Bush's Foreign Policy: "Just Say No!".

• Author: HOWELL, LLEWELLYN D.
• Position: George W. Bush - Brief Article

DESPITE A LATE START after the turbulence of the Florida vote count, the Bush Administration was well-prepared to launch a new foreign policy when it came into office in January. All of the top appointees were identified and were working in concert to put in place a well-identified strategy. The candidates for appointment had credentials, experience, and even some balance of perspectives. Although Al Gore had won the popular vote and the electoral vote was only made effective by a seemingly partisan decision of the Supreme Court, Bush had the resources of the nation at his command.

The U.S. is clearly the number-one military power in the world. Diplomatically, the U.S. Foreign Service is among the best-trained and most-experienced in the world. By virtue of intellectual capability and diversity and dispersion of experience, the country can command the high ground in negotiations and bargaining.

The Bush Administration had everything going for it: resources, administrative personnel, and military and diplomatic power. So, what went wrong? Much of the problem lies in the nature of the policy. The central component of the strategy seems to have been to be "UnClinton." That is, if the Clinton Administration had been for it, Bush's policy would be against it. The primary tactical component of the policy was to "Just Say No!" Here was an approach that hasn't worked for underage consumption of alcohol, for curbing drugs, or for controlling sexual behavior, but maybe it would work here. Every initial move from Bush's White House has been in the negative. Let's look at a list of the major items:

Missile defense. Say no to concerns that a missile defense wouldn't work. The Administration started out with a strategic failure by being trapped by "the fallacy of the final move." Even if the antimissile missiles can be shown to work technically and financially (the latter being just as important as the former), an assumption has to be that the tactics of rogue nations would be the same after a missile defense was deployed. All alternate responses of such potential enemies are being ignored--multiple warheads, decoys, more missiles, ship delivery of nuclear weapons, delivery by component, perhaps more devastating biological or chemical weapon delivery, and the creation of countering alliances. There is an assumption underlying the Bush approach that potential rogue enemies are not intelligent. This is a very big mistake. We're embarked on an expensive...