[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 175 (Monday, December 8, 2003)]
[House]
[Pages H12893-H12896]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[[Page H12893]]
FACTORS TO CONSIDER CONCERNING FOREIGN POLICY
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 7, 2003, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Leach) is recognized for
the balance of the time of approximately 30 minutes as the designee of
the majority leader.
Mr. LEACH. Mr. Speaker, 26 months after 9/11 and 7 months after the
conclusion of major combat operations in Iraq, America is in a
strategic pickle and Americans are in a judgmental quandary. The issue
of our engagement in Iraq demands that we, as a society, probe the
question of the limits of the superpower's power and the possible
anomaly that there are severe liabilities to power, particularly for a
superpower. Does, for instance, overwhelming military might protect us
from terrorism or, if used unwisely, increase our vulnerability to
terrorism? Likewise, does overwhelming economic power ensure loyalty or
buy friendship from the countries most indebted to the United States?
In other words, can military and economic might ever become a
substitute for sensible and sensitive foreign policy? And given the
dilemma of Iraq, could it, indeed, be that the most important
``multibillion'' problem America faces is not deficits measured in
dollars, fiscal, or trade, but the antagonism of billions of people
around the world who object to our current foreign policy?
Here let me say that I strongly believe the need for clarification of
thought as it applies to policy, and anyone who wishes to review the
reasoning I have applied to the Iraq issue, ranging from a floor
explanation of a ``no'' vote on the congressional resolution
authorizing war last year to calls for internationalizing the civil
governance in Iraq several months ago, to a vote in favor of generosity
in reconstruction efforts several weeks ago, can find explanatory
statements on my congressional Web site.
What I would like to do today is summarize the dilemma we face and
make the following points about where we might go from here.
Point number 1: there are no certitudes. Anyone who was not
conflicted on the original decision to intervene or who does not see a
downside to all courses of action today is not approaching the problem
with an open mind. In an era of anger, of divisions in the world based
on economics, on color of skin, on ethnicity, on religious belief, on
happenstance of family and place of birth; in a world made smaller by
technological revolutions in communications and transportation, those
who have causes, good or bad, have possibilities of being heard and
felt around the globe that never existed before. Great leaders like
Gandhi and Martin Luther King appealed to the higher angels of our
nature and achieved revolutionary change with nonviolence. Mendacious
leaders like Hitler, Saddam Hussein, and Osama bin Laden have sought to
impose their wills on others through appeals to hate and reliance on
increasingly wanton instruments of oppression.
As the world's only superpower, the U.S. has no choice but to display
firmness of purpose and resolve in deterring inhumane breaches of
order. Yet, firmness and resolve must be matched by compassionate
understanding of the reasons people of the world lash out. We have the
world's greatest Armed Forces. But these forces cannot successfully be
deployed to counter international misconduct if we do not also seek to
undercut the causes of such conduct.
Reviewing the causes of World War I, historians quickly concluded
that there was not enough flexibility in the European alliance system,
and that this rigidity allowed a rather minor event, the assassination
of an Austrian archduke, to precipitate a cataclysmic war. With this
example in mind, political leaders in the 1930s erred on the side of
irresolution, which led them to Munich and the partition of
Czechoslovakia. Too much inflexibility caused one war; too little spine
led to an even greater one.
The problem today is not whether we should meet problems with
firmness or compassion. We often need both. The problem is determining
whether and how to respond with firmness and when and how to express
compassion. As in all human conduct, the challenge is wisdom.
Point number 2: we must listen as well as assert. Four decades ago,
the British author Lawrence Durrell wrote a series of novels called the
``Alexandria Quartet'' in which he describes a set of events in
Alexandria, Egypt preceding World War II. An experiment in the
relativity of human perception, each of the four books views the same
events through the eyes of a different character. While the events
described are the same in each book, the stories as seen through the
lens of each of the participants are surprisingly different. The reader
comes to the realization that a broad understanding about events as
they transpire can only be grasped by synthesizing the different
perceptions of various protagonists.
To understand the Middle East today, we need to listen to everyone's
story.
Point number 3: to shape or to deter opponents' actions, we need to
understand how they think.
American policymakers, at their best, reason in a pragmatic, future-
oriented manner. In much of the rest of the world, on the other hand,
people reason by historical analogy. Events dating centuries back,
especially umbrages, dominate thinking about today. People in the
Middle East, as in the Balkans, are oriented to the past and are driven
by values and ideas of honor of a very different shape and emphasis
than those we derive from American culture. When we assume the Iraqi
populace should accept a prolonged American presence because of our
goodwill and desire to establish a Western-style democracy, Muslims see
our presence as compounding grievances originating in the Crusades and,
in some ways, even earlier Biblical times.
Point number 4: no country can go it alone for long and expect to be
respected as an international leader.
Doctrines of American exceptionalism, the precept that we should not
be bound by legal or procedural norms that bind others, which are now
fashionable in certain Washington ideological circles, have led to
intervention in Iraq without full U.N. sanction. Ironically, prior to
9/11, these same notions led to rejection of a Comprehensive Test Ban
Treaty and of upgraded verification provisions for the 1972 Biological
Weapons Convention, agreements that would have stood in the way of
weapons of mass destruction production in Iraq and provided a legal
basis for possible armed intervention if violations occurred. The world
is crying out for leadership in restraining weapons development. We are
not providing it because Washington policymakers prefer that restraint
on others not apply to ourselves.
Point number 5: be cautious of articulating policy doctrines.
Given the events of 9/11, consideration of preemption must
continuously be on the table in Washington, but there is a distinction
between needing to consider an action and setting forth a definitive
doctrine. Here Teddy Roosevelt may have had the right adage: ``speak
softly and carry a big stick.'' Any American President, Democratic or
Republican, socialist, liberal, conservative, or libertarian, would not
think more than a millisecond before ordering the Marines to
intervention if he or she were presented information that on some
island, somewhere, a terrorist group had gotten control of a weapon of
mass destruction which it was prepared to explode or infilter in an
American city. The problem is that raising a commonsense concern to the
order of a doctrine legitimizes such a doctrine for others: China,
India, Russia, North Korea, for example, and undercuts the premises of
much of post-World War II international law.
Complicating the issue is the psychological assumption that once the
leader articulates a doctrine, especially one that bears his name, it
is difficult to advance a policy in a given circumstance which is not
consistent with the doctrine. Not to do so would provide critics a
chance to suggest that a doctrine like preemption is ethereal, lacking
meatiness ness, unless it is made real.
{time} 1915
Any leader who outlines such a doctrine but chooses not to intervene
would be open to charges of lightness or worse. Hence, the simple
articulation of a doctrine can have the effect of biasing decision-
making in complicated circumstances. The exception
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might be a doctrine of quietude; statesmanship often should be measured
by what is not, rather than what is, said.
Point number six. When Washington policymakers speak on foreign
policy, they must understand that their audience is more than one
party's political base. While Saddam Hussein is widely perceived to be
the worst sort of tyrant, many people around the world view us as
bullies for attacking a sovereign country without prior armed
provocation. That is why it is so critical that a case for intervention
should be based in concern for the well-being of others as well as the
United States' national interest. For foreign policy to be effective,
it must be clearly articulated and convincing in those parts of the
world most affected by it.
Point number seven. We must rededicate ourselves to building up an
intelligence capacity that better understands the Middle East and
Islamic world and is less susceptible to being politicized. Our
inability to understand Islamic culture resulted in the greatest
intelligence failure of our era. It is, however, not the sole
intelligence failure. In one of the greatest judgmental errors of our
time, we appear to have attempted to combat the ideological posturing
of others by slanting our own intelligence. Based on what is known
today, policymakers not only erred in assessing Saddam Hussein's WMD
capacities but put too much faith in a narrow cadre of ideologues who
suggested that the U.S. would be welcomed as a liberating, rather than
conquering or worse yet, colonizing, force in Iraq. Estimates of the
cost of war, the ramifications of involvement, of the expected reaction
of the population, and of the likelihood of foreign support were dead
wrong.
Point number eight. It is the responsibility of public officials to
ensure that no American soldier is deployed as a defenseless magnet for
terrorist attack or in such a way as to incite foreign radicals to
commit terrorist acts in America itself. American soldiers have been
trained to withstand the heat of battle in defense of America and
American values. For 2\1/4\ centuries, no country has been more
effectively or more courageously served by a citizen soldiery than the
United States. In Iraq, our Armed Forces could not have performed more
professionally or valiantly than in the initial engagement.
But the difference between service in combat and service in
occupation of a foreign land, especially in Islamic society, is
profound. In Iraq, which is fast becoming for us much like Algeria was
for the French in 1950s, our men and women in uniform are increasingly
facing hit-and-run terrorist assaults, which are much more difficult to
defend against than traditional military confrontations. The challenge
of policymakers has recognized that there is a distinction between
three endeavors: warfare, reconstruction, and occupation. Our Armed
Forces are trained to prevail in the first, they can be helped on the
second, but in the Islamic world no outside power is ever going to be
well received as an occupying force. Hence, strategies that emphasize
the first two endeavors and do not lead to a long-term reliance on the
third should be the goal of the U.S. policymakers today.
Point number nine. Responses to terrorism often lead to escalating
action-reaction cycles. When our armed services become subject to
terrorist assault, and the perpetrators disappear into their
neighborhoods, we, like Israel, will inevitably be tempted to retaliate
in ways that may intensify, rather than restrain, future violence.
Calls will be made not only to use air power in urban areas but to
double or triple troop deployments perhaps without adequate assessments
of what such troops would be assigned to do. In conventional warfare,
the case for overwhelming superiority, sometimes referred to as the
Powell Doctrine, is compelling. In a terrorist setting, as in modernist
design, less can often be more. There may be cases where deploying a
large force to combat terrorism is appropriate, there may also be
cases, and I believe Iraq is one, where additional soldiers simply
become additional targets; and a different mix of strategies is both
preferable and more effective.
Point number ten. To defend against terrorism, especially when it is
fueled by an explosive mix of religious and national sentiment requires
frank acknowledgment of the nature and depth of the problem. For
months, the administration has suggested that the problem in Iraq is
limited to 5,000 dissidents. This is a five-digit miscalculation. At
least half the Muslim world, over 500 million people, is outraged by
the U.S. Government's attitudes and action. Long-simmering resentment
of American policies in Muslim countries like Indonesia as in recent
months metastasized into hatred. And in Europe, including what the
Defense Department refers to as the ``new Europe'' as well as in south
and east Asia, respect for American policy is in steep decline.
In the Vietnam War, we gave a great deal of attention to the notion
of winning the hearts and minds of the people. We did not succeed in
convincing the Vietnamese or world opinion of our good intentions
despite the horrendous tactics of the Viet Cong in the communist north.
Today, Americans must understand that in the battle for the minds of
men, particularly in the Muslim world, we are doing less well than even
the most difficult days of the Vietnam War.
In this context, we would be well advised to remember America's
original revolutionary commitment to decent respect for the monies of
mankind.
Point number eleven. While for the time being security in Iraq must
remain the responsibility of U.S. military commanders in the field, we
would be wise to put an international face on civil governance in the
country and ask Secretary General Kofi Annan to immediately appoint a
top civilian administrator to whom Ambassador Bremer and his staff
would report. Transfer of interim civil authority to the U.N. would
provide greater legitimacy to the formation of a new Iraqi government
and encourage other countries to help with economic reconstruction and
security requirements.
We should also work to transfer as soon as practicable responsibility
for internal security to troops of other nations of the Iraqis
themselves. Transferring the police function to others is a way to
build up Iraq's own postwar internal security infrastructure and make
evident that the U.S. does not desire long-term control.
Point number twelve. We should also move forthwith to transfer more
political control to the Iraqi Governing Council and press for
immediate elections and constitution-writing. Some argue that stability
is more likely to be achieved with a long-term U.S. occupation. I
believe the reverse is true. The longer we are in Iraq, the greater the
instability there and the greater the likelihood that terrorism will
spread to other countries, including the United States.
Point number thirteen. America cannot cut and run politically,
economically, or militarily; but we would be wise to announce a
timetable for troop withdrawal by the end of next year at the latest.
Some experts in and out of government believe that American troops
should stay in and control Iraq at least as long as we did in Japan and
Germany after World War II. Such a timetable, a minimum of 5 years, is
out of sync with the times and the mood of the Islamic world.
The world is more impatient today and Muslims in particular are more
history-sensitive than ever before. While we assume the Iraqi populace
accepts the American presence because of our goodwill, the Muslim world
sees our force as the compounding of grievances dating back to the
Crusades and more recently to the American support of Israel. The
imagery Al Jazeera projects of Baghdad is that of another West Bank. In
this context American commitments to ``slog on'' interminably play into
the hands of extremists. All extremists have to do is continue blowing
up a vehicle or two every day, thereby eliciting a military action that
we might view as reasonable but the Islamic world is likely to see as
heavy handed, angering the populace and emboldening further dissent.
The longer we stay, the greater the opportunity for al Qaeda and
radical Baath Party supporters to claim that the war is continuing and
that they are prevailing. To prevent this, and to keep control of
events, we would be wise to announce a withdrawal timetable that we,
not they, control. Setting such a timetable has the effect of asserting
that the war itself is over and we prevailed and that Iraqis cannot
dither in establishing a legitimate elected government.
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A drawn out occupation plays into the hands of radicals. It gives
them a rallying cry to keep up resistance in Iraq and expand terrorist
assaults around the world. It gives them the chance to suggest that
America is bent on continuing the crusades and, when we eventually
withdraw, the prospect of claiming that they won the war. On the other
hand, if we set a firm schedule for drawing down our troops, we define
the war as being over in its 3rd week, not its 6th year. An announced
timetable can later be modified to allow, for instance, a small force
to remain briefly in northern Iraq to maintain sovereign cohesion.
Timetables can also be abbreviated. But the point is that they
underscore our reluctance to become an imperial power and, perhaps more
importantly, our determination to control our own destiny.
Point number fourteen. Beware of partisan critiques. Some partisans
are implying today ill motives in Presidential leadership and have
suggested that American actions are constitutionally frail. Such
criticisms miss the mark. This President is sincerely committed to his
national security responsibilities, and his policies have received
constitutional endorsement from the Congress. Other partisans are
taking what some might perceive as an oxymoronic, liberal, neohawk
perspective. They suggest the problem is the administration has not
committed sufficient troops and sufficient time to do what we want to
do in Iraq, whatever that might be.
The assumption is that Iraq will be a much better place if we
aggressively occupy the country for prolonged periods of time. This
assumption deserves review from two perspectives: the situation within
and the political environment outside Iraq. From the first, the
question has to be raised whether an occupying force has the effect of
an over-stayed house guest: understandable for a short period,
increasingly irritable with each passing day. In a domestic setting,
house guests can at some point be pointed to the door. In Iraq, many
have concluded that the only effective way of getting the uninvited to
leave is to submit young soldiers to terrorist strikes and their local
supporters to anarchist attacks.
A response to this dilemma cannot be developed in the simple
linguistic context of resolving to stay the course, particularly when
no clear course has been laid out. The language of intervention was
couched in terms of concern for weapons of mass destruction and the
need to retaliate against the forces that precipitated the events of 9/
11. Postmortem analysis of these rationalizations put our actions in a
questionable light. On the other hand, we must proceed from where we
are not, where we thought we would have been. Wisdom might indicate
that the emphasis be placed on, A, the humanitarian advantage to Iraqis
in the region of the overthrow of Saddam Hussein; B, U.S. assistance
and rebuilding Iraq's social infrastructure and help in bringing the
country back into the mainstream of international politics and country;
and, C, the laying of the groundwork for new political institutions.
None of these three emphases necessitates 5 to 10 years of
occupation. Indeed, the longer we are there, the more likely a Saddam-
type demagogue, albeit probably less secular, will emerge. It is true
that the development of new civil institutions will take time, but it
is also the case that the U.S. role in shepherding their development
can be quickened. The judgment call we must make is whether U.S.
leadership for change should be swift or slow paced. My sense is that
swift actions are more likely to lead to Iraq-centric responsibility-
taking. The U.S. will inevitably be dissatisfied with postwar
circumstances in Iraq; but the longer the conflict continues, the more
unstable the aftermath. Iraq will become more splintered and the U.S.
more vulnerable to hateful reaction to others.
Another approach might be to indicate that we would expect to take
most of our troops from Iraq within 6 months of Saddam Hussein's
capture or death. Such a pronouncement would underscore that our
problem is with his dictatorial regime, not with the Iraqi people or
their religious faith. It might also provide incentive for the populace
to help in apprehending their former head of state.
Point number fifteen. It is critical to the security of our troops as
well as Iraqi security that we create an Iraqi police force as soon as
possible. Responsibility for domestic security is an internal, not
external, matter. We cannot be their policemen; and if we persist in
trying, we will make it harder for stability to be established and
maintained. Students of international politics have for the past
generation questioned the capacity and moral authority of any country
to be policemen for the world. But little academic attention has been
devoted to the challenge of being policemen within a country after the
conclusion of conflict. We have little experience with such
responsibility. In Japan, MacArthur relied on indigenous Japanese
police. In post-Hitler Germany, we quickly reconstituted a German
constabulary at most levels.
Common sense would indicate that trying to police a country the size
of France with soldiers unfamiliar with the language and culture of the
society, untrained in the art of policing and unwelcome and resented in
critical cities and towns must be a nearly impossible task.
{time} 1930
Hence, the need to expedite the training of an indigenous Iraqi
police force.
Point number sixteen. We should announce that we have no intention of
establishing permanent military bases in Iraq.
Some Washington policymakers want such bases but they would be a
political burden for any new government in Baghdad and a constant
struggle for the U.S. to defend. Defense of American bases in Iraq from
terrorism in the 21st Century is likely to be far more difficult than
the challenge we first saw of maintaining United State sovereignty over
the Panama Canal in the 20th Century.
The reason the Department of Defense concluded in the Carter
Administration that it was wise to transfer control over the Panama
Canal to the Panamanians was the estimation that the canal could be
defended against traditional aggression but not sabotage or acts of
terrorism. It seemed wiser to respect nationalist sentiment and provide
for gradual transfer of the canal to local control than to insist in
quasi-colonial assertions of power.
There are many reasons which Europeans are so smugly opposed to our
policy in Iraq. One is historic experience to colonialism. The French
were chased out of Algeria, the Russians, and earlier the British, out
of Afghanistan. U.S. intervention in Iraq is seen in Europe is not too
dissimilar to the British and French effort to reestablish control over
the Suez Canal in 1956. It is noteworthy that the Islamic world deeply
appreciated President Eisenhower's refusal to back the British and
French intervention in Egypt at that time.
Europeans now think the shoe is on the other foot. We appear
insensitive to history. In particular, those who call for multiyear
occupation based on the World War II model seem not to comprehend that
the Japanese understood that they attacked us and the Germans
understood that our intervention was precipitated by their aggression.
Iraqis, on the other hand, look at us as the aggressors, as imposers of
alien values. They feel our presence is only justified at their behest.
Of all forms of government, successful occupation depends on consent
of the governed. If it is lacking, problems are inevitable,
particularly when and if foreign presence is of a military nature.
Point number seventeen. Credit will remain the dominant economic
issue until Iraq's foreign debt is reduced or cancelled.
Neither significant private nor large-scale public credit will be
made available to Iraqis until the burden of old debt is lifted.
Accordingly, we should press vigorously for Saddam-era debt, which went
largely to build palaces for Saddam's family and to buy weapons of
aggression to be written off. We should also press to establish
community-centered banks and credit unions where micro-credit can be
offered.
Oil wealth has its advantages only if revenues are used for the
benefit of society rather than political insiders. Increasing petroleum
production is not enough. Oil is not a labor-intensive industry. Jobs
matter and Iraq needs bankers and small business entrepreneurs far more
than oil barrens. We
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have no choice except to help rebuild Iraq's oil infrastructure, but we
must make clear that we have no intention of controlling the country's
oil reserves. The natural resource of Iraq must be treated as the
patrimony of the Iraqi people.
Point number 18: Economic assistance to Iraq should be front-loaded
and generous.
War has been a constant of history, but the concept of reconstruction
is relatively new. The 20th century gave us two vastly different
models. At the end of World War I, the victors imposed retributive
terms on Germany, which so angered German society that it turned to
fascism. World War II was the result.
The allies took a different approach at the end of World War II.
Generosity was the watchword. The Marshall Plan was adopted to rebuild
Europe and General MacArthur directed the reform and modernization of
Japan. Model democracies emerged. The world was made more secure.
The economic plan for Iraq should be two-prong, debt forgiveness
coupled with institution building. A better world is more likely to
emerge if the American agenda places its emphasis on construction
rather than destruction.
Here a note about the other reconstruction model in American history
is relevant. With his call for malice toward none in his second
inaugural address, Lincoln set the most conciliatory tone in the
history of war. His successor once removed, U.S. Grant, proved to be a
more proficient soldier than President and countenanced carpetbagging
conflicts of interest.
Our government today would be well-advised to recognize that neither
history, nor the American public, approves of war or postwar
profiteering. Great care has to be taken to ensure transparency and
integrity in government contracts. And common sense would indicate that
the more Iraqis are involved in rebuilding their own society, the more
lasting such efforts are likely would be to be.
Point number 19: Terrorism effects world economics as well as
politics.
Markets depend on confidence and nothing undercuts confidence more
than anarchist acts. Policies designed to deter terrorism can be
counterproductive. International disapproval of our actions may
jeopardize our economy and diminish the credibility of our political
leadership in the world. Increased terrorism could well have the dual
effect of precipitating new U.S. military engagements and, ironically,
strengthening isolationist sentiment which in turn could degenerate
into a disastrous spiral of protectionism.
Point number 20: The measure of success in reconstruction is not the
sum of accomplishments.
During the Viet Nam War, the Pentagon gave progress reports mainly in
terms of body counts. One of the most liberal critics of that war, I.F.
Stone, once commented that he accepted the validity of the body counts,
but thought that they did not reveal the big picture.
Suppose, Stone suggested, he was walking down a street and he bumped
into a man running out of a bank, waving a gun and carrying a satchel
full of money and were to ask the man, ``What are you doing?'' If the
man responded, ``I am waiting for a car,'' he would be telling the
truth but not revealing the big picture.
Good things are being accomplished in Iraq, particularly in the north
where an American General has won a measure of popularity through
progressive stabilization initiatives. Yet, terrorism cannot credibly
be contained in the arms-infested Iraqi environment. American
civilians, as well as Armed Services personnel who have been posted to
Iraq, deserve to be commended for their commitment and sacrifices, but
prudence suggests that brevity of service is preferable to a long-
standing presence. Otherwise, in a world where terrorism is a growth
industry, even extraordinary sacrifice and significant accomplishments
could be for naught.
Point number 21: We must respect Iraqi culture and work to ensure
that the art and artifacts of this cradle of civilization are preserved
for the Iraqi people.
There are few umbrages more long-lasting than cultural theft.
Cultural looting must be stopped, and the market for stolen antiquities
squelched. For our part, we should ensure that Iraqi cultural sites are
protected and that our laws are upgraded. Any stolen antiquities
brought to America must be returned.
Point number 22: The war in Iraq should not cause us to forget
Afghanistan.
While the center of our military attention may at the moment be
Bagdad, we must remember that no Iraqi was involved in hijacking the
planes that struck the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 9/11.
Few countries are more distant physically or culturally from the
United States than Afghanistan; yet, it is there the plotting for the
terrorist acts began. The Taliban have been removed and a new, more
tolerant government has been established; but the world community has
not fulfilled its commitments to raise the country out of poverty and
warlordism. The U.S. cannot continue to be complacent about economic
and social development in that country, where foreigners have never
been welcome. Failure of the Karzai government and a return of the
Taliban would be a major setback in the battle with terrorism.
Point number 23: Lastly and most importantly, U.S. policymakers
should never lose sight of the fact that events in Israel and Iraq are
intertwined and that no challenge is more important for regional and
global security than resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian dilemma.
Extraordinarily, from a priority perspective, administration after
administration in Washington seems to pay only intermittent attention
to the Palestinian issue. There should be no higher priority in our
foreign policy than a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Attention in Washington should be riveted at all times on this singular
problem. The current status quo is good neither for Israel nor for the
Palestinians. Now, for the first time lack of progress in establishing
a mutually acceptable modus vivendi between the parties may be even
more damaging to countries not directly involved in the conflict. The
need for U.S. leadership in pressing for peace has never been more
urgent. It would be a tragedy if, focused as we are upon making war in
one part of the Middle East, we neglected to give sufficient prority to
promoting peace in another.
In conclusion, the world is noting that we are saying and what we are
doing. Many are not convinced by our words; many are appalled by our
actions. Yet nothing would be worse for the world than for us to fail.
We must not. The key at this point is to recognize the limits as well
as magnitude of our power and emphasize the most uplifting aspects of
our heritage: democracy, opportunity, freedom of thought and worship.
Motives matter; so do techniques to advance our values. The lesson of
the past year is clear: America does better as a mediator and multi-
party peace maker than as a unilateral interventionist.
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