American Un-Exceptionalism, and the Limits of Soft Power

The WaPo reports that at Iran's nuclear summit, Pres Ahmadinejad called on the US to disarm first, and to end its "blind support" of Israel which has over 200 nuclear weapons but has not yet signed the NPT.  Criticizing the administration's nuclear strategy that does not rule out the use of nuclear weapons against North Korea and Iran, Ahmadinejad states "Threatening with nuclear weapons only dishonored the American government officials and more fully exposed their inhumane and aggressive policies." Meanwhile, Charles Krauthammer criticizes Obama's recent nuclear summit pointing out that the most urgent threats to nuclear terrorism and proliferation, Pakistani plutonium and Iran's uranium enrichment, were not on the table for discussion. In a similar vein, Shadow Government points out in a post titled "Did We Come Away from the Nuclear Summit Empty-Handed?", that in regards to Iran, China and Russia both said diplomacy instead of sanctions should be pursued, and that Turkey stated prior to the summit that Israel was a greater threat to peace in the mideast region, and that sanctions would be ineffective. Shadow Gov't concludes:

The danger is that the blizzard of documents and words will be mistaken for action by those who fear nuclear terrorism but seek to avoid the costs of doing something about it. The greater danger is that others will conclude that they face only such words if they continue to develop or acquire nuclear weapons.

In short, while the nuclear summit produced some marginally useful steps towards nuclear non-proliferation, it nibbled around the edges avoiding the tough problems of Iran, Pakistan, North Korea, and to some extent, Syria, whose facility was bombed by Israel last year.

Critics of Bush's foreign policy would often point out the limits of hard power, which is getting other countries to do what you want them to do. Iraq was their vindication on the limits of military force enabling one country to impose its will on another.  They mourned for the loss of US moral authority and with it, soft power.  Soft power is based on cooperation and moral suasion, as its architect Joseph Nye puts it, on getting countries to want what you want.  The foreign policy establishment like all other elite academic institutions, was enthralled when Pres Obama took office based on the premise he would resuscitate America's moral standing in the world. Soft power was back and in vogue again. Ushered in with this new era of soft power came realpolitik--as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pointed out, ideology is so yesterday.

Yet Nye also says that soft power is rooted in a country's values, institutions, and policies. These values, combined with overlapping nat'l interests that realists key on, should attract other countries in the international arena for cooperation. But what moral authority has Pres Obama restored?  To some degree, his administration has offered a more consultative tone to other countries.  But in other areas, the administration does little to showcase American values. The persecution of the CIA and upholding of the torture narrative have only confirmed and given fodder to what our adversaries already think of us. Only through mirror imaging can one naively believe that other cultures will somehow seek to emulate or appreciate the US style of openness, making them magically more prone to cooperate with us.

Democracy and human rights, the latter a potentially effective tool against the Iranian regime in wake of the protests, are not a priority for this administration. Longtime allies such as Great Britain, have had their special relationship with us donwgraded. Obama abrogated the BMD agreement with Poland and the Czech Republic, and has ignored the President of Georgia, a country who dedicated 5000 troops to Iraq, a large sacrifice for so small a country. Instead, he chases after Putin and Medveded on START treaties. They gladly accept the great power stage Obama hands to him, while clearly refusing to play along on Iranian sanctions, stating instead they will complete Iran's Bushehr nuclear reactor this year. And Israel--well, in the administration's mind, they are part of the problem. So there seems to be very little effort on the administration's part to work with allies already predisposed to cooperate with America on the problem of nuclear proliferation, or even to defend fellow democracies rhetorically. 

Some foreign policy wonks like Walter Russell Mead believe Obama's view is more along the lines of the Jeffersonian tradition, mixed with Wilsonian idealism. The former seeks to minimize American commitments and to dismantle the national security state as much as possible, seeking instead to be the best example of democracy for others by living up to it at home. The latter seeks a moral authority through international cooperation thru multi-lateral institutions like the UN.

However, I believe Obama's worldview goes beyond the traditional academic circles of theory.   There is a difference in approaching others with humility, or to "talk softly and carry a big stick," and constantly apologizing, bowing to monarchs and autocrats, and refusing to acknowledge American exceptionalism.  It's symptomatic of a perspective that views the world through moral relativism and equivalence.  As Melanie Phillips points out, "Obama believes America has to expiate its sins: both its original, Founding sins of slavery and racism, and its latter-day sins against the world of Islam."  This moral equivalence is used against us by our rivals--because if America is badly flawed and has committed atrocities to the same extent as others, than there's no point really, in following our lead. We see this reasoning in Pres Ahmadinejad's words. To be sure, he would have probably used this same sort of rhetoric against any US administration, but what's interesting is that others like Turkey, are agreeing with Iran that the bigger problem for proliferation is Israel.  Iran's own nuclear summit attracted 60 countries while the US included 47 countries, showing Iran is not alone in its thinking.  Why not pound away at America's moral standing when the President himself will not speak convincingly of America's values overseas, and instead seems to be embarrassed of his country when he speaks about its past? Why give up your nuclear potential and instead demand that America disarm itself and Israel, since the American President himself clearly devalued the possession and use of nuclear weapons?

As Rich Lowry notes:

Obama hopes that throwing America's past under the bus will win him diplomatic chits abroad, as we "break free" from "stale debates and old ideologies." What he doesn't realize is that for enemies like Iran and Venezuela, the debates aren't stale and the ideologies aren't old. For these players, Obama's rhetorical concessions aren't ways to move beyond the debates but to make advances within them.

Nye acknowledges that soft power must be combined with hard power--he argues that it makes hard power more effective. But with nuclear terrorism, an issue the administration rightfully presented as being one of the biggest challenges to our national security in our lifetime, there is very little hard power to accompany it. And as such, Iran, North Korea, and others continue defiantly to undermine the administration's non-nuclear proliferation push.  If you view it thru the lens of moral equivalence--that after all, Israel has nukes, we've used nukes as Pres Obama has reminded the world, and America really isn't exceptional, it makes sense to resign yourself to a nuclear-capable Iran.