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To See Ourselves as Others See Us
How Publics Abroad View the United States after 9/11
By OLE R. HOLSTI The University of Michigan Press
Copyright © 2008 University of Michigan
All right reserved. ISBN: 978-0-472-07036-7
Chapter One
Introduction
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. -Charles Dickens
A decent respect to the opinions of mankind. -Declaration of Independence
Oh wad some power the giftie gie us, To see oursels as others see us! It wad frae monie a blunder free us, An' foolish notion. -Robert Burns
The opening sentence of Charles Dickens's classic novel of the French Revolution, A Tale of Two Cities, could serve as an apt description of contemporary American foreign policy. In fact, each of these familiar quotations frames some central themes in this book, which studies the ways publics abroad have assessed the United States, its institutions, and its policies in recent years.
By conventional measures of power and status, the United States unquestionably sits at the apex of the international pecking order. Its military capabilities outstrip those of any potential challenger or, indeed, those of any potential coalition of challengers. Because the Pentagon'sannual budget is higher than that of the next sixteen countries combined, accounting for 48 percent of global military spending in 2005, the American position at the top of the world's military hierarchy seems certain to persist into the foreseeable future. The next four countries-Great Britain, France, China, and Japan-each contributed 4 to 5 percent of the world total.
When our attention turns to the economic realm, the picture is much the same. In 2000 the United States accounted for 29.3 percent of the world gross domestic product, a figure that is estimated to have risen to 29.5 percent in 2005 and to decline only slightly to 28.8 percent in 2025, while the countries that two decades ago were sometimes identified as challengers to American economic superiority-the Soviet Union, Japan, and Germany-have either disintegrated (the Soviet Union) or have suffered serious economic difficulties (Japan and Germany) that have all but eliminated their chances of approaching, much less surpassing, the United States. To be sure, reckless American tax policies since 2001 have resulted in unprecedented budget and trade deficits that will almost surely have serious consequences at some point in the future. It is also possible, though by no means inevitable, that China's economy will surpass the U.S. economy in several decades, but for the time being the American position as the world's top economy is beyond serious debate. Given the disparity in the present sizes of the American and Chinese economies, even should China maintain its spectacular GDP growth rate of 9.3 percent annually while the United States continues growing at a pedestrian 3.3 percent, the gap between the two countries will grow rather than contract. Analysts have even come to rethink their views of two decades ago that as a result of "imperial overreach" the United States would follow the declining path of previous hegemonic powers-Spain, the Netherlands, France, and Great Britain among them.
These figures clearly point to "the best of times" for the material bases of American foreign policy. How, then, can the phrase "the worst of times" possibly be used in any sentence or paragraph that deals with American foreign policy? By another measure of power-the ability to get others to do one's bidding-the situation is somewhat less clear. Recent years have witnessed an increasing number of episodes in which the United States found itself unable to achieve its foreign policy goals as other countries have balked at following America's lead. That the United States has been unable to gain much cooperation from China on such issues as the future of Taiwan or Iran's nuclear program is not especially surprising, given the history of Sino-American relations and China's own status as a nuclear-armed major power and, perhaps, as an emerging superpower. Moreover, China's leading role in financing America's budget deficit provides Beijing with considerable potential leverage in its relations with Washington. But in many cases the foreign policy setbacks have come at the hands of much less powerful countries, some of which have long been among America's allies in such organizations as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Organization of American States (OAS). A few examples illustrate Washington's recent difficulties in translating its exceptional reservoir of "hard power" into effective influence on some important foreign policy issues.
In the summer of 2002, as the George W. Bush administration was gearing up a full-scale effort to gain congressional and international support for military action to overthrow the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder faced a very difficult reelection campaign. Schroeder publicly declared that Germany, which in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks had sent troops to assist in the U.S.-led campaign against the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan, would not in any circumstances join in military action against Iraq. That promise was probably sufficient to ensure his reelection.
During the run-up to the Iraq war the United States put intense pressure on the recently elected Turkish government to permit deployment of the U.S. Fourth Infantry Division there to open a northern front against Iraq. Despite American use of both carrots (offers of aid and loans) and sticks (possible withdrawal of support for Turkey's bid for European Union membership), in a close vote the recently elected Turkish Grand National Assembly rejected the U.S. demands, thereby faithfully reflecting overwhelming public opposition to the U.S. plan.
Apparently at the insistence of Secretary of State Colin Powell and against the advice of other key foreign policy officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney, and Defense Department officials Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, the Bush administration reluctantly took its case for the use of force against Iraq to the UN Security Council. Washington realized that France or Russia might well veto an American resolution authorizing the invasion of Iraq, and it was all but certain that Germany would not support it, but the United States expected to obtain support from at least nine of the fifteen Security Council members, thereby gaining a measure of legitimacy for its Iraq policy while simultaneously isolating naysayers in Paris, Moscow, and Berlin. The issue never came to a vote because preliminary canvassing revealed that the resolution would result in an embarrassing American defeat. The three African members of the Security Council-Angola, Cameroon, Guinea-let it be known that they agreed with French opposition to the use of force in Iraq. The United States was unable to gain the support of even Mexico or Chile, hemispheric neighbors with which it has special trade relationships. Only seven of thirty-three Latin American and Caribbean countries supported military action against Iraq.
After the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, President George H.W. Bush was able to gain Security Council authorization to use force against Iraq should it fail to withdraw from Kuwait, and he put together a coalition of twenty-six countries to contribute to the war effort against Iraq. That coalition notably included two important Islamic regional powers-Egypt and Turkey. In contrast, President George W. Bush not only failed to gain Security Council support for the invasion of Iraq in 2003, but his "coalition of the willing" included significant contributions of armed forces only from Great Britain, with much smaller, mostly symbolic military units from Poland and Australia and, later, from Italy, Spain, and several other countries. Notably missing were any Arab or Muslim countries.
Even after the war successfully toppled the brutal Saddam Hussein regime that had previously committed aggression against two neighbors-Iran and Kuwait-predictions by administration officials and their cheerleaders that an awesome display of American military power would lead to at least grudging support from Islamic countries and their publics (the so-called Arab street) proved to be wildly off the mark.
After President Bush announced the end of hostilities in Iraq on May 1, 2003-"Mission Accomplished," as a banner at an aircraft carrier photo opportunity famously proclaimed-many countries, including those that opposed the war, were informed that they were expected to make significant financial contributions, including debt forgiveness, toward rebuilding post-Saddam Iraq and arranging for the transition to a stable democratic government. Such contributions were not forthcoming, perhaps in part because the administration also made it clear that contracts for rebuilding Iraq would be issued only to firms from countries that joined the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, thereby excluding France, Germany, Russia, and Canada, among others.
As the June 30, 2004, deadline for a partial handover of sovereignty to an interim Iraqi government approached, the administration once again demanded that NATO members contribute more troops to help quell an increasingly serious Iraqi insurgency and to maintain security during the transition period leading up to full sovereignty for Iraq. At the June 2004 Group of Eight meeting at Sea Island, Georgia, it became clear that such additional assistance would not be forthcoming; President Bush conceded that it was an "unrealistic expectation" to count on additional NATO troops. France, Germany, and other hesitant NATO members apparently saw no advantage in becoming involved in Iraq, probably in part because of the growing toll inflicted by insurgents. Both Germany and France later offered to help train Iraqi military personnel, but not in Iraq.
South Korea has been a longtime American ally, and U.S. troops have been stationed there since the July 1953 armistice that brought the Korean War to an end. For various reasons, including misbehavior by U.S. troops stationed in Korea, anti-American sentiments have risen, especially among the younger generation who did not experience the international effort, led by the United States, to repel the North Korean aggression during the bloody 1950-53 war. North Korea has openly boasted of violating agreements to terminate its nuclear weapons program, but how to deal with the issue has divided rather than united Washington and Seoul. In his 2002 State of the Union address, President Bush included North Korea in the "axis of evil," whereas South Korea has generally followed a softer line-the "sunshine" policy-perhaps fearing a flood of refugees across the 38th parallel should the totalitarian North Korean regime collapse. In presidential elections on December 19, 2002, liberal candidate Roh Moo-hyun won by taking a very critical stance toward the United States, even in the face of nuclear threats from North Korea. According to one analyst: "In the past, security threats from the North would have made Koreans favor a conservative candidate and seek solidarity with the United States. In 2002, however, a pro-U.S. image was a burden in the election."
Although Canada has not always followed Washington's lead in foreign affairs-for example, it maintains diplomatic and trade relations with Cuba-it has generally been a faithful ally of the United States and Britain on major international issues. Canada fought alongside the United States and Great Britain as an ally in every war through the end of the twentieth century, but it declined to join them in the "coalition of the willing" for the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.10 Canada also served as an integral part of NORAD and the DEW Line, the air defense systems erected during the Cold War, but in 2005 the government in Ottawa pulled out of the missile defense system, one of the centerpieces of Bush administration defense planning. Perhaps the long record of test failures of the missile defense system contributed to the withdrawal, but like the decision not to participate in the invasion of Iraq, it may also have been rooted in the opposition of the Canadian public. "Polls have shown the system to be unpopular with the public, particularly in Quebec." However, the 2006 elections brought to power a minority conservative government, headed by Stephen Harper, that appears more willing to participate in the missile defense system as a part of an effort to improve relations with Washington.
In June 2005 the United States proposed a resolution that would authorize the Organization of American States to appraise the state of democracy among member countries as a way of putting some teeth in the "Democratic Charter" adopted four years earlier. The American effort met strong resistance among other members, in part because they feared that the resolution might be used by the United States against Venezuela, whose populist president, Hugo Chávez, has used vitriolic anti-American rhetoric to bolster his popularity at home. OAS members had earlier broken precedent by declining to support an American-backed candidate for secretary general of the organization, electing José Miguel Insulza instead.
In September 2006, the newly elected leader of Britain's Conservative Party, David Cameron, made his first major foreign policy address. With a view toward possible elections in 2009, and in recognition that Labor prime minister Tony Blair would shortly leave office under a dark cloud owing to his close ties to President Bush on the Iraq war, Cameron took special pains to distinguish his policies from those of Blair. Speaking on the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, he went on to criticize a core tenet of the Bush administration's post-September 11 policies: "The danger is that by positing a single source of terrorism-a global jihad-and opposing it with a single global response-American-backed force-we will simply fulfill our own prophecy." After assuring his audience, the British American Project, that "I and my party are instinctive friends of America, and passionate supporters of the Atlantic Alliance," Cameron went on to assert, "Britain does not need to establish her identity by recklessly poking the United States in the eye, as some like to do." Although he had earlier acknowledged that since the Churchill-Roosevelt era during World War II, Britain has been America's junior partner, he then issued something of a declaration of quasi-independence. "But we will serve neither our own, nor America's, nor the world's interests if we are seen as America's unconditional associate in every endeavor. Our duty is to our own citizens, and to our own conception of what is right for the world. We should be solid but not slavish in our friendship with America.... I fear that if we continue as at present we may combine the maximum of exposure with the minimum of real influence over decisions." He also pointed to the problems with unilateralism in world affairs. "But as we have found out in recent years, a country may act alone-but it cannot always succeed alone. The United States has learnt this lesson painfully." In closing, he quoted a warning from nineteenth-century prime minister William Gladstone against imperial hubris and international arrogance: "even when you do a good thing, you may do it in so bad a way that you entirely spoil the beneficial effect." It is unlikely that anyone in the audience failed to grasp the target of Cameron's polite but devastating critique. Whether or not Cameron's diagnosis of terrorism or the American response is valid, it reflected the belief that his electoral prospects can be improved by avoiding the label-"Bush's poodle"-that was often applied to Tony Blair. An ICM poll in 2006 revealed that 63 percent of British voters felt that Britain is "too close to the United States," 30 percent stated that the relationship is "about right," and only 3 percent responded that Britain is "not close enough to the USA."
Nicholas Sarkozy, the center-right Union pour un Movement Populaire (UMP) party candidate in the 2007 election for the French presidency, has a pro-American image. He was photographed with President Bush in September 2006 and has been branded by his Socialist opponent as an "American neo-conservative with a French passport." Locked in a close race that he ultimately won, Sarkozy gave a 90-minute interview, conducted in French and translated into English, with Charlie Rose on American public television in which he sought to distance himself from American foreign policy. "I want to say this to my American friends. The world does not come to a halt at the borders of your country.... Beyond the Pacific and beyond the Atlantic, there are men and women like you. Get interested in the world and the world will learn to love you.... The world is not just the American empire. There's more to it than that." Since winning the presidency, Sarkozy has taken several significant steps toward improving relations with the United States, including considering whether France should rejoin NATO as a full-fledged member, but he has shown no inclination to send French forces into Iraq. Although no friend of President Jacques Chirac, Sarkozy paid him homage: "Jacques Chirac's international policy, particularly on Iraq, was the right one. He made the right choice at the right time."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from To See Ourselves as Others See Us by OLE R. HOLSTI Copyright © 2008 by University of Michigan . Excerpted by permission.
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