Romney and Obama’s international credentials

On Sept 11, the anniversary of America’s 9/11 terrorist attack, Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney said:

“It’s disgraceful that the Obama Administration’s first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks.” With that, all hell broke loose.

Romney was linking Obama to a statement from the U.S Embassy in Cairo on that day that sympathized with rioters who were inflamed by a rogue online film desecratating the Prophet Muhammad.

Hours later, extremist Salafi Muslim crowds attacked the U.S. consulate in Benghazi in Libya, killing Christopher Stevens, the U.S. Ambassador, and three other Americans. The Obama aides, the press and many neutral critics lashed back at Romney for seizing on the Cairo statement to attack the Obama Administration for political points. Since then, Romney’s foreign policy, previously on the back burner in an election all about the economy and jobs, has become a front-and-center concern.

Romney has not backed down on his Cairo statement, which was aimed at making Obama look weak and sympathetic to terrorists. Obama also had to revise his initial claim that the attack was unanticipated. Later evidence suggests the extremists used anger over the film to launch an attack that had been planned well in advance and that was known in part to Libyan officials.

For the Republican right wing, Romney’s hardline approach worked. But for the great middle of the U.S. electorate, it seemed to backfire. Obama’s standing to handle foreign policy rose in the polls, Romney’s fell.

There are 45 days left in the presidential campaign – plenty of time for this episode and a recent faux pas from Romney on Americans who don’t pay taxes, to do their damage but then fade.

But the event does raise the question:

What kind of international leaders would a first-term Romney or a second-term Obama be as presidents?

Romney, matching the Republican agenda, is more strident and has less daylight on his foreign policy than Obama. Obama started his term seeking to repair a hostile “with-us-or-against-us” image projected by George W. Bush. Remember the cheering masses in Berlin on Obama’s first visit? Obama has more grey in his foreign policy than Romney, a condition necessary for a sitting President who must daily balance force with diplomacy.

Romney doesn’t have to worry about being subtle, but he does need to convince voters that he’s internationally smart. The opposite has happened. Romney wanted to make Obama look weak. But since September 11, it’s been a bad two weeks for Romney. Even friendly conservatives have questioned his judgment. While Romney hasn’t backed down, he’s grown cautious, fogging up his international image more, but also leaving voters more perplexed.

On a checklist, Romney’s positions are:

India: Romney has called India a staunch ally and said aid to Pakistan should be conditioned on the nation’s tolerance for Taliban forces on the Western border. He would end aid if the Taliban presence continues. But Romney has been slammed for outsourcing jobs to India when he ran the private equity firm Bain Capital. Obama has said he’d bring outsourced jobs back, but few believe that is more than campaign rhetoric. Romney says India should open more to foreign investment – and it has, as evidenced by New Delhi’s long-awaited recent decision to allow foreign direct investment into its retail sector.

Israel: Romney is a hard-line supporter of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his call for drawing a “nuclear red line” on Iran’s bomb development. Romney has also suggested a trigger-point on Iran, and slammed Obama for not setting one. This is standard Republican policy but doubly important now to help Florida with its activist Jewish vote.

China: Romney regularly says he’ll stand up – even risk a trade war – with China for currency manipulation and that he’ll bring American jobs home. Obama also says he’ll bring jobs home but is less forceful about how. In truth, the only thing that would return jobs would be strikingly higher costs in China though yuan revaluation or inflation. Neither is in the current picture.

Afghanistan and Iraq: Romney seems close to the same position as Obama on the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2014, suggesting that he’d keep to that timetable if president. He has not attacked Obama for using 33,000 extra troops in a surge, which are now being withdrawn. More telling, he never mentioned Afghanistan or Iraq in his acceptance speech at the Republican convention. Some elements in the Republican Party would like him to be more hawkish, keeping more troops in Afghanistan, but polls show Americans want out of both Iraq and Afghanistan. One big question on Afghanistan is how Romney would react to China exerting greater influence in the strife torn nation through a “strategic partnership” with Afghan leaders, as recently reported by C. Raja Mohan in the Indian Express. While India has the same strategic arrangement, Romney’s endorsement of India as an ally means India’s role isn’t controversial.

East Asia: Romney has not expressed a position on the growing animosity to China in East Asia or over China-Japan skirmishes in the South China Sea. However, Romney has strongly endorsed Japan has an ally, fitting the Republican hawkish view of China as a potential enemy in a Japan-China dispute. Interestingly, his primary challenger Jon Huntsman, the former ambassador to China, has a much more nuanced view of China, arguing that the U.S. will have a topsy-turvy relationship with China for decades ahead no matter who is president.

Russia: Romney has been a tough critic of Vladimir Putin and says the Russian leader is bent on recreating the Russian empire. He opposes letting Russia into the World Trade Organization and would not cut missile defense, which he sees as a primary deterrent to Russia.

Climate change: Romney is a powerful proponent of American energy independence, meaning more oil and gas drilling on public lands, less regulation of coal mining and fewer subsidies for solar and wind power. Romney has been on both sides of the fence on the causes of global warming, saying he believes humans have been a factor, but also saying science does not know what is causing warming.

Global trade: Romney is a backer of more free trade agreements with South Korea and Central America and says Obama has been foot-dragging because American unions don’t want the deals.

Defense Spending: Romney has taken a hard line on cutting defense spending despite the $800 billion military budget, a move that is aimed at making Obama look weak and keeps defense “hawks” in his own party at bay. Obama’s advisers want to take out $200 billion or more in phased cutbacks and most observers believe that no matter who is president, defense spending, larger in aggregate than all the industrial countries combined, will have to shrink.

One key point of Romney critics is that he has more political than internationally experienced advisers around him; those with experience are the neo-cons who backed President Bush on the Iraq war.

Dan Senor who was a chief spokesman for the U.S. military out of Iraq, is a key adviser; as are John Bolton, Bush’s hawkish United Nations ambassador who advocates bombing Iran; Richard Williamson, a state department veteran who coordinates views among 40 different voices; writer Robert Kagan, a hardliner on the military budget and Aaron Friedberg, a Harvard professor called a foreign policy “realist.” A long time steady hand is Robert Zoellick, the former World Bank President.

There is time until the election for Romney to win international credentials a
nd for Obama to stumble. Unpopular as it is with pundits and critics, Romney is likely to hit Obama again on any sign of international weakness, because appearing “soft on America” stirs up voters. Bill Clinton slammed George H.W. Bush for letting the Serbian attacks multiply in Bosnia but once in office waited seven years before risking bombing to end that war. Obama ran for his first term claiming that Bush had let the Taliban return to Afghanistan by opening an unpopular war in Iraq. Obama will now withdraw from Afghanistan with Taliban attacks surging across key points in the country.

The bottom line is that Obama’s middle road foreign policy is understood and world leaders like that stability. Romney’s runs on campaign foreign policy. If elected, his real foreign policy won’t be known until he takes over next January.

Bob Dowling is Editorial Advisor to Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations.

This article was exclusively written for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. You can read more exclusive content here.

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