Hillary, McCain and Jingoism
I was in Baku on an oil story when Hillary Clinton visited Central Asia during the 1990s, but when I got back to Almaty I asked around for local impressions of her. The visit went over well, I was told by her Kazakh and Uzbek hosts -- she stopped by a pre-natal care clinic in Almaty, and met with Kazakhstan's Nursultan Nazarbayev and, in Tashkent, with Uzbekistan's Islam Karimov. But I also heard a singular personal observation from the amused locals -- Clinton, it turns out, doesn't have an athlete's slim legs.How to respond to an immature remark? Probably with silence, which is what I did. And in fact, I didn't hear Nazarbayev, Karimov or any other official or reporter say publicly: F-A-T T-H-I-G-H-S.
Nor for that matter did I hear then or since any public official abroad say of John McCain: "I looked into his eyes and saw three letters: O-L-D."
Which brings me to recent remarks by Clinton and McCain, both of whom maintain that above all else what sets them apart from their respective rivals in both main parties is gravitas on the foreign policy stage.
So how is it that we find Clinton saying of Vladimir Putin, as she did yesterday: "he's a KGB agent. By definition he doesn't have a soul." And McCain in a newspaper interview: "I looked into his eyes and saw three letters: a K, a G and a B."
Both of these knee-slappers were intended as swipes at President Bush for his oft-quoted 2001 remark about Putin, as kindly provided by the L.A. Times' Andrew Malcolm: "I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy. We had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul; a man deeply committed to his country and the best interests of his country. And I appreciated so very much the frank dialogue."
Did Bush's remark reflect wisdom or good judgment? No. But neither does it require any to remark on someone's well-known former employment.
Putin's KGB background does affect Kremlin policy. The thrust of it is -- anything goes. In other words, set the goal, and use whatever means necessary to achieve it, which is a worrying approach to domestic and foreign policy.
But Putin is going to be around a long time, and the U.S. is going to have to find a common language with him. Rather than offering a serious approach, Clinton and McCain dived quite happily into the muck in a craven effort to capture the base.
Photo: DBKing
Rights: Creative Commons
Labels: Caspian, central asia, hillary, mccain, oil book, presidential campaign, Putin, Russia, russia book, soul
8 Comments:
Wasn't Putin not too long ago saying nasty things about the "west" during his party's own campaign? Not sure why our politicians shouldn't reciprocate. Correct me, but hasn't Putin managed to create a whole new generation of America haters in Russia?
The cold war is back on. Don't see why our politicians should act like it isn't. It might be helpful once we decide to finally do something about our oil habit to have some enemies to point to. Putin makes for a ready target.
Welcome Great Green Hammer. Good humor in your final couple of lines. On the previous, Putin's remarks regarding the West at Munich, while widely described as belligerent, actually were fairly mild observations that one, unspecified power was attempting to have its way around the world regardless of anyone else's opinion. That seems a reasonable description of the last seven or so years. Nashi, meanwhile, is a nationalist movement comparable to any of our own here. The point for me, however, is how the president comports himself. It's he who must be the ultimate negotiator of matters of import. What Clinton said, for instance, simply isn't serious. It's talk radio blather, precisely what she rails against.
Thanks for the comment, Steve
Cheers Steve.
Perhaps more disturbing than Putin's rhetoric, which admitedly, i might be picking at nits there, is Russia's sale of anti-missle tech to the Iranians. I can't help but think that this recent military transfer may have something to do with the latest provocation in the Straight. I guess what I'm getting at, is the Iranians mistakenly believed we would sink those boats-- creating a sort of "reverse Gulf of Tonkin" -- allowing them to test all their fresh military goodies via Putin. Sounds crazy, but for some reason, Iran might believe they have a shot at taking us down militarily.
Do you think perhaps that Putin is grooming another proxy war candidate (Iran) to take on the US the same way Moscow goaded Egypt and Syria in to attacking Israel during the 70s? What better way to measure the effectiveness of Russian weaponry against the West than to dupe Iran into another confrontation? It satisfies Russian strategic interest on so many levels -- It's a boon for their military R&D infrastructure but most importantly, its just good for business as it would send crude to prices we'd never dreamed of.
anyway, thanks for putting together such a thoughtful and wonderful blog Steve. And thanks for humoring a foreign affairs neophite like myself.
Um, some evidence that the USSR goaded Egypt and Syria into attacking Israel in the 1970s would be nice here. They seemed to have been as suprised as anyone by the '73 war, and that war certainly didn't help the Soviets. At all.
thegreenhammer:
So far Russia has sold nothing of strategic value to Iran. For the last 15 years there've rumors of sales of everything upto and including Backfire bombers. A couple of diesel subs (questionably maintained), point-defence surface-to-air missiles, and that's about it. Nothing on the scale of sales to India, China or even Venezuela. At least in an air-campaign, Iran will get rolled.
I think it might also be worth noting that anti-missile systems need to be effective to be worrisome. Thus far, even the best we have (the short range missile and gatling batteries on CVNs) aren't too fantastic, though they're far better than nothing.
Shooting down missiles is still really hard—Iran is nothing to worry about in that regard anytime in the future. Their decision to adopt smaller vessels and swarm tactics in the water, however, is.
Steve, I have to say, it's almost like you're angry that power-hungry politicians are saying whatever they have to to get into power. I don't know where you could have possibly gotten that idea, though — clearly, all of the presidential candidates represent the highest ideals of selfless love of country and enlightened desire to lead.
Hammer, I tend to be anti-conspiratorialist, so would discount the notion that Russia would be conducting a grand scheme with its Iran policy. In fact, I've argued the opposite -- that Putin would love the international accord that would go with settling the Iran-West impasse. But it's not so easy, he has found, even when you cozy up to Khameini.
Josh, I suppose some mild irritation -- okay, anger -- creeped in to that post. It's just that Clinton and McCain are supposed to be representing the adult wing of each of their parties, so one -- perhaps vainly -- expects more.
Posting this for Brian Quigley in Tashkent:
Hi Steve,
I posted last week regarding one of your articles, and I really enjoy the web site.
Your last entry "Hilary, McCain and Jingoism" on the US Presidential candidate's smearing of Putin precisely echoed what I've been saying to others since McCain's first shot at him.
Along with the lame attack on Putin's KGB background - as if there aren't enough former CIA types plying lesser trades throughout the world - it's fascinating that many 'Cold Warrior' pundits credited 'Godlessness' as the main reason for the collapse of the USSR. Yet there is Putin, as devout an Orthodox as the leadership has seen in at least 90 years, leading Russia back to - if not social, economic - an important geopolitical position.
I guess Putin's religious affiliation curried a bit of (perhaps, misplaced) favor and affection in Bush's eyes, but aside from the general flawed logic
comparing the Soviet of old as the Russia of new - it's a simply a pity that the 'scare tactics' of the 60s-70s-80s appear to be back en vogue as the candidates hit the trail.
Such stupid, off-the-cuff commentary by presidential candidates on countries (or leaders) that the US doesn't see as completely 'democratic' or 'partners in the War on Terror' continues to be an embarassing,
open advertisement of the severe intellectual/world view limitation of all candidates...or further proof that the campaigns are hijacked by their cynical PR managers (or both...).
And, of course, should either get elected, is it not a rather inauspicious start to relations with an important future partner...?
I'd have posted the response to your Putin post to the web site but access has been 'limited' in Tashkent this week, unfortunately. Nor can I read the other comments, which I would have enjoyed. Such is life.
Please include me on the mailing list.
Best regards
Brian Quigley
Tashkent, Uzbekistan
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