Dean Formulates a Nuanced Approach to Foreign Policy
By DAVID E. SANGER and JODI WILGOREN
Published: December 14, 2003
MAHA, Dec. 12 ¡ª Howard Dean barely paused when asked what he would have done differently had he, instead of President Bush, been meeting with China's premier this week, in the midst of a flare-up between Taiwan and China.
"I would have probably said the same thing," he said of the president's warning to Taiwan not to even think about independence. "But I wouldn't have said it sitting next to the premier of China" because it undercut another American ally.
Similarly, Dr. Dean said he would strike all hard-edged references to pre-emptive strikes in the United States national security strategy ¡ª without actually abandoning pre-emption as an option.
"Of course we're going to use our force at our discretion to protect the United States," he said. "To say that we've never had a preemption policy would be foolish."
On Monday, Dr. Dean will give the first major foreign policy speech of his campaign, at a time when he is strengthening his leading position for the Democratic presidential nomination but also facing intense scrutiny and criticism from his rivals. In a 50-minute interview on Friday aboard a chartered jet, he talked about national security, trade and diplomatic style.
Dr. Dean's candidacy has been defined by his opposition to the war in Iraq, the position that most energizes his supporters. But more quietly, he is formulating a worldview that has surprising intersections with Mr. Bush's. The critical difference between him and Mr. Bush ¡ª the man he once respected as a fellow governor but now derides for having an "extraordinarily tin ear" ¡ª is oftentimes one of style more than substance.
"It's all about nuance," he said. Dr. Dean's discussion of North Korea and Iran, rebuilding Iraq and reconstructing the American intelligence community was filled with talk of course corrections, but few fundamental reversals in policy.
It is, some of his informal advisers say, the first evidence that Dr. Dean is already seeking ways to move to the middle ¡ª and to assure voters that the country would be safe in the hands of a Vermonter whose most complex foreign policy problem in the past decade was the New England dairy compact.
He shows a fluency in discussing the world that is certainly beyond where Mr. Bush was four years ago, when he talked about foreign policy and international trade with a reporter while tromping through a snowy Iowa town. Dr. Dean likes to remind people that he has visited 51 countries ¡ª dabbling as a student backpacker, then filling his passport as a governor with national ambition ¡ª arguing that he has a better sense of Africa and Asia than Mr. Bush did when he came into office.
His planned speech on Monday is the product of many hands, including former Vice President Al Gore, whose consultations on the text were a prelude to his recent endorsement of the Dean candidacy. (Dr. Dean will not say which parts Mr. Gore edited.)
He also plans to announce on Monday that a host of advisers ¡ª including W. Anthony Lake, former President Bill Clinton's first national security adviser; Adm. Stansfield Turner, the former director of the Central Intelligence Agency; and Adm. Charles Larson, the former commander of all forces in the Pacific ¡ª have signed on to the campaign. Like several of the other Democratic candidates, he also consults Samuel R. Berger, who succeeded Mr. Lake as national security adviser.
The speech is filled with critiques of how Mr. Bush squandered good will toward the United States, and assessments like this one: "The removal of Saddam Hussein was accomplished in the wrong way, at the wrong time, with inadequate planning, insufficient help and at unbelievable cost."
He concedes that he has not given thought to how to handle Pakistan, the tinderbox that Washington regarded chiefly as a nuclear renegade until the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Then Mr. Bush dropped sanctions against the country in hopes of securing its help in obliterating Al Qaeda.
And while a draft of his speech calls for $20 billion in spending to stop the flow of nuclear materials, he was at somewhat of a loss when asked how he might alter the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which failed to stop secret nuclear work in Iran and North Korea.
"I have to think about that," he said on Friday, as he headed from his home in Burlington, Vt., to Omaha for a campaign swing beginning in adjacent Council Bluffs, Iowa. "Clearly the current structure has not been as successful as it needs to be, and the question is, is it because there's inadequate inspection or is it because the treaty is flawed? I don't have an answer to that for you today."
Even items that are staples of his stump speech ¡ª like the proposal to replace National Guard and Reserves in Iraq with 100,000 international troops, mainly from Muslim and Arab countries ¡ª are short on specifics. He did not name the nations that might provide them, or explain, beyond promising to repair relations abroad, how he would persuade countries who feel they were shunned by the Bush administration to join in the reconstruction effort.
He said he was not surprised by the administration's moves to cut France, Germany, Russia and other nations out of American contracts for rebuilding Iraq, and then to ask the same countries to forgive Iraq's multibillion-dollar debts. "Tin ear is the characteristic of the president's foreign policy," he said.
Rarely since the Vietnam War have presidential hopefuls had to confront such issues in such detail so early in the primary season. But with the economy coming back and Iraq on voters' minds, candidates are asked questions daily in Iowa and New Hampshire about Iraq, and often about international trade.
To emphasize his differences with Mr. Bush, who came to office three years ago vowing that the military would never be tied up with "nation building," Dr. Dean says his hero was George C. Marshall ¡ª the general who rebuilt Europe after World War II. (Mr. Bush has belatedly taken up the Marshall imagery as well, citing his work as a model for Iraq.) But mostly Dr. Dean talks about when to pick up the big stick in public, and when to take a whack in private.
"I think business can be accomplished with respect but directness, and I think the president is probably direct but not respectful," Dr. Dean said. "And that's why his administration has had what I consider to be the most disastrous foreign policy since, I don't know when, my lifetime anyway.
"I believe in being very direct and very blunt privately. But I think it's important not to embarrass people publicly."
Except for Saudi Arabia. There he blames Mr. Bush for being uncharacteristically soft-spoken. He frequently mentions this as part of his plan to promote peace in the Middle East by pursuing renewable energy alternatives that would reduce American dependence on foreign oil.
"There are situations in which you would have to make very strong public statements, as I have about the Saudi funding of the teaching of small children around the Islamic world to hate Americans," Dr. Dean said. "I think that's important to have a very public, aggressive message about that because the private messages, if there are any, have clearly had very little effect."
It is in the realm of trade policy, where foreign affairs and labor concerns collide, that Dr. Dean sounds far more combative than President Bush. Mr. Bush has talked up free trade and then tried to route around it. Dr. Dean said he would rewrite the global rules.
