By MARSHA MERCER
President Theodore Roosevelt’s 20th
century admonition that in foreign affairs it’s best to “speak softly but carry
a big stick” is getting a 21st century makeover.
President Barack Obama speaks softly but he wants
Congress to help wield the stick.
On the verge of authorizing limited military strikes
against Syria, the president pivoted when expected support disappeared. The
United Nations is “paralyzed,” he said, and even ally Great Britain declined to
get involved after a negative vote in Parliament. More than 200 members of
Congress had signed letters urging Obama to seek congressional approval before
taking action.
And so he paused the march to war, or missile
strikes, and launched a campaign to win congressional and international approval
to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s use of chemical weapons against
his people.
“Our democracy is stronger when the president and
the people’s representatives stand together,” Obama said.
For the president, the move is as risky as it was
surprising. Congress and the president rarely stand or even sit together, and approval
is far from assured. So while the Senate convened hearings, Obama and his team tried
to marshal the power of persuasion on TV and in closed-door meetings.
In a sign of the showdown looming on Capitol Hill
this week, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 10 to 7 Wednesday to
support the limited use fo force. Obama faces opposition from progressive
Democrats as well as from isolationist Republicans.
U.S.
officials say conclusive evidence shows that about 2:30 in the morning of Aug.
21, rockets carrying sarin nerve gas blasted the sleeping suburbs of Damascus. Among
the more than 1,400 people killed were 426 children.
Obama conceded that Americans are war
weary, but he asked: “What message will we send
if a dictator can gas hundreds of children to death in plain sight and pay no
price?”
What, indeed? Once
again, though, the age-old debate between intervention and isolation is playing
out on Capitol Hill.
Since President
George Washington warned against permanent alliances with foreign countries,
Americans have been leery of taking a role in foreign conflicts.
World War I was supposed to be an exception. President Woodrow Wilson argued that it was in our
national interest to maintain a peaceful world order. After the war to end all wars, memories of horrific casualties sent us back
to the anti-intervention corner.
In the 1940s, it took the surprise Japanese attack
on Pearl Harbor to galvanize Americans behind the war. And only after 9/11 did
we take the plunge in Iraq and Afghanistan.
This time? Questions abound about the goals and
consequences of air strikes and an exit strategy, but Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich.,
chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, says he believes Congress ultimately
will rise to the occasion.
“This isn’t about Barack Obama vs. the Congress,”
Rogers told CNN. “This isn’t about Republicans vs. Democrats. This has a very
important worldwide reach in this decision.”
But Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and others say military
action in Syria would be a mistake. Paul predicted the Senate will back Obama
but on NBC’s “Meet the Press” gave the odds of “at least 50-50 whether the
House will vote down involvement in the Syrian war.”
Obama needs Congress’
blessing now in the event future crises require military intervention. He’s
caught between the rock and hard place of his own words. His assertion that
the use of chemical weapons was a “red line” that demanded retaliation had forced
his hand while his remarks as a presidential candidate held him back:
“The president does not have power under the
Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that
does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation,” he told
the Boston Globe in 2007.
Obama surely has learned through experience how much
easier it is to campaign than to govern. Governing requires hard choices and speaking
softly. It’s time for Congress to back the president on use of the big stick.
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