hen the smoke from the 2004 election clears many Americans
hope John Kerry will be president and big foreign policy
changes will result. Unfortunately these hopes are not
likely and here are two reasons why: first, the interest
group generated pressures that set broad parameters for
policy tend to remain constant no matter who occupies the
White House; and second, because this is so, policy
formulation is not simply a function of the personal
preferences of political leaders. Policy goals are set
largely on the basis of which domestic subgroups an elected
official and his or her party seeks to satisfy. On the other
hand, the choice of tactics used to implement policy can be
influenced by individual preference.
What follows is a comparison
of foreign policy goals and tactics pursued in the cases of
Iraq and Israel/Palestine, first under President Bush, and
then under a projected Kerry administration. While there is
overlap in the interest groups the two men respond to on
these issues, they are not exactly the same. And, as we will
see, their lobby alliances are contributing factors to what
differences we will find between them.
President
Bush and his “Forward Strategy of Freedom”
In the history of the United States, foreign policy
promoting economic expansion abroad is a constant theme.
These economic pursuits, in turn, are overlain by claims of
mythic altruism and idealism. For many citizens, foreign
policies facilitating economic interests go hand in hand
with the notions of America as a purveyor of freedom and
democracy, a builder of prosperity and modernity. Or, as
George W. Bush puts it, we aim to bring God’s gift of
liberty to “every human being in the world.” Of course, this
popular idealism hides the contradictions that exist between
itself and the tactics of exploitation inherent in much of
American foreign policy.
When it comes to such tactics
there is a continuum that runs from diplomacy and the use of
various non-military pressure tactics all the way to the
marines extolling victory in the “Halls of Montezuma.” As
long as the Soviet Union was a competitor for world wide
influence, conditions were such that an informal American
preference existed for the relatively low risk end of the
tactical spectrum. Coups, invasions and the like were second
tier options undertaken only after consideration of their
impact on important variables: Soviet reaction had to be
taken into account, alliances existed that had to be paid
attention to, treaties were to be adhered to, and
international law was to be respected at least to the point
where it could be used in the propaganda wars that labeled
the Communists horrible and our side all goodness and light.
Now the Soviet Union is no
more. And when it went the way of the Dodo, so it seems did
America’s preference for low risk tactics. Those who had
always favored the muscular end of the tactical spectrum now
felt liberated. A thousand years of Pax Americana seemed
possible if only the country could find the will to sustain
a “forward strategy of freedom” (a.k.a. send in the
marines). The world could thus be made safe for the
interests of all those influential American subgroups “doing
business” abroad.
This is no fairy tale. One
can find a strategy for this interventionist posture on the
website of the now infamous Project for the New American
Century. The neo-conservative ideologues who put forth
this strategy are one of the major lobby groups President
Bush is allied with and, as a consequence, they now command
the country’s foreign policy from their offices in the Bush
administration. Their ambitions were greatly enhanced by the
tragedy of September 11, 2001. The 9/11 attacks were
themselves the result of American interventionist policies
in the Middle East and support for Israeli colonialism, but
any recognition of this connection was a direct challenge to
the interests that had shaped those policies. Within weeks
of the attack, such questions as “why do they hate us?”
which suggested the need for national self-reflection and a
thorough policy review, were dismissed as “blame the victim”
sentiment on the part of the unpatriotic. Thus, instead of
being taken as a warning that intervention in the Arab world
and the subsidization of Israeli expansion had dangerous
“blowback” potential, the attacks were used by the
neo-conservatives as an excuse to implement extremist
foreign policy tactics which relied on military aggression.
And what have been the results? Let us take a look at the
Bush administration’s “forward strategy of freedom” in the
two important cases of Iraq and Israel/Palestine.
I. War on Terror Equals
War on Iraq
The attacks of September 11
did not occur because Islamists hate American freedoms. In
truth, they do not care how we behave in our own country.
They do, however, care about how Americans behave in their
countries. And we have not behaved well in the last 50 or so
years. Americans are oblivious to this fact. Most believe
that U.S. foreign policy is a selfless, if overly expensive,
effort to project outward our own idealized domestic
freedoms. That is why most Americans believe that we are in
Iraq to give the ungrateful locals democracy among other
wonderful things. The true history and consequences of U.S.
support for countless dictators (including Saddam Hussein),
and our support for an Israel that most of the world sees as
a wretched apartheid state, is absent from the mind and
media of America.
Soon after the September 11
attacks the Bush administration declared the War on Terror
and, following a brief diversionary move in the direction of
Osama bin Laden, the president began portraying Saddam’s
Iraq as the main enemy. To establish this connection the
Bush administration lied to the American people, and the
press uncritically swallowed the ruse. So successful was
this warmongering propaganda that by September 2003, 70% of
the American people falsely believed that Saddam Hussein was
behind the September 11 attacks (that was up from 3% right
after the 2001 tragedy).
This lie and others, such as
the false claim about weapons of mass destruction,
were used to create popular fear of Iraq, and thus support
for the subsequent U.S. invasion. Once the invasion was
under way, other lies, such as our alleged desire to bring
democracy to Iraq, were put forward. This latter claim is
hardly believable if one has insight into the attitudes of
the voting public in that country (or most of the Middle
East for that matter). A free and fair election in Iraq
would certainly bring to power a popular anti-American
government. The problem is that the Americans know nothing
about Arab or Muslim perceptions or the causes of them. Thus
they can be deluded into thinking that a puppet government
in Iraq whose main purpose is to facilitate our exploitation
of their resources and maintain a friendly attitude toward
Israel, is meant to be a step toward democracy. The
consequence of this deceitful policy, and the heavy handed
tactics being used to carry it out, is the fiasco that is
now American occupied Iraq.
II. A
Roadmap to Hell
What about the on-going
strife in Israel and Palestine? In 2002 President George W.
Bush offered his “peace plan” for this conflict. He did so
in response to mainstream Jewish and Christian expectations.
However, the plan was carefully crafted not to interfere
with the ambitions of more hardline Zionist lobbies. Dubbed
the Roadmap, it put forth a three phase program for the
creation of a “Palestinian state” existing in peace
alongside Israel. As it turns out, a state for Palestine has
about as much meaningfulness as democracy for Iraq.
In Phase One the Palestinians
were to declare a unilateral cease fire. The logic
operating here is that the occupying Israeli forces are the
ones in need of relief, and the Palestinians resisting
occupation are the aggressors. Thus the Roadmap stipulates
that the best way to begin any “peace process” is to end
resistance to a harsh and illegal occupation.
In addition, Phase One
demanded that the Palestinians “immediately undertake a
comprehensive political reform in preparation for statehood
including...free, fair, and open elections.” Again, the
assumption is that the Palestinian Authority, with its
infrastructure systematically undermined by Israel, is
corrupt and needs to prove itself capable of holding open
elections and governing competently. The PA does have
problems with corruption the cause of which, at least in
part, is the breakdown of order that accompanies occupation.
On the face of it, to demand that honest and efficient
government be demonstrated, and open elections held, all in
the midst of Israeli sponsored chaos, is absurd.
In the unlikely case that the
Palestinians did all of this, Israel was to pull its forces
back to where they were in September 2000 (not to the Green
line), freeze settlement activity (but remove only
“outposts” and not settlements) and cease its slaughter of
civilians and the destruction of their property. But again,
the Roadmap requires this of the Israelis only after the
Palestinians perform what is, for all intents and purposes,
a self-inflicted castration. And that is just Phase One.
In Phase Two the Palestinian
Authority was to “act decisively against terror.” In other
words, having talked Hamas and others into a cease fire, the
PA was now to wage civil war to destroy these resistance
movements. If they succeeded in doing so they would be
rewarded with a state with “provisional borders.” Given the
extensive illegal colonization that Israel has engaged in,
this could only mean a series of tenuously connected
bantustans on approximately 43 percent of the occupied
territories. In this rump state, surrounded by Israeli
walls, tanks and soldiers, disarmed and economically
dominated, subject to periodic incursions at the discretion
of their enemy, the Palestinians were to demonstrate a
“willingness and ability to build a practicing democracy.
It was only in Phase Three,
after the Palestinian resistance was eliminated, that
“permanent status” talks were to be held. Here, according to
the Roadmap, the problems of borders, Jerusalem,
settlements, and refugees were to be dealt with. Symbolic of
the Phase Three environment, however, was the fact that
Israel’s prime minister has already declared that a
precondition of any talks on refugees is a Palestinian
renunciation of the right of return.
As a pseudo peace plan the
Roadmap has historical precedents. All came in the form of
dictates such as the U.S. dealings with the native Indians
and Mexico in the 19th century, and the German
and Russian dealings with Poland in the 20th.
These are what the Bush plan resembles. It is dressed up
like a plan for reform and democracy in Palestine leading to
peace with Israel, but that is just sleight of hand. Like so
much else that the Bush administration does, this bit of
foreign policy is built on lies.
John
Kerry: Our Next Diplomat and Chief?
If George W. Bush is an ideologue whose belief system
(largely fashioned by the notions of Christian
Fundamentalism) resonates with neo-conservative triumphalism,
John Kerry is more a mainstream politician of
Clintonesque style. His connections to lobbies with
interests in the Middle East are not, in all but one case,
as pronounced as Mr. Bush’s. The Bush family has well
known links to the oil cartels that seek control of
Iraqi oil. Kerry and the Democrats also pay attention to
these interests, but are not beholden to them in such an
incestuous way. Vice President Cheney is “embedded” with
the arms manufacturers, construction firms, and mercenary
security firms now playing a major role in Iraq. Again, the
Democrats want to keep most of these elements relatively
satisfied but do not have the profligate connections of the
present administration. And Bush himself is a devotee of the
interests of Jewish and Christian Zionists who insist that
the U.S. government lend uncritical support to Israel. Here,
as we shall see, Kerry and the Democrats are, for different
reasons, as ensnared as is Bush. With these differences in
mind, what can we expect of a Kerry administration when it
comes to Iraq, Israel and Palestine?
I. War on
Iraq – “I don’t believe in a cut and run philosophy”
Mr. Kerry, unlike George W.
Bush, is not a “chicken hawk.” He is a veteran of combat in
Viet Nam. He served there without question but, upon
discharge, came home and raised concerns about the war’s
efficacy. This may seem a bit backwards but it does indicate
that Mr. Kerry is capable of changing his mind, once he has
“done his duty.”
However, it is a mistake to
think that Kerry as president will bring the Iraq war to a
quick end. Kerry is a professional politician and thus, like
Richard Nixon seeking “peace with honor” in Viet Nam, he
feels it would be political suicide and a dereliction of
duty to “cut and run.” Despite connections to a broad range
of interest groups, Kerry has, rightly or wrongly, decided
that the voting public he needs to be elected president
wants the war in Iraq to continue, though with less
overall risk to Americans. Thus, he will not pull out of
that country until he has appeared to have “done his duty”
and a more broad-based anti-war sentiment than exists at
present gives him political cover. On the other hand, not
being a neo-conservative ideologue, he is more flexible than
George Bush when it comes to tactics.
It is likely then that Kerry
will initially restrict changes in Iraq to the tactical
level. He favors a multilateral approach and will try to
involve the United Nations and NATO more deeply in Iraq. He
will accomplish this by being a “hands-on, engaged,
diplomat-in-chief” who “knows how to bring these [hoped for
allied] countries to the table.” To achieve this goal he is
ready to throw overboard the Bush administration’s arrogant
demeanor. As a result, he predicts that at the end of his
first term “foreign forces” will have replaced most of
America’s 140,000 troops now in Iraq. It is to be noted that
Kerry’s hidden assumption is that a simple change in
approach will obligate others to join us in the mayhem we
have created in Iraq. However, there seems no obvious reason
why other countries should rush to our aid in Iraq, only to
risk their own public facilities being attacked (a la
Spain), their nationals kidnapped and beheaded, and perhaps
their governments voted out of office. Within two or three
years of his election, Kerry’s new strategy will probably
prove a failure. At that point, having “done his duty” and
drawing on the support of interest groups pushing for more
resources for domestic programs, he may prove willing and
capable of winding down the Iraq war.
What is absent from the Kerry
orientation (as it is from that of Mr. Bush) is any
questioning of the war’s justice or necessity. Kerry seems
uninterested in the fact that the war was started on the
basis of lies and deceptions, and has publicly declared that
he would have voted to give Bush war authority even if he
had known there were no WMDs in Saddam’s arsenal. He talks
of withdrawal coming only after achieving stability in Iraq
which is really impossible since it is the American led
occupation that is the source of instability. He says little
about the corrupt practices of American profiteers in Iraq.
And, he certainly does not admit to the need for a thorough
review of those past American policies in the Middle East
that have brought us to this sorry position.
The bottom line in any
comparison of Bush and Kerry on Iraq, is that with either
man becoming the next president, the people of Iraq are
going to continue to die, be maimed, lose their property and
their livelihoods. The real difference between the two lies
in how long such madness is likely to last. To some extent
this difference reflects the interest groups the two men
respond to. With Mr. Bush’s reelection war will become
open-ended. For Bush and his backers the War on Terror is a
war between good and evil. Evil must be conquered not only
in Iraq, but also in lands beyond. Bush shares the
perceptions of Christian fundamentalists, Likud Zionists,
and neo-conservative aspirants to empire, as well as
avaricious elements of big business such as Haliburton,
Bechtel, the arms producers and mercenary security firms.
These, along with the oil companies, are the lobby groups
that urge on his muscular, neo-Prussian tactics. Thus
blinkered, he and his associates will soldier on forever if
given the opportunity. Mr. Kerry’s lobby connections are
broader: small as well as big business, labor unions,
professional organizations and other interests that
prioritize resources for domestic use rather than foreign
warfare. On the other hand, Kerry also responds to the
Jewish (though not the Christian) Zionists. The fact that
Mr. Kerry responds to a broader mix of interest groups
suggests that, as president, he is less likely to wage
open-ended war. That may mean less Americans, Iraqis and
other Arabs suffer and die in the long run. It does not mean
that they will stop suffering and dying in the short run.
II. Israel-Palestine –
“What is important, obviously, is the security of the state
of Israel”
There is one area where Mr.
Kerry completely supports the murderous tactics of Mr. Bush,
and that is in his uncritical support of Israel. Kerry does
not do so because, like Bush, he thinks God gave Palestine
to the Israelites and we must support Zionist expansionism
to hasten the second coming of Christ or, like the neo-cons,
because of a perverse admiration for Israeli aggressiveness.
Mr. Kerry’s surrender of American interests (that is,
sacrificing of the good will of almost all Arabs and
Muslims) to the interests of Israeli colonists is simply a
recognition of the power of the Jewish Zionist lobby–a
recognition that it is one of the most formidable interest
groups to now walk the marbled halls of American
government. And, indeed, this Zionist lobby has for decades
bought and bullied the Democratic Party to an even greater
extent than its Republican rival. So it should come as no
surprise to hear John Kerry competing with the Bush
administration for Zionist favor by making the following
public pronouncements:
A)
“I will never force Israel to make concessions
that cost or compromise any of Israel’s security.” Since
1967 Israeli governments have insisted that controlling the
occupied territories is important to their security. In
truth the Israelis are using the security argument as a
cover for illegal colonization, for the fact is that
occupation is demonstratively the source of their
insecurity. However, in American politics, there is great
political risk in saying this publicly, while there is
political benefit in adhering to the Israeli line.
B)
“We will
never expect Israel to negotiate without a credible
partner,” and “Palestinians
must stop the violence–this is the fundamental building
block of the peace process.” As we have seen with the
Roadmap, which Kerry sees as “an acceptable approach for
reinvigorating the peace process,” the notion of a “credible
partner” means a Palestinian Quisling who will destroy
resistance to Israel’s destruction of Palestinian society.
As the game of American politics is now played, if the
destruction of Palestinian society is a desire of dominant
interest groups, it will be facilitated and rationalized by
our government. That is what has been happening since 1967
and it will continue to happen when and if Kerry replaces
Bush in the White House.
C)
Israel’s
security fence is a legitimate act of self-defense.”
Back in October of 2003,
in a rare moment of clarity and frankness, John Kerry told
an audience at the Arab-American Institute that the
“security fence” was a “provocative and counterproductive
measure.” It did not take long for the America’s Zionist
lobbies to make clear the political costs of maintaining
such a “radical” position. Kerry quickly reversed himself.
There are some Arab Americans, such as James Zogby, who
believe that Kerry’s real beliefs are expressed in his
statement to the Arab Americans, and that his eventual
Middle East policy will reflect this. While this hope is
understandable, it is also wishful thinking. The same
political pressures which persuaded John Kerry to kowtow to
the Zionists for the sake of his election campaign, will
still exist when and if he becomes president. As president
he will face a Congress that continues to be rabidly
pro-Zionist, leaders of his own party who are on the Zionist
political payroll and a State Department purged of all
Arabists. Mr. Kerry, remember, is a professional politician.
Real peace for him is maintaining a domestic climate that
allows for his reelection.
D)
“Israel is
our ally, the only true democracy in this troubled region,
and we know that Israel as a partner is fundamental to our
security.” Both
statements are propaganda pieces designed to create a sense
of pseudo-reality simply by being repeated ad nauseam.
Israel is a democracy in the same way that America’s
southern states were democracies prior to the civil rights
movement. In Israel today, as in the American South in the
1940s and 1950s, minorities (in this case non-Jews) are
systematically discriminated against both in law and
custom. And, in what sense is Israel “fundamental to our
security?” Support for Israel over the decades, which Mr.
Kerry (just like Bush) asserts is “a central keystone of
American foreign policy,” has helped create a
security crisis for the United States by unnecessarily
alienating billions of Muslims and creating hatred toward
the U.S. throughout the Arab world.
E)
“In the
first days of a Kerry administration, I will appoint a
presidential ambassador to the peace process.”
Kerry’s spokesmen have also
told us he “would never send anyone [as a Middle East envoy]
who doesn’t have the confidence of Israel and the Jewish
community.” And, given the fact that Kerry initially
suggested Jimmy Carter for this post but withdrew the idea
immediately upon drawing Zionist ire, we can only assume
that the Zionists will have a veto on who his “presidential
ambassador” will be. As Catherine Cook, a senior analyst at
the Washington based Middle East Information and Research
Project, has observed “John Kerry could appoint Desmond Tutu
as the U.S. envoy, but unless his mandate differed from that
allowed by current U.S. policy, Tutu would fail.”
F)
“I’ve always
felt that the right of return is contrary to the viability
of a Jewish state, and that’s what Israel is.”
In other words, Kerry has put Israel’s right to maintain its
discriminatory ethnocentric nature above the rights of
millions of Palestinians held under international law. He
agrees with President Bush that Israel must be allowed to
keep its major West Bank colonies. He has labeled Yasser
Arafat a “failed leader” and said he would not deal with
him. And, he has written that we must “reaffirm our belief
that the cause of Israel is the cause of America.” So, just
what, beyond Palestinian surrender, is Mr. Kerry’s
“presidential ambassador to the peace process” going to
negotiate?
The bottom line in any
comparison of Bush and Kerry on Israel and Palestine, is
that with either man becoming the next president, their will
be no pressure put on Israel to cease its barbaric behavior
in Palestine. Thus, as is the case with Iraqis, Palestinians
are going to continue to die, be maimed, lose their property
and their livelihoods. And, unfortunately, in this case
Kerry will not shorten the time span of this horror any more
than Bush. On this issue Kerry is simply someone who will
replace Bush’s relatively hands-off, biblically inspired
support for Israel, with renewed diplomatic shuffling that
has already been proven a failure. No leader, Republican or
Democrat, can make a positive difference in the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict until the Gordian knot
connecting this issue to US domestic politics is cut. In
other words, the power of the Zionist lobbies (both Jewish
and Christian) has to be broken. Neither Kerry nor Bush has
any desire to take on this task.
Conclusions: The Costs of Disinterest and Ignorance
Given the way American foreign policy is made there
really is no such thing as “national interests.” There are
only the interests of lobby groups with goals that lie
outside the country. Achieving sufficient influence, these
lobbies can have their own interests portrayed as “the
national interest.” The Zionist lobbies and Israel is a case
in point. Support for Israel has been a major theme in U.S.
foreign policy because the Jewish Zionist lobby, now allied
to the Christian Zionists, has been sufficiently well
organized and financed to successfully demand such a policy.
As a result American national security is now actually at
greater risk. Yet both Bush and Kerry, as well as
numerous other politicians, persist in speaking of Israel’s
interests as if they were identical to the American national
interest.
It is important to note that
the power of the Zionist lobbies has been facilitated by
popular disinterest in foreign policy as well as ignorance
of the Middle East and American activities in that region.
The void created by this ignorance has been filled by myths
and rationalizations. The tragic events of September 11
presented an opportunity for the American people to take an
interest in what their government does abroad and question
the popular assumptions that those activities are always
altruistic. For a moment such an examination seemed possible
as the question was raised, “why do they hate us?” But the
politicians and interest groups responsible for the behavior
that bred the attacks understood the danger of such soul
searching and shut down that avenue of investigation.
Instead the American people were lied to yet again and,
because they know no better, swallowed whole the notion that
the September 11 attacks were the products of fanatical
Islam (assisted by Saddam’s Iraq) gone crazy with ancient
hatred of the West and its “freedoms.” Both Kerry and Bush
continue to talk in this misleading way.
The same ignorance allowed
the Bush administration to galvanize fear of Iraq based on
false assertions. However, the prospect of war and the lose
of American lives did provoke a certain level of debate and
not all interested parties agreed. However, with Bush in the
White House the debate was automatically won by a clique of
neo-conservative politicians and intellectuals who shifted
the means by which American foreign policy goals are pursued
to the extreme aggressive end of the tactical spectrum. If
the Democrats had won in 2000, the neo-cons would not be in
power and still restricted to misinterpreting history on
their web sites. American tactics would have followed a
different course. Following September 11th the
U.S. still would have gone after Osama bin Laden (perhaps
more persistently than under Bush) and might even have
attacked Afghanistan to get to him. But, given the interest
group mix Democrats traditionally respond to,
neo-conservative ideas would not have triumphed and Iraq
would have been controlled by means other than
invasion.
This scenario represents a
debate over tactics. And, as important as it certainly is,
it should not be mistaken for a difference over policy
goals. Be it Clinton, Gore, Kerry, Bush the elder or the
younger, the policy goals are the same—to promote American
political and economic dominance in a world wherein she is
the sole superpower. All the major interest groups
referencing foreign policy adhere to this end. The present
debate between Democrats and Republicans is a matter of how
you want to go about achieving that end—where your
preferences lie along the tactical spectrum.
The problem is that whatever
your tactical preferences, the end—the pursuit of American
dominance and its accompanying practices of exploitation—is
sustained by the myth that both means and ends are
altruistic. It is this distorted world view that politicians
like Bush and Kerry promote and that the mainstream media
successfully fosters. Therefore, no matter which man wins in
November, no matter which party rules, there will be no
self-reflection, no self-criticism, no reexamination of the
history of American foreign policy in the Middle East, and
no revival of that seminal question, “why do they hate us?”
Thus, ignorance will continue with the consequence that,
sooner or later, more 9/11s will occur.
Lawrence Davidson is
Professor of Middle East History at West Chester University
in West Chester, PA. He is author of two recent books:
Islamic Fundamentalism (Greenwood Press, 2003) and
America's Palestine: Popular and Official Perceptions from
Balfour to Israeli Statehood (University Press of
Florida, 2001). He also has written over twenty published
articles on US perceptions of and policies toward the Middle
East.
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