Aaron David Miller
The Middle East is in flux; and that’s where Kerry is spending most of his time. But a lot of motion doesn’t necessarily mean movement that can be channelled into agreements.
By Aaron David Miller
I’ve met John Kerry only once. Earlier this year, I was invited to a dinner at the State Department with the secretary and a few others to talk about US options on Syria.
The secretary asked more questions than he answered and didn’t reveal much about the specifics of where he stood. But it was stunningly clear from the direction of the conversation that he believed Washington needed to find a way to do more — much more. I didn’t. And Kerry for sure wasn’t convinced by my Dr No point of view. I give him credit for including me. But rarely have I encountered anyone — let alone a secretary of state — who seemed more self-confident about his own point of view and not all that interested in somebody else’s.
This sense of self-confidence is the hallmark of the Kerry style of diplomacy. No problem is too big that it can’t be made better. Trying and failing isn’t ideal; but it’s better than not trying at all. And if given enough time and focus — will and skill, too — there’s always a way forward. Only someone with this kind of can-do attitude would venture into Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy against such extremely long odds; keep pushing for a Geneva conference to end Syria’s civil war with the faintest of hopes of success; and (not or) be bullish on a deal with Iran that has alienated key US allies and much of Congress, too.
I don’t care how smart, brilliant or passionate a secretary of state may be, unless the world cooperates, significant success — let alone real breakthroughs — aren’t possible. It’s the interaction between human agency and circumstance that usually defines what happens and doesn’t in international politics.
The notion that secretaries of state — or presidents, for that matter — make their own breaks and luck is true enough, provided there’s enough raw material out of which to fashion success. So are there real chances for transformative change in Kerry world? The Middle East is in flux; and that’s where Kerry is spending most of his time. But a lot of motion doesn’t necessarily mean movement that can be channelled into agreements.
Still, Kerry has the kind of running room both abroad and at home that his predecessor never did. Hillary Clinton was constrained by President Barack Obama’s controlling nature, her own risk aversion and a lack of real opportunities. I think Kerry gets this, though it’s hardly surprising that he aspires to much more. That’s fine so long as he doesn’t get carried away and allow rhetoric to outstrip action or to obscure a realistic assessment of what can actually be accomplished. These are traps that Kerry needs to be careful to avoid. His supreme confidence in public leads him too frequently to overdramatise.
The Hippocratic Oath also apples to diplomacy: above all, do no harm. But while prudence is critically important in diplomacy, giving yourself a chance to succeed is too. And you can’t do that by just sitting on the sidelines. I hate turning US foreign policy into a breakfast analogy, but it’s true that omelettes can’t be made without breaking eggs.
The evidence to date that Kerry wants to cook is pretty clear: negotiating a US-Afghan security agreement; putting together a US-Russian framework agreement to destroy Assad’s chemical weapons; working toward a political solution to the Syrian civil war; gunning for an interim deal with Iran on the nuclear issue; and relaunching Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. Granted there’s a lot more process still in these enterprises than real sustainable accomplishment, but Kerry’s in the game.
You tell me. Carter and Kissinger had Anwar Sadat. Nixon and Kissinger had Zhou Enlai and Leonid Brezhnev; Reagan, Shultz, Bush 41, and Baker had Helmut Kohl and Mikhail Gorbachev. Today, with the exception of Putin (who’s strong but ornery), Kerry is dealing with either highly constrained partners like Syria’s fractious opposition and Palestine’s Mahmoud Abbas, or politicians like Benjamin Netanyahu and Hassan Rowhani, who are either unable or unwilling to risk much. Moreover, Kerry has a few silent partners who aren’t at the table. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and Syria’s Bashar Assad are critically important to his diplomatic efforts, but he has no contact with them and thus not much influence. Successful secretaries of state who achieve consequential things aren’t about one hand clapping. They need partners.
The question is whether or not those he’s dealing with are able to make deals, let alone grand bargains. So far the picture is quite mixed. At best, it seems, Kerry has partners who are prepared for only limited transactions. And these will be hard enough to sustain.
In Kerry’s case, this is a fascinating question. So far, Obama — the most controlling foreign policy president since Richard Nixon — has allowed Kerry to get into the middle of the mix in a way he wouldn’t do for Clinton. Up until now, he has dominated; not delegated.
But now the president has no choice. The clock’s ticking down on his second term. There are just too many potential headaches out there that need attention. And he needs a manager. The question is whether he’s prepared to take risks on the big issues that resonate politically, or more to the point, to allow Kerry to do so. Obama has his own fair share of domestic problems of late and has been pretty quiet when it comes to big foreign policy questions and the Middle East.
When it’s all over, the question on which John Kerry’s legacy as secretary of state will rest is whether he’s done something extraordinary. That’s not to say he couldn’t be judged as a fine secretary of state without some extraordinary accomplishment. But to be a truly consequential one, he’d have to take on a problem that normal human beings saw as really tough (and truly important) and make a major contribution toward resolving it. Kerry has the stamina, will and smarts. And while his extreme confidence and fiery rhetoric worries me at times, I suspect if given the opportunity he’d do well.
But that’s really the point, isn’t it? The basic problem may not be Kerry at all. The mix of factors conspires against him: a risk-averse and weakened White House focused more on a domestic agenda; the absence of strong, trusted partners abroad with which to cooperate; and the cruel reality that each of the major problems he seeks to solve is interrelated is galactically complex ways.
Maybe the era of heroic US diplomacy, where secretaries of state could tackle huge problems solo, is over. Maybe the era of Hollywood-like diplomatic endings is through. And yet, John Kerry is still trying to play the leading man. I guess we’re still only through the first act: there’s still plenty of time left on his clock for success... and for failure, too.
WP-BLOOMBERG
The Middle East is in flux; and that’s where Kerry is spending most of his time. But a lot of motion doesn’t necessarily mean movement that can be channelled into agreements.
By Aaron David Miller
I’ve met John Kerry only once. Earlier this year, I was invited to a dinner at the State Department with the secretary and a few others to talk about US options on Syria.
The secretary asked more questions than he answered and didn’t reveal much about the specifics of where he stood. But it was stunningly clear from the direction of the conversation that he believed Washington needed to find a way to do more — much more. I didn’t. And Kerry for sure wasn’t convinced by my Dr No point of view. I give him credit for including me. But rarely have I encountered anyone — let alone a secretary of state — who seemed more self-confident about his own point of view and not all that interested in somebody else’s.
This sense of self-confidence is the hallmark of the Kerry style of diplomacy. No problem is too big that it can’t be made better. Trying and failing isn’t ideal; but it’s better than not trying at all. And if given enough time and focus — will and skill, too — there’s always a way forward. Only someone with this kind of can-do attitude would venture into Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy against such extremely long odds; keep pushing for a Geneva conference to end Syria’s civil war with the faintest of hopes of success; and (not or) be bullish on a deal with Iran that has alienated key US allies and much of Congress, too.
I don’t care how smart, brilliant or passionate a secretary of state may be, unless the world cooperates, significant success — let alone real breakthroughs — aren’t possible. It’s the interaction between human agency and circumstance that usually defines what happens and doesn’t in international politics.
The notion that secretaries of state — or presidents, for that matter — make their own breaks and luck is true enough, provided there’s enough raw material out of which to fashion success. So are there real chances for transformative change in Kerry world? The Middle East is in flux; and that’s where Kerry is spending most of his time. But a lot of motion doesn’t necessarily mean movement that can be channelled into agreements.
Still, Kerry has the kind of running room both abroad and at home that his predecessor never did. Hillary Clinton was constrained by President Barack Obama’s controlling nature, her own risk aversion and a lack of real opportunities. I think Kerry gets this, though it’s hardly surprising that he aspires to much more. That’s fine so long as he doesn’t get carried away and allow rhetoric to outstrip action or to obscure a realistic assessment of what can actually be accomplished. These are traps that Kerry needs to be careful to avoid. His supreme confidence in public leads him too frequently to overdramatise.
The Hippocratic Oath also apples to diplomacy: above all, do no harm. But while prudence is critically important in diplomacy, giving yourself a chance to succeed is too. And you can’t do that by just sitting on the sidelines. I hate turning US foreign policy into a breakfast analogy, but it’s true that omelettes can’t be made without breaking eggs.
The evidence to date that Kerry wants to cook is pretty clear: negotiating a US-Afghan security agreement; putting together a US-Russian framework agreement to destroy Assad’s chemical weapons; working toward a political solution to the Syrian civil war; gunning for an interim deal with Iran on the nuclear issue; and relaunching Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. Granted there’s a lot more process still in these enterprises than real sustainable accomplishment, but Kerry’s in the game.
You tell me. Carter and Kissinger had Anwar Sadat. Nixon and Kissinger had Zhou Enlai and Leonid Brezhnev; Reagan, Shultz, Bush 41, and Baker had Helmut Kohl and Mikhail Gorbachev. Today, with the exception of Putin (who’s strong but ornery), Kerry is dealing with either highly constrained partners like Syria’s fractious opposition and Palestine’s Mahmoud Abbas, or politicians like Benjamin Netanyahu and Hassan Rowhani, who are either unable or unwilling to risk much. Moreover, Kerry has a few silent partners who aren’t at the table. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and Syria’s Bashar Assad are critically important to his diplomatic efforts, but he has no contact with them and thus not much influence. Successful secretaries of state who achieve consequential things aren’t about one hand clapping. They need partners.
The question is whether or not those he’s dealing with are able to make deals, let alone grand bargains. So far the picture is quite mixed. At best, it seems, Kerry has partners who are prepared for only limited transactions. And these will be hard enough to sustain.
In Kerry’s case, this is a fascinating question. So far, Obama — the most controlling foreign policy president since Richard Nixon — has allowed Kerry to get into the middle of the mix in a way he wouldn’t do for Clinton. Up until now, he has dominated; not delegated.
But now the president has no choice. The clock’s ticking down on his second term. There are just too many potential headaches out there that need attention. And he needs a manager. The question is whether he’s prepared to take risks on the big issues that resonate politically, or more to the point, to allow Kerry to do so. Obama has his own fair share of domestic problems of late and has been pretty quiet when it comes to big foreign policy questions and the Middle East.
When it’s all over, the question on which John Kerry’s legacy as secretary of state will rest is whether he’s done something extraordinary. That’s not to say he couldn’t be judged as a fine secretary of state without some extraordinary accomplishment. But to be a truly consequential one, he’d have to take on a problem that normal human beings saw as really tough (and truly important) and make a major contribution toward resolving it. Kerry has the stamina, will and smarts. And while his extreme confidence and fiery rhetoric worries me at times, I suspect if given the opportunity he’d do well.
But that’s really the point, isn’t it? The basic problem may not be Kerry at all. The mix of factors conspires against him: a risk-averse and weakened White House focused more on a domestic agenda; the absence of strong, trusted partners abroad with which to cooperate; and the cruel reality that each of the major problems he seeks to solve is interrelated is galactically complex ways.
Maybe the era of heroic US diplomacy, where secretaries of state could tackle huge problems solo, is over. Maybe the era of Hollywood-like diplomatic endings is through. And yet, John Kerry is still trying to play the leading man. I guess we’re still only through the first act: there’s still plenty of time left on his clock for success... and for failure, too.
WP-BLOOMBERG
