Foreign Policy: I was pretty blown away by a glimpse of what a Kerry foreign policy could look like, thanks to a panel organized by NDI that drew almost 500 foreign leaders and journalists at the Charles Hotel. It featured Kerry's lead national security advisor, Rand Beers, Richard Holbrooke (who absolutely must become secretary of state), former defense secretary Bill Perry, Gary Hart, Laura Tyson and Ernest Miller of the University of Maryland, introduced by Madeleine Albright. Since this is my thing, I plan to have more on this in posts and articles in the coming weeks. But briefly now, some highlights:

Rand Beers: How would a Kerry foreign policy be different from George W. Bush foreign policy? The four imperatives of a Kerry foreign policy:
1) To return to an era of alliances, reinvigorate our relationships with our friends, our allies, and with multilateral institutions around the world, to ensure as the US acts in the world, we do so with the broadest possible coalitions we can assemble.

2) To strengthen America's military, specifically by providing the kinds of forces that are needed for the threats of the 21st Century: 40,000 more US troops in the areas of special ops, military police, civil affairs, to deal with the threats of terror, failed states, etc.

3) Recognition the use of force is not the only option. Reemphasize the use of diplomacy, economic power, to express the values that America believes in and wishes to promulgate in the world.

4) Kerry believes America's dependence on foreign oil represents a serious impediment....What is unique about this is the marraiage of domestic and foreign policy on the energy independence issue....

Richard Holbrooke. [The beautiful bastard. Let's make him Secretary of State. He's arrogant, he's brilliant, he's a bull dog, he's a pragmatist, he's an internationalist, he's a born leader, even visionary, on the issues that plague the globe, from intervention to stop genocide, to finding a real solution to the global AIDS epidemic. He's as charming and undiplomatic as they come. The Bushies are always invoking Churchill. In my opinion, Holbrooke is as close as the US comes to a Churchill. -- ed: we got it. ]

Holbrooke's telling of the John Kerry story is so compelling but a bit long so will save it for some other telling. For now, just some brief key points:

The real difference between Kerry and Bush, the two men, is revealed in their personal backgrounds. Kerry is fundamentally an internationalist. It is relevant that he is the son of a foreign service officer, that his father served in Berlin during the height of the Cold War, that Kerry was educated in Europe, that he's married to a woman born abroad, it is relevant that he served in Vietnam. This is not just campaign rhetoric. Vietnam is centrally important to understanding Kerry....He came out of the war a war hero but someone questioning the war.....

John Kerry will be his own secretary of state. He will be a real hands on and enaged foreign policy chief. He likes to travel, he likes to sit around and talk about foreign policy issues, he cares about these issues, he is interested in foreign cultures, he's an internationalist.....

The candidates' platforms don't tell you what they are going to do. Presidents are inevitably confronted by realities. The better way to predict is to look at their personalities.

On multilateral institutions, Holbrooke said, the UN is a mess, but it's the only mess we have. We have to strengthen it, not like the Bushies try to delegitimize and weaken and unfund it. Room for some new multilateral institutions, but not to replace the UN (as some neocons have proposed the Community of Democracies would do -- Holbrooke says it won't work, and he's right. See my July American Prospect article on UN reform linked to on the left side of the site).

Gary Hart: globalization and info revolution............He was a bit hyped up, to tell you the truth, and sounded like a smart college kid.....

William Perry: talk about gravitas. If this guy becomes our next secretary of defense, we could not be in better hands. Why: because of Perry's totally clear eyed and intellectually prescient analysis of the problem. The transnational nature of the threats we face -- global terrorism, WMD proliferation, failed states, bifurcated world rich/poor -- need an international response. And he [and Holbrooke] have done it: in 1994, getting former Soviet successor states Ukraine and Kazakhstan to agree to remove their nuclear weapons to Russia, in 1995, the negotiation of the Dayton accords to end the Bosnian war; with North Korea, Perry negotiated getting the South Koreans and Japanese totally on board then going to Pyongyang and getting a deal (which now the Bushies have to their chagrin totally tried to return to)...

Perry quoted Churchill: the problem with allies is that sometimes they have ideas of their own.

He quoted Churchill again, the only thing worse than fighting a war with allies is fighting a war without allies.

More on all this later in some form.

Finally, I got to briefly grab former British foreign minister Robin Cook, a man I respect very much for his leadership on the humanitarian interventions in Bosnia and Kosovo, for a brief conversation about a subject near and dear to my heart: those alleged other British sources of intelligence on the African uranium issue. [You will remember Cook resigned from the Blair government expressing the belief that Blair was going to war in Iraq on false pretenses/hyped up intelligence]. Cook's response: there are none. There are no other British sources of intelligence that Iraq was seeking uranium in Niger. He said the French control Niger's uranium and any other intelligence on this issue the British had would have come from the French, and the French obviously didn't give it much credence.

Then, Matt Yglesias and I got really wonderful greasy cheeseburgers from Charlie's Kitchen, where the 75 year old updoed waitress Helen showed me the beautiful blue sequinced dress, with matching purse, that she is wearing tonight to the hottest and hard to get party ticket in town, the Creative Coalition party at Louis Boston. Go, Helen.

UPDATE: OK, the above is a bit over the top. Mostly I was relieved to be part of an event that involved issues I care about, was accessable in a way the convention is somehow not for me, and with potential future foreign policy advisors with whom I feel a shared perception of the world, reality. After years of going to events at AEI and observing the Bush administration, it is just so refreshing. That said it's over the top. Meanwhile, thanks to Spencer Ackerman for the correction of Bill Perry's former job title...

Posted by Laura at July 28, 2004 02:34 PM