[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 75 (Wednesday, June 15, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: June 15, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                      AMERICA'S ROLE IN THE WORLD

  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I wish to take a few moments to say a few 
words about the American role in the world. With the end of the cold 
war, many believed that the United States could stand down from its 
leadership in the world and that the burdens of our global 
responsibilities would diminish.
  In my view, the cold war officially ended on Christmas Day in 1991, 
when the red flag of the Soviet Union was lowered for the last time 
over the Kremlin. Yet during the next 2\1/2\ years, the demands for 
United States leadership have not abated. In some respects, they have 
increased.
  To be sure, the challenge is different. We are not faced by a global 
threat from an ideological rival. Instead, we face the challenge of 
increasing global disorder and political instability. The threat is not 
one of conquest and intimidation by a rival power. Instead, it is one 
of increasing regional and civil conflicts that will demand responses 
from the international community.
  The world will become engaged in these conflicts not purely out of 
altruism. It will also do so because they will affect the interests of 
the international community. Conflicts can produce thousands if not 
millions of refugees, unleash militants willing to use terrorism to 
achieve their goals, create military threats to vital resources such as 
oil, breed drug trafficking in war-torn areas, and even lead to 
environmental terrorism as the world saw during the Persian Gulf war.
  Because the international community will not be able to remain 
indifferent in the face of such threats, the question then becomes how 
the world will mount a response. I firmly believe that the world will 
not be able to mobilize an effective response without strong U.S. 
leadership.
  As the world's only military, economic, and political superpower, the 
United States must lead. During the cold war, we wrote the book on 
leading as a superpower. Without such leadership, the international 
community will flounder in responding to the new challenges we face.
  Some argue the United States should turn over the reins of leadership 
to the United Nations. We could make no greater mistake than to heed 
that advice. In fact, the two most egregious failures of policy over 
the last 2 years are largely attributable to the United Nations.
  Mr. President, let us look at the example of the U.N. operation in 
Somalia. We went into Somalia on a humanitarian mission. Our forces 
were configured and equipped to perform that task. Yet, through the 
United Nations, our responsibilities expanded.
  Within 6 months, the United Nations was declaring that our troops 
were also in Somalia to engage in nation building--that is, to fix 
Somalia's internal problems so that we would leave behind a stable and 
democratic government. But military forces are not suited to such a 
mission. Moreover, when the United Nations transformed our goal, it did 
not simultaneously transform the size and configuration of our forces.
  Our mission and our forces were totally mismatched. In large measure, 
the subsequent disaster in Mogadishu was the result of ceding 
leadership over the Somalia mission to the United Nations.
  An even more tragic example of muddled U.N. leadership is the 
situation in Bosnia. In 1991, when the dissolution of the former 
Yugoslavia began, the United States delegated its leadership role to 
its European allies and to the United Nations. We have all seen on 
television the tragic result of unchecked Serbian aggression and ethnic 
cleansing.
  What went wrong? The United Nations opted for a course of action 
based on diplomacy unsupported by the judicious use of power. It 
imposed an arms embargo on all of the countries emerging from the 
former Yugoslavia and launched an unending series of negotiations among 
the combatants. However, because Serbia inherited the armed forces and 
munitions industry of the former Yugoslavia, the effect of the arms 
embargo was to keep the victims of aggression weak and to facilitate 
Serbia's aggression.
  In addition, the United Nations unwillingness to recognize that 
negotiations alone would not stop Serbia was ruthlessly exploited by 
Serbian leaders, who feigned a desire to reach a settlement only to 
undermine any movement within the United Nations to take 
stronger action and to create a smokescreen for continuing aggression 
and ethnic cleansing.

  The real tragedy was that this outcome could have been avoided 
through sensible policy. If the United States had exercised wise 
leadership, it could have lifted the arms embargo against Croatia and 
Bosnia--the victims of aggression--in order to create a balance of 
power on the ground. That, in turn, would have given the Serbs a 
genuine incentive to negotiate and reach a just peace settlement.
  It is not too late to adopt such a course. But U.S. policy is 
hamstrung by its delegation of power to the United Nations, and the 
United Nations cannot lead because of conflicting views among its 
members and its continuing myopia about how to resolve the conflict.
  Mr. President, the United Nations has not led effectively and cannot 
lead effectively in the future. Turbulent times in a changing world 
cannot be managed through leadership by committee. It is time for the 
United States to abandon its apparent belief that the United Nations 
can be the substitute for American leadership.
  The issue of leadership would not matter if the stakes were small. 
But great opportunities will be forfeited unless the United States 
leads. In the former Soviet Union, 15 new countries are struggling to 
consolidate their independence and, in many cases, to develop working 
democratic institutions amid the economic ruins left in the aftermath 
of communism.
  After the Soviet Union was dissolved in December 1991 and Yeltsin 
launched his reforms in January 1992, the United States and the West 
were shockingly complacent. It took more than 6 months before an 
assistance package was put together. What's worse, very little of the 
assistance was ever delivered. As a result, the opportunity to jump 
start free market economics and democracy in Russia might have been 
lost.
  The failure of leadership was even worse with respect to the non-
Russian states of the former Soviet Union. To this day, the West has 
not adopted an activist approach to help these new countries transform 
their economic and political systems and to provide for their own 
security.
  To be sure, one of the problems is that there is no model for 
transforming a command economy into a free market economy. There is no 
road map for the policies that need to be adopted. However, without 
U.S. leadership, no creative effort to develop such a model will likely 
take place. The Europeans, whose economies are saddled with even more 
bureaucracy than ours, cannot preach what they do not practice. The 
Japanese are not trusted by the Russians. Only the United States can 
lead the way in this vital task.
  It is vitally important that we do so because of the consequences 
should reforms fail. Russia could become a reactionary, expansionist 
power, as the recent parliamentary elections have suggested it might. 
Economic crisis in the non-Russian states could result in weak, 
vulnerable states along Russia's periphery. I cannot imagine any 
formula more certain to produce dangerous political and military 
instability in Eurasia, particularly after the feckless response to 
Serbian aggression in the former Yugoslavia.
  Great opportunities and potential dangers also exist in Asia, where 
free-market economics have created the fastest growing economies in the 
world but where the lack of a security structure creates the threat of 
arms races and political rivalry. Every year, the amount of new GDP 
created by the growing economies of the Pacific basin is larger than 
the entire economy of Germany. Moreover, the successful developing 
countries of Asia can serve as models for market-driven development in 
other parts of the third world.
  As these economies have grown, however, so have military budgets. 
East Asia exceeds any other region in the world in terms of increasing 
defense spending. Countries that used to be minor players or weak 
regional powers will have the resources to play wider roles and to 
assert wider interests. As they do so, the potential for clashing 
interests will increase.
  China is an example of the opportunities and dangers we face. The 
economic reforms adopted by China since 1978 have unleashed tremendous 
growth. Over time, the erosion of state control over the economy and 
erosion of the dependence of individuals and families on the state for 
basic necessities will open the door to peaceful political change in 
China.
  Incidentally, that's one reason we should not revoke China's most-
favored-nation trade status. To do so would undercut the very economic 
development that holds the greatest promise for the peaceful 
transformation of China's political system.

  This economic growth has not only internal but also external 
political consequences. Regardless of our views of China's human rights 
record, we cannot afford to create irreconcilably hostile relations 
with a country whose foreign policies will be critical to long-term 
stability in Asia.
  Today, China is a nuclear power, a major arms exporter, and a 
regional power. If China's growth continues, it will become the world's 
second largest economy in the next century and could well become the 
dominant military power in East Asia. Although we should speak out on 
China's human rights abuses, we must not hinge the entire Sino-American 
relationship on this issue. Too much is at stake in the long term to 
forfeit opportunities for cooperation and constructive engagement with 
China.
  As the potential development in East Asia show, those who say the end 
of the cold war means the United States can afford to put lower 
priority on security issues are wrong. We have vital interests at stake 
in Europe, East Asia, the Persian Gulf, and the Western Hemisphere.
  Potential threats to those interests continue to exist. For example, 
Saddam Hussein's regime still poses a long-term threat to our interests 
in the Persian Gulf. His military capabilities were only partially 
destroyed in the gulf war. Iraq retains the ability to mount a nuclear 
weapons program. The economic embargo and no-fly zones imposed on Iraq 
cannot topple his regime. Since the international community's 
determination to keep these sanctions in place will wane over time, we 
must maintain the military capability to protect Western interests in 
the gulf.
  In addition, I believe that we could do more to undermine Saddam's 
grip on power. We could tighten the sanctions by pressing Jordan to cut 
off commercial traffic to Iraq. We could build up the political stature 
of the Iraqi national Congress, the umbrella organization of the Iraqi 
opposition. We could provide the Kurds in the north and shia Arabs in 
the south with arms for self defense.
  In a broader sense, we have a vital interest in global stability. 
Total U.S. trade accounts for more than 35 percent of the U.S. gross 
domestic product, and international trade depends on stability. The 
enormous expansion of trade over the past 40 years was made possible by 
the security umbrella provided by U.S. global military capabilities.
  Some say that in the future arms control alone can achieve such 
stability. I do not agree. Nations acquire arms to assert or defend 
conflicting interests, not because of the absence of arms control 
treaties.
  During the cold war, no issue consumed more time on the part of 
American Presidents but produced fewer results than arms control. All 
the United States-Soviet negotiations and summit meetings produced 
agreements that only slightly altered the military spending and weapons 
procurement programs of the two countries. Once the cold war was over--
that is, once the democratic revolution in Russia made Moscow a 
potential friend rather than an adversary--the major arms reductions 
under Start I and Start II become possible.
  Thus, the lesson of the cold war is that it is not arms control but 
concrete political interests and relationships that will determine 
military spending and stability.
  That has implications for many post-cold-war arms control issues. It 
would be a mistake, for example, to pursue a total ban on nuclear 
weapons testing. The fact is that we continue to depend on nuclear 
weapons as part of our military posture. As long as we do so, we must 
conduct sufficient tests to ensure the safety and reliability of those 
weapons.
  Efforts to reduce the international arms trade must also be 
realistic. The problem is not the level of trading in military 
equipment but the effect of such sales on regional balances of power. 
There is nothing wrong with selling arms to Israel and other friendly 
and non-aggressive states. United States efforts to constrain the flow 
of arms should be focused on keeping weaponry and munitions out of the 
hands of international outlaws, such as Syria, Libya, Iraq, Iran, and 
North Korea.
  Proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver 
them will become increasingly important. So far, U.S. policy has been 
shortsighted. Too often, we focus solely on export controls designed to 
block the acquisition of critical Western technologies by would-be 
proliferators. Export control is important, and the Clinton 
administration has erred in loosening export control in ways that will 
facilitate such evasions.

  More important, vulnerable states can be persuaded not to develop or 
retain weapons of mass destruction by enhancing their security. 
Ukraine, for example, has been tempted to retain nuclear weapons 
because of the potential security threat from Russia. Therefore, the 
most effective route to ensuring that the democratic government of 
Ukraine forgo the nuclear option would be to develop policies and 
security relationships in the former Soviet Union that alleviate Kiev's 
potential fears.
  The greatest problem is not proliferation by countries such as 
Ukraine but proliferation by rogue states that might actually use such 
weapons. North Korea comes to mind here. No one should underestimate 
the difficulty of controlling proliferation in such situations.
  Although we should spare no political and economic instruments of 
power, we have very little leverage vis-a-vis North Korea. Even a total 
embargo will likely not be decisive against one of the most isolated 
governments in the world. The only viable option is to work with China, 
Japan, and South Korea to persuade and pressure North Korea to allow 
international inspections of its nuclear facilities that would prevent 
diversion of nuclear materials to a weapons program.
  Beyond these security issues, the international community will face 
many problems related to unstable multinational states, ethnic 
conflicts, and containing interstate tensions. The progress in the 
Palestinian-Israeli peace process is encouraging. The democratic 
breakthrough in South Africa is hopeful but fragile.
  In these and other cases, the United States should not be a passive 
observer but an active participant in advancing peaceful progress. It 
should do so because no other state has the standing and resources to 
play a positive role. It should do so most of all because the other 
side of the coin of progress is the potential for horrific violence, as 
we have witnessed in Bosnia and in Rwanda.
  At the same time, the United States must lead if the international 
community is to address novel issues brought about by increasing 
international interdependence. These include international 
environmental issues, such as protection of endangered species.
  It also includes developing concerted responses to international 
criminal organizations that are having an ever greater effect on 
American life. Such organizations include not only drug cartels but 
also financial fraud operations and other types of criminal activity. 
The international community will never get a handle on this challenge 
unless the United States leads the way in developing strategies and 
capabilities to neutralize these organizations.
  Mr. President, I have outlined here some of the reasons why strong 
American international leadership is imperative. In closing, I would 
like to note one additional reason why only the United States can play 
this role: The United States is the only major power viewed around the 
world as an honest broker. Around the world, others come to the United 
States for assistance not only because of our power but also because 
they understand that our polices are guided in part by a sense of 
what's right and wrong. We often take that for granted, but 
historically American leadership--guided by idealism--is the exception 
but not the rule. In a turbulent world, it is a positive influence that 
the international community cannot afford to lose.

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