How business, doctors and journalists prey on your food anxieties I

Commentary
on events at home <strong>and</strong> abroad
By Caspar W. Weinberger, Cliaivinan
AS THE U .N . PECEhBEPNG EFFORTS in Bosnia disappear
into ignominy, it is apparent that bills designed to prevent
U .S . involvement in this kind of fiasco must be passed <strong>and</strong>
signed into law. Currently, there are bills before Congress
requiring diat : (1) a President certify that the mission sen e
the national securiryinterest before he can place U .S . forces
under U .N . comm<strong>and</strong>; (2) Congress be told t;te purpose
of such a mission, who else is taking part <strong>and</strong> wkat dac
expected costs are ; <strong>and</strong> (3) America retain the right to
withdraw its forces at any time <strong>and</strong> to take w hatever steps
necessarv to protect them . If these requirements are met,
a President can send troops to back up a U .N . mission .
Yet the Clinton Adminisnztion
has lened increasiuglv &antic charges
that such proposals are isolationist
<strong>and</strong> c otild . if implemented, m .vk
the withdrawal of America fiom
international activities of all kinds .
The requirements in these bills
essentially spell out what any President
should specify before committing
U .S . troops . If he cannot
fulfill these requiremenzs, he should
not commit our forces . The charge
that these conditions constitute
isolationism is not only maliciously
ISOLATIONISM-OR COMMON SENSE?
Refugees of Srehrenica : What must they think
as the world watches <strong>and</strong> waits?
foolish but also quite wrong .
Isolationism is a totally flawed, impossibly NNrong policv .
It would be turning our back on foreign events <strong>and</strong> retreating
within what used to be called inculnerable "Fortress
America ." Onlv a few fanatics propose a return to this
ruinous policy . An accusation of isolationism is one of the
cheapest <strong>and</strong> oldest political tricks, setting up a false association
between P~publicanism <strong>and</strong> isolationism <strong>and</strong> then
proceeding to attack as if the association were prm °en .
The Administration's aim seems to be to enable the Pres
ident to send U .S . troops to join so-called peacekeeping cfforts
in hopeless situations where there is no peace . The
aggressive arrogance with which the Serbs drove a few
lightly armed U .N . peacekeepers from Srcbrcnica illustrates
che absurd <strong>and</strong> highly dangerous missions to which brave
-soldiers can be subjected . As the city came under attack <strong>and</strong>
-some 30,000 Muslim civilians, along with dte peaeekeepers,
were sent flecing north, the ailv punishment (after
lC)ng negotiations) was another pinprick NATO air strike .
Now- we have been promised `significant" air strikes if
the Serbs attack Gorazde . Two days after this threat was
made, the Serbs brazenly continued their heaw shelling of
Sarajevo <strong>and</strong> Bihac <strong>and</strong> their ground attacks on Zepa, with
no NATO response . It is not ket clear if U .N . civilian
authority approval will be required to initiate strikes . If it is,
the ne v threat will be as empty as all the others . Secretary
General Boutros-Ghali, me :unvhile, has been in Afiica,
demonstrating, as he said, that the crisis is overrated, making
the battle for Srebrenica sound "like Stalingrad" A
more likely explanation is that there are more votes in
Afiica for his reelection than there are in Bosnia .
The tragedv for Bosnia <strong>and</strong> for the
bra\e U .N . soldiers there is that
tltey oan do nothing to stop Serbian
aggression . Mhen peacekeepers
oet in the w °av of Serbia's \car plans,
dte\, are brushed aside, jailed or
chained to NATO targets . One
«unders what tkotdd hase happened
to Ku~sait if die West's oniv
remed~had been using a U .N .
peacekeeping force that had orders
not to harm Saddam Hussein .
President Bush's actions were the
opposite of isolationism . The coalition
of 30 nations that Bush put
together, inspired be our decision to proceed alone if necessary,
secured the defeat of Iraq . Nothing in the GOP bills
would prevent any President from taking the same course .
The Gulf «•as not a U .N . operation, <strong>and</strong> no one but Mr .
Clinton would describe that cictorv as isolationism .
There are two continuing problems : (I) the Clinton
Administration's failure to exercise anv leadership in
deterring Serbian aggression vvhile a1wa1•s seeking nmltilateral
consensus ; <strong>and</strong> (2) the weakening of our armed
forces through anemic budgeting, which, if continued
for fi%e ntore pe :us, will make it impossible for us to take
the type of effective action that ~~e took in the Gulf
These problems are correctable, but not by Mr . Ciinton's
frantic political attempts to raise the specter of
isolationism against those who are trying to restrain the
use of American forces in doomed <strong>and</strong> perilous efforts
such as "peacekeeping" in Bosnia . Such restraint is not
isolationism ; it is simple common sense. ~
r
Forbes a August 14, 1995
http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/agf97d00/pdf
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