Foreign Policy Flare-Ups Test Obama Worldview

The list of foreign policy crises has multiplied rapidly in the past week. The anti-American demonstrations in a wide array of Muslim-majority countries, the attack on Camp Bastion in Afghanistan, the escalating war in Syria, and tensions in Iraq and south China all add up to a major test of the Obama Adminstration in a critical election season, says Susan Glasser, the editor in chief at Foreign Policy magazine.

“That’s the peril and also the opportunity of being the incumbent president and running for re-election is that you don’t have the luxury just of focusing on one thing, but your inbox will sooner or later roar up with something like this,” Glasser says.

She says US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told Foreign Policy he is monitoring more than a dozen conflicts and accessing the need for intervention.

“He said that he was watching as many as 18 different countries in case a rapid deployment of Marines needed to take place,” Glasser says. “It suggests the extent of the unknowns we’re facing now, and the extent of the possible instability.”

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Lisa Mullins: Susan Glasser is the Editor in Chief at Foreign Policy magazine. She’s in Washington DC. Susan, the number of foreign policy crises at the moment is head spinning. We just heard from Mary Kay about the South China conflict and the anti-American demonstrations in a broad swath of majority-Muslim countries, there is the highly destructive attack that happened at Camp Bastion in Afghanistan and, of course, there is the ongoing war in Syria, and we should mention Iraq and elsewhere, the list goes on as you know. When you add all of these thing together, for President Obama, what does it accumulate to? Is this a critical turning point? Or would you describe it otherwise?

Susan Glasser: Well, you know, I think it’s a good reminder that no matter how close you get to the presidential election and how much you want to focus exclusively on campaigning, the world happens, right? And that’s the peril and also the opportunity of being the incumbent president and running for reelection, is that you don’t have the luxury just at focusing on one thing, but your inbox sooner or later will roar up with something like this. What’s striking, of course, is up until now in the US presidential election context, foreign policy and world events have played very little role. And before the conventions I think the number was four percent of American voters who thought that foreign policy would figure heavily into their votes. Four percent. I’m sure that number is going up.

Mullins: Do you believe that if we look, in particular what’s happening right now in Muslim countries where there are protests going on, anti-American protests, does this give sufficient cause for questioning President Obama’s approach to the Arab uprising’s response to them?

Glasser: Well, you know, there really are very serious questions to be asked and a real debate to be had about what the right US strategy is. We haven’t even talked yet about Syria, for example, where a new report out today shows that the violence against civilians in that escalating civil war has gone up in recent months. We’re talking about tens of thousands of people dead and not only no end to the conflict in sight, but actually it appears to be ratcheting up in its deadliness. And so what’s the conversation going to be about whether President Obama has taken the right course by largely sitting on the sidelines and unfortunately allowing this violence to play out, for example?

Mullins: And what is the argument for that? That he has sat on the sidelines and allowed things to play out? I mean and the argument that he should have and could have done more, and more is in question as well as to what that could have been to back America’s friends in the region?

Glasser: Well, first of all, of course, you have no international consensus and you have Russia and China which have actively worked and blocked any effort to come up with a global consensus resolution on the UN security council, so that part is closed. Second of all, there’s a belief that the Syrian military is a much more professional and deadly and organized military than that which existed in Libya, so there’s not as clear cut of a military solution there. And thirdly, of course, there is the question of whether American voters have the stomach for another major military intervention in the Middle East. In many ways it’s quite possible that the events of the last week and the protests against US embassies and, of course, the tragic killing of the US envoy to Libya may actually increase the sentiment across the political spectrum in the United States for the US simply to move away from the Middle East as quickly as possible.

Mullins: Do you think there’s any reason to beleive a particular government that doesn’t like Barack Obama is allowing more vociferous and violent protests? Or do you think it’s more organic than that?

Glasser: Well, I think what happened in Yemen is very different than what happened in Tunisia, it’s very different than what happened in Egypt, and in what’s unfolding in Pakistan, for example. So I think there are different facets and different levels of engagement, or disengagement as the case may be, with all of these protests, so that while in Libya the story may be, “Have we created a new failed state? What is the ability of a generally pro-US central government to project for us and to protect American and Western diplomats around the country?” The answer might be “fairly minimal”. So really that might be a story about a potentially failed state. While in Egypt, on the other hand, the story may be, “Well, how come the Egyptian security forces weren’t called out in force to dispel the protest at the embassy when they certainly could have been?” And so, again, you have a wide variety of situations to assess.

Mullins: Susan Glasser is the Editor in Chief at Foreign Policy magazine. Nice to have you on the program.

Glasser: Thanks very much.

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