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NO RETREAT FROM THE RISE OF FREEDOM |
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Written by Tim Pawlenty
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Tuesday, 28 June 2011 |
[This is the full text
of Tim Pawlenty's address today, 6/28, to the Council on Foreign Relation on
American policy towards the Middle
East.]
I want to speak plainly this morning about the opportunities and the dangers
we face today in the Middle East. The revolutions
now roiling that region offer the promise of a more democratic, more open, and
a more prosperous Arab world. From Morocco
to the Arabian Gulf, the escape from the dead hand of
oppression is now a real possibility.
Now is not the time to retreat from freedom's rise.
Yet at the same time, we know these revolutions can bring to power
forces that are neither democratic nor forward-looking. Just as the
people of Egypt,
Tunisia, Libya,
Syria and
elsewhere see a chance for a better life of genuine freedom, the leaders of
radical Islam see a chance to ride political turmoil into power.
The United States
has a vital stake in the future of this region. We have been presented
with a challenge as great as any we have faced in recent decades. And we
must get it right. The question is, are we up to the challenge?
My answer is, of course we are. If we are clear about our
interests and guided by our principles, we can help steer events in the right
direction. Our nation has done this in the past -- at the end of World
War II, in the last decade of the Cold War, and in the more recent war on
terror ... and we can do it again.
But President Obama has failed to formulate and carry out an
effective and coherent strategy in response to these events. He has been
timid, slow, and too often without a clear understanding of our interests or a
clear commitment to our principles.
And parts of the Republican Party now seem to be trying to out-bid
the Democrats in appealing to isolationist sentiments. This is no time
for uncertain leadership in either party. The stakes are simply too high,
and the opportunity is simply too great.
No one in this Administration predicted the events of the Arab
spring - but the freedom deficit in the Arab world was no secret. For 60
years, Western nations excused and accommodated the lack of freedom in the Middle
East. That could not last. The days of comfortable
private deals with dictators were coming to an end in the age of Twitter, You
Tube, and Facebook. And history teaches there is no such thing as stable
oppression.
President Obama has ignored that lesson of history. Instead
of promoting democracy - whose fruit we see now ripening across the region - he
adopted a murky policy he called "engagement."
"Engagement" meant that in 2009, when the Iranian ayatollahs stole
an election, and the people of that country rose up in protest, President Obama
held his tongue. His silence validated the mullahs, despite the blood on
their hands and the nuclear centrifuges in their tunnels.
While protesters were killed and tortured, Secretary Clinton said
the Administration was "waiting to see the outcome of the internal Iranian
processes." She and the president waited long enough to see the Green
Movement crushed.
"Engagement" meant that in his first year in office, President
Obama cut democracy funding for Egyptian civil society by 74 percent. As
one American democracy organization noted, this was "perceived by Egyptian
democracy activists as signaling a lack of support." They perceived
correctly. It was a lack of support.
"Engagement" meant that when crisis erupted in Cairo
this year, as tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Tahrir
Square, Secretary Clinton declared, "the Egyptian
Government is stable." Two weeks later, Mubarak was gone. When
Secretary Clinton visited Cairo
after Mubarak's fall, democratic activist groups refused to meet with her.
And who can blame them?
The forces we now need to succeed in Egypt
-- the pro-democracy, secular political parties -- these are the very people
President Obama cut off, and Secretary Clinton dismissed.
The Obama "engagement" policy in Syria
led the Administration to call Bashar al Assad a "reformer." Even as
Assad's regime was shooting hundreds of protesters dead in the street,
President Obama announced his plan to give Assad "an alternative vision of
himself." Does anyone outside a therapist's office have any idea what
that means? This is what passes for moral clarity in the Obama
Administration.
By contrast, I called for Assad's departure on March 29; I call for
it again today. We should recall our ambassador from Damascus;
and I call for that again today. The leader of the United
States should never leave those willing to
sacrifice their lives in the cause of freedom wondering where America
stands. As President, I will not.
We need a president who fully understands that America
never "leads from behind."
We cannot underestimate how pivotal this moment is in Middle
Eastern history. We need decisive, clear-eyed leadership that is
responsive to this historical moment of change in ways that are consistent with
our deepest principles and safeguards our vital interests.
Opportunity still exists amid the turmoil of
the Arab Spring -- and we should seize it.
As I see it, the governments of the Middle East
fall into four broad categories, and each requires a different strategic
approach.
The first category consists of three countries now at various
stages of transition toward democracy - the formerly fake republics in Egypt,
Tunisia, and Libya.
Iraq is
also in this category, but is further along on its journey toward democracy.
For these countries, our goal should be to help promote freedom and
democracy.
Elections that produce anti-democratic regimes undermine both
freedom and stability. We must do more than monitor polling places.
We must redirect foreign aid away from efforts to merely build good will,
and toward efforts to build good allies -- genuine democracies governed by free
people according to the rule of law. And we must insist that our
international partners get off the sidelines and do the same.
We should have no illusions about the difficulty of the transitions
faced by Libya,
Tunisia, and
especially Egypt.
Whereas Libya
is rich in oil, and Tunisia
is small, Egypt
is large, populous, and poor. Among the region's emerging democracies, it
remains the biggest opportunity and the biggest danger for American interests.
Having ejected the Mubarak regime, too many Egyptians are now
rejecting the beginnings of the economic opening engineered in the last decade.
We act out of friendship when we tell Egyptians, and every new democracy,
that economic growth and prosperity are the result of free markets and free
trade-not subsidies and foreign aid. If we want these countries to
succeed, we must afford them the respect of telling them the truth.
In Libya, the best help America can provide to these new friends is
to stop leading from behind and commit America's strength to removing Ghadafi,
recognizing the TNC as the government of Libya, and unfreezing assets so the
TNC can afford security and essential services as it marches toward Tripoli.
Beyond Libya,
America should
always promote the universal principles that undergird freedom. We should
press new friends to end discrimination against women, to establish independent
courts, and freedom of speech and the press. We must insist on religious
freedoms for all, including the region's minorities-whether Christian, Shia,
Sunni, or Bahai.
The second category of states is the Arab monarchies. Some -
like Jordan and
Morocco - are
engaging now in what looks like genuine reform. This should earn our
praise and our assistance. These kings have understood they must forge a
partnership with their own people, leading step by step toward more democratic
societies. These monarchies can smooth the path to constitutional reform
and freedom and thereby deepen their own legitimacy. If they choose this
route, they, too, deserve our help.
But others are resisting reform. While President Obama spoke well
about Bahrain
in his recent speech, he neglected to utter two important words: Saudi
Arabia.
US-Saudi relations are at an all-time low-and not primarily because
of the Arab Spring. They were going downhill fast, long before the
uprisings began. The Saudis saw an American Administration yearning to
engage Iran-just
at the time they saw Iran,
correctly, as a mortal enemy.
We need to tell the Saudis what we think, which will only be
effective if we have a position of trust with them. We will develop that
trust by demonstrating that we share their great concern about Iran
and that we are committed to doing all that is necessary to defend the region
from Iranian aggression.
At the same time, we need to be frank about what the Saudis must do
to insure stability in their own country. Above all, they need to reform
and open their society. Their treatment of Christians and other
minorities, and their treatment of women, is indefensible and must change.
We know that reform will come to Saudi
Arabia-sooner and more smoothly if the royal
family accepts and designs it. It will come later and with turbulence and
even violence if they resist. The vast wealth of their country should be
used to support reforms that fit Saudi history and culture-but not to buy off
the people as a substitute for lasting reform.
The third category consists of states that are directly hostile to America.
They include Iran
and Syria.
The Arab Spring has already vastly undermined the appeal of Al Qaeda and
the killing of Osama Bin Laden has significantly weakened it.
The success of peaceful protests in several Arab countries has
shown the world that terror is not only evil, but will eventually be overcome
by good. Peaceful protests may soon bring down the Assad regime in Syria.
The 2009 protests in Iran
inspired Arabs to seek their freedom. Similarly, the Arab protests of
this year, and the fall of regime after broken regime, can inspire Iranians to
seek their freedom once again.
We have a clear interest in seeing an end to Assad's murderous
regime. By sticking to Bashar al Assad so long, the Obama Administration
has not only frustrated Syrians who are fighting for freedom-it has
demonstrated strategic blindness. The governments of Iran
and Syria are
enemies of the United States.
They are not reformers and never will be. They support each other.
To weaken or replace one, is to weaken or replace the other.
The fall of the Assad mafia in Damascus
would weaken Hamas, which is headquartered there. It would weaken
Hezbollah, which gets its arms from Iran,
through Syria.
And it would weaken the Iranian regime itself.
To take advantage of this moment, we should press every diplomatic
and economic channel to bring the Assad reign of terror to an end. We
need more forceful sanctions to persuade Syria's
Sunni business elite that Assad is too expensive to keep backing. We need
to work with Turkey
and the Arab nations and the Europeans, to further isolate the regime.
And we need to encourage opponents of the regime by making our own
position very clear, right now: Bashar al-Assad must go.
When he does, the mullahs of Iran
will find themselves isolated and vulnerable. Syria
is Iran's only
Arab ally. If we peel that away, I believe it will hasten the fall of the
mullahs. And that is the ultimate goal we must pursue. It's the
singular opportunity offered to the world by the brave men and women of the
Arab Spring.
The march of freedom in the Middle East cuts
across the region's diversity of religious, ethnic, and political groups.
But it is born of a particular unity. It is a united front against
stolen elections and stolen liberty, secret police, corruption, and the
state-sanctioned violence that is the essence of the Iranian regime's tyranny.
So this is a moment to ratchet up pressure and speak with clarity.
More sanctions. More and better broadcasting into Iran.
More assistance to Iranians to access the Internet and satellite TV and
the knowledge and freedom that comes with it. More efforts to expose the
vicious repression inside that country and expose Teheran's regime for the
pariah it is.
And, very critically, we must have more clarity when it comes to Iran's
nuclear program. In 2008, candidate Barack Obama told AIPAC that he would
"always keep the threat of military action on the table to defend our security
and our ally Israel."
This year, he told AIPAC "we remain committed to preventing Iran
from acquiring nuclear weapons." So I have to ask: are all the options
still on the table or not? If he's not clear with us, it's no wonder that
even our closest allies are confused.
The Administration should enforce all sanctions for which legal
authority already exits. We should enact and then enforce new pending
legislation which strengthens sanctions particularly against the Iranian
Revolutionary Guards who control much of the Iranian economy.
And in the middle of all this, is Israel.
Israel
is unique in the region because of what it stands for and what it has
accomplished. And it is unique in the threat it faces-the threat of
annihilation. It has long been a bastion of democracy in a region of
tyranny and violence. And it is by far our closest ally in that part of
the world.
Despite wars and terrorists attacks, Israel offers all its
citizens, men and women, Jews, Christians, Muslims and, others including 1.5
million Arabs, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, the right to vote,
access to independent courts and all other democratic rights.
Nowhere has President Obama's lack of judgment been more stunning
than in his dealings with Israel.
It breaks my heart that President Obama treats Israel,
our great friend, as a problem, rather than as an ally. The President
seems to genuinely believe the Israeli-Palestinian conflict lies at the heart
of every problem in the Middle East. He said it Cairo
in 2009 and again this year.
President Obama could not be more wrong.
The uprisings in Tunis,
Cairo, Tripoli
and elsewhere are not about Israelis and Palestinians. They're about oppressed
people yearning for freedom and prosperity. Whether those countries
become prosperous and free is not about how many apartments Israel
builds in Jerusalem.
Today the president doesn't really have a policy toward the peace
process. He has an attitude. And let's be frank about what that
attitude is: he thinks Israel
is the problem. And he thinks the answer is always more pressure on Israel.
I reject that anti-Israel attitude. I reject it because Israel
is a close and reliable democratic ally. And I reject it because I know
the people of Israel
want peace.
Israeli - Palestinian peace is further away now than the day Barack
Obama came to office. But that does not have to be a permanent
situation.
We must recognize that peace will only come if everyone in the
region perceives clearly that America
stands strongly with Israel.
I would take a new approach.
First, I would never undermine Israel's
negotiating position, nor pressure it to accept borders which jeopardize
security and its ability to defend itself.
Second, I would not pressure Israel
to negotiate with Hamas or a Palestinian government that includes Hamas, unless
Hamas renounces terror, accepts Israel's
right to exist, and honors the previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements. In
short, Hamas needs to cease being a terrorist group in both word and deed as a
first step towards global legitimacy.
Third, I would ensure our assistance to the Palestinians
immediately ends if the teaching of hatred in Palestinian classrooms and
airwaves continues. That incitement must end now.
Fourth, I would recommend cultivating and empowering moderate
forces in Palestinian society.
When the Palestinians have leaders who are honest and capable, who
appreciate the rule of law, who understand that war against Israel has doomed
generations of Palestinians to lives of bitterness, violence, and poverty -
then peace will come.
The Middle East is changing before our
eyes-but our government has not kept up. It abandoned the promotion of
democracy just as Arabs were about to seize it. It sought to cozy up to
dictators just as their own people rose against them. It downplayed our
principles and distanced us from key allies.
All this was wrong, and these policies have failed. The
Administration has abandoned them, and at the price of American leadership.
A region that since World War II has looked to us for security and
progress now wonders where we are and what we're up to.
The next president must do better. Today, in our own Republican
Party, some look back and conclude our projection of strength and defense of
freedom was a product of different times and different challenges. While
times have changed, the nature of the challenge has not.
In the 1980s, we were up against a violent, totalitarian ideology
bent on subjugating the people and principles of the West. While others
sought to co-exist, President Reagan instead sought victory. So must we,
today. For America
is exceptional, and we have the moral clarity to lead the world.
It is not wrong for Republicans to question the conduct of
President Obama's military leadership in Libya.
There is much to question. And it is not wrong for Republicans to
debate the timing of our military drawdown in Afghanistan-
though my belief is that General Petraeus'
voice ought to carry the most weight on that question.
What is wrong, is for the Republican Party to shrink from the
challenges of American leadership in the world. History repeatedly warns
us that in the long run, weakness in foreign policy costs us and our children
much more than we'll save in a budget line item.
America
already has one political party devoted to decline, retrenchment, and
withdrawal. It does not need a second one.
Our enemies in the War on Terror, just like our opponents in the
Cold War, respect and respond to strength. Sometimes strength means
military intervention. Sometimes it means diplomatic pressure. It
always means moral clarity in word and deed.
That is the legacy of Republican foreign policy at its best, and
the banner our next Republican President must carry around the world.
Our ideals of economic and political freedom, of equality and
opportunity for all citizens, remain the dream of people in the Middle
East and throughout the world. As America
stands for these principles, and stands with our friends and allies, we will
help the Middle East transform this moment of turbulence
into a firmer, more lasting opportunity for freedom, peace, and progress.
Tim Pawlenty was Governor of Minnesota from 2003-2011. He is a Republican cadidate for President in 2012.
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