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Answer
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Name
Dina
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Profession
Question
As, you talked about the American support for Israel as being a potential "root cause" of terrorism and you said that US policies should not be dictated by terrorist attacks, your policies shouldn't be dictated by terrorist attacks.
It should rather be dicatated by the grievances of the people of the region, who have been subjected to oppression and humiliation for decades. Don't you think that terrorist attacks should raise the alarm about the growing frustration in the region?
In other words, don't you think that the US policies should be changed, not because of the attacks themselves, but because those attacks are indications that the policies are wrong? It's not about giving in to "terrorists"; rather, it's about realizing the fact that those people reflect the grievances their societies have.
Answer
Hi, Dina.
Thank you for your questions.
You have mentioned two points. One is that the attacks themselves are more evil and immoral than anything else in the conflict. So they become the main problem and the main grievance.
Even if people have a legitimate grievance, if they engage in terrorism they lose all moral standing, and there is no obligation to any longer to consider their grievance.
Your second point is that the US tried as hard as it could to resolve the Israel-Palestinian issue. The one foreign guest who stayed at the White House most often in Clinton's 8 years was Yasir Arafat.
But in the end, the Palestinian side refused any peace settlement. The only solution to Palestinian grievances can come from the Palestinians, by agreeing to a peace settlement in which there will be two states.
Name
Isabelle
- United Kingdom
Profession
Question
Sir,
It's obvious to the world that US foreign policy is formed and enacted in a moral vacuum. My question to you, sir, is: how do you people sleep at night?
Even if you do not believe that you will be held accountable for your actions by your Creator, doesn't your conscience hurt you? Don't you look at your children and think of other children just as beautiful as yours who are living in the most inhumane of conditions because of decisions YOU took?
Answer
Isabelle, it seems very different to me, and if possible I'd like you to explain what you are referring to. As I see it, the US is one of the few countries whose foreign policy factors in moral considerations.
Every country will put its own security first. Every contry's foreign policy will give highest priority to its own wellbeing. But some coutries also give a measure of consideration to moral questions. And some do not.
To my mind, Russia and China are examples of countries that consider nothing but their own interests.
The US, first of all, considers its own interests. But also gives consideration to moral factors.
For example, that is why we went into Somalia in 1992 to end the famine.
In part why we bombed the Serbs in 1995 (3 years too late, alas) to end their ethnic cleansing of Bosnian Muslims.
It is why we give a lot of money in foreign aid and give some emphasis (not enough) to human rights in our diplomacy.
It was also the United States that at the end of World War Two, when we emerged as a superpower, used our power to insist on an end to colonialism.
The United States is a mighty military force, but it has no empire and does not threaten its neighbors.
Name
H. Toadstool
- New Zealand (Aotearoa)
Profession
Lecturer on Female Anatomy
Question
What has been your experience in responding to claims by Islamic terrorists that the native population is not ready to participate in Western-style democratic republican governments?
Answer
Toadstool, I would be careful about the word "western-style." Today there are 192 independent countries in the world. 122 or 64% have governments that were freely elected in legitimate elections by their citizens. This means that democracy is becoming a norm in all parts of the world.
Of course, it is hard to establish democracy where it hasn't been before, and some countries try and fail a few times before they get it. France is in its Fifth Republic.
And it is hard to establish and sustain democracy in countries that are poor or have low literacy or ethnic conflicts, etc. But to say it is hard, does not mean it is impossible. I believe that ultimately democracy is possible everywhere.
Name
Aisha
- Algeria
Profession
Question
Don't you think that it's unfair that after decades of supporting dictators to continue imposing on the people of the region the type of political system they live under? Who said that democracy was the political system that suited the countries of the region? I'm not making here the argument that the region's culture is incompatible with democracy, but I just can't understand why it's taken for granted that it's the best option they have. Why doesn't the United States leave the people of the region decide for themselves? i.e. instead of "promoting democracy," why don't the Americans give people the right to free choice without starving them?
Answer
Hi, Aisha. I don't know what you mean by "starving them." There are indeed people in many corners of the world who are starving, and none of us -- or very few -- whether individuals or countries, are doing enough to help them. But I don't think that the United States is starving anyone.
When you say "right of free choice" then we are really on the same side. How can people have the right of free choice? The only way I know is through elections, in other words "democracy."
Usually, it is dictators who say "our people are very happy with our own ways; they don't want democracy." But everywhere in the world when people who did not have democracy got a chance to speak for themselves they have always chosen democracy. That was true in Chile, the Philippines, Poland, Nicargua, Cambodia, Lebanon, etc.
It is surely NOT America's business to tell you whom to elect (even if you elect leaders we don't like). But what is wrong with our saying that we believe people everywhere should elect their own leaders rather than having dictators imposed on them?
Name
Cheri
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Profession
Question
The US is so concerned about the democratization of the Middle East. Yet, when the ME DOES take steps to democratize (the elections in Palestine is a prime example), you decide to PUNISH the people who are doing what YOU wanted. Are you trying to teach us (I am Egyptian) by hypocrisy? I have studied teaching and if anything, you are supposed to teach people by example.
My question is: how far is the US going to go? How many more ME countries do you want to invade, and when will this end? What would make US foreign policy happy? Full ownership of all natural resources in the region?
Answer
Hi, Cheri. Your question contains about five different points, so I'll try to respond one at a time. First, we believe that the Palestinians have a right to elect their own leaders, whomever they choose. But we also have a right to deal with those leaders as we see fit. Hamas is a party of war, a party of genocide. Its program is to destroy Israel and to kill Jews. It is a terrorist organization. The Palestinians are free to vote for it. But you cannot expect us to support it. By the way, it is not just Israel and Jews that Hamas threatens. If you will read the Hamas charter you will see that it proclaims that every inch of land in the world including Spain that was ever conquered by Muslims is part of the holy Waqf that must be reclaimed by force.
Second, I do not believe that the United States is going to invade any other country in the region. I am pretty sure of this. (One exception: we may bomb Iran's nuclear weapons facilities.) But the United States is not after ownership of any natural resources.
We may or may not have been wrong to invade Iraq, but it had nothing to do with wanting Iraq's natural resources. The United States uses a fair amount of foreign petroleum, but we don't get it anywhere by conquest. We buy it. That is a much cheaper and easier way to get it.
You might think what we have done is terrible wrong, and even immoral. But you will become a more cogent critic of our policies if you try to understand them, and seizing resources has nothing at all to do with it.
Name
Anonymous
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Profession
Question
You say in your article, "Democracy will never be our only goal. The real question is whether democracy will be included in the mix of our main goals."
What if your other goals (that are directly related to your short-run self interest) conflict, on many occasions, with your goal of achieving democracy in the Middle East. Usually other goals take priority, not democracy. I don't think that being intermittent in speaking out and calling for democracy can get the Middle East anywhere. You just don't have a solid, coherent stance or tone. Your other interests take priority and democracy is lost
Answer
Anonymous, that is a very powerful critique. You are right. We will often put other things first. For example, we are going easy on Libya now because Qaddafy gave up his nukes, and proliferation is a very big issue for us. We go easy on Musharraf because we want his cooperation against Al Qaeda and terrorism. So I don't disagreee with you very much, and I wish the United States gave democracy a stronger priority.
However, it think it is not as bad as you think. The fact that we are constantly talking about democracy and putting some diplomatic pressure and reorienting our foreign aid donations to stress democratization -- all these things have some impact. And we have seen some slight movement in the region in the last two years because of it.
Let me share a story with you that gives an analogy. I wrote my doctoral dissertation on the subject of the elevation of human rights to a higher profile in US foreign policy by President Carter in 1977-80. I criticized him very strongly for his inconsistency. Human rights always seemed to get overridden by other policy goals. Thus the United States almost never criticized such influential countries as China and Saudi Arabia, even though both had abysmal human rights records. But what I realized years later was that despite all the inconsistencies and hypocrisies, Carter's constant harping on human rights did make a big difference. The world is in much better shape regarding human rights today than it was in 1977. So I hope that our new emphasis on democracy -- even though you correctly point out our flaws -- will still have a beneficial impact.
Name
susan
- United States
Profession
teacher
Question
If Iraq turns into a stable functioning democracy and or America becomes more even handed with Israel/Palestine will that make Muslims feel more positive about America?
Answer
Hi, Susan. I don't know that I am in a good position to speak for how Muslims feel. But I'll make a guess.
I doubt that a change in US policy toward Israel/Palestine would do it, because it is hard to imagine US policy changing that much. President Bush is an unusually strong supporter of Israel's. But even when we had presidents who were less strong in that direction, for example, Bush's father, there was still a lot of hostility to America. Perhaps somewhat less. And it is hard to imagine a president who would be more on the Palestinian side.
A more likely scenario is that we leave Iraq in a few years and leave behind a functioning, democratically-elected government. I don't think that would be a cure-all for anger at America. But at least people in the region would see that we were not trying to usurp Iraqi oil or to create an empire or a military base in the region.
There are many reasons why people in the region are angry at us, but if they could see that in Iraq we were not lying about our purposes and our purposes were not as malign as they suspected, then I think that many would think again about their anger at us.
