THE OBAMA FOREIGN POLICY INTERVIEW by Michael Brenner

  The Atlantic has just published a long essay, The Obama Doctrine, by their Washington national correspondent, Jeffrey Goldberg. Based in most part on wide-ranging reflective interviews with President Barack Obama, the article makes extensive use of direct quotes from that interview. Considerable space is devoted to the various American engagements in the Middle East along with Obama’s views on prospects for the region.   It is a remarkable journalistic event insofar as it represents a preemptive attempt by a sitting President to shape the discourse about his record and his legacy. What he says is revealing - less as analysis and interpretation of actions taken, though, than as an ‘exhibit' of all that is peculiar about Obama’s policy-making  style - and what the implications for American diplomacy have been.

Obama's overall stance is one of dissociation from his own administration and its conduct. Throughout, he appears to be referring to himself in the 3rd person. This can be seen as the soon to be memoir writer's attempt to cast himself as detached statesman while distancing himself from errors made. However, this degree of dissociation by a still incumbent President is odd. It suggests that he has been playing the role of participant-observer while in the Oval Office. Moreover, it conveys his sense that somehow the words he utters are equivalent to actions. Indeed, a feature of his Presidency has been a frequent mismatch of words and deeds which never get reconciled. Nor do they in this seemingly candid interview. That raises a cardinal question: is this honest reflection or a characteristic flight from accountability?

Two, this strange attitude is most pronounced in his remarks about the Middle East. For example, he inveighs against allowing the United States to be placed in a position of picking sides in Islam's Sunni-Shi'ite civil war. He is especially adamant about the dangers of American power being used as a tool of the Saudis to advance their cause. Yet, this is exactly what he has been doing in Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Bahrain. Moreover, he never has confronted the KSA leaders about the promotion of wahabbism or their concrete support for ISIl and al-Qaeda (in Syria and Yemen - where they fight side-by-side with Saudi troops) - either in private or in public.

Let’s step back and reflect on this. Barack Obama, President of the United States, in telling a journalist that his most important ‘ally’ in the Middle East has been aiding and abetting America’s mortal enemies – and that they should stop. Yet, three years after those hostile actions began he has yet to voice his displeasure directly in numerous meetings. Instead, he gets an interview published in a magazine that the Saudi leaders might pick up in the waiting room at the Mayo Clinic on their next medical visit. If there is any sense or logic to this, it must conform to a mental process never before encountered.

Obama urges that the KSA and Iran learn to co-exist, "to share space," in the region. Yet, in the wake of the nuclear accord, he's gone overboard in denouncing the IRI as the primary source of instability in the Middle East and insists that until they cease and desist, no normalization is possible. As Goldberg quotes Susan Rice in seconding the President: “The Iran deal was never primarily about trying to open a new era of relations between the U.S. and Iran.”   In other words, if the US refuses adamantly to "share space" - as in Iraq - on what grounds does he here encourage the Saudis to do so?  On Turkey, Obama is similarly mealy-mouthed as regards their tangible contributions to both ISIl and al-Nusra/al-Qaeda - although he refrains from the same direct criticism of Erdogan. 

Finally, Obama strongly criticizes Washington's foreign policy Establishment as being overly rigid in their thinking and imposing their views on American leaders. This is baffling - is not the President the head of the Establishment? Has Obama not stocked his two administrations - to a man and to a woman - with members of the Establishment? Robert Gates, David Petraeus and John Brennan were his appointees. Gates boasts in his memoir of the scheme he orchestrated to force Obama’s hand in escalating in Afghanistan in 2009. With his allies Petraeus and Hillary Clinton, Gates planned to expand it further and to make its duration indefinite. Only Stanley McChrystal’s inopportune public insults of the President prevented its success.

 Does he not invite Robert Kagan and Thomas Friedman to intimate Camp David deep think sessions? Did Obama not put Victoria Nuland, Dick Cheney’s principal deputy foreign policy adviser (and Kagan’s wife), in charge of European policy where she helped foment the Ukrainian coup – and from which post she aggressively runs a belligerent policy toward Russia? Hasn't he bowed the knee before the Israeli lobby – going so far as to allow himself to be humiliated by Netanyahu before Congress without any rejoinder? Does he not have the authority to address the country directly and to instruct them about world realities? 

Yet, he whines to Goldberg that he is somehow caught in a web spun by “the Establishment.” What is a reasonable interpretation of this illogic? Election politics? – but nothing has changed since his 2012 re-election. (Anyway, is starting a new war in the Middle East a sure-fire vote-getter?) Was the President fantasizing for seven years, was he blackmailed, did he lack the conviction to take different paths, or was he simply weak and feckless?

Here is the Obama view of where he fits in Washington’s power map of foreign policy-makers/thinkers: “There’s a playbook in Washington that presidents are supposed to follow. It’s a playbook that comes out of the foreign-policy establishment. And the playbook prescribes responses to different events, and these responses tend to be militarized responses. Where America is directly threatened, the playbook works. But the playbook can also be a trap that can lead to bad decisions. In the midst of an international challenge like Syria, you get judged harshly if you don’t follow the playbook, even if there are good reasons why it does not apply.”

The deference and passivity accorded the upholders of the conventional wisdom exposes the critical flaw in Obama’s interpretation of his authority as Chief Executive and Commander-in-Chief. He is not a constrained Doge of Venice under strict surveillance by the Great Council of aristocrats. He is not just the custodian of some Holy Grail in the sacred custody of a vestal priesthood. He is not the prize student being tested in a simulation exercise by masters of the guild. The Washington Consensus embodied by the head-nodders of the think tanks and op. ed. pages is nothing more than the calcified corpus of failed ideas which have brought the United States nothing but wrack and ruin for (at least) the past 15 years. The Iraq debacle cut the ground from under it – thereby helping to clear the way for Obama's entry into the White House. His historic task was reformation. Instead, he decided that acceptance into the ranks of the Establishment was worth a ritualized surrender.

  All of this is baffling. Part of the explanation lies in the President’s singular personality. Despite his high intelligence, he seems to live with a great number of unreconciled contradictions. Some have to do with his background and upbringing. Some are intellectual. The title of the Atlantic article is misleading. There is no “Obama Doctrine.”  Incoherence is the hallmark of American actions in the Middle East and elsewhere. The interview with Goldberg confirms that.  

II

Barack Obama gave Goldberg many, many hours of his time. The President allowed the writer to accompany him on international jaunts, and accorded him entry to his inner circle. Goldberg has thanked the President by concentrating on the supposed historic error of not bombing Syria when Assad allegedly (if factually mistakenly) was accused of crossing the notorious ’ red line’ by using sarin gas. That is the pivot of the article; it is returned to time after time in positing the hard-line critique of the Obama foreign policy as the one authoritative perspective.  That was predictable. Goldberg is an Israeli who started his career at the Likud megaphone The Jerusalem Post. Why does a President afford such liberties to a tendentious journalist?

European monarchs of old had court portraitists.  American presidencies have Boswells like Bob Woodward and now Jeff Goldberg.  Boswells who are not friends but on assignment.  The purpose seems similar: to immortalize the ruler at the height of his powers.  To show a forceful leader mastering a daunting problem with resolve, sobriety and dedication to the interests of his fellow citizens.  This being America, the subject matter has to be one of action and suspense.  Bush the Younger seeking retribution for 9/11.  Now Barack Obama in a titanic struggle to escape the coils of stifling dogma.

A narrative account that covers a long span of time, though, does have a few drawbacks.  It cannot fix the image at a single moment that will last for eternity. However laudatory, the written account is liable to be viewed differently as time goes by.  And Goldberg’s portrait is not very becoming. A picture wings the flying hour; a story is part of the flow of events.  There is the further drawback that the chronicler may depict persons and things in ways that are not entirely complimentary to the main protagonist in the drama.

Journalistic talents may be available for lease but they do not come with a money back guarantee.  For the exchange currency is not hard cash but access.  The White House gets surefire blockbuster publicity – and, in this case, the chance to set in place the first sketch of his Presidential record.  A  complication is that while the President is the patron, the commission is loosely written to allow the artist unmonitored access to other members of the court.  Their vanities and ambitions are not identical with his.  See the quoted remarks of John Kerry and Pentagon officials.

In the light of the ensuing risks, why does Barack Obama enter into such a pact?  Our celebrity culture provides part of the answer.  Publicity is what it is all about.  A public figure whose meteoric rise is a testament to star power must be acutely sensitive to the imperative of how vital to success is mythic imagery and turns in the limelight.  The stage lights have the special glow when energized by a graphic account of star performance. 

Then there is the simple truth that Presidents want to celebrate themselves.  They are the ultimate celebrity in a celebrity culture.  They in fact feel proud of what they do and how they do it.  Reality is clay in my hands.  A successful leader must never allow the future to be hostage to history – even yesterday’s history.  Except where history can be bent better to serve fresh exigencies – or a post-Presidency career of 30 -35 years.

The selection of a hawk like Goldberg to be his interlocutor demonstrates another truth that also can be inferred from the Obama discourse. Authority on matters of foreign policy is understood to rest with the guardians of the very Establishment that constrains him. It is the neo-cons and their hard-line companions in arms who, he believes, are the cynosure of core American beliefs about the world and our place in it. So it ultimately is from them that he must seek validation. This conviction of Obama’s, of course, becomes self-confirming – as we have observed for seven years.

Obama is a man of reflection, at least as concerns his own identity and self-image. Maybe, the serial interviews with Goldberg were the first try at coming to terms with himself as director of American foreign policy. So he invited Goldberg to join him in an excursion through the Presidential mind  - a Virgil exploring his own psyche. 

Comments

[turcopolier]

All

Borg = "Foreign policy establishment." pl

[Patrick armstrong]

He's polishing the turd. "Don't blame me for the Juliet Foxtrot, I wasn't there".

[David Lentini]

I'm still trying to find Obama's "genus" that the press loves to talk about. In foreign policy, he has been very much the emperor without clothes; the man the Borg love to pet and coo at while they do their own bidding at our expense.

[David Lentini]

What's a "Juliet Foxtrot"? I know about Charlie Foxtrots, but this is news to me.

[Thirdeye]

Obama's desire to be accepted by the Washington establishment was the hallmark of his every policy from his first day in office, leading to abdication of his mandates on economic stimulus, banking reform, health care reform, and foreign policy. The situation called for a head-knocker, not someone who hoped that by waving the magic wand of his personna he could undo the entrenched dysfunction. We've had two "reformers," Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, who were at best competent caretakers for the Washington establishment when the situation called for a transformative challenger. Now there's a potentially transformative, head-knocking challenger coming and we're seeing what REAL panic on the part of the Washington establishment looks like. Thought Obama took some cheap shots in 2008? Ha!

[cynic]

A very confused Virgil, who forgot that he was supposed to be Augustus; and this self-pitying whine is his Aeneid.

[Bob]

Though I am in no way giving Obama a get out of jail free card. (Both him and his predecessor should be in jail) I think the author does need to bone up on the role that congress plays in budgeting, appointments and passing laws. The president may be the most powerful man on earth. But is subservient in a lot of ways to Congress. A congress packed with hacks,flacks and idiots from both sides of the isle.

[CaliHalibut]

Affirmative action doesn't look very noble when its recipient is under 24/7 public scrutiny.

[VietnamVet]

MB

This sheds light on a dark subject. With Nancy Regan’s passing the stories of her tiffs with the White House Chiefs of Staff were recounted. Then I suddenly realized I had no idea who the current one is.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_House_Chief_of_Staff

The only reason that I come up with is that Denis McDonough is no longer in the center of the decision making system. The White House is a scripted Information Operation directed by outside powers.

“A kingdom for a stage, princes to act. And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!”

[Ken Macaulay]

Obama polishing his credentials to become the chief lobbyist for the TPP when he leaves office?
Will the forthcoming Obama foundation be able to eclipse the Clinton foundation as the go to for dodgy corporates & dodgy foreign political aspirants - if she gets the gets elected?
This I believe will be one of the big stories in the future...

[NotTimothyGeithner]

The Clinton Foundation was an investment not payback. Obama won't be penniless, but the Clintons weren't bringing in the big bucks until after Kerry lost in 2004. We are 10,000 votes in Ohio in 2004 away from who will challenge President Edwards as he seeks a second term. Hillary might be a trivia question in that world.

Michelle isn't running for office. Obama never built his own patronage program, relying on too many Clinton retreads, Rahm, Podesta. There are no big bucks to be had.

[Kyle Pearson]

It has seemed to me, at many times in Obama's presidency, that the cabinet members are leading and Obama is simply following the best of a lot of very bad recommendations.

That was true during G. W. Bush's tenure as president, and also as Reagan's tenure - at least during his later years, when his mind was pretty much gone.

I suspect it was also often true during Bill Clinton's term -

I think it's wrong to say that these three or four presidents "set" foreign policy. How much does anyone here think that Clinton knew the first thing about Yugoslavia? Colonel Lang has made it quite clear that Cheney and Rumsfeld (but mainly Cheney) purposefully distorted the intelligence that the public received on Iraq and its purported WMDs - why is it such a stretch to think that these presidents, each of whom lacked any or had only minimal experience in the Executive or Federal branches, could be expected to formulate a foreign policy that is independent of the people who are feeding them the information they must base their decisions upon?

Obama basically fired Clinton, and brought in Kerry to take her place - with that shift, we have seen a relatively large shift in foreign policy.

It seems to me that Obama's speech, when couched in the third person, is indicating that his own ability to influence policy is strongly limited by the government institutions atop which he has been placed.

I myself can understand if a President who regularly orders drone strikes on compounds half-a-planet away might be worried about what could happen to him (or her) should s/he deviate too greatly away from DC's proffered solutions.

[ked]

I continue to believe that the presidency simply isn't as influential at this stage of empire as it was in the past. And whether cause or effect (probably both), we aren't the beneficiaries of having a good selection of quality political leaders participating at any level - from local school boards to the WH. There's more for individuals having drive & talent to accomplish elsewhere. I suspect this has dawned on Obama. He may realize that rather than affirmative action that positioned him to become president, it was lousy competition. Let the Borg & Wall St & Congress have its way... "I'm getting out alive". Given the tenor of our polity and elites these days, that may be a real accomplishment.

[optimax]

Didn't Lincoln speak of himself in the third person?

[Charles Michael]

"Obama's desire to be accepted by the Washington establishment..."

Yes, I fully agree with that, to say it plainly: it shows a real psychological weakness, IMO largely sourced in its origins.

So when his job was to be the Ring Master (ring, loop, beltway)he satisfied himself to be the iconic first AA president, the blue-eyed boy of the harpies even if in some occasions he cunningly deflected USA Foreign Policy from some more disasters.

[HankP]

Honest question here - are there lots of non-neocons available to advise the President, or have the neocons intellectually captured the foreign policy apparatus?

[William R. Cumming]

Thanks for all participating in this post and thread. Perhaps a short hand for evaluation of candidates and Presidents? What decisions have they made, and how and when did they make them?

I would argue that the legal profession by training is an observer class that does all it can to avoid accountability. The Obama Administration may be the high point for one lacking accountability.

As to FP [foreign policy] and foreign relations the U.S. allows key Ambassadorial slots to be purchased so what can be really expected? And since most painted in SECRECY its inhabitants allowed to construct visions of their role that are largely non-factually based.

[Patrick Armstrong]

Same thing. JF may be more Canadian Army slang than CF.

[Seamus Padraig]

"He is not a constrained Doge of Venice under strict surveillance by the Great Council of aristocrats."

Oh, but what if he is? For some years now, I have strongly entertained the notion that the US president is not a sun-king at all, but rather a mere corporate CEO who answers to a board of directors. The question is, who are the directors in this case?

"It is the neo-cons and their hard-line companions in arms who, he believes, are the cynosure of core American beliefs about the world and our place in it."

The neocons seem to act like sheepdogs, herding one president after the next--both Democrat and Republican--towards pre-planned policies and objectives. Thus, they do not so much work for our presidents as work them over! But if they do not really work for the president, whom do they work for? Again, who comprises this mysterious board of directors?

[Peter Reichard]

Obama was a tool of Wall Street and the foreign policy establishment from the get go.His role was to put a new more friendly face on the empire after the Bush administration burned through all its international political capital after 9-11 and alienated the entire world with its blatant aggression, incompetence and Texas swagger.So successful was he initially that the Europeans were even bamboozled into giving him the Nobel Peace Prize.I expected a kinder and gentler imperialism as R2P replaced neoconservatism as a rationale for US intervention but it certainly hasn't been so. R2P is a fraud, its proponents don't have a humanitarian bone in their bodies. It is just neoconservative aggression repackaged in a way to be sold to liberal dupes. Temperamentally Obama might have made a great labor mediator or UN ambassador but not a President. He is indecisive, listening to both sides then steering a middle course between his hawk and dove advisers satisfying neither and producing an ineffective policy. This is not leadership. He feels constrained by the establishment to operate within narrow confines. This too is not leadership. I often wonder if his policies are limited by him being subject to some kind of blackmail and/or intimidation. His background is very mysterious and untransparent even to the extent that the continent of his birth has been in question. Who knows what might lurk in his past? His personal security has been compromised by numerous Secret Service failures. Is it just incompetence or is a message being sent to him by the powers that be? One wonders.

[David Lentini]

The Clintons have proven that "caretaking" can be quite profitable. I suspect the same will be true for Mr. Obama.

[David Lentini]

True, but in 2008 Obama had a very unique public mandate that he could have used like a trump card (no pun intended) like the last Democrat to confront a major stock market crash, FDR. Obama chose instead to install himself in the WH with a fawning entourage.

[turcopolier]

HankP

IMO the neocons and R2P neoliberals have bred non-neocons and non-neliberals out of the system through selections, non-selections and retirements. pl

[sumiDreamer]

I read some time back that Obama had only made two decisions in his life -- to stop smoking (a resolution that didn't last) and to buy his house from the felon Rezko.

Reading the article I didn't get much to suspect that indecisiveness had changed much.

I notice no one took on the whole question raised about the syncophant who painted the portrait. As I read, I couldn't believe the amount of koolaid he drank to slake his thrist. Just a tarted up version of People magazine article really. Who knew you could portray the Commander in Chief as Top Celebrity. Who knew? Not much more than the Paris HiltonKim Kardashian fashion paraade. Or is it merely the Manchurian Candidate has a summer fling with another chickenhawk?

Great critique. I thought maybe only I was seeing the distancing Obama engages in. Very astute comments.

[LeaNder]

"I think the author does need to bone up ..."

sounds close to my inner response to Michael Brenner, and I am quite pleased he picks up on the issue.

"(Both him and his predecessor should be in jail)"

I can understand the impulse concerning Bush jun's court. But I assume that the trouble is that whoever shaped matters ending in "Operation Enduring Freedom" can claim they were indeed true believers. ... Curveball, wasn't that the German's fault?

What should get Obama in jail? Ideally it should be something into which he wasn't thrown, so to speak. The drone war? ... If so, Jeffrey does not give us much evidence. ;)