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Washington's policies veering off
course
By Jim Lobe
WASHINGTON
- Two years after the September 11 terrorist attacks on
the United States, the US public favors a distinctly
less unilateral strategy than the one pursued by
President George W Bush, found a major new poll released
on Tuesday.
Some 81 percent of more than 1,200
respondents told pollsters from the University of
Maryland's Program on International Policy Attitudes
(PIPA) that working "more closely" with other countries
was a key lesson learned from September 11, as opposed
to Washington acting "on its own more" to fight
terrorism.
Strong majorities also called for the
administration to pursue "more cooperative approaches"
with other nations and rely more on economic aid and
diplomacy to fight terrorism and less on military means,
according to the survey, conducted by California-based
Knowledge Networks between August 26 and September 3.
The poll was released by PIPA, which has tracked
US public opinion on foreign policy for some 15 years,
on the eve of the second anniversary of the September 11
attacks and just as the Bush administration appears to
have begun canvassing for support at the United Nations
for greater international participation in peacekeeping
and reconstruction efforts in Iraq.
In a
separate poll released on Tuesday, the Gallup
organization said the public's confidence in the
government's ability to handle international problems
has fallen to levels close to what they were just before
September 11.
Before the attacks, 14 percent of
respondents expressed a great deal of confidence in the
government's capability, a total that rose to 36 percent
in October 2001. But today, the figure has fallen back
to 18 percent, Gallup said.
The administration,
which had insisted on going to war in March without
authorization from the UN Security Council, has
concluded that it must now return to the council in
order to persuade other countries to send troops and
other forms of assistance.
In a nationally
televised address Sunday, Bush said other countries had
a "duty" to provide help and, at the same time,
announced that his administration needed some US$87
billion in emergency aid over the next 13 months to
sustain US operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The total, which shocked even Bush's fellow
Republicans in the US Congress worried about
Washington's exploding budget deficit, was more than
twice what had previously been estimated and assumes
that other countries will contribute some $30 billion
additional to the effort.
Some commentators have
said that the administration's new approach to the UN
constitutes an implicit admission that the unilateralism
with which it pursued the war is no longer tenable.
If so, the administration may be moving toward
the mainstream of US public opinion, which has long
called for a more multilateral approach to its "war on
terrorism" and in Iraq.
If anything, according
to the poll, which asked the randomly chosen respondents
more than 60 in-depth questions, the public's embrace of
multilateralism appears to have deepened.
Asked
which was the "more important lesson of September 11",
81 percent of respondents chose "the US needs to work
more closely with other countries" instead of "the US
needs to act on its own more to fight terrorism", with
which 16 percent of respondents agreed.
In June
2002, the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations asked the
same question in its own comprehensive survey. At that
time, 61 percent of respondents agreed with the first
alternative and 34 percent chose the more unilateralist
approach.
While the new poll found that about
two-thirds of respondents approved of Bush's
anti-terrorist efforts in a general sense, they were
more critical of specific policies, according to Steven
Kull, PIPA's director, who attributed the relatively
high approval ratings to the residue of a
"rally-round-the-president effect" that dates from
September 11.
Some 54 percent of respondents
said the administration has been "too assertive" in
relation to other countries, while 58 percent called on
the administration to put "more emphasis on diplomatic
and economic methods" in dealing with threats in the
Islamic world, as opposed to "military methods".
In what Kull said was "the most dramatic
finding", the survey found that 76 percent of the public
said they feel no safer from the threat of terrorism now
than they did in the immediate aftermath of September
11. Only 24 percent said they felt safer.
On the
other hand, asked whether the administration's efforts
over the past two years at reducing the risk of a
terrorist act had made them feel safer, 46 percent
agreed. In response to that question, 53 percent said
they felt no safer.
At the same time, a very
strong majority - nearly 80 percent - said they believed
that US policy in the Islamic world is creating
conditions that make it easier for terrorist groups to
grow there.
Two-thirds of respondents said they
thought feelings by Muslims against US policy had
worsened over the past two years, while 60 percent said
they thought "a majority of people in the Islamic world
think US policies in the Middle East make the region
less stable". Only 35 percent disagreed, insisting that
most Muslims overseas think US policies enhance Middle
Eastern stability.
Perhaps most striking, almost
three-quarters of respondents assume that the majority
of overseas Muslims "share many of al-Qaeda's feelings
toward the US", even if most of those who have a similar
perspective do not support their methods.
Two-thirds of respondents also said they believe
that most people in the Middle East want Washington "to
play a less prominent and influential role" in the
region and reduce its military presence there.
A
similar majority agreed that the US military presence in
the region increases the likelihood of terrorist attacks
against the country, and that it indeed should be
reduced over the next decade. By contrast, 32 percent
and 31 percent, respectively, said the US military
presence reduces the chances of a terrorist attack and
that its military profile there should be increased.
In a rebuke to the administration's plans to
reform the Middle East, unilaterally if necessary, some
58 percent of respondents agreed that, "The US is
playing the role of world policeman in the Middle East
more than it should". Thirty-nine percent disagreed.
A majority of the public rejects the view that
tensions between the West and the Islamic world are
inevitable, although the proportion of individuals who
take that view has increased over the past two years.
While a minority of 36 percent agreed with the
assertion, "Because Islamic religious and social
traditions are intolerant and fundamentally incompatible
with Western culture, violent conflict is bound to keep
happening", that marked an increase from 26 percent when
PIPA asked the same question in November 2001.
Similarly, 60 percent of respondents
insisted that Muslims generally "have needs and wants
like those of people everywhere, so it is possible for
us to find common ground", while 68 percent subscribed
to that view two months after the September 11 attacks.
But
close to 80 percent of respondents said Washington
should make greater efforts to improve relations with
people in the Islamic world.
(Inter Press
Service)
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