Barack Obama in The Obamians, by James Mann
On Foreign Policy:
Engage with Iran; but combat Al Qaeda in Pakistan
One important influence upon the new administration's thinking was Lee Hamilton. Hamilton had served as a back-channel adviser to the Obama presidential campaign, both through his former aides and in private talks with Obama himself.
The Obama aides who had previously worked for Hamilton felt the men shared a common worldview, a general sense of the limits of American power. Hamilton had long been a proponent of a policy of engagement with Iran.
Separately, however, he had also favored intensive US military strikes into Pakistan to combat al-Qaeda. Both of these positions became key points on which Obama, as a candidate, had sought to differentiate himself from Hillary Clinton.
After Obama was elected president, these ideas on Iran and Pakistan eventually became among the most prominent and distinctive aspects of the new administration's foreign policy.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p.150
Jun 14, 2012
On Foreign Policy:
Focus on BRICs: Brazil, Russia, India, China, & South Africa
Early on, the Obama administration seemed to embrace a new concept: Its diplomacy would emphasize 4 emerging economic powers called the BRICs, or Brazil, Russia, India & China. (Later on, South Africa was sometimes added as a 5th country, conveniently
taking up the letter S.) The idea originally came from Wall Street: In 2001, a Goldman-Sachs economist invented the concept of the BRICs to describe the 4 emerging economies that he believed would play an increasingly important role in the world markets.
By 2009, the term had become an addition to the jargon of foreign policy, and the Obama team began to talk about the importance of the BRICs in their speeches. In her first major speech as secretary of state, Clinton said that the Obama administration,
while reinvigorating its traditional alliances, "will also put special emphasis on encouraging major emerging global powers--China, India, Russia & Brazil, as well as Turkey, Indonesia & South Africa--to be full partners in tackling the global agenda."
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p.174
Jun 14, 2012
On Foreign Policy:
Avoid trap of military overstretch; that destroys countries
Obama looked ahead to a time when the US, with all its economic problems, might no longer be able to maintain predominance. He focused on redirecting America's resources and energy toward domestic renewal.
His US would manage to work out a new, more modest international role in line with its new circumstances: its still awesome military power but diminishing economic power.
The ideas underlying Obama's foreign policy were those of Paul Kennedy's book, "The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers." Kennedy's great powers became overstretched in their military commitments yet were unable to give them up, and they eventually
lost their dominant roles. This was the fate of Spain and the Netherlands in the 18th and 19th centuries and Britain and France in the 20th. Obama sought to avoid the trap into which these countries fell.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p.251
Jun 14, 2012
On Free Trade:
Skeptical on whether China feels bound by global trade rules
Obama was skeptical about the degree to which China felt bound by the rules of the global trading system in general and the rules of the World Trade Organization in particular.
Obama made it plain to veterans of the Clinton administration that he felt they had allowed China to enter into the World Trade Organization under terms that weren't tight enough--
thus allowing China to become a trading giant and leaving Obama with too little leverage when China flouted the trading rules.
There was also a certain Asian quality to the president's negotiations with China. "They push and push and push until you say no," Obama told those around him. "And then they stop pushing."
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p.179-180
Jun 14, 2012
On Principles & Values:
Appointed Clinton & Biden as "team of rivals," like Lincoln
The Obama team had already shrewdly deflected attention away from the politics of the Clinton appointment--whether, for example, Obama was appointing her to remove a potential source of intraparty opposition--by touting the idea of a "team of rivals."
That phrase, taken from the title of Doris Kearns Goodwin's book on Abraham Lincoln's Civil War cabinet, gave a grand historical gloss to the uneasy merger of the Obama and Clinton teams, which everyone knew would be carefully scrutinized for any sign of
discord.Nevertheless, at the initial press conference Obama appeared considerably more comfortable with Clinton than, 8 years earlier, George W Bush had looked while announcing his appointment of Colin Powell as secretary of state
(Powell proceeded to dominate the ensuing press conference). Bush's foreign policy team had been a genuine team of rivals; Obama's team was something less than that. As applied to the Obama cabinet, "team of rivals" was mostly a marketing concept.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 11
Jun 14, 2012
On Technology:
Media change since Clinton: intravenous Internet news feed
How did the Obama administration differ from the Clinton administration? Clinton alumni were confronting a changed world, one that the younger Obamians took for granted but the Clinton alumni did not. "The change in the media environment is dramatic--
it's had a profound impact," said a National Security Council staffer. "In the Clinton administration, we basically stopped work every night at 6:30 to watch the national network news. I don't think many people do that anymore. And in the morning you
rushed to see what was above the fold of the NY Times & the Washington Post, which no one does anymore, either. Instead, we're on an intravenous feed of cable and the Internet and blogs."Such a change may at first seem inconsequential, but the staffer
argued that it has had a profound impact. "You have to resist the temptation to be totally reactive to everything you're hearing minute to minute." He said one of Obama's strengths was that he didn't get "distracted by the daily or hourly turbulence."
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p.338-339
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
OpEd: Calling Iraq "a dumb war" left open "smarter war"
In 2002, Obama spoke at a demonstration in Chicago against the war. Congress was preparing to vote on whether to authorize the use of force. Obama went out of his way to emphasize that he was not a pacifist. His characterization of Iraq as a "dumb war"
clearly left open the possibility of a "smarter" war. In this sense, he was not giving the demonstrators what they expected to hear. "I stand before you as someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances," Obama declared. He mentioned the Civil
War, WWII and finally, the Bush administration's action against al-Qaeda after 9/11. "I would willingly take up arms myself to prevent such tragedy from happening again," Obama said.Obama's speech set him apart from the elite Democrats. To be sure,
there had been a series of caveats about other wars, but these would be either overlooked or dismissed as necessary hedging. Obama had actually taken a clear, forthright and unequivocal position against the war in Iraq--before it occurred, not afterward.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 63-64
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
Iraq was a rash war, based on politics, not on reason
Even the prominent Democrats lagged well behind the party's rank and file. Party activists & peace groups had been strongly against the Iraq War much earlier, and so had some local politicians. One of them was a state senator from Illinois, Barack Obama.
In the fall of 2002, Obama was beginning to lay the groundwork for a campaign for the US Senate. Obama's speech [to an anti-war demonstration] proved to be a critical step in launching him to the Senate & then to the presidency. What he said would be
recalled and recited again and again during his battle for the Democratic nomination in 2008. He called Bush's intervention in Iraq "a dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason, but on passions, not on principle, but on politics. I know that an
invasion of Iraq, without a clear rationale and without strong international support, will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than the best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment of al-Qaeda."
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 63-64
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
2008 trump card: opposition to Iraq War showed experience
When early in the campaign Obama began advocating a more aggressive stance toward Pakistan, Senators Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Chris Dodd chided Obama for his inexperience in foreign policy.In response, Obama pulled out his trump card: his early
opposition to the Iraq War that his opponents had voted to authorize. He recited: "I find it amusing that those who helped to authorize and engineer the biggest foreign policy disaster in our generation are now criticizing me for making sure that we are
on the right battlefield and not the wrong battlefield in the war against terrorism." Obama said. The audience cheered.
Years later, an Obama aide said he felt this was a turning point in winning the Democratic nomination. Obama not only deflected the
attacks on his inexperience in foreign policy, but turned that inexperience into a virtue. His words reinforced the campaign's larger message that Obama was a young, energetic outsider who was not tied to the Democrats of the past.
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p. 87
Jun 14, 2012
On War & Peace:
Expanded CIA drone program for "targeted killings"
In the first year of his administration, Obama beefed up the military campaign against al-Qaeda by stepping up the use of unmanned drones in Pakistan. The increase became particularly noticeable in late 2009, after the administration's long internal
review of the war in Afghanistan.The Obama administration referred to these drone attacks as "targeted killing," rather than "assassinations." The euphemism was of legal significance. In the 1970s, President Ford issued an executive order that banned
assassinations. The administration's formal reasoning for why its overseas killings did not constitute assassination went like this: Congress had authorized the use of force against al-Qaeda. Therefore, America was at war, and under the law of war,
America had the right to defend itself "by targeting persons such as high-level al-Qaeda leaders who are planning attacks." Since the laws of war permitted targeted killing, therefore the practice wasn't illegal, and "does not constitute assassination."
Source: The Obamians, by James Mann, p.217
Jun 14, 2012
Page last updated: Feb 25, 2019