John McCain's 'Frightening' Strategy

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Jornal de Negocios, Portugal

John McCain's 'Frightening' Strategy

"McCain's plans are frightening in their incoherence, total lack of realism and underestimation of economic and financial constraints. …It is a worrying state of the mind that animates McCain in his desire to reform the world."

By João Carlos Barradas

Translated By Brandi Miller

April 30, 2008

Portugal - Jornal de Negocios - Original Article (Portuguese)

C-SPAN VIDEO: Senator John McCain Speaks to the Los Angeles World Affairs Council, Mar. 26, 00:53:00

A son and grandson of admirals, a Navy pilot and a prisoner in Vietnam, John McCain says that he "hates war" and is open to promoting democracy, "by defending the rules of international civilized society and by creating the new international institutions necessary to advance peace and freedom."

This statement is contained in a March 26th speech before the Los Angeles World Affairs Council, and it backs up the Republican candidate's ideas about "United States leadership" in a world with multiple centers of democratic power, from India to the European Union, and where the influence of countries like Russia and China is growing.

The systematic explanation of McCain's foreign policy goals was initially overshadowed by the dispute between the Democratic candidates, but as the possibility of a Republican victory in the November presidential election grows, so too does the difficulty in discerning the strategic wisdom of the senator from Arizona.

THE MCCAIN 'LEAGUE'

McCain believes that the dialogue with the Democratic partners of the United States obliges Washington to adopt behavior in accord with constitutional values and, consequently, the repudiation of "torture or inhuman treatment of detained terrorist suspects."

The closing of the prison at Guantánamo and negotiating with allies for "a new international understanding" on the status of "dangerous detainees" is the corollary of this laudable position of principle.

An old international institution like the United Nations, however, can't be what McCain is referring to when he argues for the reinforcement of "global alliances" with Washington as "the core of a new global compact - the League of Democracies."

The League is defined by McCain as the "more than one hundred democratic nations around the world" capable of "advancing our values and defending our shared interests."

Another statement of principle from McCain about U.S. involvement in negotiations to establish a globally and "economically responsible" post-Kyoto system for controlling greenhouse gas emissions is sufficiently broad to allow for any kind of understanding.

The free trade agreement established in 1994 between the United States, Canada, and Mexico is in turn pointed to by McCain as an example to follow for prosperity in Central and South America, and here the senator does better than the Democratic candidates.

Cuba wasn't mentioned in the Los Angeles speech, but the candidate has said on other occasions that he considered it impossible to alter the current "policy of containment" until the island holds free elections and releases all political prisoners.

For McCain, the blockade of Cuba is an example of successful political strategy because it allowed for the elimination of Havana's influence in Latin America and Africa.

On another front, transparency and respect for legality are two essential conditions for the progress in the African states, according to McCain, who promises to continue Washington's support in combating AIDS and eradicating malaria on a continent where this indispensable foreign aid will help friendly countries.

AGAINST THE RUSSIANS AND CHINESE

McCain's global strategy concerns essentially excluding Russia from the G8 and including Brazil and India.

Alongside this proposal, the Republican candidate supports the enlargement of NATO to all democratic states against the dangers of "a revanchist Russia." [A Russia seeking to restore its former military and political power].

China is in turn considered "a central challenge," and being a non-democratic state, Washington will have to base its relationship with Beijing on "sporadic shared interests."

McCain demands "more responsible" behavior from China and that Beijing abandon attempts at reach regional understandings and economic agreements that exclude the United States from Asia [McCain is probably referring to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which was invented by Beijing and Moscow to counter NATO ].

The trade deficit with Beijing and the Chinese investments in United States Treasury bonds receive no special attention from McCain, who also lacks any perspective on reforming institutions like the World Bank or the IMF.

Although he excludes Moscow and Beijing from his League of Democracies and the G8, the senator, who presents himself as a "realistic idealist," believes he can count on Russian and Chinese cooperation to "halt and reverse nuclear proliferation" and even to reduce existing arsenals.

In Los Angeles, McCain didn't feel the need to elaborate on the successive statements in which he has reserved the right, given the threat of outcast countries like North Korea and strategic competitors like Russia and China, for the United States to develop new anti-missile systems, including a military component in space.

[The Telegraph, U.K.]

NEITHER AUTOCRATS NOR REALISM

In the strategic scenario presented in California, Iran's nuclear weapons program, highlighted by McCain as an intolerable risk that could justify a military strike, will be eliminated thanks through the efforts of the "international community."

The "threat of radical Islamic terrorism," being the most dangerous threat due to the risk involved with weapons of mass destruction, requires in turn an, "aggressive strategy of confronting and rooting out terrorists wherever they seek to operate." McCain acknowledges that, beyond the use of military force, it will be imperative to win the support of a majority of moderate Muslim believers and create "international structures for a durable peace."

To clarify his idea, McCain says that order and stability in the Greater Middle East will not be secured through "outdated autocracies," like, for example, the Saudi royal family, the Pakistani generals or the leaders of Egypt, even though he admits it would be undesirable, "to act rashly or demand change overnight" to reform such regimes.

The Republican candidate ignored the Israel-Palestine conflict in his Los Angeles speech, but his well-known ambiguity on the issue is in order to keep all options open, including the possibility of pressing the Jewish state to offer territorial concessions to advance peace talks that exclude Hamas.

In the arc that goes from the Middle East to Southeast Asia through Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent, McCain identifies as "pillars for the construction of secure peace," democratic states like Turkey, Israel, India and Indonesia.

Iraq and Afghanistan, however, emerge as the central elements in the "triumph of religious tolerance," implying the pursuit of a war effort that has as its goal the creation of "peaceful, stable, prosperous democratic states that pose no threat to neighbors and contribute to the defeat of terrorists."

[Excelsior, Mexico]

INCOHERENT AND FRIGHTENING

McCain's plans are frightening in their incoherence, total lack of realism and underestimation of economic and financial constraints.

While partly inspired by the thinking of the Republican realist school of international relations shared by some advisers like Henry Kissinger and Richard Armitage, what gives the best glimpse into McCain's strategic intentions is the interventionist and confrontational neoconservative ideology of William Kristol or Robert Kagan.

John McCain, should he ever be elected president, will be immediately subject to such a cold shower of demands and afflictions that neither the creation of a League of Democracies or the restructuring of the G8 will save.

Even before Beijing or Moscow put the heat on the eventual Republican president, the apprehension of allies in Berlin, Tokyo and Riyadh would be such that either McCain will have to change course or he will condemn the United States to a proactive interventionism capable of bringing even greater misfortune.

Posted by WORLDMEETS.US

It is a worrying state of the mind that animates McCain in his desire to reform the world.

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