Democrats weigh leverage in Iraq pullout
THE CURRENT foreign policy buzzword among Democrats is "leverage."In the views of prominent Democrats I spoke with as the party's convention loomed, John Kerry included, the leverage the United States has to involve Iraq's responsible neighbors and Europe in helping produce a durable stability is both positive and implicitly negative. On the latter point, Senator Edward M. Kennedy said in an interview over the weekend at his home in Hyannis Port: "The real leverage they all pay attention to is the length of stay in Iraq of the American military. What I think we are offering the voting public and the rest of the world is a policy on Iraq that maximizes this leverage as an alternative to simply and irresponsibly cutting and running."
The assumption is that for all their anti-American and anti-Bush rhetoric, Europe and Iraq's neighbors fear the violent vacuum that would follow a precipitate US pullout from Iraq.
"I am convinced, and I am convinced John Kerry is convinced," Kennedy said, "that maximizing US influence will convince these countries that their Iraq stake is as large if not larger than our own. John Kerry will go wherever he has to go to make this work."
When he called from Ohio over the weekend, Kerry was happy to reinforce the point, arguing that President Bush has barely scratched the surface of international cooperation on this and many other foreign policy issues.
"As you know," he said, "I have said from almost the beginning of this campaign that I will make sure the leaders of other nations understand clearly that a new day is coming and that there isn't a challenge we face in the world that can't be responded to more effectively by more inclusive, stronger alliances. I really intend to accomplish this."
Another Kerry foreign policy confidant, Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware, was more blunt, addressing those nations that are sick of Bush's go-it-alone-ism and pine for a new, inclusive, diplomatically activist US leader.
"Be careful what you wish for," Biden said, "because you are going to get it. Be prepared for multiple challenges for your involvement. It may make you nostalgic for the sidelines."
Former secretary of state Madeleine Albright, another source of advice for Kerry, urges a more positive form of leverage on Iraq's neighbors, without whom stability is highly unlikely. As someone who helped take the Israeli-Palestinian conundrum to the brink of resolution in 2000, she says the abandonment of serious American diplomacy in the region is beyond outrageous.
"Their so-called road map has never for a second come out of the glove compartment," she said.
In many ways the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory is so basic to the deep emotions in the Muslim world, and thus deeply implicated in the rise of fundamentalism, extremism, and terrorism, that Albright and many other experts are convinced that US participation in a revived peace process can help draw Arab governments into the reconstruction of Iraq.
Albright said she is positive Kerry means what he says about a return to special envoys, the use of financial and diplomatic leverage on the Palestinian Authority to suppress terrorist groups, and constant pressure for progress.
For convention week, the strategic decision by the Kerry campaign to suppress Bush-bashing from the speaker's podium reflects a conviction that voters are ready to hear about a new agenda and to learn more about Kerry himself.
As Biden noted, it is harder to do this in foreign policy -- where the future probably holds crises not on the front burner today -- than in offering a domestic legislative proposal. However, the Democrats' discussion of leverage is an example of their effort to sketch a different future where Iraq is concerned.
There are pitfalls, however. Albright said 146,000 US military personnel are "bogged down" in Iraq. The danger is that the situation could remain so violently chaotic that their presence will be needed indefinitely. For the short term, many Democrats, Biden included, remain convinced there should be even more troops in Iraq.
This is how quagmires are made. As Bush has learned the hard way, there has never been majority support in this country for spending the gobs of money that we are now spending (the war total is beginning to approach $200 billion). In addition, polls consistently show no majority of Americans in favor of a continued military presence for more than six months.
In short, a huge foreign policy venture with US lives lost in the bargain is proceeding without public support. Bush offers no end in sight beyond sound-bite bromides. The Democrats with increasing specificity are talking about new approaches, but still with US troops in Iraq.
At some point, the "leverage" of US withdrawal may have to become more than leverage; it may have to be a real option unless our leaders can do something to earn public support.
Thomas Oliphant's e-mail address is oliphant@globe.com.
