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More historical perspectives, with some embedded warnings. -
KWC Presidencies
hewn by war
By
Linda Feldmann, Staff writer of The
Christian Science Monitor March
21, 2003 @ http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0321/p01s02-woiq.html WASHINGTON - As chief executive, George W. Bush is known for
staying on schedule, turning in early, and getting a good night's sleep. Even
in the midst of national crises, there is not a hint of second-guessing or
agonizing over decisions. When asked how he will be judged by history, he
claims not to be concerned. That's for the historians to work out, he says. Since the start of his term, President Bush has barely
changed his routine. Yet there is
nothing routine about Bush's presidency. The Sept. 11-induced war on terrorism
has now morphed to include war on Iraq, the first under his so-called
"doctrine of preemption." And so Bush has further fixed his place in
history, joining a select category of presidents - those who have taken the
nation into war. He is gambling that he will join those noted for victory, not
defeat. Historians
agree that wars shape presidents. Rankings of America's greatest presidents invariably are
topped by those who led the nation successfully through major wars - Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Franklin
D. Roosevelt.
All rose to the occasion, communicating
effectively and projecting a vision. Even some of those who lost at war and suffered mortal
political wounds, such as Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson, have risen over time
in the estimation of historians. Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Bill Clinton both wished
out loud that they had had the chance to show their mettle during a national
crisis on the level of a major war.
But George W. Bush has no such complaint. Sept. 11, 2001, handed him the
opportunity to lead, and now he has pushed the envelope with a war of choice
against his father's nemesis, Saddam Hussein. Failure in Iraq could end Bush the Son's political career.
But victory guarantees nothing: Bush the Elder won the first Gulf War, only to
lose reelection over the economy. For
presidents, "the history of postwar America is such that a foreign-policy
triumph will not reelect you, but a disaster could kill you," says Allan Lichtman, a history professor
at the American University in Washington. "Three presidents since World
War II were driven from office from foreign-policy disasters: Truman in '52,
Johnson in '68, and [Jimmy] Carter in '80. Carter would have lost anyway,
probably, but I'm not sure about '52 and '68." There
is no one personality type best suited to fighting a war, historians say. Lincoln was plain-spoken and prone to
bouts of melancholy, but knew how to rally a nation. Franklin Roosevelt was
gregarious and charming. "His composure under stress was remarkable,"
writes biographer James MacGregor Burns. Woodrow Wilson, who led the nation
through World War I, has been described as a "dormant volcano." Truman projected humility and decisiveness - and, like the
current President Bush, made decisions and moved on. Johnson, in contrast,
personalized the Vietnam War and got bogged down, ruining his health. "In many ways, I think presidents as leaders in wars
pretty much have the same style characteristics as leaders in general,"
says Gary Hess, a historian at Bowling Green State University in Ohio and
author of the book "Presidential Decisions for War." "Johnson was always someone who worked tirelessly on
issues in the Senate, and practiced a lot of deception," he says.
"The same characteristics played out in Vietnam, especially the deceptive
part, which worked to
his disadvantage.
He was always trying to make the war sound better than it was." Bush, too, speaks in sanguine, forceful terms about the war
he has just embarked upon - a war aimed not only at destroying Iraq's weapons
of mass destruction and overthrowing its government, but also at turning the
entire Middle East into a bastion of democracy. Critics, moreover,
say he has deceived the American public into believing war is the only way to
protect the United States from Mr. Hussein. But unlike his fellow Texan, he shows no signs of becoming
overly immersed in detail. As a self-acknowledged nonexpert on foreign policy,
Bush relies on his advisers, most of whom came into office believing Hussein
had to be overthrown. "If
I had to put George W. Bush closest to another president, I would do it to
plain-spoken Harry Truman, who was straightforward, not charismatic, much to
the point,"
says David Abshire, president of the Center for the Study of the Presidency in
Washington. But
for Bush to succeed,
says Ambassador Abshire, he has to become a "grand strategist" in the vein of a
Dwight Eisenhower - and in particular, he has a lot of work to do to shore up
the United States' image abroad and the flailing global economy. Some historians see a Woodrow Wilson-esque grand vision in
Bush's talk about bringing democracy to the Middle East. But in another
important respect, Bush is the antithesis of Wilson: He is embarking on war with
a narrow coalition, in contrast with the vision of broad collective security
that became a hallmark of Wilson's presidency. Wilson was determined to focus on domestic issues, but
became embroiled in foreign policy, and eventually World War I. Bush entered
office much the same way. So far, he has not dropped his ambitious domestic
goals of cutting taxes and reforming Medicare. Yet history is littered with
presidents who tried to have it all, but had to give up on domestic goals in
favor of pressing foreign concerns. For Wilson, progressivism came to a halt in April 1917, when
the US entered the war. Franklin Roosevelt went from being Dr. New Deal to Dr.
Win the War. Truman's Fair Deal was killed off by the Korean War. Johnson's war
on poverty bit the dust when the Vietnam War took center stage. For
all these presidents, war was a transforming experience. In turn, the nation
was transformed.
World War I brought a period of isolationism. World War II gave birth to the
United Nations. Now, after the US decision to go to war without UN support, the
future of that body's security component is in question. "A president
can act wisely, as Bush did with 9/11," says Robert
Dallek, a historian at Boston University. "Then there's the danger he'll overreach." Outgoing mail scanned by NAV 2002 |
