SUBMITTED TESTIMONY OF FRANK J. GAFFNEY, JR. before the HOUSE FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEE

Washington, D.C.

27 July 1994

‘IT’S FOREIGN POLICY, STUPID’: U.S. LEADERSHIP IS CRUCIAL AT HOME — AND ABROAD

I am delighted to be able to participate in the Committee’s deliberations about an absolutely fundamental — and vexing — issue: How can the support of the American people be developed and maintained for the sort of foreign policy that a global power like the United States must have?

Let me confess at the outset to having strong views as to what such a foreign policy should be. In the course of my professional career — starting with my service on the staffs of such preeminent internationalists as Senators Henry M. "Scoop" Jackson and John Tower, through my four and a half years as a senior official in the Reagan Defense Department, and my six years as director of the Center for Security Policy — I have believed that the world was a better, and safer, place if a strong and engaged America played a decisive role in its affairs. This is a conviction that has its roots in our country’s history during this century; it also reflects a sense of the present and likely future requirements of our security.

There are those who would have you believe that such a policy is anathema to the American people, that they are reflexively isolationist and determined to shrink from global leadership and its costs. I believe this contention to be as inaccurate as it is dangerous for U.S. international interests.

In my experience, the vast majority of Americans exhibit a native common sense about the importance of U.S. engagement in the world. To be sure, they do not want American power squandered, inappropriately exercised or, if possible, utilized without the support and help of our allies. Still, they recognize that it is important for the United States to have the power to influence international affairs and to defend its interests around the globe.

My assessment on this score is derived principally from first-hand experience in our representative government and from my considerable interactions with the public over the years through public speaking, media appearances — including as a guest on radio call-in programs — and other statistically unscientific samples. Like my colleagues, however, I can point to polling data that supports this assessment:

For example, a poll performed on a regular basis since March 1947 by the National Opinion Research Center has established that between 61 and 79 percent of those questioned routinely agree that "it will be best for the future of this country if we take an active role in world affairs." The highest percentage received for the alternative of "staying out" of world affairs was 36 percent in 1975; the average support enjoyed by the "isolationist" option was roughly 28 percent. Further evidence of what I regard as the public’s good judgment can be found in recent polls showing substantial support for: maintaining a large military presence in Europe; preserving and expanding the NATO alliance; responding militarily to North Korea’s nuclear threat; and for spending additional resources to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons technology and nuclear terrorism.

So how is one to square this assessment with the conventional wisdom — also to some extent borne out by polling data — that the public is in an isolationist mood, convinced that we must concentrate resources and energy on domestic concerns rather than international ones and opposed to the use of military power overseas?

I believe that the answer lies primarily in a failure of American leadership. In the absence of a clear sense of the vision, direction and purpose for U.S. foreign and defense policies, the public in this country — like its counterparts in other democracies — is susceptible to the temptation to believe that the world can be safely ignored. This is particularly true when our leaders pander to such sentiments, either because they themselves lack a sense of the needed vision, direction and purpose or because they think it is the safest route to political popularity.

Importantly, this phenomenon is not unique to the present moment. It has, I believe, characterized American politics repeatedly throughout this century — typically after a perceived, monolithic threat has dissipated. After World Wars I and II, after the Korean War and after the Vietnam conflict, the nation indulged in the delusion that "peace dividends" could be cashed in, with precedence given to civilian problems over persistent, albeit often less clearly defined, international challenges. In each case, we overdid it, putting vital national interests at risk, inviting greater challenges to our security and, ironically, leaving less resources available for domestic needs as a result of the wastefulness of a bust-and-boom approach to investment in defense.

If this phenomenon is not unprecedented, it is currently acutely in evidence at this juncture. It is not to ignore the contributions being made to its appearance by the collapse of the Soviet Union and the emergence of instantaneous global television news to say that, in my view, the principal responsibility for popular myopia about security policy lies with the President and his Administration. Certainly, the former do exacerbate a problem that largely arises from presidential shortcomings.

It is an open secret that Mr. Clinton’s past inexperience with foreign affairs has translated into a discomfort on his part in dealing with this area of public policy. This discomfort, in turn, gives rise to a reluctance to devote the time and energy required to conduct security policy effectively and a tendency to delegate unduly responsibility for managing this part of his portfolio. The deleterious consequences of this approach have been compounded by the manifest weakness of his subordinates in this area.

The result has, in the first instance, been a pattern of responses to non-domestic challenges that have generally been expediency driven, short-sighted and ad hoc in nature. They have played to the public’s readiness to focus on domestic problems even as they have given rise to a growing lack of popular confidence in the Clinton Administration’s stewardship in foreign affairs.

Worse yet, U.S. policy-makers — and here, I regret to say, I must assign blame to the legislative branch as well as the executive branch — have seized upon perceived public unconcern with security policy to take steps that will greatly magnify the dangers of applying inadequate leadership, attention and resources to world affairs. These include: the demobilization of the U.S. armed forces; the deconstruction of key security-related institutions; unilateral disarmament; the diversion of military resources to non-defense related tasks; and the demoralization of the American military. I would be pleased to elaborate on each of these areas of concern if you wish me to do so.

The question then arises: What can be done to build support for the sort of active U.S. role in the world that I — and I sense most members of this Committee — believe is necessary? The following suggestions come to mind:

• First and foremost, the President and his team need to conceptualize and articulate a coherent security policy, one that is compatible with the Nation’s need to be able to engage decisively in world affairs. This will require reversing a number of policy decisions — not least, the subordinating of our foreign policy decision-making to international organizations and lowest-common denominator consensuses — taken in recent years. More importantly, it will demand a degree of presidential involvement, leadership and consistency that have not been in evidence of late.

 

• Second, U.S. foreign policy cannot be either effectively conceived or successfully executed on the basis of polling data, focus groups or less sophisticated means of determining which way the political winds are blowing. This phenomenon reached absurd dimensions recently as the Clinton Administration’s policy on Haiti was undergoing modifications literally hour-by-hour, apparently due to continuous recalibrations based on perceptions of the changing attitudes of special interest groups, the press or the public at large.

 

I believe that the President has the responsibility to lead, not merely represent, the people of the United States. If the direction of his leadership is, broadly speaking, in tune with the fundamentals of a principled, engaged and powerful America, it will enjoy popular support. If it is not, no amount of misleading rhetoric, cynical packaging or manipulative "spin control" will make it palatable to the public.

 

• Third, the President, his advisors and the Congress must be held accountable to a greater degree than has generally been the case in recent years for decisions that are at cross-purposes with the common sense and traditional desires of the American people. In our small way, we at the Center for Security Policy try to do this daily by calling attention, for example, to: the absurdity of official policies that will leave this country, its allies and troops overseas permanently vulnerable to ballistic missile attack; the dangers of committing U.S. forces to a deployment on the Golan Heights without careful deliberation and prior debate; the unilateral liquidation of America’s nuclear deterrent now underway; the folly of abandoning controls on the export of strategic dual-use technologies; the risks involved in believing that the world can be rid of chemical and biological weapons through arms control agreements, etc.

 

Establishing and maintaining such accountability is, of course, a very big job. It is incumbent upon the press to facilitate public scrutiny of key security policy decisions and the responsibility of congressional committees like this one to ensure that such scrutiny translates into course corrections, where necessary.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I would note that — if in the past we had the luxury of exhibiting presidential irresoluteness and national indifference to world affairs — we clearly do not have that latitude today. Real, if ill-defined, threats to our security interests are emerging; strategic developments are creating possibly irreversible economic and political fissures with long-time allies; and the interaction between domestic financial security and international money flows is becoming ever more direct and volatile.

On the last point, I very much agree with Kevin Phillips’ analysis in Sunday’s Washington Postevery American whose pocketbook is touched by rising short-term and long-term interest rates, the dollar’s doldrums and the diminished competitiveness of our industry is directly bearing the costs of a hapless foreign policy. If no other reason might be found — and there are plenty — for returning to the principled, reliable and assertive U.S. security policies that have traditionally commanded respect internationally and enjoyed strong support at home, this phenomenon increasingly provides ample grounds for doing so. to the effect that the currency markets’ discounting of the dollar is a function, at least in part, of "domestic and global respect for Clinton’s foreign policy — or, more accurately, the lack of it." In short,