What is Fords Legacy, really? Greg Sargent @ The Horses Mouth retrieved from archives the April 1975 speech by Pres. Ford declaring The Vietnam War is Over to point out that Beltway pundits are avoiding the obvious comparisons between Ford closing the door on Vietnam and Bush not being able to do the same in Iraq.
This well-known speech highlights a key aspect of Gerald Ford's legacy: His performance at the end of the Vietnam War. Yet if you read all the pieces lauding Ford, you'll find that this aspect of his Presidency -- his handling of the war's aftermath -- is not very high at all on the list of things that are praised by Washington's wisest commentators. This speech, for instance, was not mentioned in David Broder's column <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/27/AR200612270 1384.html> deifying Ford today. There was no mention of it in George Will's column <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/27/AR200612270 1384.html> on Ford, no mention in Robert Novak's column <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/27/AR200612270 1382.html> on him, and no mention in the Washington Post's grand and sweeping farewell editorial <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/27/AR200612270 1489.html> . In fact, neither Broder's nor Will's column even contained the words "Vietnam" or "Indochina." Nor did Novak or the Post editorial make any mention of Ford's declaration that the Vietnam war was over. Instead, those worthies spent most of their ink praising Ford for his "civility" or "decency" -- that is, mostly towards themselves and others in Washington, D.C. This strikes me as exceedingly strange -- and very revealing. Whatever the verdict on Ford's performance in the aftermath of Vietnam, Ford's handling of the end of the war would seem to be one of the aspects of his Presidency that has direct relevance to our current situation. It clearly bears most directly on the thing that matters to the American people more than any other issue right now -- that is, the Iraq war. After all, at this moment we're all awaiting a speech from another President about another seemingly hopeless quagmire that continues to claim the lives of Americans with no end in sight. While the historical parallels are far from perfect, many of Ford's phrases then have profound resonance in the current debate. http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/12/post_471.html#014936 <http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/12/post_471.html#014936> If you watched any of the Ford funeral you might have been struck as I was by Pres. Bushs seeming projection of Fords legacy as decent man who was right when everyone thought he had been wrong. Bush said it this way in his weekly radio address: He always put the needs of his country before his own, and did what he thought was right, even when those decisions were unpopular. Only years later would Americans come to fully appreciate the foresight and wisdom of this good man. >From the White House Saturday radio address Dec 30 2006 <http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/12/20061230.html> LA Times Editorial Dec. 31, 2006 <http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-bush31dec31,0,7181307.story?coll= la-opinion-leftrail> Job evaluation: George W. Bush It hasn't been a good year for the president. Even he knows that. IT'S THAT TIME of year, when the drones of corporate America gather their No. 2 pencils and call over to human resources for all the personnel files. The dirty little secret (or maybe it's not so secret) is that managers resent these yearly job performance evaluations as much as employees do. But why let the private sector have all the fun? An election is a kind of evaluation, of course, but what if our elected officials had to fit their year's accomplishments on the same kind of form with which millions of the rest of us are familiar? For President Bush, the results would not be encouraging. Knowledge of job: Below expectations. Despite describing himself as "the decider," employee often abdicated important decisions to others, as in his insistence that he could do nothing about prison conditions at Guantanamo Bay without judicial branch input. Job effectiveness: Below expectations, even his own, and not just in his controversial and poorly planned takeover of despotic foreign operation (also see previous evaluations). Confirmation of favored candidate for a top-level judicial branch appointment was a major achievement. But failed to rally support in legislative branch and among own partisans for positions on which he was in the right, such as his call for comprehensive immigration reform. Critical thinking skills: Meets expectations, which were low. Instead of building bridges to opponents within the legislative branch on foreign policy, he demonized them with this election-year rant: "The Democrat [sic] approach comes down to this: The terrorists win and America loses." Failed to dismiss key architect of war until after Republicans were routed in midterm elections. Works well with others: Meets expectations. More successful at staking out common ground with headstrong allies of own party than at seeking out compromise with extra-party rivals who may actually be useful to policy goals. Needlessly provoked Democrats with renomination of partisan flame-thrower to major international body even after it was clear that nominee was unfit for the job. Unclear at the end of this performance period whether he will accept any advice from the bipartisan Iraq Study Group. Financial management: Exceeds expectations. Federal budget deficit is smaller than expected, though employee's insistence that this is a result of his tax cuts is unpersuasive. Also, after the election, indicated that he was open to fresh talks with Democrats about Social Security. Areas for improvement: New management in legislative branch will require considerable improvement in people skills, especially but not exclusively in identifying a "way forward" in Iraq. To borrow a phrase associated with one of employee's predecessors, present employee needs to adopt a "kinder, gentler" rhetorical style, one that acknowledges past mistakes and doesn't demonize those who think differently. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Lest we forget, one major difference in Pres. Fords decision to declare an end to the Vietnam war and Pres. Bushs predicament about his Iraq war, besides the fact that Ford didnt start the longer and more deadly US involvement in Vietnam and Bush most certainly is responsible for Iraqs, is that we still had a huge active duty armed services then and today we have a very overtaxed volunteer army. Pres. Nixon ended the draft before the 1971 election (gaining some grateful voters in the process) but Pres. Bushs reported plans to announce a troop escalation of at least 20,000 suggests he will have some Fuzzy Math to do with troop numbers or, as some have suggested wickedly conscript the estimated 20,000 Blackwater private mercenaries operating in Iraq, outside the legal oversight of military law. If you have noticed the parallels between the critical factor of establishing a successful or at least resistant to a coup native govt between Vietnam and Iraq, this TIME article from 1971 reviews the recurring problems of successive coup detats in Vietnam that plagued talks of withdrawal. This is the problem with occupation, as the British and French well know. A friend sent me an essay this week that knits nicely into this period of comparing presidencies and the men whose legacies are now being made and polished (may Jerry Ford rest in peace). The Nixon pardon may be the wiser choice for the past, but times change, and democracy must not be sacrificed for convenience. Despite attempting to emulate TDR and Truman, Bush43 should have read Ikes bio and remembered Nixons. kwc Reasons to Like Ike Stephen Zunes, Foreign Policy in Focus, December 30, 2006 The fiftieth anniversary of the Suez Crisis came and went this past November without much notice. Thats too bad because the Bush administration could learn a lot from the crisis, which ensued when the armed forces of Great Britain, France, and Israel invaded Egypt, then under the rule of Gamal Abdul-Nasser. In a move that earned the United States respect around the world, the administration of Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower denounced the tripartite invasion as a violation of international law and used Americas considerable diplomatic leverage to force a withdrawal of these American allies. The goal of the British, French, and Israelis was regime change. They compared Nasser to Adolph Hitler and insisted he was threat to the regions security and to the world. He was believed to be developing chemical and biological weapons, and there was fear that he might even have long-term nuclear ambitions. He was accused of supporting Palestinian and Algerian terrorists. His nationalization of the Suez Canal Company from its British and French owners was seen as a dangerous socialist initiative that they hoped to reverse by re-opening the country to foreign investment and market principles. His autocratic rule and ruthless repression of dissent led to calls to liberate the country in the name of bringing democracy to the region. Yet, despite this, the Eisenhower administration wisely recognized that, should our erstwhile allies succeed in their overthrow and occupation, it would set a dangerous precedent. The United States had led the world just weeks earlier in condemning the Soviet Union for its brutal invasion of Hungary and its denial of their right of self-determination. Recognizing that consistency in the application of international law was critical for U.S. credibility, Eisenhower figured that it would be wrong to allow its Cold War allies to get away with what it condemned its Cold War adversary from doing. Indeed, Eisenhower realized that such an overt violation of the UN Charter and could risk a breakdown of the post-World War II international legal system critical to international stability. He also recognized that democracy could not be imposed from above and that free elections in the Middle East would not necessarily bring to power stable pro-American governments. The Eisenhower administration also recognized that the re-conquest of an Arab state by Western powers would breed widespread popular resistance, including guerrilla warfare and terrorism in Egypt and throughout the Arab/Islamic world, and would encourage anti-Western extremism. The threat of U.S. economic sanctions against Britain and France, still heavily in debt to the United States from World War II, as well as against Israel, which was even more dependent on U.S. contributions in its early years than it is today, was enough to force these countries to withdraw from Egypt within weeks. Eisenhower initially challenged the Israelis and our European allies just days prior to the 1956 presidential election, in which he was seeking his second term. Despite the widespread belief even at that time that its politically dangerous to criticize Israel during an election campaign, Eisenhower was re-elected by a landslide. This policy was even more popular overseas. According to historian Stephen Ambrose, in his biography of Eisenhower, Eisenhowers insistence on the primacy of the U.N., of treaty obligations, and of the rights of all nations gave the United States a standing in world opinion it had never before achieved. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles noted, This has been a policy which has evoked greater international support for the United States than we have secured at any time in our history. The Eisenhower administration was certainly not above violating international legal norms, such as clandestinely sponsoring coups against democratically elected governments in Guatemala and Iran. Yet at least the United States at that time had the sense to recognize the dangerous consequences of a full-scale invasion and occupation of an Arab nation by a Western power. It is profoundly disappointing how much our country has regressed in the past 50 years. President George W. Bush, with the support of the Republican and much of the Democratic leadership in Congress, launched an invasion of Iraq using the same flawed rationalizations that the British, French, and Israelis used in1956. Not surprisingly, the dangers of such an offensive war recognized by Eisenhower have largely come to pass. There is an important historic lesson here: when the United States defends our historic principles of enforcing the rule of law, support for the right of self-determination, and rejection of imperialism, we are respected and supported in the Arab and Islamic world. When we do otherwise, we become the targets of terrorists and extremists. In short, we are not hated for our values. We are hated because we have strayed from those values. Stephen Zunes is the Foreign Policy In Focus Middle East editor (www.fpif.org). He is a professor of Politics at the University of San Francisco and the author of Tinderbox: U.S. Middle East Policy and the Roots of Terrorism (Common Courage Press, 2003). http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/3844 <http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/3844>
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