In recent days, commentators of both left and right have noticed Senator Barack Obama‘s efforts to adopt as many of President Bush’s policies as he can in the hope of winning the presidential election. Some commentators have even dubbed the Democrat party’s presumptive presidential nominee as Barack Hussein Bush.
Kenneth M. Pollack’s timely book shows that Obama is not alone in adopting, or swallowing, key aspects of Bush’s domestic and foreign policies. A good many of the Democratic leadership elite, perhaps even a majority, realize that Bush-bashing of the kind that motivates MoveOn and similar groups cannot form a serious basis for a future administration’s policies.
Pollack, a former CIA analyst and official in the Clinton administration, describes himself as an internationalist neo-liberal, a term coined to put him at the opposite point of the political spectrum from neo-conservatives.
He devotes a good part of his book to trashing the Bush administration record in the Middle East, but ends up adopting the Bush Doctrine that links US national security to democratization in the Middle East. What Pollack is angry about is Bush’s supposed failure to implement the doctrine that bears his name, not the doctrine itself.
“We cannot as a nation discard this approach just because the Bush administration championed it rhetorically,” Pollard says. “Despite the fact that George W. Bush said it was the best thing to do, it is actually the best thing to do.”
Pollack also endorses Bush’s position on Iraq. To pre-empt criticism from fellow Democrats, Pollack is careful to condemn the war in Iraq, and use clichés – fiasco, quagmire, catastrophe, mess, etc. – to describe the situation there. He has to do so if only because , four years ago, he was one of the most ardent advocates of pre-emptive war against Saddam Hussein. (His book, “The Threatening Storm: The Case of Invading Iraq,” became a bestseller). He now says he still believes that the US should have liberated Iraq, but only after doing lots of other things, including defeating terrorism, modernizing the region’s economy, solving the Palestinian problem and eradicating poverty. In other words: not in his lifetime!
Although the book was written before the full effects of the “surge” had persuaded most Democrats that the war was not lost, Pollack rejects cut-and-run as an option. He acknowledges that with the liberation of Afghanistan and Iraq, the expulsion of the Syrians from Lebanon, and the subduing of Kaddhafi in Libya, a new system has begun to emerge in the region.
“We cannot walk away from the system we built because it has helped so many others; it is also that we cannot walk away from it lest it collapses and in doing so threaten our economic development and even physical security,” he says.
More poignantly, Pollack even admits that the much maligned Bush may well have done better in protecting the US against terrorism than its predecessor. “We are already doing better than we did before 9/11, and for this the Bush administration deserves credit.”
Throughout the book, Pollack whets our appetite by promising to expose the core of his proposed grand strategy. However, this never happens. Apart from repeating the premises and conclusions of the Bush Doctrine, often more effectively than members of he Bush administration have done over the past seven years, Pollack offers few concrete measures of his own.
One such suggestion is “an increase of $5 to $10 billion dollars in annual aid for Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Tunisia, Sudan and Bahrain.” We are not told which of the problems the US faces will be solved by such a move. Some of Pollack’s other suggestions belong to the apple pie and motherhood category. He advocates free markets, good governance and, of course, pluralism and free elections, although he is not as bewitched by the latter as the Bushites are supposed to be. Beyond these, he suggests programs to teach English and computer skills to young Arabs and provide micro-credit facilities and loan guarantees for small businesses. He also proposes food distribution among hungry Arabs, and the creation of medical care centers and dental cabinets. The implication is that people speaking English and surfing the net, and enjoying good health and sturdy teeth would be less inclined to try to kill Americans.
Pollack believes that the region’s No. 1 problem, “the mother of all woes,” is economic. One might take issue with that. Assuming the primacy of economics is a Marxian affliction. In fact, the “mother of all woes” in the region, including its economic problems, stem from lack of political freedom and the rule of law. No amount of US aid would solve problems created by corrupt regimes that deny their people a say in their own affairs. Nor would prosperity alone guarantee that no one would dream of conquering the world through terror in the name of a perverted version of religion.
Although one has no way of guessing what influence this book might have on the shapers of foreign policy in the Democratic Party, one thing is certain: Pollack invites his fellow Democrats to think beyond partisan considerations. And that is good news. The United Sates cannot develop and implement a credible strategy in the Middle East as long as it is perceived to be a house divided.
A Path Out of the Desert
A Grand Strategy for America in the Middle East
by Kenneth M. Pollack
Random House