With the new edition of Foreign Affairs now out, we can gorge ourselves on the feast that is Rudy Giuliani’s essay about his national security priorities. And what a smorgasbord it is. Some highlights:
Rudy on Iraq:
America must remember one of the lessons of the Vietnam War. Then, as now, we fought a war with the wrong strategy for several years. And then, as now, we corrected course and began to show real progress. Many historians today believe that by about 1972 we and our South Vietnamese partners had succeeded in defeating the Vietcong insurgency and in setting South Vietnam on a path to political self-sufficiency. But America then withdrew its support, allowing the communist North to conquer the South.
Rudy on the UN:
The organization can be useful for some humanitarian and peacekeeping functions, but we should not expect much more of it. The UN has proved irrelevant to the resolution of almost every major dispute of the last 50 years. Worse, it has failed to combat terrorism and human rights abuses. It has not lived up to the great hopes that inspired its creation. Too often, it has been weak, indecisive, and outright corrupt.
Rudy on prospects for a two state solution in the Middle East:
Too much emphasis has been placed on brokering negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians — negotiations that bring up the same issues again and again. It is not in the interest of the United States, at a time when it is being threatened by Islamist terrorists, to assist the creation of another state that will support terrorism.
Rudy on public diplomacy:
The time has come to refine the diplomats’ mission down to their core purpose: presenting U.S. policy to the rest of the world. Reforming the State Department is a matter not of changing its organizational chart — although simplification is needed — but of changing the way we practice diplomacy and the way we measure results. Our ambassadors must clearly understand and clearly advocate for U.S. policies and be judged on the results. Too many people denounce our country or our policies simply because they are confident that they will not hear any serious refutation from our representatives.
And finally, Rudy on why the Cold War ended:
Companies such as Pepsi, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, and Levi’s helped win the Cold War by entering the Soviet market. Cultural events, such as Van Cliburn’s concerts in the Soviet Union and Mstislav Rostropovich’s in the United States, also hastened change.
If anyone knows who Van Cliburn is, please email us. His country needs him.
