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Robert Matthews - FRIDE
The US 2008 Campaign and Foreign Policy: What to expect from a John McCain Presidency*
*Excerpted from longer article posted on FRIDE's website (www.FRIDE.org) March 2008
Robert Matthews
Associate Researcher, Fundación de Relaciones internacionales y del Diálogo Exterior (FRIDE), Madrid
March 16, 2008
The campaign of 2008 will present the US electorate with perhaps the clearest choice between Republican and Democratic candidates and their platforms since the 1972 contest between George McGovern and Richard Nixon. While there are overlapping positions among the top three candidates in both domestic and foreign policy, there are also stark differences in approaches, style and substance. The degree of continuity or discontinuity with the previous administration's policies after November will, of course depend on who wins the election and the complexion of the Congress that is elected.
We have some good indications of what John McCain really thinks and will probably do because Senator McCain has been in Congress for twenty-six years and has staked out his views and policy positions for some time. Despite criticism that McCain is too liberal by the Republican hard right, the Arizona senator has solid conservative credentials-- even for a conservative society like the US. He is pro-business, an economic supply-sider, and supports smaller government, low taxes for individuals and corporations, free trade, secure borders, and a strong military and defense policy, while opposing abortion and gun control.
He continually displays these bedrock beliefs in his campaign rhetoric, infusing his speeches with Bush era phrases like: "Our purpose is to keep this blessed country free, safe, prosperous and proud….liberty is a right conferred by our Creator, not by governments …[and] the state's function is to minimize its sway over the society while pursuing its first obligation: protecting the liberty and property of its citizens.” He reiterates that the major concern of conservatives like him is the threat of radical Islamic extremism and that he is the candidate best qualified to keep the nation safe. Because of the continued threat from terrorists whom he describes as “moral monsters….led by an apocalyptic zeal that celebrates murder,” the country needs to remain tough on national security. In this sense McCain is still running on a variant of the fear-baiting, politics of dread orchestrated so masterfully by the Republican Party in the post 9-11 electoral campaigns.
At first glance John McCain's foreign policy appears as a sort of trimmed down version of Bush's militarism but with the kind of detailed plans that the arrogant Rumsfeld scorned. His vision is not that of a neoconservative with its emphasis on muscular unilateralism, preemptive wars and military adventures to remake countries and reconfigure regions. McCain's vision is rather that of a more traditional, patriotic, pro-military, empire-defending conservative. Although he does not articulate it quite the same way, like the Democrats, he feels that Bush's foreign policy has led the country astray in many respects. Unlike the Democrats, he says this only in private. And more than the two Democratic candidates, McCain still sees the US role as that of the post-Cold War “global sheriff,” a role he is proud to uphold, defend and enhance.
Multilateralism
In place of Bush's unilateralism McCain is more willing to consult and act in concert with allied nations to confront international problems. He has pledged more respect for European allies, NATO and the UN than the Bush administration demonstrated in the run-up to the war in Iraq.
The most ambitious expression of this idea is his proposal for a “League of Democracies” to take action when the UN fails to do so and to be involved in political and moral suasion and humanitarian missions. Regarding Europe McCain has said one of his top foreign policy priorities will be to revitalize the transatlantic partnership and that “Americans should welcome the rise of a strong, confident European Union.” Apart from common security concerns, he has stressed that the alliance's future lies in developing a common energy policy, creating a transatlantic common market and institutionalizing our cooperation on issues such as climate change, foreign assistance, and democracy promotion.
Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan:
In Mid-East policy the greatest distance between McCain and the Democrats is over Iraq and Iran. Regarding the former, he is quite vocal in supporting a military solution. Despite the growing disenchantment with the war in Iraq, McCain affirms proudly that he has always supported military operations in Iraq, “even at a time when that position was not very popular within the Republican Party.”
As to Iran-at least rhetorically-McCain has taken a more bellicose, hardline stance, similar to the counterproductive belligerence of Bush's approach. He would continue Washington's current the policy of not talking directly to Teheran; he speaks only of organizing a concert of nations to apply sanctions and other punishments until Iran disavows its nuclear ambition and changes its rhetoric on Israel. He accuses Clinton and Obama of not seriously addressing the threat posed by an Iran with nuclear ambitions against US ally, Israel, and the entire region.
It stands to reason that a candidate who favors winning the war in Iraq and has offered no policy changes from the US' present military strategy is also committed in equal measure to victory in Afghanistan. McCain has not discussed rethinking what is in many respects a failed US strategy or veering from the current course which emphasizes pressuring NATO allies to augment the US effort with more of their troops and more involvement in the fighting in the south and east.
How much difference would McCain make in US foreign policy?
What we have is a Republican candidate who in some measure mirrors Bush's domestic and foreign policies-if in a sort of Bush-lite version. With regard to Iraq and Iran he has been arguably more hard-nosed and bellicose in his recent rhetoric than the Bush administration. But there are some noteworthy shifts expressed in McCain's positions during the campaign. His embrace of multilateralism offers a refreshing antidote to the clumsy and counterproductive diplomacy of the Bush years. His past commitment to dialogue with Europe and his assurance of this during the campaign leave little doubt that a McCain administration would have more credibility with our NATO allies. His vow to banish torture and to close Guantánamo are important distinctions separating him from the current administration. His pledge to pursue a successor treaty to Kyoto, disowned by the Bush administration, and his general attitudes toward the issue of environmental protection place him very near the stance of his Democratic rivals. Finally, however, McCain's support for free trade and the NAFTA agreement places him at odds with the Democrats but squarely in the Bush camp.
Robert Matthews, es investigador asociado de La FUNDACION PARA LAS RELACIONES INTERNACIONALES Y EL DIALOGO EXTERIOR (FRIDE) en Madrid. Colabora también con el Seminario de Investigación para la Paz (SIP) en Zaragoza. Tiene su Ph.D en Historia de América Latina por la Universidad de Nueva York, y durante veinte años fue colaborador del Centro de Investigación para la Paz (CIP) en Madrid, especializado en la política exterior de EE.UU. Durante varios años fue profesor adjunto en el Centro de Estudios para Graduados sobre América Latina y el Caribe en la Universidad de Nueva York y presidió el Departamento de Historia en la Fieldston School. Ha escrito numerosos trabajos sobre los movimientos sociales en América Latina, las relaciones de EE.UU. con la región y el resto del mundo en desarrollo en general, la participación de EE UU en conflictos de baja intensidad durante la guerra fría, y recientemente sobre la guerra global de EE UU contra el terrorismo, la guerra en Irak y Afganistán, y los conflictos con Venezuela, Irán y Corea del Norte. Vive actualmente en Madrid.
Robert Matthews is an associate researcher with La Fundación de Relaciones Internacionales y del Diálogo Exterior (FRIDE) in Madrid. He holds a Ph.D in Latin American history from New York University, and for twenty years was a collaborator with the Centro de Investigación para la Paz (CIP) in Madrid, specializing in United States foreign policy. For many years he was adjunct professor at the Graduate Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies at New York University and chair of the history department at the Fieldston School. He has written about nineteenth social movements in Latin America, U.S. relations with Latin America and with the developing world in general, U.S. involvement in low-intensity conflicts during the cold war, and recently the U.S. global war on terrorism, the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and conflicts with Venezuela, Iran and North Korea. He is currently living in Madrid.