Iran trumps N Korea in axis of
fear By Donald Kirk
WASHINGTON - Americans are dismayed about
the drift of US policy from one end of President
George W Bush's "axis of evil" to the other, with
Iran seen as by far the gravest threat to US
national security.
While fears of Iran as
an unpredictable nuclear power may come as no
surprise, China also ranks high among countries
perceived as threats. These results stand out in a
poll conducted by the American Security Project in
which 27% of the 2,000 respondents named Iran as
posing "the greatest threat to American national
security".
That
percentage was more than double the 13% who
believe Iraq poses the worst threat, the 12% who
put North Korea in that category, or the 10% who
named China. No other country came close - just 2%
of Americans see Russia or Afghanistan as the
greatest threat, while 1% named Israel or Mexico
as the most feared.
The poll of about
2,000 respondents show America's "traditional
allies" - the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia
and Japan - play "a positive role in the world
affairs" while China, Iran, North Korea, Syria and
Cuba are all seen as negative influences.
At the same time, the poll results reveal
the impact on Americans of the problems besetting
the US alliance with South Korea.
In
response to questions about whether South Korea is
playing a "positive" or "negative" role in the
world, considerably more people answered "yes" to
the latter than the former. Nearly half - 48% -
put South Korea in the negative column as opposed
to 36% in the "positive".
And it may come
as a shock to Koreans that only 16% of respondents
saw Japan's role as "negative" while 70% said it
was "positive". In fact, as a trustworthy ally,
Japan falls not far behind the UK, the leader,
viewed positively by 85% of respondents, Canada,
with a 77% positive rating, and Australia, with
71%.
US attitudes on South Korea are all
the more significant when compared with polls of
South Koreans, who have often expressed severe
doubts about the US-Korean alliance and the role
of US troops on the Korean Peninsula. Clearly,
attitudes in the United States reflect a response
to all those anti-American demonstrations as well
as disagreement on how to deal with North Korea.
The same poll showed that 43% of
respondents viewed North Korea as a "potential
threat down the road" to the US while 45% saw it
as a "potential threat" to world peace. And 26%
saw North Korea as a "threat in the near future"
to both the US and world peace.
Respondents were not asked whether South
Korea posed a threat. Close ties between the US
and South Korea exist on numerous complex levels,
from military to commercial to academic to
personal.
Overall, the poll appears as a
reflection of the soul-searching going on in the
United States in view of widespread qualms about
the competence of the administration of President
George W Bush to deal with foreign-policy crises.
The American Security Project may be "liberal", as
shown by the presence of Senator John Kerry, the
Democratic loser to Bush in the 2004 presidential
election, on the ASP board, but the board also
includes retired generals and admirals.
The board chairman, Gary Hart, the former
senator who ran briefly for the Democratic
presidential nomination 23 years ago, was
co-chairman with Warren Rudman, also a former
senator and board member, of the Commission on
National Security in the Twenty-First Century,
warning "of the danger of attacks on the US
homeland". Other luminaries on the board are
Richard Armitage, a former deputy secretary of
state and ambassador; George Mitchell, a former
senator and chairman of the International Crisis
Group, often critical of US foreign policy; and
Anthony Zinni, the US Marine Corps general who
served as commander of the US Central Command in
the Middle East from 1997 to 2000.
The
credentials of the board members suggest that this
report has to be taken seriously, especially when
considering that a Democrat may well take over the
White House as a result of the presidential
election next year.
If we are to
extrapolate a message as far as Korea is
concerned, it is that the US-Korean alliance is in
dire need of repair so both the US and South Korea
can work together to deal effectively with North
Korea. Try as they may to bridge the gap, US and
South Korean officials continue to differ on how
to deal with North Korea, as seen in US concerns
about South Korea promising aid to the North
before it gives up its nuclear-weapons program.
The same poll shows that 85% of
respondents have a negative view of North Korea.
That figure is only slightly less than the 89%
with a negative view of Iran, with which North
Korea has collaborated, one way or another, on
technology and components for nuclear warheads and
missiles.
Equally revealing, the poll
shows more than half of respondents - 52% -
harboring negative feelings about China's role in
world affairs, compared with only 37% who see
China as playing a positive role. China still came
out better than the Palestinian territories, with
75% seeing their role as negative, or Pakistan,
63%, and Saudi Arabia, 61%.
In general,
Americans seem much happier about India - 48%
seeing India's role as positive as opposed to only
27% who feel negative and 50% viewing India's
emergence as a major economic power as a positive
development compared with 37% in the negative.
As might be expected, respondents were
most worried about the competence of the Bush
administration to deal with crises. The poll
showed 70% feeling "things are off on the wrong
track" when it comes to "America's leadership role
in the world" while 61% disapproved of how Bush is
handling his job as president, compared with 35%
who approve.
Bush did not fare better in
specific questions about foreign policy and
national security - 64% disapproved of how he's
handling foreign policy, compared with 31% who
approved, and 54% disapproved of how he's dealing
with national security while 42% approved.
Fears of a nuclear holocaust dominated the
poll results, as seen in questions focusing on
Iran and North Korea. Bush has never repeated the
term "axis of evil" from his State of the Union
address of January 2002, but Americans still see
Iran and North Korea, named as members of the
"axis" along with Iraq, as sinister collaborators
in a terrifying arms race.
On a scale of
1-10, respondents gave "absolute top priority" to
containing Iran's "export of terror" and
"preventing acquisition of nuclear weapons" by
Iran, while 48% gave top priority to eliminating
North Korea's nukes.
Just how to achieve
such goals, though, was unclear. Despite "broad
rejection of a theoretical preemptive strike",
said the American Security Project in a report
accompanying the poll results, "a majority of
Americans (61%) would be in favor of using troops
under a scenario in which terrorists were planning
an attack on embassies abroad".
And 51%,
said the report, "would also be in favor of
committing US troops" - that is, if "needed for a
United Nations peacekeeping mission".
Journalist Donald Kirk has been
covering Korea - and the confrontation of forces
in Northeast Asia - for more than 30
years.
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