Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State

President-elect Barak Obama is already taking steps to warm many hearts. If there is any truth in the cliché that morning shows the day, then it is just not only the people in USA but also the rest of the world who can feel that sunshine is about to return to their lives after eight long and miserable winters suffered under President George W Bush by the decisions that the transition team of the President-elect is taking.

Senator Obama is clearly a man of vision; one who can rise about partisanship and lead by bridging gaps rather than dividing in sharp contrast to the man he would soon be replacing. He has already reached out to the Republicans, initiating and then meeting Senator McCain, his opponent in a very bitter Presidential election to ensure that he has his support in the Congress in implementing his agenda of change. His country vitally needs this change to return from the worst economic predicament that USA has faced since the Great Depression of the 1930s. He is already contemplating giving cabinet positions to the Republican Party following President Lincoln who after winning the 1860 election took into his Cabinet some of his bitterest critics for the sake of the country. Obama, who writes or drafts most of his speeches like Abraham Lincoln but also uses speechwriters, instructed one of them to underpin a quote from Lincoln for his victory speech. The writer came out with a quote not used much that says: "We are not enemies, but friends … Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection." When these words were spoken by Obama before a vast crowd at Chicago's Grant Park on election night, it found an immediate connect with a nation sick with bipartisan bickering and underscored unequivocally Obama's determination to unite his country.

President-elect Obama's desire to follow the footsteps of President Lincoln by uniting his one-time opponents for the sake of the country can also be seen in his move to make Senator Hillary Clinton Secretary of State. He had fought against her one of the bitterest fights ever seen in the Democratic Party for the nomination for the President. At one stage, Senator Clinton even mentioned publicly and incorrectly that Senator Obama attended an Islamic school in Indonesia where he spent some years as a child with his mother and Indonesian step-father, a reference intended to underline Senator Obama's Islamic link.

The choice of the Senator from New York as the Secretary of State is one in which there are many other positives. Senator Clinton has already proved that she has what it takes to go to the White House and had she not met someone as brilliant and outstanding as Senator Obama, her party's nomination would have been hers for the asking and she could have been very well the President-elect. She has had a comparatively short career as a Senator but during this period, she has gained experience in five committees, notable the heavyweight Armed Services Committee. Although she voted for the Iraq war, she and Obama now shares the common concern of bringing the US troops from Iraq earlier than later. As the First Lady, she played a very crucial role in the Clinton administration with such initiatives as Clinton health care plan (that was aborted in the Congress); State Children's Health Insurance Program and Adoption and Safe Families Act that added credibility and weight to the Clinton White House. At the time of her husband's infidelity, she stood by him by rising above her emotions for the sake of the country.

She is loaded with experience and ability whose inclusion in the Cabinet will be welcomed just not in her country but outside the United States. She will have one additional advantage for the Obama administration if she joins it. She will have an insider in her husband President Clinton to advise her on issues with which he is perhaps one of the most competent to speak to, having been a very successful President in foreign affairs - an interest he is still pursuing with his foundation that provides millions of dollars for development in Africa. As President, Bill Clinton had focused great attention and energy for resolving the Palestinian problem and just before he handed the administration to George Bush, had come very close to a permanent resolution to the crisis. It can be expected that he would influence the Obama administration indirectly for a just and sustainable peace in the ME and moderate the overtly pro-Israel stance that the President-elect had taken during the presidential campaign.

The Obama administration would be assuming office at a time when the US is in the midst of an economic meltdown. By tradition, the Democrats are pro-labour and in trade, protectionist. The economic crisis will only make Democrats in Congress less “free textile trade” and more “fair textile trade” with textile quotas ending at the end of the year. This is not good news for Bangladesh whose crucial export earnings from RMG come mostly from the US market. Bangladesh's economic diplomacy will be tested to the fullest to receive favourable attention from the new administration so that her RMG market in the US does not face a major blow. Bangladesh has no lobbyist working in the US; it has a Bangladesh caucus in the Congress but there is no reason to be optimistic that this group would be able to do much to help Bangladesh with her trade interests. The outlook is bleak with one window of opportunity, which one can see is in a connection that a leading Bangladeshi has with Senator and President Clinton. In this context, I remember an event during the early days of the Clinton administration where Dr. Yunus was being honoured at the US State Department with one of the many international prizes that he has won. In his address at the event, Secretary of State Warren Christopher said that during the presidential campaign in California, when as candidate Bill Clinton was relaxing after a hard day's work, he told a group of close associates that there was an individual working wonders in Bangladesh with the poor and poverty alleviation and that he should be given the Nobel Prize. Very few knew who Bill Clinton was talking about till he named that individual as Dr. Mohammed Yunus. Before that in the 1980s, Dr. Yunus had been invited by the Clintons to Arkansas where Bill Clinton was Governor and ever since, Dr. Yunus has been a very close friend of the Clintons, a fact now widely known in relevant circles in Washington.

Successful diplomacy depends on tact, contact and national power. Of power, the less said the better in case of Bangladesh. Tact or the ability of diplomats to negotiate successfully is on the decline. On contact, Bangladesh has precious little to successfully achieve her foreign policy goals. If Senator Clinton becomes the next US Secretary of State, a window of opportunity would open in achieving Bangladesh's bilateral interests with USA with the element of contact. This window of opportunity could work if a number of other things fall into line. Bangladesh must have a credible election and an elected government in place without resorting to violence. The government that would come to office must make its intentions clear on its resolve to deal with Islamic militancy. As President, Obama would have little or no interest in Bangladesh; there is no reason for him to be. But if Bangladesh can come strongly with a democratic government serious on the issue of militancy, it could attract the attention of policy makers in the new administration, including Hillary Clinton as the Secretary of State. In that scenario, Bangladesh could work with Senator Clinton through Dr. Yunus with a very limited bilateral agenda such as sustainable access to the RMG market in the US. An announcement that Senator Clinton would be the next Secretary of State is expected after Thanksgiving and at the moment, it seems certain that she will be.

US foreign policy under President Bush: A critical view

IN an interesting interview given to the New York Times recently, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has given the administration of President George Bush high marks in the area of foreign policy. Secretary Rice has been a National Security Adviser in the first Bush Administration and then replaced General Colin Powell in 2005 to become the Secretary of State in President Bush's second administration.

Secretary Rice said US foreign policy has served the cause of democracy worldwide successfully, working under President Bush's belief that democracy is not just for a few. She cited Iraq's move to a multi-ethnic democracy and voting rights of women in Kuwait as evidence. She also said that because of US' role, the European parliament has not been afraid to award Andrei Sakharov prize to Chinese dissident Hu Jia despite the blowback from Beijing. She said Egypt will change and that Egyptians will demand a different presidential election next time.

On Middle-East, Secretary Rice said there have been substantial gains but cited that the real change has been in conversation all over the region where every country is now seeking some form of popular legitimacy. In the context of Palestine-Israel relations, she said that “the Palestinian leadership is avowedly in favour of negotiations, renounces violence, and recognizes the right of Israel to exist. There is a robust negotiating process, and they have made a lot of progress on how to get to a two-state solution”. She said Hamas takeover of Gaza has been a problem but that the Egyptians have helped in containing conflict. The US effort there has been to strengthen the hands of Mahmoud Abbas to take an agreement to the Palestinians by demonstrating that Hamas has no solution to the Palestinian problem.

On Iran, Secretary Rice said the objectives have been to change the behaviour of the regime but not the regime itself and help indigenous forces there with democracy. On Darfur, Secretary Rice expressed regret that the principle “the responsibility to protect” that the UN adopted in 2006 in the end meant nothing but empty words with no one wanting consequences, leaving the US using sanctions unilaterally to no useful purpose.

On Europe, Secretary Rice dismissed the perception that US has poor relations with that continent as “myth” though she admitted some disagreement without any serious problems in US-Europe relations. On Russia, she said that the country is in an “infrastructural nightmare” where an aging population is being replaced by a “sickly population”, concluding that US could remain “calm” about Russia.

About President Bush's legacy in foreign affairs, Secretary Rice said the most important one has been in spreading the message of freedom just not from tyranny but also poverty, disease and linking these to US's security needs. She said the world is at a historical transformation and US foreign policy goals set to motion by President Bush will tie democracy, defense and development in one single process. She also said that Bush's foreign policy has successfully handled foreign assistance, doubling it in Latin America; quadrupling in Africa and tripling worldwide, adding 300 new AID officers and 1100 Foreign Service officers to the State Department.

Secretary Rice's interview is, to say the least, very interesting given the fact that upon analysis it is very thin on substance against the claims she has made. Egypt elected Hosne Mubarak in 2005 for fifth consecutive six-year term by 88% and her prediction for a more credible election next time rests only on the hope that Mubarak will be too old to participate in it. The situation in Iraq is far from what has been claimed and she has not talked about the human costs, with so many thousands of innocent lives lost, not to speak of the hundreds of billions of dollars spent that has caused the greatest meltdown in US history that is now threatening to take down the world economy with it down the same path in which it now lies.

The claim on change in ME is also suspect given the fact after eight years of Bush's tenure, the region remains as far removed from democracy as it was at the end of the Clinton term. Ironically, it is in Palestine that a truly democratic parliamentary election was held in 2006 in which the Palestinians freely and fairly elected the Hamas that the US rejected because of Hamas' links to terrorism. In June 2007 US, in collusion with Israel, unsuccessfully tried to put a faction of Hamas led by Mohhmad Dahlan whom President Bush called “our guy” to overthrow the Hamas led Government. In fact the foundations that are the basis of democracy that the US preaches like universal franchise: elections for political offices, a freely elected parliament, are present only in Iran and Palestine. Elsewhere, monarchs are as powerful as ever and as a result of US foreign policy in the region, these monarchs have received extra hundreds of billions of dollars by windfall as a consequence of increase in price of oil three fold due to the invasion of Iraq. They have spent these extra billions partly to distribute further economic prosperity to their people so that they have less need to think or worry for democratic governments. Thus, at least on surface, there are no significant moves for democracy in the ME, except in Egypt where US economic and military aid has kept and continues to keep General Mubarak in power.

Iran has been identified by the US as an “axis of evil” and in these last eight years, there has been speculations on and off that US would invade that country to bring down its alleged nuclear installations urged by its strongest ally in the region, Israel, that has a major nuclear arsenal of its own and had in the past attacked Iraq in the 1980s to bring down that country's nuclear installation. Iran's only fault, seen by the US, is that its President has said Iran will wipe Israel out of existence. That statement, unacceptable as it is, has never been put in its proper perspective from the Iranian point of view. Iran is in the middle of a region surrounded on all sides by nuclear weapons states: Israel on the west, Russia on the north and Pakistan on the east. With all three, the US has excellent relations. In case of Pakistan, US endeared her at a time when General Musharraf had come to power after overthrowing a democratically elected government and under the cloud for selling nuclear technology in the open market. Iran needs to be assured of its own security that cannot be enhanced with Israel urging the US to attack Iran and USA calling Iran an “axis of evil”. Furthermore, Iran, with its view on Israel notwithstanding, cannot be denied access to civil nuclear technology, now less so after the US has signed the civil-nuclear deal with India which is a nuclear weapons state.

The failure to focus on the Palestinian issue as the most important problem in the ME has been a major failure in US foreign policy under President Bush. It took his Secretary of State Colin Powell eight months to pay his first visit to ME and on that visit he said that Iraq and not the Palestinian issue was more important in US foreign policy, thereby striking all the good work done for resolution of the Palestinian problem in the Clinton era; a problem that is the single most important factor that has rendered maximum wind to the sail of Islamic terrorism. The hastily declared war on terror following 9/11 that took the US to Afghanistan in search of Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda and then leaving Afghanistan with the work unfinished to invade Iraq on falsehood and deceit placed the US foreign policy into conflict with the rest of the world, the consequences of which have devastated the world.

The postscript on the assessment on US foreign policy under President Bush has been written in the way the world rejoiced at the victory of Senator Obama. Never in history has a world leader been hailed the way as Senator Obama has been hailed; nor ever will a US President leave office with such an abysmal infamy record as President Bush. The world's rejoicing at Senator Obama's victory has been due almost totally to the failure of US foreign policy in the past eight years. The doctrine of pre-emptive strike and “you are either with us or against us” that have been at the basis of US foreign policy during this period have made the United States very unpopular with the rest of the world. The new US President, Secretary Rice's tall claims in her NYT interview notwithstanding, will have a very challenging task ahead to win back the trust that the world has lost in the US by recasting the foreign policy of the neo-con that has been based on the belief that US can and has the power to impose its will on the rest of the world.

US foreign policy under President Bush has sent democracy, defense and development on three different directions. It will now be President-elect Obama's task to bring these in line for sake of the United States and the world.

Published in The Daily Star, November 21, 2008