by publius
The Post reports that North Korea is shutting down its main nuclear reactor, having received its first shipment of fuel oil. For now, Rice beat out the Cheney/Bolton wing and has some tangible results to show for it. And good for her -- and the world, for that matter. It’s not the end of all problems, but it’s certainly better than a reactor going full speed (or a military strike).
But that leads to a different question. One foundation of the Cheney/Kristol/Bolton foreign policy is a refusal to engage those that are deemed enemies. The idea apparently is that (in addition to showing "moral clarity") the snubbing will either (1) force them to the table on more favorable -- if unrealistic -- terms; or (2) destabilize the regime. The alternate approach is to engage and negotiate.
Yes, this is an overly simplistic description, but one that is hopefully useful. After all, the divisions that matter among the people in power (and the policy elites they listen to) often turn on whether to ignore or engage. You see this divide play out again and again -- e.g., Iraq, Iran, Syria, Hamas, North Korea.
Getting away from the abstract ideology, here’s my question -- has the Cheney/Kristol/Bolton method ever worked? I just want to approach the question empirically (and invite people to comment). Have we ever been better off by refusing to engage? Has snubbing ever worked?
I’m no Foreign Policy expert (except from the hours of 12-3 AM in bars), but it’s hard for me to think of an example where snubbing helped. The most obvious example is the Cold War. If Dick Cheney had been in power during the formative years of the Cold War, and assuming the human race still existed, I assume we would have just ignored the Soviet Union and refused to engage them. But history shows that engagement worked out pretty damn well. Same deal with China. Our willingness to engage has benefited both us and world stability more generally. (On an aside, the sheer magnitude of the calamity that a US-China military escalation could cause is one reason why the Cheney camp is apparently so enamored with it.).
But snark aside, it’s a serious question. Has snubbing ever worked? Feel free to move beyond America too -- I’m genuinely curious. It seems that engagement is almost always a superior strategy. (And if you cite Hitler and Chamberlain, you have to explain why snubbing as opposed to a different type of engagement would have been better).
To zoom down a bit, the snubbing strategy certainly doesn’t work on a micro-level in social situations. When you snub someone and refuse to engage them, they generally get pissed off and small misunderstandings escalate unnecessarily. I don’t know why we should expect a different result if we zoom out to the level of the nation-state. Humans are humans. Actions that piss off co-workers at the office water cooler will have the same affect at the UN.
Hitler and Chamberlain would be an extra inappropriate example because Hitler actually wanted "to be snubbed". After the "success" of Munich he foamed that those d*mn*d English had spoiled his war. There are numerous examples of one side relying on the other side to be snubbish, so the own action would look justified because the other side simply "refused to come to the table".
Posted by: Hartmut | July 15, 2007 at 04:42 AM
Snubbing works in certain kinds of tightly structured hierarchical environments...like fraternities that choose to operate that way, for instance, and country clubs and churches that put a great deal of emphasis on physical positioning as a clue to status. It's a way of life no doubt intimately familiar to Bush, Cheney, and most of those around them. I'd guess that the emotional, as opposed to merely intellectual, awareness that this only works in certain highly unusual situation is very, very far from their minds.
Posted by: Bruce Baugh | July 15, 2007 at 05:27 AM
It's probable that pressure from the government of China had more to do with NKorea's acquiesence on its nuclear program (political instability being bad for business, after all), but, since it happened on Condi's watch, I'd give her some credit.
As for the Hitler-Chamberlain analogy, I'm not sure what that is supposed to mean. Hitler's annexation of the Sudetenland (and eventually, all of Czechoslovakia) was a done deal before Chamberlain even entered the picture. It was when Hitler re-militarized the Rheinland in 1936 when the British and the French could have reined him in. But they didn't, and that only fed his megalomania.
Posted by: raj | July 15, 2007 at 05:57 AM
Has snubbing ever worked?
I’m not sure you can entirely discount its role in this very case. That is, a few years of snubbing may have led directly to this result. Given the principals involved, I don’t think it can be shown conclusively that the snubbing did not play any role in NK’s decision to reengage. NK has claimed to want normalized relations for some time. It may be the prospect of the easing of the snubbing that leads to this.
And don’t forget that snubbing here mostly consisted of insisting on multilateral talks. We engaged closely with China throughout this process, and China is the one with the real leverage, not us. I was always a little confused by the many people who could hold both of these opinions at the same time: “The US has been too unilateral, it must engage with the rest of the world on pretty much everything”, and, “The US is wrong to insist on multilateral talks in regards to NK, we have to engage them directly”.
Posted by: OCSteve | July 15, 2007 at 08:25 AM
South Africa?
I was a kid/teenager when it took place, but my memory of the situation is that sanctions had the desired effect. I would call sanctions a form of snubbing, but I am not sure how much other kinds of engagement were involved in the process.
Posted by: kevin | July 15, 2007 at 08:53 AM
I don't believe, as a general proposition, that it does work, which is why I have responded to recent conservative blathering for a "Democracy Caucus" to replace the UN as a really, really bad idea. If countries ask as they do when given the world diplomatic forum of the UN, imagine how they'll act when they're not even invited.
This, though, I can imagine some of the conservative responses to:
As, for example, Charles B. has argued in these very comment sections, a key part of theBushCheney Doctrine is that stability is not enough anymore. Stability brought us 9/11. Stability let Saddam gas his own people. Etc., etc., ad nauseum. They don't want stability. They want worldwide "democracy," by force if necessary.Posted by: Phil | July 15, 2007 at 08:54 AM
OT, I'm pleased to announce that TiO is open for business. OCSteve's good question about what the US should do about North Korea will probably occasion a post this week. I've switched to the Nucleus blog engine, and it looks quite interesting. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to port the user names and passwords over, so you'll need to sign in again.
Posted by: liberal japonicus | July 15, 2007 at 09:15 AM
OCSteve: I dont think that snubbing can be said to have "worked" in this case, even leaving aside questions about whether it was us, the Chinese, or something else that got NK to shut down the reactor.
It was snubbing, in the form of Bush & Cheney's announcement that they were going to reevaluate the Agreed Framework, that started this whole thing. It was snubbing (or, at times, a standoff between the snub/no snub factions in our government, which Bush never resolved) that stood in the way of our doing anything about it for years, while NK got more and more plutonium. Supposing for the sake of argument that is was also snubbing that eventually got them to shut down the reactor, the best you can say for snubbing in this case is: it precipitated a crisis, as a result of which NK got the plutonium we had spent decades trying to deny them, and may or may not have got nuclear weapons (that work), and then it eventually got us back to an agreement that looks an awful lot like the Agreed Framework we originally had.
Some success.
I honestly don't get the point of snubbing. It involves voluntarily depriving ourselves not just of a whole lot of ways of affecting other countries' behavior -- all the ones that depend on, well, communicating -- but also ways of finding out more about who our adversaries are and how they work, ways of making sure that our views are communicated accurately, rather than via some process like those games of 'telephone' that we probably all played as kids, etc., etc., etc.
And for what?
And how is it supposed to work? Sanctions I understand, but I think snubbing has more to do with the refusal to talk to people than with sanctions. Snubbing seems to rely on the idea that there is something valuable to other countries about the mere fact of talking to us. And much as I respect our diplomats, I don't really see how being deprived of their company is such a huge sacrifice that it could be expected to change another country's foreign policy.
Posted by: hilzoy | July 15, 2007 at 09:17 AM
I happen to agree with OCSteve that the 'snubbing' drammaticaly affected our bargaining position today in both NK and Iran. Of course the snubbing can also be said to be helping those countries internally justify acquiring Nuclear abilities. I don't think this is really the case espicially for the NK. They had been acguiring the materials for years before we started snubbing them, it was only a matter of time until they completed it. Most of that build up happen during our time of engagement. The complications in Iran are a whole essay so I won't bother to over simplify that one.
I also want to take exception to snubbing being merely a stopping of talking to someone. Snubbing usually means no 'formal talks', though informal ones do continue, but more importantly it also means we aren't going to do any more business with you, trade, aid, etc. Snubbing is of course ridiculous with out sanctions. Snubbing is usually the result of a failed negotiating table. Snubbing is however never a final policy but only a delaying tactic so that you can return on more favorable days. Snubbing also has a way out for the snubbed, i.e. letting inspectors return, or dismantling such and such.
Now this does not mean that this means I agree with Cheney's doctrine. As far as I can tell, he would like to take snubbing as an end tactic, "we won't talk to you until either you collapse of after the war." I see no need to point out this tactic's weak points. The only benefit I can see to this stance is a posturing position for the more hardliners of our government that our diplomats could exploit during negotiations.
I can think of a personal case were snubbing can be said to have worked for people. Think alcoholic father being snubbed by his wife until he cleans up. She says I'm leaving taking the kids with, and you can have nothing to do with us until you clean up. Will it work, I heard of it doing so with people I know, but ultimately it depends on the drunk I suppose. But it was probably a move of desperation on the wifes part after failing to convince him otherwise. It should of course be noted that if it fails there is no coming back. Returning the family after snubbing failed to 'cure his ails' would surely result extremely badly.
This risk holds true for government snubbing as well of course.
Posted by: Tad | July 15, 2007 at 10:02 AM
Testosterone-fueled egotism from "men" too insecure to think anything but that discussion and potential compromise are weaknesses.
Posted by: Georgette Orwell | July 15, 2007 at 10:12 AM
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