When Bill Clinton was elected as President in 1992, he intended to maintain a focus on domestic policy and leave existing foreign policy as it was. His efforts to improve America’s economy through free trade with NAFTA and the World Trade Organization involved countries all over the world, but Clinton also got involved in various military interactions all over the world.
The Clinton Administration inherited various conflicts in Africa, including American troops being dispatched to Somalia under President Bush’s orders. The mission had started as an attempt to solve the issue of famine, but it escalated into violent conflict. When American soldiers were killed and helicopters were shot down, Clinton’s response of sending more troops only increased political opposition to the war, and he was forced to withdraw. The intervention had been unsuccessful and warlords remained in control of a non-functional government after U.S. and UN troops withdrew in 1994. Unfortunately, this failure led to future trepidation in intervening in c Rwanda, where a civil war led to a large-scale massacre of a minority group. Clinton and the U.S. received widespread criticism over over their inaction. There was also hesitation to act in the Balkans when Yugoslavia split and violence descended over the area in 1995. It was only after genocide in Bosnia that there was NATO bombing operation, ordered by Clinton, to resolve the situation. Even after the countries signed the Dayton Peace Accords, new conflict was sparked again three years later and was met with another bombing campaign.
International terrorism was also escalating in the Clinton years, and the President took action after U.S. embassy bombings by al Qaeda in Tanzania and Kenya. The U.S. led missile strikes on terrorist training camps and a chemical factory in Sudan that was suspected of manufacturing chemical weapons, but it turned out to be a pharmaceutical company that manufactured drugs for the Sudanese people. Though the strikes did not have their intended effects of destroying the terrorists, Clinton maintained that it was the right thing to do.
While Bill Clinton enjoyed various successes domestically during his presidency, foreign policy was not his strength, and this combined with a multitude of violent conflict emerging in the world at that time made for a failure to promote peace and an ineffective U.S. foreign policy.
Sources
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/general-article/clinton-legacy/
http://millercenter.org/president/biography/clinton-foreign-affairs
http://study.com/academy/lesson/bill-clintons-foreign-policy-the-middle-east-haiti-african-northern-ireland.html
Its interesting to see how presidents objectives and policies change once they are in office. How with Clinton although he had little intention to change the US foreign policy he was forced to do quite a bit as the world events he had inherited unfolded. I wonder how much more he would have been able to do with domestic policy had foreign policy not unfolded as it had?
ReplyDeleteThough Bill Clinton was praised for his domestic policy I find it interesting how you shine light on his failure in foreign policy. It was not necessarily his fault because he did inherit the issues in Africa and many other terrorism issues worldwide, but the way Clinton and the UN handled the situation was poor and not many Americans knew of that situation. If he wasn't so focused on domestic policy do you think Clinton could have better succeeded in foreign policy?
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