Peter Wehner, National Review
Former Arkansas governor and Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee has written an article for Foreign Affairs magazine, the first two paragraphs of which are stunningly silly, misguided, and unfortunately for Huckabee, deeply revealing.
The two opening paragraphs read this way:
The United States, as the world's only superpower, is less vulnerable to military defeat. But it is more vulnerable to the animosity of other countries. Much like a top high school student, if it is modest about its abilities and achievements, if it is generous in helping others, it is loved. But if it attempts to dominate others, it is despised.
American foreign policy needs to change its tone and attitude, open up, and reach out. The Bush administration's arrogant bunker mentality has been counterproductive at home and abroad. My administration will recognized that the United States' main fight today does not pit us against the world but pits the world against the terrorists. At the same time, my administration will never surrender our sovereignty, which is why I was the first presidential candidate to oppose ratification of the Law of the Sea Treaty, which would endanger both our national security and our economic interests.
Where ought one to begin untangling this unholy mess?
Perhaps the place to begin is with his contention that America is ungenerous, which (according to Huckabee) explains the animus now directed at the United States. The fact is that the United States, in fact, has sacrificed enormous an amount of blood and treasure to help other nations. Any suggestion otherwise is wrong and even offensive.
We have, for starters, liberated more than 50 million people from two of the most repressive regimes in modern history (the Taliban and the Baathist police state in Iraq). The global AIDS initiative qualifies as among the most humane and generous acts in the history of American foreign policy. We give billions in additional foreign aid; including the enormous generosity America displayed in helping Indonesia and other nations in the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami that devastated Indonesia and other nations in December 2004.
The United States, while imperfect, ranks as perhaps the most benevolent superpower (to say nothing of its status as a benevolent nation) in human history. Unlike past empires, we are using American power and influence for great good instead of as a means of advancing oppression.
Beyond that, the belief that if we are modest and generous we will be “loved” by other nations, and that anger at America is based on our attempts to “dominate,” is both naive and foolish. Some nations (like Cuba, Syria, Iran, North Korea, and others) will oppose us because they are totalitarian states that hate our efforts to curb their ambitions and advance freedom and self-determination.
They are not the loving kind.
Other nations (like France under Jacques Chirac) will oppose us because they canÂ’t stand the idea of a unipolar world and want to counterbalance it. And other nations (like China and Russia) will oppose our efforts to end genocide in Darfur and keep Iran from gaining nuclear weapons because of their economic interests.
Memo to Mike Huckabee: Sometimes we are despised for all the right reasons. |