U.S. Department of State
Dispatch Volume 7, Number 12, March 18, 1996
Bureau of Public Affairs
ARTICLES IN THIS ISSUE:
1. The Summit of Peacemakers: A United Front Against Terrorism -
President Clinton, Secretary Christopher, Egyptian President Mubarak,
Israeli Prime Minister Peres
2. U.S. Expresses Sympathy and Outrage Over Terrorist Bombings in Israel
and Announces Measures for Support - President Clinton
3. International Women's Day: Celebrating Remarkable Achievements -
Secretary Christopher
4. Support for Democracy and the U.S. National Interest - Deputy
Secretary Talbott
5. American Eagle or Ostrich: Challenges for U.S. Leadership in the
Post-Cold War World - Deputy Secretary Talbott
6. Defining Missions, Setting Deadlines: Meeting New Security
Challenges in the Post-Cold War World - Anthony Lake
ARTICLE 1:
The Summit of Peacemakers: A United Front Against Terrorism
President Clinton, Secretary Christopher, Egyptian President Mubarak,
Israeli Prime Minister Peres
President Clinton
Remarks by the President at the opening of the Summit of Peacemakers,
Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, March 13, 1996.
Thank you very much, President Mubarak. Your Majesties, Your Highnesses,
Heads of State, Heads of Government, Foreign Ministers, and Mr.
Secretary General: I'd like to begin by thanking President Mubarak for
his extraordinary efforts in the last few days to convene this meeting,
to host us here, and to make us feel welcome. I thank President Yeltsin,
my distinguished cosponsor of the peace process, and all the rest of you
who have come so far on such short notice to this very important
meeting. From all around the world we have come to the Sinai to deliver
one simple, unified message: Peace will prevail. This summit is
unprecedented in the history of the Middle East. It would have been
inconceivable just a few short years ago. It stands as proof and promise
that this region has changed for good. Leaders from Israel and the Arab
world, from Europe, from Asia, from North America--29 of us, shoulder to
shoulder, joined in support of peace. We have gathered before to
celebrate new milestones in our journey; today we join in common defense
against those who would turn us back. We are here because we know what
is at stake.
In the 18 years since Egypt and Israel made a miracle at Camp David,
Israelis and Arabs have changed the course of history in their lands.
Step by step, courageously they have broken with the past, laying down
the arms of war and opening their arms to one another. But with every
milestone passed along the road of peace and progress, the enemies of
peace have grown more desperate and more depraved. They know they cannot
compete in the marketplace of ideas; they know they have nothing to
offer but hardship and despair. And so they resort to murderous attacks
that are an affront to the civilized world and to the moral precepts
that lie at the core of the three faiths represented here, as President
Mubarak has so eloquently stated.
In the busy streets of Jerusalem, Ashquelon, and Tel Aviv, suicide
bombers launched a wave of terror to kill as many Israelis as possible.
Ordinary men and women riding the bus to work, families shopping for the
holidays, innocent children in their Purim costumes --all were murdered
for the blood in their veins.
Our hearts go out to the people of Israel and to all the victims of
these atrocities, which also include Palestinians and Americans. Many of
the nations here today have experienced the nightmare of terror. Death
does not discriminate among the terrorists' victims. Over the last two
weeks, as I have said, losses were felt not only in Israeli but also in
Palestinian, American, and Moroccan homes.
The hard-won achievements of the Palestinian people are under direct
assault. The merchants of terror would sell out their future and trade
their dreams for despair. And Arab mothers and fathers who seek a better
life for their children understand the enemies of peace have targeted
them, as well.
Let no one underestimate the significance of our gathering here today.
Today, the wall of division we face is not really between Arab and
Israeli. It is instead between those who reach for a better tomorrow and
those who rail against it, between those who traffic in hate and terror
and those who work for peace.
To the forces of hatred and violence I say--and let us all say--you kill
yourselves and others in the aim of killing peace, yet today, as you
see, peace survives. And peace will grow stronger. You will not succeed.
Your day has passed. You have plowed the fields of hatred, but here we
are coming to reap unity and new strength to defeat you and to keep the
promise and hope of peace alive.
We who have gathered in Egypt today are committed to the search for
peace. Our very presence here underscores the depth of our dedication.
But words and symbols are not enough. The world looks to us now for
action, and we must direct our collective resolve in three specific
areas.
First, we must be clear in our condemnation of those who resort to
terror. Violence has no place in the future we all seek for the Middle
East.
Second, we must reinforce our common search for a comprehensive peace.
We must press forward until the circle of peace is closed. And we must
work to bring the benefits of peace to the daily lives of the people
here, for if people lose their hope and peace, the terrorists will have
succeeded. This would be the cruelest victory of all, and we must not
let it happen.
Third, we must actively counter the terrorists with all the means at our
command, combining our efforts tangibly and joining our strength to
defeat their evil aims. Chairman Arafat and the Palestinian Authority
are responding to that challenge. Each of us here must do our part to
help them succeed in their mission. We know we cannot guarantee 100%
success, but all of us must demand of each other and of ourselves 100%
effort.
The danger we face is urgent, the challenge is clear, but the solidarity
of the peacemakers will conquer the forces of division if we will
resolve to keep that solidarity.
We stand today as one not far from the Mount where God gave the Word to
Moses--the law of humanity, tolerance, and faith that guides our way
today. We are the heirs of that moral legacy, whether we be Moslem or
Jew or Christian. From many lands and many different traditions we come,
today all speaking the language of peace.
In the Bible, we are told that when they were grown, Isaac, the
Patriarch of the Jews, and Ishmael, the Patriarch of the Arabs, met but
once. They came together at the death of Abraham, the father they
shared--the father of both peoples. Today, the descendants of Isaac and
Ishmael have joined together in a spirit of rebirth to secure the shared
promise of a life of peace for all the peoples of this region. Those of
us who come here today to stand with them must not allow the forces of
the past to deny them the future they seek--that we all seek.
Let our charge go forth from the Sinai today: We will win the battle
for peace.
President Clinton, President Mubarak
Opening remarks at a press conference, Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, March 13,
1996.
President Mubarak. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Once again, the
nations of the world have united together in order to enhance peace and
promote security in the Middle East. Many leaders who were not present
with us today contacted us to express their solidarity and support for
the objectives of the conference.
This site where the peacemakers' summit was held was the theater of many
battles in the unhappy past. Today, it has become the living symbol of
the new era of peace and co-existence. Our gathering represented all
worldly cultures and reflected the real concern for peace and stability
in this troubled area. It is our consensus that the Sharm el-Sheikh
conference was a big success.
All leaders and delegates demonstrated a profound commitment to the
promotion of peace and security throughout the region. All of them spoke
their minds and discussed the issues in a spirit of openness, candor,
and objectivity. Our discussions remained focused on the issues of peace
and security. Many valuable contributions were made in the course of the
two sessions we held.
There were no sharp disagreements or disputes. The interventions went
beyond the customary generalities and dealt with specific points which
were quite relevant to the papers of the summit conference. The outcome
of the discussions were properly reflected in the statement which was
distributed to you a while ago.
You have certainly noticed that the conference adopted a set of policies
and measures in order to enhance the chance for peace and reinforce the
security of all parties directly involved in the peace process. Concrete
measures and mechanisms were agreed upon for the purpose of combating
terror and the terrorists. All the peoples of the region view terrorism
as one of the most dangerous threats to their security and stability--
individually and collectively.
It is our hope that the believers in peace and reconciliation who
constitute the great majority will triumph over the forces of doom and
gloom. Hope will ultimately prevail over despair and fear. It is our
hope also that the peace process will be activated and revived without
delay.
As greater security and tranquillity are achieved in the area,
restrictive measures would be eased and lifted as soon as possible. The
living conditions of the innocent people who are suffering in the
aftermath of the violence should be improved markedly.
Finally, I would like to say a few words to all those wise leaders who
attended the conference. I want to state in this gathering that we are
indebted to each and every one of them for their significant
contribution and positive spirit. The leaders of the parties who are
immediately concerned exhibited their courage and vision. They spoke
candidly and positively.
Our Arab brothers exemplified the true spirit of Islam and the Arab
culture. Our European friends demonstrated once again that they are
fully aware that our two regions are inseparable. Our destiny is one and
the same. The cosponsors of the peace process showed the depth of their
commitment to peace and security in the Middle East. Asian participants
in the conference were equally helpful.
President Clinton, who co-chaired the meetings and who shares the podium
with me, has made invaluable contributions. He worked with me day and
night during the past few days. The seven-hour time difference was no
barrier or hindrance. He is a statesman of vision and courage.
Before I open the floor to your questions to both of us, I would like to
thank you--representatives of the media--for your cooperation and
patience. I realize that you are hard-pressed by time and space, but you
will prevail as will we. Thank you.
President Clinton. Thank you very much, Mr. President. Let me begin by
thanking President Mubarak for his willingness to host this historic
meeting and for the work he did to help get this amazing group of people
together.
This is a historic showing of the strength of peace in the Middle East
today. As the co-chairman's statement makes clear, this unprecedented
meeting of leaders from this region and from all around the world has
been very serious, has been very successful, and is very productive.
The statement has been passed out, I believe, to all of you, but I would
like to summarize it for the benefit of those who may not have read it
yet. I see some of the press nodding their heads that they don't have it
yet, so let me--it's very brief, so let me go over it.
The Summit of Peacemakers has just concluded. This meeting took place at
a time when the peace process confronts serious threats. The summit had
three fundamental objectives: to enhance the peace process, to promote
security, and to combat terror.
Accordingly, the participants here today expressed their full support
for the Middle East peace process and their determination that this
process continue in order to accomplish a just, lasting, and
comprehensive peace in the region; affirmed their determination to
promote security and stability and to prevent the enemies of peace from
achieving their ultimate objective of destroying the real opportunity
for peace in the Middle East; re-emphasized their strong condemnation of
all acts of terror in all its abhorrent forms--whatever its motivation
and whoever its perpetrator, including recent attacks in Israel--
considering them alien to the moral and spiritual values shared by all
peoples of the region and reaffirmed their intention to stand staunchly
against all such acts and to urge all governments to join them in this
condemnation and opposition.
To that end, we decided to:
-- Support the Israeli-Palestinian agreements, the continuation of the
negotiating process, and to politically and economically reinforce it;
-- Enhance the security situation for both with special attention to the
current and pressing economic needs of the Palestinians;
-- Support the continuation of the negotiating process in order to
achieve a comprehensive settlement;
-- Work together to promote security and stability in the region by
developing effective and practical means of cooperation and further
assistance;
-- Promote coordination of efforts to stop acts of terror on bilateral,
regional, and international levels, ensuring that instigators of such
acts are brought to justice;
-- Support efforts by all parties to prevent their territories from
being used for terrorist purposes and prevent terrorist organizations
from engaging in recruitment, supplying arms, or fund-raising;
-- Exert maximum efforts to identify and determine the sources of
financing for these groups and to cooperate in cutting them off;
-- Provide training, equipment, and other forms of support to those
taking steps against groups using violence and terror to undermine
peace, security, or stability; and
-- Finally, to form a working group open to all summit participants to
prepare recommendations on how best to implement the decisions contained
in this statement through ongoing work and to report to the participants
within 30 days.
I can say that President Mubarak and I asked the participants to support
an effort by the United States to coordinate an early working group
meeting of these--of all the participants here, and we expect to do that
within a couple of weeks.
Let me just make one last point. This is a remarkable day because of the
number of people from the region who came here, as well as those who
came from all around the world. When I leave President Mubarak and
Egypt, I will go to Israel with a clear message that Israel is not
alone. Now throughout the region as well as the world, there are
peacemakers who stand together against terror--for security and for the
cause of peace. The meeting today and the statements which were made in
public by the leaders who were here today would have been unthinkable
just a short while ago.
Let me say again to President Mubarak: You, sir, deserve a large share
of credit for the fact that this meeting could take place, and it could
have taken place in no other place than Egypt. We are grateful to you.
Let me say, on behalf of the United States, to the people of this region
who stand for peace: You can all draw courage and strength and
inspiration from what we have achieved here today and what we are
committed to do in the future. Thank you very much.
President Clinton, Prime Minister Peres
Remarks upon arrival of President Clinton, Tel Aviv, Israel, March 13,
1996.
Prime Minister Peres. Mr. President, Secretary of State, distinguished
delegation: I really feel moved--I saw the President of the United
States at his best. He's a great President, and may I tell our people,
as a concerned friend, from the moment the first bomb exploded, the
President did not stop. His was to worry, to ask what he could do in
order, really, to overcome the difficulties and agonies of Israel, to
save the peace process, to introduce a light of hope and understanding
in the Middle East.
I would like to tell our people, actually, that in order to confront
terrorism, we have to fight on three fronts: domestically, to organize
our own forces; then to ask the Palestinians to perform correctly to
save the agreement between us and them; and then to have the responsible
international community come together and stop the traffic of arms, of
money, and of support.
The President got himself involved in all three domains. We asked for
some equipment, and, in 12 hours, it was in Israel. Then the President
called upon the heads of the Palestinian Authority and in very clear
terms told them that he had to do whatever he could, in accordance with
the agreement, to prevent Gaza from becoming a source of violence and
killing. And then, in just six or seven days, the President organized a
conference of an unprecedented nature. For the first time in the history
of the Middle East, 13 representatives--kings, prime ministers, and
foreign ministers of the Arab lands--came together and were considering
how to bring security so as to enable peace to flow on. The most
impressive leaders of our time came to Sharm el-Sheikh, and, in an
extremely short time, it became an outstanding landmark in the attempt
to face a new situation.
May I say a word about that new situation. Previously, we knew times of
war and times of peace: When there was peace, there was no war; when
there was war, there was no peace. Now, for the first time, we are
trying to bring peace, and, at the same time, we have to stop terror
from killing the peace.
I think that what the President did is a sort of a doctrine--saying we
have to fight terror if we want to proceed with peace. We cannot satisfy
ourselves just by being nice people and promoting the peace process. And
with an unbelieving eye, I saw today 30 leaders, 13 of them Arabs,
coming together and accepting the invitation and the doctrine of the
President of the United States.
Nobody can guarantee that, from now on, we shall see only nice things,
but I can say with a full heart that whatever could have been done
internationally, regionally, nationally, and humanely, the President
took the initiative to do so, and he did it with great devotion and
great understanding.
And what I want to say is, simply, welcome to the land of Israel. Thank
you, Mr. President, for being as great and friendly as you are. Thank
you.
President Clinton. Thank you. Mr. Prime Minister, Mr. Speaker, members
of the Israeli Government, representatives of the people of Israel: I
am honored to be here today, again, to stand with you in a time of pain
and mourning and challenge. We grieve with you in the loss of innocent
lives, we pray with you for the scores who lie wounded, and we stand
with you in the unceasing battle against those who commit these awful
crimes. Your journey is our journey, and America will be with you every
step of the way.
The attacks we mourn claimed Israeli lives, although others, including
Americans, died as well. But these attacks were aimed at all who yearn
for a better day for this region, at all who believe that peace is
better than war. The enemies of peace have grown desperate and more
vicious as the reality of peace has moved closer. But we must not let
the acts of the wicked few destroy the dreams of the many. Together, we
must restore the security that building peace requires. Those who
practice terror must not succeed. We must root them out; we will not let
them kill the peace.
In this time, you are not alone. I have flown here with the Prime
Minister, as he said, from Sharm el-Sheikh, from a summit of peacemakers
that is unprecedented in the history of the Middle East. At the urging
of many who were once Israel's sworn enemies--Egypt, Jordan, the
Palestinians--29 leaders came together, 13 of them from Arab countries.
There were Israel's neighbors, there were other Arab nations, and
nations from Europe, North America, and Asia. All have long labored for
peace. All are now united against the terror aimed at Israel.
They came to support with deeds as well as with words the peace process
and the restoration of security and new efforts against terrorism. Only
a few years ago, such a meeting would have been inconceivable. Only a
few weeks ago, such a meeting would have been hard to imagine. Just a
few days ago, this remarkable meeting was put together.
The leaders of this area have met only a handful of times, and then
always to celebrate events on the road to peace. But today they met in
common cause to take action to confront the urgent threat of terrorism--
to show that Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Islamic Jihad will not succeed in
killing the peace.
Now, many of Israel's neighbors in the region have demonstrated that
they share your desire for peace, and they understand that extremist
violence is also their enemy. The nations that met in Sharm el-Sheikh
sowed the seeds for a new cooperation to build peace and to confront
those who would destroy it. The Middle East is changing; we must not, we
will not let terror reverse history.
The meeting at Sharm el-Sheikh was a beginning. Tomorrow, we will press
forward when I and senior administration officials meet with the Prime
Minister and his key security advisors. We will discuss concrete steps
that the United States can take to help the IDF and the Israeli police
defeat those who would murder and maim. No one takes greater personal
risks on behalf of peace than the brave men and women of Israel's
security forces, such as those who are standing here. America is
determined to support them in every way and to provide them with the
means they need to prevail against extremism and violence.
I have visited this beautiful and holy land before. I have celebrated
the great events on the road to peace. I have mourned Prime Minister
Rabin. Today, I come again in sorrow but also in determination, with
this message from the American people: The United States stands more
strongly than ever, shoulder to shoulder, with Israel. We will work with
you as you strive for a secure peace. We will stand by your side until
Israelis come to know that peace with security within this land is a
reality, ". . . until," in the words of the prophet, "the voice of joy
and the voice of gladness are heard again in the cities and the hills of
Israel." Thank you very much.
President Clinton, Prime Minister Peres
Opening remarks at a press conference, Jerusalem, March 14, 1996.
Prime Minister Peres. Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen: Under the
Administration of President Clinton, this is the fourth important move
that has taken place in the Middle East. The first was with the PLO;
next, the agreement with Jordan; then, the second agreement with the
PLO; now, the fourth agreement in the Middle East is to confront
terrorism.
Those are events that exceed any normal political achievement. The
Palestinian conflict seemed unsolvable. The Jordanians were not quick at
the beginning to make peace; then it became a great success. We have
encountered danger to these three achievements by the acts of terror.
President Clinton is the first world leader in our time who put peace on
the agenda as a major goal.
If you look back at history, most of the time was spent on wars--on cold
war, on confrontations. This was a chance for the first time to escape
all the bitter history of blood and terror. We have encountered again
another unprecedented problem: how to go ahead with peace when you have
acts of terror.
I think yesterday a foundation was laid down to do both; namely, to go
ahead with peace and reject terror. I tell you, Mr. President, that in
our eyes, you, your Administration, and the American Congress have
changed the whole destiny of the Middle East.
The importance of the Middle East is not just because it has produced
religions and the Bible; the importance of the Middle East is that, in
our times, it is the first testing ground to take many conflicts that
were so difficult to solve and try to solve them. If we succeed, I think
it may serve as a model for other places.
For us, President Clinton is really a great leader, but not less than
that, a moving friend. He has tears in his eyes when we go through
difficult periods of time, and we have tears in our eyes when we listen
to his reaction and involvement. Thank you very much, Mr. President.
President Clinton. Thank you. First, I would like to express my
appreciation to the Prime Minister and his cabinet for the meeting that
we had this morning just before coming over here to discuss the
situation with regard to terrorism and the recent bombings. We have
decided that the United States and Israel will immediately begin
negotiations to conclude a bilateral agreement on combating terrorism. I
told the Prime Minister that the United States will commit more than
$100 million to this effort.
I am taking this step because I am determined that we must have every
tool at our disposal to fight against extremist violence. Last night, I
sent to the Congress an urgent request for the first installment of this
counter- terrorism effort. I expect Congress to act quickly on this
important measure. The agreement will strengthen our attack on terror in
three important areas.
First, the United States will immediately begin to provide Israel with
additional equipment and training.
Second, our nations will join together to develop new anti-terror
methods and technologies.
Third, we will work to enhance communication and coordination between
our nations, as well as with other governments that have joined us in
the war against terror.
In addition to what we propose to do under this agreement, the United
States also will increase its intelligence-sharing and coordination. At
my direction, our Secretary of State, Warren Christopher, and the
Director of Central Intelligence, John Deutch, will remain in Israel to
speed the progress of this agreement. We must do everything we can to
track down those responsible for the recent violence, and we must work
to prevent them from shedding more innocent blood.
The forces supporting peace and security are stronger than those that
pursue destruction. We must prove that. Whatever effort it takes,
whatever time it takes, we must say to them: You will be tracked down;
you will be rooted out.
The message of the pact to the people of Israel should also be quite
clear: Just as America walks with you every step of the way as you work
toward peace, we stand with you now in defending all that you are and
all that has been accomplished. Without security, there is no peace.
And, ultimately, without peace, there can be no permanent security.
Therefore, we are resolved to work with you until the day that Israel
achieves peace with security. To give up hope for peace now or to fail
to stand up for security after all that has been done would be to give
the terrorists their victory.
To speak of Israel is to speak of courage and character, to speak of
strength in the face of decades of hardship and bloodshed. David Ben
Gurion once said, "I have seen what a people is capable of achieving in
their hour of supreme trial. I have seen their spirit touched by
nobility."
For those of us in the rest of the world, after the ordeal of these
bombings, we have seen once again the nobility that is Israel. As a
result of the meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh yesterday, I have seen for the
first time a broad-based commitment to making sure the noble people of
Israel and the peace-loving peoples throughout this region may be able
to live and work together against terrorism and for a peaceful future.
Thank you.
Secretary Christopher, Prime Minister Peres
Opening remarks at a joint press conference, Tel Aviv, Israel, March 15,
1996.
Prime Minister Peres. Ladies and gentlemen: As President Clinton has
indicated, the Secretary of State and the Director of the Central
Intelligence Agency remained here, and, over the last 24 hours, a great
deal of work was done to translate the basic agreements into a more
detailed list of actions and dates, but I won't go into it; the
Secretary will do that. I want only to say that I believe it is quite an
achievement, and, for our part, we are very much satisfied. We would
like to thank deeply the Secretary and the Director for their
cooperation--they and their teams. We shall work for another half an
hour or so after the press meeting. Mr. Secretary, please.
Secretary Christopher. Thank you very much, Mr. Prime Minister. As you
have said, the President asked CIA Director John Deutch and me to remain
here to accelerate the negotiations on a U.S.-Israeli anti-terrorism
pact. Our experts worked through the night on this subject, and we have
been meeting this morning. Following the meeting this morning, I am
pleased to say that I think we have made very substantial progress. It
is the kind of progress that should permit us to conclude an overall
agreement and have it ready for signing when the Prime Minister comes to
Washington next month.
As the President said yesterday, we are determined to use every tool at
our disposal to fight against extremist violence. As you know, the
United States has now committed $100 million to this effort. This will
be a comprehensive strategy, a way to cover a broad front.
We have been working on a number of specific matters. On an emergency
basis, the President directed us to move as quickly as possible in
meeting Israel's priority equipment needs. We are already close to
finalizing the equipment which will be involved in the first $50 million
of the program. Most of that equipment is ready for shipment to Israel
within the next few weeks. Some of it will take a little longer, but it
is important that Congress go forward with the necessary reprogramming
so that we can make these shipments within the next few weeks.
Let me tell you just a few things about the nature of this equipment.
First, it will include state-of- the-art explosive detection equipment
as well as x-ray gear. This will enable Israel to strengthen its border
controls, thus giving Israel greater protection against suicide bombers
and smuggled weapons and smuggled explosives. At the same time, this
same equipment will help expedite the flow of people and goods through
checkpoints and, hence, will have the capacity to decrease the economic
impact on the Palestinians. The remainder of the equipment, as I say,
should be available within two or three months.
The bilateral pact that we have been discussing here overnight will
provide Israel with increased anti-terrorism training as well. A U.S.
training team has been at work already with Israel's security personnel.
We also plan to enhance our cooperation in the research and development
of new counter-terrorism technologies. We also plan to strengthen
regional coordination against terrorism. In addition, I think it is
important to say that Director Deutch has been working overnight and
through this morning with his Israeli counterparts to intensify our
intelligence cooperation. We believe--indeed, we are convinced--that
this kind of a comprehensive package will make a real contribution to
Israel's efforts to combat the enemies of peace.
Palestinian efforts are also critical and need our support. In recent
days, Chairman Arafat and the Palestinian Authority, as you all know,
have undertaken a number of important steps to root out the terrorist
infrastructure of the Hamas military wing. This will require a maximum
effort. There is no room at all for vacillating on eliminating this
threat which is directed not only at killing innocent Israelis but also
at destroying the Palestinians' aspirations for peace.
Finally, we believe strongly that the international community must step
up to its responsibilities. Sharm el-Sheikh must now be translated into
deeds. This weekend, I will be sending a letter to my summit
counterparts inviting them to send their representatives to Washington
the week of March 25th to establish a working group to implement the
declarations that were made by the leaders at Sharm el-Sheikh. As called
for in the declaration there, concrete steps are required from every
nation to isolate and condemn the terrorists, to cut off their sources
of funding and training, and to improve coordination with other
governments committed to the fight against terror.
Let me also stress that the United States is convinced that the time has
come for our friends and allies in Europe and Asia to reconsider their
stand toward Iran. The evidence is clear that Iran continues to fund,
train, and provide political support for Hezbollah, the Islamic Jihad,
and Hamas--all sworn enemies of peace. In the coming days, the United
States and Israel will be working together to urge our European and
Asian friends to adopt tougher policies that will bring real pressure on
Iran to change its abhorrent behavior.
Prime Minister Peres, in conclusion, let me say that there is no doubt
that we, and you especially, are facing an extraordinary challenge. But
with the summit at Sharm el-Sheikh and with President Clinton's visit to
Israel, we have shown that we are capable of extraordinary responses. An
unprecedented coalition of Arabs, Europeans --including the Russians--
and Asians have joined the United States in rallying to Israel's side.
The battle for peace has been joined. Now we must move forward and be
united in our determination to ensure that terrorists do not succeed and
that the promise of peace that we have so long sought will finally be
fulfilled. Thank you.
(###)
ARTICLE 2:
U.S. Expresses Sympathy and Outrage Over Terrorist Bombings in Israel
and Announces Measures for Support
Text of videotaped statement by President Clinton to the people of
Israel, released by the White House, Office of the Press Secretary,
Washington, DC, March 5, 1996 (introductory remarks deleted).
Over the last week, the world has watched in horror as scores of
innocent Israeli citizens have been murdered by suicide bombers. On
behalf of the American people, I want to express my deepest sorrow and
strongest outrage to the people of Israel and especially to the families
and friends of the victims. As I have told Prime Minister Peres, I share
your determination to do everything possible to bring this horror to an
end and to bring those responsible to justice.
These fanatical acts are aimed not just at killing innocent people, but
at killing the growing hope for peace in the Middle East. Those
responsible for these vicious crimes thrive on division and conflict.
They know a new day is dawning in their region. They know the vast
majority of Israelis and Palestinians have chosen the path of peace.
With every new step that is taken along that path, the enemies of peace
grow more desperate. We must not allow their hatred to turn us back to
the past. We must counter their senseless violence with resolve and
action.
Those who committed the recent bombings brutally attacked Israelis. But
make no mistake: The future they darken is their own. Instead of a life
of security and prosperity, all they have to offer is violence, poverty,
and despair. Chairman Arafat knows that his leadership and the hopes of
the Palestinian people are under direct challenge. He must do everything
possible to end this campaign of terror.
I have pledged to Prime Minister Peres that the United States will work
with Israel and with our friends in the Middle East to stop the killing,
to bring the criminals to justice, and to permit the process of
peacemaking to continue. Today, I announced a series of measures to
support these critical goals. These include the immediate emergency
transfer to Israel of sophisticated equipment for detecting explosives;
the dispatch of American specialists to work with their Israeli
colleagues on strengthening anti-terrorism measures; the development of
a comprehensive package of training, technical assistance, and equipment
to improve anti-terrorism cooperation among Israelis, Palestinians, and
regional governments; and urging our friends and allies all around the
world to step up their own struggle for peace.
The United States has stood with you--the people of Israel--in times of
triumph and tragedy. We stand with you today. Our nations both cherish
the same ideals: freedom, tolerance, and democracy. And we know that
whenever these ideals are under siege in one country, they are
threatened everywhere.
We have never been more determined to defend these ideals and to achieve
our goal of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East. The road ahead
will not be easy, but think how far you have come. Now is the time to
redouble our efforts. Now is the time to be strong. Bullets and bombs
must not prevail against the will for peace, and they will not.
(###)
ARTICLE 3:
International Women's Day: Celebrating Remarkable Achievements
Secretary Christopher
Welcoming remarks at International Women's Day ceremony, Washington, DC,
March 11, 1996
Distinguished Members of Congress, ambassadors, ladies and gentlemen,
and guests: I am glad to welcome you this morning. On this
International Women's Day, we commemorate the remarkable achievements of
women in our government and we celebrate the progress over the past year
for women's rights and political participation. We must seize the
opportunity before us to put women's issues at the top of the agenda in
America and the world. It is particularly good to have Gerry Ferraro,
who has taken such a leading role in promoting human rights, with us
today.
Where women's rights are not protected, human rights are not secure.
Where women are not educated about their health, their families suffer
along with them. Where women play no role in protecting the environment,
it does not get protected. But where women enjoy equal rights and equal
protection, all society progresses. That is why this Administration is
committed to bringing women's issues into the mainstream of American
diplomacy.
Nowhere is our commitment reflected more clearly than in the
Department's 20th annual human rights reports released this week. You
will find not just a section on women, but documentation throughout the
reports on abuses from workplace discrimination to physical mutilation.
The reports show that the harm done to society is very great when
women's rights are neglected in peace or trampled in war.
Our first priority in the Department and around the world must be our
work for peace. As much as the soldier with a gun, the face of war is
the child born in a refugee camp, the rape victim, and the women whose
sons and husbands have disappeared--and there are all-too many of those.
In 1996, President Clinton and I have rededicated ourselves to the task
of seeking peace with justice. In Bosnia, we not only achieved the end
of war but an unprecedented role for the International War Crimes
Tribunal that is seeking justice for victims of deliberate policies of
murder and rape. In Haiti, our victory in the fight for democracy is
allowing Haiti's women and men to turn to the fight against poverty and
thus to improve the rights of women and children.
As we promote peace, we work with women such as Sonja Licht. Her
courageous advocacy of human rights and defense of NGOs in Belgrade has
come to symbolize hope for a more open society in Serbia. We also stand
with the Catholics and Protestants who overcame their losses in the
bloody conflict in Northern Ireland to found Women Together, a great
organization which is doing so much to renew the peace process there.
The world saw these faces and heard these voices at the Beijing
Conference on Women. The Beijing Conference threw out a challenge to the
forces of poverty, ignorance, and intolerance. The First Lady summed up
that challenge simply: "Women's rights are human rights, and human
rights are women's rights." Her forceful presence and the hard work of
many of you here today, as well as the outstanding work of our UN
ambassador, Madeleine Albright, helped set a forward-looking agenda for
us to take from Beijing. All Americans should be proud of what our
delegation accomplished--committing the nations of the world to take
concrete steps to improve women's health and education and increase
women's participation in the lives of their societies.
The United States must lead the way in fulfilling the Beijing Platform
for Action. This year we will promote the political and legal rights of
women--and we should ratify the Convention to Eliminate All Forms of
Discrimination Against Women--CEDAW. We will also emphasize programs
such as USAID's Girls' and Women's Education Initiative, aimed at
increasing the number of girls who complete primary school in countries
from India to Indonesia and from Guinea to Guatemala.
Our Women in Africa initiative is a good example of how we can integrate
these priorities into our foreign policy. Each of our embassies in
Africa is monitoring the follow-up to the Beijing conference. African
women made a great contribution at Beijing, and so it is appropriate
that our embassies are working with African women to make the biggest
difference with our limited resources--with projects as traditional as
improving access to family planning or as cutting-edge as improving NGO
access to computers and communications. These projects have a real
possibility to lift the lives of Africans and advance key objectives of
American diplomacy.
The Beijing priorities reaffirm the conclusions of the Cairo Conference
on Population and Development. We are focusing on women's education and
empowerment as we move forward to implement the Cairo commitments. But
our leadership to ensure access to safe, voluntary family-planning
services for millions of women and men is under attack by many in
Congress. I am deeply indebted to those on the platform who have so
strongly defended our programs and requests for resources to carry them
out. I thank them for their efforts.
On my trip to Latin America last week, I had the pleasure of meeting
some outstanding women and men who are providing free legal services to
over 700,000 people in Chile. I was struck by the leadership and support
of Chile's Minister of Justice, Mrs. Soledad Alvear. Across South
America, the women who marched to restore democracy are founding
community centers and development banks. Their vision of justice for all
is a reminder that women's participation and determination are
indispensable.
I am proud to say that this Administration has made good strides in
putting women in positions of power and prominence in American
diplomacy--not enough, but many in high positions doing great work. Let
me acknowledge the efforts and excellence of the many here who give
American diplomacy the face of a woman every day. Thank you.
We are very fortunate to be joined today by several members of Congress-
-women whose work has furthered the cause of women's equality and
women's rights and kept these issues before Congress and before the
American people.
(###)
ARTICLE 4:
Support for Democracy and the U.S. National Interest
Deputy Secretary Talbott
Remarks before the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace,
Washington, DC, March 1, 1996 (introductory remarks deleted)
My topic this afternoon is support for democracy as a factor in American
foreign policy and as a means of advancing our national security
interest abroad. Of course, it is not the only such factor.
Democratization is part of a much broader, complex, drawn-out, often
painful, and erratic process of political, social, and economic
transformation. But it is, nonetheless, a crucial component of that
larger process.
Isaiah Berlin, in his famous essay on Tolstoy, made much of the contrast
between the fox "who knows many things," and the hedgehog "who knows one
big thing." Sir Isaiah was distinguishing between those, on the one
hand, who try to relate everything to a single, universal organizing
principle and those, on the other, who are comfortable with the full
range of human experiences and interests, with all its disorder and
diversity and internal contradictions.
At first glance, American foreign policy in the post-Cold War era seems
best suited to the fox. Rather than focusing on a single, overriding
goal-- such as the containment of Soviet communism--we now face a wide
variety of often compelling economic and security concerns that require
our active, constant, and simultaneous attention.
To mention just the most obvious and pressing of those: Our prosperity
depends on our ability to create opportunities for international trade
and investment. Our health and safety depend on our success in
countering transnational threats like environmental degradation,
terrorism, and the proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological
weapons. Our security requires constructive relations with the other
great powers--our long-standing allies in Western Europe and Japan, as
well as our former adversaries in Russia and China. At the same time, we
must contend with threats posed by rogue states and failed states, as
well as with regional conflicts, from the Balkans to Central Africa to
the Persian Gulf to the Korean Peninsula.
Nevertheless, there is still a place for the hedgehog in the terrain of
U.S. foreign policy. We will advance all the objectives I just
enumerated, and others as well, if we also strengthen associations among
established democracies and support the transition to democracy in
states that are emerging from dictatorship or civil strife. Democracy,
in short, is the one big thing that we must defend, sustain, and promote
wherever possible, even as we deal with the many other tasks that face
us.
This is, of course, not a new theme in American foreign policy--far from
it. It is time-honored and bipartisan. Support for democracy goes back
not just to Truman's rationale for the Marshall Plan and Franklin
Roosevelt's for Lend-Lease and Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points, but
also to Henry Clay's American System and Thomas Paine's aggressive
defense of "The Rights of Man."
When American soldiers and sailors went off to fight in this century's
two world wars, they knew they were going to defend American ideals as
well as American interests. The Cold War, too, was at its core not just
about the international behavior of states: It was also very much about
competing visions of the relationship between the individual citizen and
his or her government.
While NATO has proven to be the most successful military alliance in
history, it is also the most successful democratic alliance. The Cold
War finally ended because there were proponents of democracy on both
sides of what used to be the Iron Curtain.
Today, there is, around the globe, more grass-roots support for
democracy than at any other time in human history. In part, this is
because of modern communications. The Soviet communist system collapsed
not just because it was contained by military power but also because it
was penetrated and subverted by information and ideas. Even the most
heavily fortified borders became increasingly permeable first to radio,
then to television, and eventually to the interactive influences of
telefax and e-mail. Contrary to George Orwell's prediction for 1984, the
technological revolution weakened Big Brother rather than strengthening
him.
The demise of Soviet-style communism has created a historic opportunity
for the United States to forge and lead a global coalition based on and
in support of democratic principles. Over the past two decades, we have
made genuine progress in that regard. Jimmy Carter institutionalized
support for human rights in the State Department by creating a bureau
dedicated to their promotion and defense--under the supervision, by the
way, of then- Deputy Secretary Warren Christopher. Among its other
contributions, the Reagan Administration played a crucial role in easing
out Ferdinand Marcos and making way for "people power" in the
Philippines during the last week of February 1986, almost exactly 10
years ago. Our host, Mort Abramowitz, is among those who deserve the
credit for our steadfast support for Cory Aquino and all that she
represented. George Bush responded to the fall of the Berlin Wall with a
series of initiatives intended to assure the emergence of "a Europe
whole and free."
President Clinton has made it a priority of his presidency to nurture
political reform throughout Central and Eastern Europe and the former
Soviet Union, where two dozen countries are struggling, with varying
degrees of success, to overcome decades of totalitarian rule; in Latin
America, Africa, and South Asia where a generation of emerging
democracies is working to undo the damage caused by military regimes,
presidents-for-life, and other forms of despotism; in the Middle East,
where advocates of peaceful political change are bravely confronting
those who resort to terrorism and assassination; and in East Asia and
the Pacific, where the citizens of newly industrialized nations are
increasingly asserting their political rights.
We are doing all of this for the reason that Bill Clinton invoked in his
very first campaign speech at Georgetown University in December 1991,
and that he has reiterated many times since: namely, that the promotion
of democracy is a means of advancing American interests as well as
American values. It's an issue not just of moralpolitik, but of
realpolitik. Why? Because democracies are more likely to be reliable
partners in trade and diplomacy and more likely to pursue foreign and
defense policies that are compatible with American interests.
Democracies are less likely to go to war with each other, to unleash
tidal waves of refugees, to create environmental catastrophes, or to
engage in terrorism. As borders become more porous and as people,
technologies, ideas, weapons, and money--dirty and otherwise--flow back
and forth, Americans have an increasing stake in how other societies
around the world govern or misgovern themselves. The larger and more
closely knit the community of democracies, the safer and more prosperous
we Americans will be.
But new democracies present a special challenge for American diplomacy.
Our experience of the last few years, while encouraging in many
respects, has also contained plenty of vivid reminders that democratic
politics are often messy, unpredictable, fraught with contradictions
between the exigencies of getting elected or re-elected on the one hand
and the requirements of good governance and sound statesmanship on the
other. This is true even in countries with long histories of
representative government and well-established institutions, including
our own. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that in fledgling
democracies--in countries where the wounds of civil war are still raw
and where the legacy of tyranny is still heavy-- politics can be
especially volatile. The ruling elites of the old regime and violent
factions look for ways to dominate the new order--or exploit the new
disorder. Newly elected leaders, unsure of their hold on power or too
sure of their infallibility and indispensability, sometimes use a heavy
hand to silence the opposition--loyal and otherwise.
Democracy depends on the effectiveness of institutions, such as a non-
political police force and an independent judiciary, and on civilian
control of the military institutions that are either altogether missing
or woefully inadequate in countries just leaving behind a dictatorial
past. Moreover, institutional reforms must be matched by a corresponding
change in public attitudes, or what is sometimes called political
culture. Democracy depends on a willingness to reconcile with old
enemies and tolerate the expression of dissenting viewpoints. It means
building bridges across different segments and classes of society.
Conversely, democracy tends to break down--or, in the case of
transitional states, never get off the ground--when voter allegiance is
excessively or exclusively based on ethnic, clan, religious, or regional
loyalties rather than on the choice of parties or candidates for their
proposed programs and policies. When group affiliations become the
pretext for denying individual citizens their basic human and civil
rights, then democracy is in mortal peril.
Another point: All democracies-- and all elections--operate under the
slogan, "It's the economy, stupid!" Many incipient democracies must
grapple with huge economic disadvantages. Poverty, underdevelopment, and
economic stagnation should not be alibis for tyranny, but there is no
question that they are obstacles to democracy. Yet those conditions are
often present in states that have just emerged from dictatorship. In
much of Africa and Asia, they have the added burden of unsustainable
population growth.
Even with a well-intentioned, enlightened political leadership, a
country that remains wretchedly poor is much less likely to sustain
democratic rule. Without enduring, broad-based economic development,
voters are likely to become disillusioned with politics and politicians
and thus with democracy itself.
In the post-communist world especially, a sense of relief and good-
riddance over the dismantlement of the old, inefficient, top-heavy
command system has given way to widespread resentment at what often
seems to be the capriciousness and inequity of the market and insecurity
over the absence of a safety net. Newly enfranchised citizens tend to
have unrealistically high expectations of what their elected leaders can
accomplish, how long it will take, and with what degree of attendant
hardship and pain. When those expectations are disappointed, voters
become vulnerable to demagogues, to purveyors of foolish, even dangerous
nostrums based on nostalgia for the past or fear of the future.
For all these reasons, we have made it a priority of U.S. foreign policy
to help nascent democracies through their period of greatest fragility.
We have done so through a variety of mechanisms--some bilateral and
others multilateral--and we have done so in ways that concentrate on the
economic as well as the political infrastructure of countries in
transition.
Let me give you four very different examples of where American
engagement has already been instrumental and where it continues to be
crucial. I'm deliberately concentrating on cases that illustrate the
dilemmas and difficulties associated with support for democracy, as well
as the imperative that we persist in providing that support: Cambodia,
Haiti, South Africa, and Russia.
Cambodia has come a long way in a short time, under the most difficult
of circumstances. I remember visiting Mort in Bangkok in the late 1970s;
his wife, Sheppy, was spending much of her time with Cambodian refugees
on the border. Cambodia had already bestowed on our language the phrase
"the killing fields," and it was in the midst of one of the most
horrible mass murders since the holocaust.
Yet 21/2 years ago, a United Nations mission, with strong backing from
first the Bush and then the Clinton Administrations, helped the
Cambodians hold the first free, fair, and comprehensive elections in
their country's history. More than 90% of the eligible voters
participated, many of them literally walking through minefields to vote.
Since that election and the formation of a coalition government,
political violence has dropped sharply, and some 370,000 refugees have
returned to their homes and resumed normal lives.
That said, as Mort will affirm, Cambodia still has a long way to go. It
suffers from widespread corruption, an inadequately staffed and trained
judicial system, and a weakened but stubborn Khmer Rouge insurgency. And
while we're mindful of the need to preserve political stability in a
precarious situation, we're, nevertheless, concerned about the continued
mistreatment of rival political leaders and the attacks on opposition
newspapers.
The Cambodian people have a difficult journey ahead. They will, quite
simply, not make it if they have to go it alone. We will stay with them,
as will Japan and Australia--two of the region's oldest democracies--
along with France, the region's former colonial power.
One handicap that the Cambodian people--and their friends in the
international community--will have to overcome is that Cambodia is
situated in a less-than-hospitable neighborhood. Of its four Southeast
Asian neighbors, only one, Thailand, is a democracy. Laos and Vietnam
are anachronisms in that they are still under communist rule. Burma,
governed by a brutal military regime, is one of the world's largest
exporters of illegal narcotics.
By contrast, Haiti lives in a good neighborhood, which, of course, also
happens to be our neighborhood. As recently as 17 years ago, most of the
nations in this hemisphere suffered some form of dictatorship. Today,
every government except one, which is very much on our minds at the
moment--Cuba's--has a claim to democratic legitimacy.
This trend toward democratization in Latin America and the Caribbean has
proved to be self-reinforcing. When democracy was threatened in
Guatemala in June 1993, the 34 member nations of the Organization of
American States moved quickly and unanimously to head off a presidential
auto-golpe. In recent years, the OAS member states have also provided
essential support for democracy in El Salvador, Peru, Nicaragua,
Suriname, and the Dominican Republic.
Now, at last, Haiti is part of this regional--and increasingly global--
consensus. Last month, my wife Brooke and I had the satisfaction of
being part of Madeleine Albright's delegation at the inauguration in
Port-au-Prince of one democratically elected president who was
succeeding another, peacefully, in an atmosphere of celebration. That is
a first in Haitian history. Contrary to the skeptical predictions of
many, Jean-Bertrand Aristide has now moved out of the presidential
palace in Port-au-Prince. He is establishing a private foundation
devoted to promoting both literacy and democracy, because he understands
the connection between the two.
Aristide's aspiration to lead his people, as he memorably and repeatedly
put it, "from misery to poverty with dignity" resonates across Africa as
well. It is now nearly two years since Nelson Mandela took the oath of
office as South Africa's first popularly elected president. That event
has had a ripple effect across the region. Today in southern Africa,
after decades of struggling against apartheid, regional leaders are now
refocusing much of their energies on strengthening democratic rule--not
only in their own states, but also through a "good neighbor" policy that
we have actively supported.
But even in South Africa itself, the hard work of building a multi-
ethnic, multi-racial democracy is far from over. While political
violence has declined in that country, criminal violence is reaching
dangerous proportions. The old apartheid-based bureaucracy, layered with
redundant offices for each race and homeland, still wastes vast
resources. Those resources need to be put to better use, so that the
government can make good on its promise of jobs and housing.
Just as South Africa's future will have a dramatic impact on all of the
other countries in its region, so, too, will the fate of democracy in
Russia have ramifications far beyond its own borders--certainly
throughout Eurasia. And it will also have profound implications for us--
for our future, for our security.
The high voter turnout in December's parliamentary elections suggests
that the Russian people are getting used to choosing their leaders. But
as Russia's June presidential election approaches, there are troubling
trends. Communists and ultra-nationalists are riding high in the polls
in the parliament and on the campaign trail, while reformers and
centrists are divided.
Even--perhaps I should say especially--when the direction of Russian
politics is uncertain, the fundamentals of American policy must remain
clear and consistent. One of those fundamentals is that we support
democracy in Russia as we do elsewhere. It is not our responsibility to
choose Russia's leaders; it never was. The Russian people now have the
power to do that themselves. And that is a good thing. It is and must
remain a fundamental premise of American policy that the enfranchisement
of Russian citizens will, if sustained, be good for their country, for
the world, and for U.S. national interests.
My point here is that the difficulties through which Haiti, Cambodia,
South Africa, and Russia are all going should not, by any means,
discourage us from supporting democracy in those countries or anywhere
else. Quite the contrary. We must have the courage of our own democratic
convictions. Freedom of choice and freedom of speech will, over time,
help move these and other new democracies toward civil society, rule of
law, and the other attributes of states that will be welcome as fully
integrated and constructive members of the international community.
We should resist and reject the notion that some races or cultures are
"unsuited" to democracy. We should be wary of stereotypes about national
character, particularly ones that would, if they became the basis for
our policy, consign whole nations to tyranny or civil war or unending
chaos on the perverse theory that that is the fate they deserve, or that
that fate is encoded in their genes.
Still, the more somber and cautionary aspects of the four cases I've
cited should deter us from speaking about a "democratic revolution."
Democratization is by definition not revolutionary at all--it is
evolutionary. No society can transform the way it governs itself
overnight. Even with the support of the United States and our democratic
allies, it will take decades or even generations for many of these
nations to make the transition. That is in part because establishing a
real democracy means more than simply drafting a constitution and having
a single election or even two or three elections on schedule. Our own
Founding Fathers understood that the piece of paper they drafted in
1787--11 years after we achieved independence--depended on the rule of
law and on guarantees of individual liberties. And it's worth recalling
that African-Americans did not receive the protections contained in the
Bill of Rights until the 1960s, nearly two centuries late. In short, our
own experience argues for some forbearance of others who are in the
early stages of an experiment that is in our interest to see succeed.
Our recent and current experience also argues for fundamental confidence
that the benefits and sustaining power of democracy will prevail over
the imperfections and the setbacks. Leaders of--and apologists for--
authoritarian regimes sometimes claim that backward or developing
countries are somehow "not ready" for democracy. Yet the last half-
century has shown that poor nations need democracy as much as rich ones,
and they need it for economic as well as political reasons. Even in the
world's poorest countries-- from Haiti and Nicaragua to Malawi to
Albania to Cambodia--democratically elected leaders have shown
themselves more inclined than their authoritarian or totalitarian
predecessors to choose the economic and social policies that will best
benefit their people. Elected leaders, because they know they will be
held accountable at the ballot box, are more likely to pay attention to
their citizens' basic needs. Thus, Harvard economist Amartya Sen has
argued, with a good deal of supporting data, that "no substantial famine
has ever occurred in a country with a democratic form of government and
a relatively free press."
Likewise, in more developed states--from Argentina to Estonia to the
Philippines--popularly elected governments are more likely to have the
legitimacy--that is, the support of constituents--to make painful but
necessary economic choices. And as we move into the next century, open
societies will be the best prepared to take advantage of emerging
information technologies: In the age of the microchip and the modem,
economic development will falter when citizens must fight suspicious,
dictatorial authorities simply for the right to own a fax machine, make
copies of a document, or talk on the telephone. That truth will be
increasingly apparent not just to dissidents and reformers in those
countries, but to the powers-that-be as well--or at least to the take-
over generation.
A final point: Whatever the domestic impediments to democratization,
the international environment for the process is increasingly conducive.
Democratization in Russia, Cambodia, Haiti, and South Africa is taking
place against the backdrop of globalization, interdependence, the
communications revolution--that same complex of trends, some
revolutionary and others evolutionary, that helped tear down the Iron
Curtain, empower the people of the Philippines, and send the colonels
back to the barracks in Latin America during the 1980s. All those facts
of international life will continue to have a salutary effect on the
national life of countries struggling with democratic transition.
America's role as a supporter and sponsor of that process will continue
to be critical, and it will continue to pay dividends to us. We gain not
just from the success of democracy in other lands, but also from our own
championship of the cause of freedom. Our nation's track record of
standing up for our democratic ideals gives us a unique authority and
credibility in international affairs. The world continues to look to us
for leadership not just because of our economic and military might, but
also because we are at our best when we are promoting and defending the
same political principles abroad that we cherish here at home.
Our foreign policy, in short, must continue to be based on our nature as
a society as well as on our interests as a state. This is not a question
of charity or "social work;" it is a matter of securing and expanding
the community of nations that share our values and thus have compatible
interests. It is an investment in our long-term security. The watchwords
of this enduring feature of American foreign policy should be:
patience, steadiness, and focus. If animals could talk, that's what
you'd expect to hear from a hedgehog.
Thanks for hearing me out, and now I look forward to hearing from you.
(###)
ARTICLE 5:
American Eagle or Ostrich: Challenges for U.S. Leadership in the Post-
Cold War World
Deputy Secretary Talbott
Address at a Town Hall meeting, St. Louis, Missouri, March 6, 1996
(introductory remarks deleted)
Twelve hours ago, a U.S. Air Force C-141 landed at Ben Gurion Airport in
Israel, carrying the most sophisticated explosive-detection equipment in
the world and a team of American technical experts. Meanwhile, the
President and Secretary Christopher are personally calling on key
regional leaders to try to ensure that there will be no safe havens for
the perpetrators of these horrors. Dan, as I have said, will give you
more details this afternoon.
But the point I would stress is this: The United States has been the
leader of the search for peace in the Middle East. In the aftermath of
the recent bombings, the United States is also the leader of the
international effort--which, for the first time, brings together Israel
and several of its Arab neighbors--to combat and defeat the forces of
extremism that are opposed to peace. And when the peace process resumes,
the United States will once again be in the lead.
That is the topic of my remarks today: America's leadership in the
world--why it is vital to our national well-being, why we must preserve
and enhance our leadership in the face of new opportunities and new
challenges.
Let me begin by describing, in broad-brush terms, the world in which we
live. As the headlines of the last few days make all-too clear, there is
still plenty of misery, violence, chaos, insanity, and brutality on our
planet. But we must not lose sight of the big picture, which is far more
positive.
It is an indisputable fact that the world has changed a lot in the last
10 years--and changed overwhelmingly for the better. We have seen,
simultaneously, the decline and fall of dictators and the rise of
freedom. Over the past decade, those twin trends have been evident in
the victory of "people power" in the Philippines; the collapse of the
Berlin Wall and the Iron Curtain; the end of apartheid in South Africa;
and the inspiring spectacle of Cambodians walking across mine fields and
defying death threats to vote against the Khmer Rouge.
As much as any region, our own hemisphere has been transformed. As
recently as 17 years ago, a majority of the nations in Latin America and
the Caribbean suffered some form of dictatorship. But when Secretary
Christopher traveled through the region just last week, every government
except the Castro regime in Cuba had a claim to democratic legitimacy.
As political systems have opened up throughout the Americas, so have the
region's economies. Import barriers have fallen; trade has flourished;
competition, long a dirty word, has gained respectability--all to the
benefit of American exports, American investors, and American jobs.
Today, to the extent few of us ever expected to see in our lifetimes,
the world is joined in a loose, imperfect, incomplete, but still
extraordinary consensus in favor of open societies and open markets.
Thanks in large part to American leadership, the political and economic
principles that we have nurtured here in the United States for over 200
years are now ascendant around the globe. We face a historic opportunity
to build a world that reflects our ideals and promotes our interests--a
world that will be more prosperous and more secure not only for our
generation but for our children and their children as well.
That is the good news. But it is clouded not just by outbreaks of bad
news abroad of the sort we have seen recently in the Middle East--there
are also some disturbing trends here on the home front. Ironically, at
this very moment of great hope and opportunity, there is, here in this
country, a backlash against internationalism--or, to put it differently,
a resurgence of isolationism.
I say "resurgence" because we have seen it before. Today, in the
aftermath of the Cold War, just as in the aftermath of other great
struggles earlier in our nation's history, there is a temptation to draw
back into ourselves, to devote all our attention and resources to fixing
our own problems--a temptation to let other countries fend for
themselves. That temptation, if not kept in check, would turn the
American eagle into an ostrich.
We are, in this decisive year of 1996, embarked on a great debate over
America's role in the world. On one side are some members of Congress--
and one major presidential candidate-- who have even suggested diverting
the money we now spend on foreign aid to the construction of a giant
fence along our borders. Sunday's New York Times, by the way, estimated
the construction costs of such a fence as somewhere between $166.8
million and $45.2 billion, a wide range that will make sense to anyone
who has ever tried to pin down a contractor on what it will cost to do
any major home improvements.
Ponder the symbolism of this idea: There is an instinct twitching in
our body politic to wall us in--and wall the world out; an instinct to
build barriers to ensure that what happens elsewhere, far away or right
next door, does not affect us here in the United States. We see this
same isolationist instinct in efforts to reject free trade agreements,
or the desire to keep us from having anything to do with any foreign
conflicts, or to gut the United Nations, or in the fantasy that we can
build multi-billion dollar space-based shields that will keep us safe
from any military attack.
It is certainly apparent in calls for us to slash the international
affairs portion of the federal budget. More accurately, I should say
"keep slashing," since international affairs spending, in real dollars,
adjusted for inflation, has already been cut by nearly half over the
past decade. President Clinton's proposed 1997 international affairs
budget of $19.2 billion represents only about 1.2% of total Federal
spending. That 1.2% pays for all our embassies and diplomats overseas,
for our foreign aid and economic assistance programs, for our
participation in international organizations and our support for
multinational peacekeeping operations, for many of our arms control
initiatives, and for our overseas public information services. That is
how much or, rather, how little President Clinton is asking Congress to
approve and the taxpayer to fund in order to assure that Americans live,
travel, and trade in a safer, more stable, more prosperous world.
Yet there is a move in Congress to slice more than 30% from this bare-
bones budget over the next seven years. If this move prevails, the
result will be deep, across-the-board cuts in all areas. It would mean
scaling back the nuclear safeguards program of the International Atomic
Energy Agency, which tracks and regulates the presence and use of
nuclear materials all over the world, especially in the former Soviet
Union, North Korea, Iran, and Iraq; it would mean stopping in its tracks
the President's initiative to combat international crime and fight drug
trafficking, and it would mean closing more than two dozen embassies and
consulates around the world. We would be less able to replace a
tourist's lost passport or help an American company gain a foothold in a
foreign market.
There is a view in Congress that the United States can have a foreign
policy on the cheap; that our truly vital interests in some sense end at
the water's edge. That view is just plain wrong and dangerously,
damagingly so. Why? Because our national well-being--our safety and our
prosperity-- depends, to an unprecedented extent, on what happens in
other parts of the world; it depends on a continuation of that steady
progress of the kind I mentioned a moment ago--toward open societies and
open markets.
Why is that? Because our society and our economy are, as never before,
interacting with others around the planet. Since I work for a President
who won the White House on the slogan, "It's the economy, stupid," let
me start with the issue of open markets. The livelihood of our workers
and farmers increasingly depends on their ability to compete in global
markets. Here in Missouri, for instance, one out of every five
manufacturing jobs is dependent on exports. Every other row of Missouri
soybeans and one out of every four bales of Missouri cotton is sold
abroad.
No President in the last 40 years has done more than Bill Clinton to
open up new markets for American trade and investment. NAFTA and the
Uruguay Round of GATT are creating hundreds of thousands of good jobs
for Americans all across the country, including here in Missouri. For
instance, this state's exports to Mexico have risen by more than 250%
since 1992.
The President recognizes that there is still more work to be done in
breaking down barriers to doing business overseas. That is why every
American diplomat--from my boss, Warren Christopher, on down, in
Washington and in our posts overseas--has made economic issues and U.S.
commercial interests a top foreign policy priority.
The Clinton Administration also is focusing foreign policy resources on
those international threats that directly affect the safety of Americans
here at home. Thanks to our efforts, the architects of the World Trade
Center bombing were brought to justice. We stopped another attack in New
York before it happened and thwarted a plan to blow up American
airliners over the Pacific.
Each of these law enforcement operations depended on having a vigorous
presence abroad. We must be able to track villains on their home turf
before they can strike at us where we live. If we start drastically
cutting back on embassies abroad, as several congressional bills would
require, we will be punching holes in our first line of defense against
international terrorists and criminals. And what a stupid time to be
doing that! The battle against international terrorism is far from over,
as we saw, not just from the Hamas bombings in Israel, but also from the
recent IRA attacks in London.
We also need to keep up the struggle against the proliferation of
nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons that might someday end up in
the hands of political extremists. When our Administration came into
office, the world had known for some years that the North Koreans had an
active nuclear weapons program and the time was fast approaching when we
might see North Korean nuclear weapons for sale to other rogue states or
organizations. After months of intensive negotiations, our
Administration brought the North Korean project to a halt. We did it by
putting in place a program that will substitute relatively safe power-
generation reactors for dangerous, bomb-building ones. But some in
Congress would like to pull the plug on that program, which could have
the consequence of allowing the North Koreans to resume their quest for
nuclear weapons. That, in turn, could bring us to the brink of a new
Korean war.
Over the past two years, President Clinton has concluded landmark
agreements to make sure that there will be only one nuclear-weapons
state on the territory of the former U.S.S.R. rather than four. Together
with the former Soviet states, we have been destroying nuclear warheads
at an unprecedented rate. We are helping those countries improve
security of their bomb-making materials, so that those materials don't
someday end up in the wrong hands. Yet some of the proposed budget cuts
would prevent us from finishing that job.
Another job we must see through is the one we have undertaken in the
former Yugoslavia. We can all debate the history of the last five years.
No one, I suspect, will argue that the international community did
enough, or acted quickly enough, in the early stages of the tragedy. But
we can all be proud of the role that the United States has played in
galvanizing an effective diplomatic and military strategy over the past
year. The peace that reigns in the Balkans today, however fragile and
uncertain, is a credit to American leadership.
It is also a credit to America's willingness and ability to assemble
international coalitions in support of our own interests. In Bosnia, we
have put together and led a force of 33 nations, including nine of our
former enemies from the old Warsaw Pact. Part of the lesson--and it is a
very encouraging one--is that the emerging global consensus in support
of our values and interests increases our ability to defend and advance
those values and interests in cooperation with others.
Now, let me be clear: The ultimate guarantor of our security remains
our capacity and willingness to act forcefully all by ourselves when
necessary. Our military must remain modern, mobile, ready, and strong.
But as this century has amply demonstrated, our freedom, security, and
prosperity cannot be fully ensured without the active help of other free
peoples, all of whom are looking to us for leadership.
The most successful American-led coalition of our time is NATO, the
anchor of American engagement in Europe and the linchpin of
transatlantic security. As Secretary Christopher puts it, NATO has
"helped to reconcile old adversaries, to embed free countries in strong
and solid institutions, and to create an enduring sense of shared
purpose in one another's security." Now that the Cold War has ended, we
must work with our NATO allies not just to make peace possible in the
Balkans, but also to bring the new democracies of Central and Eastern
Europe and the former Soviet Union into a new European security order.
If we meet that challenge, then we will have dramatically reduced the
chance of conflict in the area where two world wars and a global cold
war began.
When we talk about American leadership of international institutions, we
must also address the question of the United Nations--especially today,
since that organization has come under increasing attack, particularly
in regard to its peacekeeping activities. Some of the proposals now in
Congress would effectively force the United States to stop paying our UN
dues, thereby reneging on our treaty obligations under the UN Charter.
In the name of the Contract with America, it would abrogate the contract
with the world that Harry Truman signed 50 years ago and that every
President since--Republican and Democrat--has reaffirmed.
How much does our membership in the UN actually cost you and me as
individual Americans? The current per capita price to the U.S., for all
the work the UN does--from blue helmets for peacekeepers to polio
vaccines for babies--is less than $7 per year, which is considerably
less than the cost of a ticket to see the St. Louis Blues play--with or
without Wayne Gretzky.
In short, the UN is a good bargain; and it is a good way of leveraging
our power and influence. It is a good way of exercising our leadership.
If we with-draw our support of the UN--if we withdraw from our position
of leadership in the international community more generally--there is no
other country that will step in and lead in our place.
Make no mistake about that. At the same time, make no mistake that there
are plenty of forces that will fill the vacuum we leave in other ways
not at all to our liking or to our advantage. That is why, just as those
wise men put in place American foreign policy after World War II, our
generation must put in place a foreign policy for the post-Cold War era
that is equally hard-headed and forward-looking--and that means outward-
looking; a foreign policy that is not penny-wise and pound-foolish; a
foreign policy that puts our money where our interests and principles
are.
So by all means, let us get on with the great debate. Let us have that
debate not just inside the Washington Beltway or on the floor of the
Congress or on the 1996 campaign trail. Let us have it in town meetings
such as this one.
Let its starting point be a shared recognition of what must continue to
be the three pillars of American foreign policy: First, the strength
and global appeal of our democratic values and institutions; second, the
strength of our economy, which depends on global peace and stability;
and third, the strength of our military power. In short, we have the
heart, the brains, the wallet, and the muscle to lead the world and to
do so on behalf of our own interests as well as those of humanity as a
whole. Thank you.
(###)
ARTICLE 6:
Defining Missions, Setting Deadlines: Meeting New Security Challenges
in the Post-Cold War World
Anthony Lake, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs
Address to students and faculty at The George Washington University,
Washington, DC, March 6, 1996
I want to speak with you today about the most difficult issue any
president has to address: when to use American force and to put young
Americans in harm's way abroad. This is a good time for this discussion.
Six weeks from now, the last of more than 20,000 American troops
assigned to the UN Mission in Haiti will come home. About an equal
number are serving in Bosnia to help keep the hard-won peace there. Both
missions reflect answers to difficult questions about when to use force-
-and especially how to use it.
Let me start by putting my thoughts in a larger context. Halfway between
the end of the Cold War and the start of a new century, we're living a
moment of very real hope. Our nation is secure. Our economy is strong.
All around the world more people live free and at peace than ever
before.
But the promise of this moment is also matched by its perils--as the
desperate and despicable acts of the enemies of peace in the Middle East
have shown over the last week. Old threats like ethnic and religious
violence and aggression by rogue states have taken on new and dangerous
dimensions. And no one is immune to a host of equal opportunity
destroyers: the spread of weapons of mass destruction, terrorism,
organized crime, drug trafficking, environmental degradation.
Individually, each could undermine our growing security. Together, they
have the potential to cause terrible chaos around the world and in our
own society.
Faced with both the promise and the problems of our time, there are
those--on both the left and the right and in both political parties--who
would have America retreat from its responsibilities.
Some proclaim that America must stay engaged, but they then would deny
us the tools and the resources to match their rhetoric. These back-door
isolationists would stop us from working with others to share the risks
and the costs of engagement. They would gut our diplomatic readiness and
cut our assistance to those who take risks for peace around the world.
They fail to recognize that the global trend toward democracy and free
markets--and the opportunities it creates for our people--is neither
inevitable nor irreversible. It needs our support, our resources, and
our leadership.
Others--call them neo-know-nothings--argue that with the Cold War won,
it's safe to return to a "fortress America." It is not the American way
to retreat or refuse to compete. We can't build a wall high enough or
dig a moat deep enough to keep out the threats to our well-being--or to
isolate ourselves from the global economy. As President Clinton said in
his State of the Union address this year: We must confront these
challenges now, or we will pay a much higher price for our indifference
later.
The century that we have seen makes this truth very clear. After World
War I, America withdrew from the world, leaving a vacuum that was filled
by the forces of hatred and tyranny. And we paid the price in World War
II. After World War II, we stayed involved; we worked with others, and
we led--patiently, persistently, and pragmatically. And we helped create
the institutions that secured half a century of security and prosperity
for us all.
For the past three years, the Clinton Administration has built upon this
bipartisan legacy of leadership by reducing the nuclear threat,
supporting peacemakers, spreading democracy, and opening markets. I'm
proud of the results--for our own people and for people around the
world.
We stayed engaged with Russia and the other states of the former Soviet
Union--despite our differences--because it is in the interests of the
American people that we do so. Today, American cities and American
citizens no longer live under direct targeting of Russian missiles.
Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakstan are giving up the nuclear weapons left
on their land when the Soviet Union collapsed. We are safeguarding
nuclear materials and destroying nuclear weapons so they don't wind up
in the wrong hands. And, we have taken the lead in securing, extending,
or promoting landmark arms control agreements: START I and II, the Non-
Proliferation Treaty, the comprehensive test ban treaty, the Chemical
Weapons Convention.
We applied steady, patient pressure to North Korea. Now, it has frozen
its dangerous nuclear weapons program.
We're waging a tough counter-terrorism campaign with stronger laws;
increased funding, manpower, and training for law enforcement; sanctions
against states that sponsor terrorism; and closer cooperation with
foreign governments. Now, those responsible for the World Trade Center
bombing are behind bars. We've foiled attacks on New York City and on
our airliners abroad, and we've tracked down terrorists and brought them
to justice around the world.
We sent our troops, ships, and planes to the Persian Gulf when Saddam
Hussein moved his forces closer to the Kuwaiti border. Now Kuwait
remains safe and the world's energy supply secure.
We backed diplomacy with force in Haiti. Now the dictators are gone.
Haiti has celebrated the first democratic transfer of power in its 200-
year history, and the flood of refugees to our shores has ended.
Our troops are standing up for peace in Bosnia. Now its playgrounds are
no longer killing fields. A dangerous fire at the heart of Europe is not
raging as it had been for four years. The Bosnian people now have their
first real chance for peace.
We are standing with those who are taking risks for peace--very real
risks for peace--through good times and, as in the Middle East now,
through bad times.
In Northern Ireland, the determination of Prime Minister Major and Prime
Minister Bruton is pushing the peace process back on track and a date
certain for negotiations, and we hope a new cease-fire is on its way.
In the Middle East, we know, tragically, that fanatics will stop at
nothing to kill the hope for peace. As you know, the President has
ordered a series of steps to express our complete support for the
peacemakers as they combat terrorism.
We must also not lose sight of the tremendous progress that has been
made toward a comprehensive peace--or the fact that the overwhelming
majority of people--Palestinians and Israelis--want peace. We will not
rest until that desire becomes a reality.
What the terrorists want here is what we must not give them. We are
going to be very tough and absolutely steadfast in the way we stand with
Israel and the way we help the Palestinian Authority combat terrorism.
But what the terrorists are trying to do is get us, in the process, to
abandon the possibilities for peace itself and to give up on peace. To
abandon the peace process now in our very legitimate and natural anger
at what has happened would be to do precisely what the terrorists want;
it would give them the victory--a victory that must be ours.
And we negotiated a better deal for America as we opened markets abroad.
Now our exports are at an all- time high, and hundreds of thousands more
Americans have jobs at home. With Japan alone, this Administration has
completed 20 specific trade agreements. The sectors covered by those
agreements--from auto parts to medical equipment--have seen their
exports increase by 80%. That's almost twice as much as exports from
other sectors, which are also growing fast.
Not one of these achievements came about easily or automatically. They
happened for a number of reasons: because we kept our military strong
while adapting our alliance to new demands; because we acted with others
where we could and alone where we had to; because we were patient enough
to stick with diplomacy but prepared to use force; because we rejected
isolationism but refused to become the world's policeman; because in
each and every instance, we brought together our interests and values,
and we acted where we could make a difference.
Some people, in a curious bit of nostalgia for the Cold War, complain
that our policy lacks a single, over- arching principle--that it can't
be summed up on a bumper sticker. But while we are operating in a
radically new international environment, America's fundamental mission
endures. The same ideas that were under attack by communism and before
that by fascism remain under attack today, as we are seeing in the
Middle East. Now, as then, we are defending an idea that has many names-
-tolerance, liberty, civility, pluralism, but that shows a constant
face--the face of the democratic society. Now, as then, our special role
in the world is to defend, enlarge, and strengthen the community of
democratic nations against all of these new threats and to seize these
new opportunities.
Let me be very clear that in pursuing this mission, our interests and
ideals converge. We know from experience that democracies rarely go to
war with one another or abuse the rights of their people. They make for
better trading partners. And each one is a potential ally in the
struggle against the forces of hatred and intolerance--whether those
forces take the shape of rogue nations, ethnic and religious hatreds, or
terrorists trafficking in weapons of mass destruction.
What we have left behind are the certitudes and simplifications of the
past--and that's not necessarily a bad thing. During the Cold War,
policy-makers could justify every act with one word: containment. We
got the big things right--containment was the right policy, and it
succeeded; and we won the Cold War, and we are all far, far better for
it. But even the best policy can become the worst straitjacket if it is
pursued too rigidly and reflexively--as we saw in Vietnam.
Now we have the opportunity to think anew about the best ways to promote
America's interests and ideals. Our tools of first resort remain
diplomacy and the power of our example. But sometimes we have to rely on
the example of our power. We face no more important questions than when
and how to use it. From our experience in countering traditional
aggression--as in the Persian Gulf--and contending with more novel
crises--as in Haiti and Bosnia--there are some principles on the use of
force that I would like to discuss with you.
First, let me cite one underlying and enduring principle: We will
always be ready to use force to defend our national interests. Until
human nature changes, power and force will remain at the heart of
international relations.
This begs the question of just what those interests are that we will
defend. I would cite seven circumstances, which, taken in some
combination or even alone, may call for the use of force or our military
forces.
-- To defend against direct attacks on the United States, its citizens,
and its allies;
-- To counter aggression;
-- To defend our key economic interests, which is where most Americans
see their most immediate stake in our international engagement;
-- To preserve, promote, and defend democracy, which enhances our
security and the spread of our values;
-- To prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction, terrorism,
international crime, and drug trafficking;
-- To maintain our reliability, because when our partnerships are strong
and confidence in our leadership is high, it is easier to get others to
work with us and to share the burdens of leadership; and
-- For humanitarian purposes, to combat famines, natural disasters, and
gross abuses of human rights with, occasionally, our military forces.
Not one of these interests by itself--with the obvious exception of an
attack on our nation, people, and allies--should automatically lead to
the use of force. But the greater the number and the weight of the
interests in play, the greater the likelihood that we will use force--
once all peaceful means have been tried and have failed and once we have
measured a mission's benefits against its costs in both human and
financial terms.
In Haiti, when we saw democracy stolen from its people, a reign of
brutality take hold in our hemisphere, a flood of refugees come to our
shores, international agreements consistently violated, and efforts to
resolve the impasse through negotiations and sanctions fail, the case
for intervention was compelling. In Bosnia, the worst atrocities in
Europe since World War II--a dangerous fire at the very heart of the
continent--our commitments to our NATO allies and a peace agreement the
parties were calling on us to secure required us to act, and the
President decided to do so. But more than the "when" of using force,
Haiti, Bosnia, and some other recent interventions highlight principles
that get at a harder question, perhaps, and that is the "how" we should
use force.
First, threatening to use force can achieve the same results as actually
using it--but only if you're prepared to carry through on that threat.
The best-trained, best-equipped, and best-prepared fighting force in the
world has a unique ability to concentrate the minds of our adversaries
without firing a shot. In Haiti, when the military regime learned that
the 82d Airborne literally was on the way, those leaders got out of the
way. In the Persian Gulf, as soon as President Clinton moved American
forces into the region, Iraq moved its troops away from Kuwait. And by
backing diplomacy with the presence of U.S. military forces to deter
attack on South Korea, we convinced North Korea to freeze its dangerous
nuclear weapons program.
A second principle is that the selective but substantial use of force is
sometimes more appropriate than its massive use--provided that the force
is adequate to the task and then some. President Clinton refused to
engage our troops in a ground war in Bosnia because he knew that no
outside power could force peace on the parties. To do so would have
risked a Vietnam-like quagmire. But this summer, the combination of
NATO's heavy and continuous air strikes, Bosnian and Croat gains on the
ground, and our determined diplomacy convinced the Bosnian Serbs to stop
making war and start making peace. Now our troops are in Bosnia not to
fight a war through a massive intervention but to secure a peace they
produced through the deliberate, calibrated use of force.
A final principle is this: Before we send our troops into a foreign
country, we should know how and when we're going to get them out. Sounds
simple, even obvious. But it is not an uncontroversial point. Carefully
defined exit strategies for foreign interventions have not been a
hallmark of our foreign policy in recent decades. Now they are, and that
makes sense for America, for America's military, and for the people
we're trying to help.
I don't want to be doctrinaire in asserting an exit-strategy doctrine.
When it comes to deterring external aggression--as in the Persian Gulf
or the Korean Peninsula--or fighting wars in defense of our most vital
security interests, a more open-ended commitment is necessary. But
increasingly, our interests require that our military keep peace in the
wake of internal conflicts. For these operations to succeed, tightly
tailored military missions and sharp withdrawal deadlines must be the
norm.
The logic is this: The first step is to give our armed forces a clear
mission with achievable military--I repeat, military--goals, as
President Clinton did in both Haiti and Bosnia. In Haiti, we asked our
armed forces to return the elected government to power and restore a
secure climate so that civilians could train a police force, hold
elections, and begin reconciliation. In Bosnia, our soldiers are
overseeing the implementation of the military side of the Dayton
accords--separating the armies, maintaining the cease-fire, securing
transferred territory--while civilian authorities help the Bosnian
people rebuild their lives and their land. In both places, our troops
are highly trained and heavily armed, with very clear rules of
engagement. The executive branch and Congress are united in their
commitment to our military's goals and success, as they were in
Operation Desert Storm.
Contrast these operations with Vietnam, Lebanon, and Somalia. There,
clear and achievable missions for our military were not defined. In
Vietnam, our society blamed our soldiers for a defeat that was not
theirs. Because we neglected to ask the right questions and establish
clear military goals from the start, our fighting men and women paid a
terrible price--both in Vietnam and upon their return home. We must
never put them in that position again. Never. It just must not happen.
The next step then, having defined clear military missions, is to set
deadlines for withdrawal based on the accomplishment of those missions.
In Haiti, our military leaders informed the President that our troops
could complete their military tasks in about a year and a half and in
Bosnia in about one year--and they will.
Here's why setting deadlines is so important: Neither we nor the
international community has either the responsibility or the means to do
whatever it takes for as long as it takes to rebuild nations. There are
many reasons for this.
First, providing a security blanket for an indefinite period without
making clear it's on loan--and not for keeps--only gives those we are
trying to help the comfort of believing that they can evade their own
responsibilities for the future of their own societies. It creates
unreasonable expectations that the hard work will be done for them, not
by them.
Second, assuming too much responsibility for a nation's future tends to
undercut the very government you are trying to help. In Vietnam, the
more we assumed responsibility for a weak Saigon administration, the
more dependent it became--and the more open to charges it was a puppet
regime beholden to foreigners. Unless you make clear that your mission
is limited in scope and duration, you risk de-legitimating a government
in the eyes of its own people, and you will lose a conflict that is, at
its heart, political, not military.
Third, overstaying one's welcome ultimately breeds resentment of our
presence and provides an easy target for blame when things go wrong. And
believe me, that target will be us.
By carefully defining the mission and clearly setting a deadline, we
serve notice that our only goal is to give governments and people the
breathing room they must have to tackle their own problems. This "tough
love" policy may sound harsh to some. It may strike others as a gamble.
But consider the alternative: self-defeating efforts to take on
responsibilities that are not ours--to create unsustainable dependencies
instead of giving nations a chance to act independently. It is a
dangerous hubris to believe we can build other nations. But where our
own interests are engaged, we can help nations build themselves--and
give them time to make a start at it.
I believe we can see the benefits of our exit-strategy doctrine in Haiti
and Bosnia. Given the chance, the Haitian people quickly focused on the
ballot, not the bullet; on trade, not terror; on hope, not despair. In
just a year and a half, with our civilian help, they have completed
presidential, parliamentary, and local government elections; trained a
police force, which is as yet imperfect but showing great progress. They
have, despite problems, dramatically improved the human rights situation
and begun to reverse the economic decline of the coup years. Haiti
remains the poorest nation in the Americas. There is no guarantee that
democracy will take hold or that the economy will prosper. But its
people now have a real chance to build a better future for themselves
and for their children. And to the U.S. forces, who have acted in Haiti
with such strength and with such skill and who are leaving when we
promised they would, we can say "mission accomplished."
The same logic applies in Bosnia, and the same opportunity lies before
the people of Bosnia. Its people understand they have a window of
opportunity that our military opened and will hold open for the
remainder of this year to decide their future in peace: to freely
choose their own leaders in elections later this summer; to begin to
rebuild their roads and schools, their factories, and their hospitals;
to reunite children with their parents, and families with their homes.
At the end of this year, when our troops leave, we can reasonably hope
that the people of Bosnia will have developed a greater stake in peace
than war--that peace will have taken on a life and logic of its own.
That is all that can be asked of us.
But let me make one point absolutely clear--the breathing room our
military is providing in Haiti and Bosnia must be filled with the oxygen
of economic reconstruction assistance. What we call civilian
implementation is the vital and necessary companion to any peacekeeping
operation. Our allies agree. That's why they are providing about 80% of
the civilian assistance for Haiti and for Bosnia. The sooner people in
conflicted countries recover the blessings of a normal life, the surer
the chances our troops will leave behind them a legacy of peace and hope
as they are doing in Haiti.
That's why Congress should now unfreeze the modest amount of outstanding
development assistance for Haiti to fund primary education, child care,
and immunizations. They should do it now. And that's why we are working
with Congress on our request for $200 million to assist civilian
reconstruction in Bosnia--money that will support economic
revitalization and reform, the deployment of international police
monitors, and our demining efforts. Money that is needed now.
In both Haiti and Bosnia, our armed forces are doing everything we have
asked of them--and more. We should live up to their example on the
civilian side in both the executive branch and Congress. Their missions
will succeed only if we do so. Holding back the dollars we need for
relief and reconstruction doesn't serve our soldiers, it doesn't serve
the people we're trying to help, and it doesn't serve our nation's
interests.
One of the great privileges of my job is to travel around the world and
to see first-hand the extraordinary respect our nation now enjoys.
People look to us for leadership not only because of our size and our
strength but also because of what we stand for and what--as today in the
Middle East--we're willing to stand against. Now, perhaps more than at
any other time in our history, America has a unique ability to make a
difference for our own people and for people around the world.
Our duty is to help use this power as wisely as possible--to steer by
the stars of our interests and our ideals. As President Clinton has
said, we can't be everywhere; we can't do everything. But where those
interests and ideals demand it--and where we can make a difference--we
must not hesitate to lead. We haven't, and we won't.
You must not hesitate, either. Many of you here today are embarking, I
hope, on careers in foreign policy. Whether you do so as teachers or
researchers, government officials or journalists, you will have an
opportunity to weigh in on the great foreign policy questions of our
time. Weigh in with passion, weigh in with argument, but, above all,
weigh in. America needs to hear your voices. It needs to feel your
enthusiasm.
Right now, no question is more fundamental--and no outcome more
important--than America's role in the world. We can succeed--this is an
absolute certainty--only if we continue to lead--not merely be engaged,
but lead. That is the lesson of what has come to be called the American
Century. If we heed its call, we can remain a force for freedom and
progress around the world as we are today and for real security and
prosperity at home. And the next century will be an American century,
too. And the world will be a better place for it.
(###)
[END DISPATCH VOL 7 NO 12]
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