformer Secretary of State Rice, and most famously Gates partner of choice is Washington. Obama's task will be Colin Powell, then to continueinducing these emerging powers to share made intoa personalcrusade. Obama will inherit the start a rudimentary a greaterburden ofmanaging a new set of global of it-an enlarged diplomatic corps, challenges that no country, including the UnitedStates, civilian and foreign expeditionary force, assistance that canmanage alone. has been increased more thanat any timesince the The asterisk here is lessa rising China (thoughthe Marshall Plan-and he lookspoised tocarrythetorch. a resurgent questionisstill open) than Russia.Andwith The pragmatic internationalism thatBush will Russia, too,Obama will inherit a strategy thathe's pass toObama was largely definedthrough changes likely to continue,simply because it'sbetterthan the made duringthe And forthatreason, past four years. alternatives. It seeksneitherto isolate Russia (which there might bemore continuity between thesecond is impossible)nor to giveRussia the wants in itsold imperi blank check it al stompinggrounds (which is irre policy seeks to sponsible). Rather, this balance cooperationwith Russia on with competi many shared interests tion when interests diverge. Maybe this balance could have been struck better on issues such as Kosovo or missile but that doesn'tsignalthe need defense, a new policy, of the current one. termof Bush and the firsttermof Obama than for justa recalibration And ifanything, the Georgiawar showed that,ifthe between thetwo terms ofBush himself. This foreign United States wants Russia tobe a responsible stake policy isa valuable inheritance. And if Obama avoids holder, encouragement won't be enough. spendinghis early years in officepursuingchange Therewill even likely be a greatdeal of continu forthesake of change-simply trying todisassociate ityin thefight againstalQaeda. There's a consensus himself from hispredecessor, as Clinton andBush too now that preemptionisnecessaryto fight terrorism; often did-he could create themakings of a new Obama himselfhas advocated for it.But inBush's bipartisanconsensuson foreign policy. second term, theadministration Obama might realizethis, basicallyconverged but the Democraticand I fear, will not.They couldeachpre on a newmantra: "We can't killourway tovictory," Republicanparties, a key tenet of counterinsurgency strategy. The focus tendas if Bush's second-term foreign policynever hap terrorists became not justfighting Atworst, but buildingcon pened. Democratscould swagger righteously ditionsof security, and justicefor the intopower, believingtheir predecessors were rubes opportunity, was even who screwed societiesthatterrorists seek to radicalize.It everything up, and now is thechance to accepted that the United Statesmight have to rec do everything differently. For their part,Republicans as itdid in Iraq and as oncilewith some terrorists, could tellthemselves thecomforting lie thattheylost some now support doing inAfghanistan.Obama because Bush abandoned a real conservative foreign most likely-and correctlywill not refer to a "war policy-thathis secondterm was all capitulation to the on terror" as theorganizing ofU.S. foreign striped-pants principle appeasersof theStateDepartment. mean hewon't approach ter but thatdoesn't One ofmy regrets policy, about my work at theState rorismin much thesameway. Department is that we were unable to convince the as the Bush administration American people that Sucha strategy Bush's pragmaticinternation depends, as eventually conceded,on embracing alismhad within it the nation-building makings of a strong, sustain a national interest. There isnow a consensusthatthe able global leadership forthe 21st century--and that, as much by failing as such,it United States is threatened and had the potential toheal someof thefraught poorly governed states as strong,aggressiveones. divisionsoverAmerica's role in the world thathave Obama's challenge will be tocontinue the Bush adm-iin plagued thecountry sincetheendof the ColdWar.My a civilian-led hope isthat istration's effort to make nation-building Obama will not onlycontinuethis foreign U.S. foreign effort-todemilitarize to policy,but strengthen it and expand support for it policyby trying in thefirst prevent statesfrom failing place.This effort among all Americans.Were he able to do that, it will requirea transformation of U.S. institutions of would truly be a change I could believe in.II

There might bemore continuity between the

term term second of Bushandthe first of Obama

thetwo than between terms of Bushhimself.

JANUARY IFEBRUARY 2009

55

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