A crisis of competence - failure of Clinton administration's foreign policies

National Review, Nov 15, 1993 by Vin Weber

SOON after the recent firelight in Mogadlshu, Secretary of Defense Les Aspin was called to Capitol Hill to give an emergency briefing on the Administration's response to the Somali crisis.

American forces had taken heavy losses in a gun-battle with militiamen loyal to warlord Mohammed Aidid; 17 Americans were dead, 77 were wounded, 1 was missing in action, and 1 had been taken prisoner. Pictures of a Somali mob dragging the body of a dead American soldier through the streets flashed on the evening news. Members of Congress wanted answers: What had gone wrong? Why were we caught off guard? How were we going to respond? And what exactly was the Administration's objective in Somalia?

But Aspin had no answers; he had come with the intention of holding a dialogue. Big mistake. The meeting quickly grew white hot, and Aspin took a verbal pummeling from furious congressmen who had expected him to present a coherent plan of action. As members emerged from the meeting, they were unusually harsh in their criticism of Aspin and of the whole Administration.

"Outrageous," fumed Senator Bob Kerrey (D., Neb.).

"Never have I heard a more confused, disjointed, vague defense of American foreign policy in my professional career," complained Representative Jim Walsh (R., N.Y.).

As congressional criticism grew louder and more heated, the situation was reaching crisis proportions. President Clinton cut short a campaign trip to California, where he was promoting his health-care plan. In an effort to articulate some modicum of policy, he gave a televised address from the Oval Office in which he announced a pull-out date of March 31, 1994. The speech served to calm things down and buy him time. Most members, appreciating the threat to our international prestige, fell in line behind the President. Bob Dole extended an olive branch to the White House, appealing to members to "come together and not quibble over a date." Congress backed off less because it supports the President's policy than out of a basic loyalty to the Commander-in-Chief. As Senator Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) put it, "At this point there is no good alternative but to support the President."

The immediate uproar had been stilled, but its underlying cause remains. Expressing publicly what many in Congress are saying privately, Senator Richard Lugar recently complained that, since taking office, Clinton has presided over "a virtual collapse of presidential leadership in [foreign] matters .... There is almost a sense of incompetence."

Indeed, confidence in Mr. Clinton's ability to lead is so low that nearly a dozen amendments have been proposed in both Houses restricting the President's ability to commit troops abroad. Even Mr. Clinton's friends in Congress are beginning to urge a major shake-up of his foreign-policy team in order to restore faith in the Administration's foreign-affairs competence. Democratic Representative Frank McCloskey, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on International Security, recently called on Secretary of State Warren Christopher to step down, stating that "the effect of Christopher's mishandling of these vital issues is that he is not seen by our allies as an effective or serious secretary of state."

How did we come to this? Since taking office, the Clinton Administration has essentially abdicated, its leadership responsibilities on the world stage, creating a power vacuum. With nobody steering the ship of state, others have moved in.

When the Bush Administration sent troops to Somalia back in December 1992, it did so with a clear and limited objective: to go in, feed starving people, and get out. But when Clinton took office, instead of completing the mission and pulling out, he allowed Secretary General Boutros-Ghali to turn what was originally a humanitarian effort into a complex scheme of "nation building."

That abdication of responsibility exploded in the President's face with the fire fight in Mogadishu. And then when Secretary Aspin arrived on Capitol Hill and demonstrated that the White House essentially had no policy, Congress was infuriated.

It was in this hostile atmosphere that the President announced his intention to commit U.S. troops to Haiti, in an effort to help "build democracy" there and assist the restoration of ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. For many in Congress, this was too much. They had no confidence that the President would not turn Haiti into "another Somalia."

Dole, for example, proposed amendments to restrain the President from sending any American forces to either Haiti or Bosnia, except to rescue Americans or to protect American national security. To avert a war-powers battle with the Senate, the White House immediately began negotiating with Dole to water the amendments down from legally binding requirements to "Sense of the Senate" resolutions requesting congressional consultation. Dole eventually agreed, and both amendments passed by wide margins. Senator Robert Byrd (D., W. Va.) proposed a similar amendment on Somalia, which would have forced the President to pull out all our troops before March 31. After intense negotiations with the White House, Byrd accepted language with lesser restrictions on U.S. actions, and his amendment passed the Senate last week.