Ken Adelman: Scuttle diplomacy (Reagan compared with Bush)
[Mr. Adelman, a U.N. ambassador and arms control director under President Reagan, now directs the Arts & Ideas series for the Aspen Institute.]
On May 15, President Bush announced vigorous support and urged the Senate to ratify the Law of the Sea Treaty. Mere mention of this treaty prompts a collective yawn. Yet herein lies a tale of dodgy diplomacy finally made right.
More than 25 years ago, LOS emerged from the dark sea onto the political horizon. President Reagan refused to follow the multilateral flow, since he viewed its deep-sea mining provisions as global socialism. Not knowing of any laws about any seas, I got involved by chance. My boss, U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Jeane Kirkpatrick, asked me to attend an early Reagan National Security Council meeting in the White House on, of all topics, this.
Secretary of State Alexander Haig opened by telling the new president that the treaty was nothing we'd want, but something we've got. After all, upwards of 150-odd nations crafted the accord since the LOS process began in 1966. Secretary Haig, reading rotely from his brief, droned on about modifications to sundry treaty provisions -- each with a myriad of subsections and micro-options. This, to put it mildly, was not playing to Reagan's strong suit.
Ronald Reagan and Donald Rumsfeld, 1983.
The president looked bored -- we all were -- and then puzzled. Finally, he broke in. "Uh, Al," he asked, "isn't this what the whole thing's all about?"
None of us could fathom what Reagan meant. Mr. Haig asked him. Well, Mr. Reagan shrugged, wasn't not going along with something "really stupid," just because 150 nations had done so, what the whole thing was all about? Our running? Our winning? Our being here? Our governing? Wasn't that what the whole thing was all about?
Stunned, Mr. Haig closed his briefing book and muttered something about how he'd be back to the president on how to get out of the treaty altogether.
After the usual government hiatus came another NSC meeting on the topic. I modestly suggested dispatching a special LOS envoy to explain the president's views directly to allied leaders. These "heads of government . . . do not know much about the LOS Treaty," I understatedly wrote White House counselor Ed Meese on June 29, 1982. "The [LOS] experts are hopeless; they have been negotiating his thing for 10 years" and are stuck in that rut.
Another bout of government hibernation. Then the usual flurry.
The president suddenly asked ex-Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld to be his LOS envoy. The next day, the new secretary of state, George Shultz, called to say that Mr. Rumsfeld asked me to accompany him. "Since you handle this issue in the U.N., Don thought you could add a lot to his meetings."
I had to tell the secretary that, while against this U.N. attempt at global socialism, "frankly, I don't know a hell of a lot more about it than Don does." The phone went dead until Mr. Shultz, known for his Buddha-like calm, finally said, "In that case, we'll have to send along a third person, who knows something about the topic."
L. Paul Bremer, then Mr. Shultz's aide, got us briefed and bundled off -- on a 33,000-mile whirl to seven countries. My wife dubbed the Rumsfeld-Adelman mission "scuttle diplomacy."...
We briefed President Reagan upon returning. On Dec. 11, 1982, the New York Times featured on its front page: "Sea Law Signed by 117 Nations; U.S. Opposes It." Nothing unexpected there. But the real story was in the subtitle: "46 Other Countries Also Refuse to Back Treaty." Among the 46 were Germany, Britain, Japan, Belgium and Italy. Except for France, no country we visited which was able to do deep seabed mining signed on. All these allies had once joined, or even led, the U.N. wave. Then the Reagan administration devised a quiet and cooperative way to bring nearly all of them around.
Back at the U.N. another debate over American unilateralism erupted. This was echoed in the New York Times lead editorial on Dec. 17 blasting the administration for "betray[ing] the bipartisan labors of previous Administrations and set[ting] back the cause of international accommodation," and for "isolation and obstruction." Sound familiar?
I proposed a wicked one-sentence amendment to the LOS Treaty: Anyone with any involvement in the LOS negotiations would forever be barred from a paid job in any LOS bureaucracy established. This caused a veritable tsunami in the General Assembly.
This stroll down memory lane, of a quarter-century back, has a purpose. George W. Bush, like Ronald Reagan, refused to join the wave of internationalism embodied by the Kyoto Treaty, International Criminal Court, ABM Treaty and others. But Mr. Bush long lacked Reagan's deftness in bringing allies around to his sensible views. It's not that he failed. He just didn't try....
Read entire article at WSJ
On May 15, President Bush announced vigorous support and urged the Senate to ratify the Law of the Sea Treaty. Mere mention of this treaty prompts a collective yawn. Yet herein lies a tale of dodgy diplomacy finally made right.
More than 25 years ago, LOS emerged from the dark sea onto the political horizon. President Reagan refused to follow the multilateral flow, since he viewed its deep-sea mining provisions as global socialism. Not knowing of any laws about any seas, I got involved by chance. My boss, U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Jeane Kirkpatrick, asked me to attend an early Reagan National Security Council meeting in the White House on, of all topics, this.
Secretary of State Alexander Haig opened by telling the new president that the treaty was nothing we'd want, but something we've got. After all, upwards of 150-odd nations crafted the accord since the LOS process began in 1966. Secretary Haig, reading rotely from his brief, droned on about modifications to sundry treaty provisions -- each with a myriad of subsections and micro-options. This, to put it mildly, was not playing to Reagan's strong suit.
Ronald Reagan and Donald Rumsfeld, 1983.
The president looked bored -- we all were -- and then puzzled. Finally, he broke in. "Uh, Al," he asked, "isn't this what the whole thing's all about?"
None of us could fathom what Reagan meant. Mr. Haig asked him. Well, Mr. Reagan shrugged, wasn't not going along with something "really stupid," just because 150 nations had done so, what the whole thing was all about? Our running? Our winning? Our being here? Our governing? Wasn't that what the whole thing was all about?
Stunned, Mr. Haig closed his briefing book and muttered something about how he'd be back to the president on how to get out of the treaty altogether.
After the usual government hiatus came another NSC meeting on the topic. I modestly suggested dispatching a special LOS envoy to explain the president's views directly to allied leaders. These "heads of government . . . do not know much about the LOS Treaty," I understatedly wrote White House counselor Ed Meese on June 29, 1982. "The [LOS] experts are hopeless; they have been negotiating his thing for 10 years" and are stuck in that rut.
Another bout of government hibernation. Then the usual flurry.
The president suddenly asked ex-Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld to be his LOS envoy. The next day, the new secretary of state, George Shultz, called to say that Mr. Rumsfeld asked me to accompany him. "Since you handle this issue in the U.N., Don thought you could add a lot to his meetings."
I had to tell the secretary that, while against this U.N. attempt at global socialism, "frankly, I don't know a hell of a lot more about it than Don does." The phone went dead until Mr. Shultz, known for his Buddha-like calm, finally said, "In that case, we'll have to send along a third person, who knows something about the topic."
L. Paul Bremer, then Mr. Shultz's aide, got us briefed and bundled off -- on a 33,000-mile whirl to seven countries. My wife dubbed the Rumsfeld-Adelman mission "scuttle diplomacy."...
We briefed President Reagan upon returning. On Dec. 11, 1982, the New York Times featured on its front page: "Sea Law Signed by 117 Nations; U.S. Opposes It." Nothing unexpected there. But the real story was in the subtitle: "46 Other Countries Also Refuse to Back Treaty." Among the 46 were Germany, Britain, Japan, Belgium and Italy. Except for France, no country we visited which was able to do deep seabed mining signed on. All these allies had once joined, or even led, the U.N. wave. Then the Reagan administration devised a quiet and cooperative way to bring nearly all of them around.
Back at the U.N. another debate over American unilateralism erupted. This was echoed in the New York Times lead editorial on Dec. 17 blasting the administration for "betray[ing] the bipartisan labors of previous Administrations and set[ting] back the cause of international accommodation," and for "isolation and obstruction." Sound familiar?
I proposed a wicked one-sentence amendment to the LOS Treaty: Anyone with any involvement in the LOS negotiations would forever be barred from a paid job in any LOS bureaucracy established. This caused a veritable tsunami in the General Assembly.
This stroll down memory lane, of a quarter-century back, has a purpose. George W. Bush, like Ronald Reagan, refused to join the wave of internationalism embodied by the Kyoto Treaty, International Criminal Court, ABM Treaty and others. But Mr. Bush long lacked Reagan's deftness in bringing allies around to his sensible views. It's not that he failed. He just didn't try....