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Executive meddling is fouling up diplomacy

Taiwan's representative to the US, Chen Chien-jen (程建人), recently returned to Taiwan to deliver a report.

He is the most fortunate, but also the most unfortunate, representative to the US since the two countries severed diplomatic ties. He is fortunate because US President George W. Bush's ideology has created the best Taiwan-US relations. But he is unfortunate because President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) ideology has caused a very good relationship to turn very sour.

Standing on the front lines of diplomacy, Chen Chien-jen has a clear understanding of the cold wind blowing in Washington.

He is a career diplomat with an excellent educational and professional background. He is a man of good character and has a good way with people and a wide personal network. Add to this that he has many talents, and even though he might not be called the renaissance man of diplomacy, he can without feeling ashamed call himself half a renaissance man.

He is, however, no George Yeh (葉公超), former ambassador to the US and foreign minister, who dared oppose Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) over Outer Mongolia. Nor is he former ambassador to the US Hu Shih (胡適).

Though Chen Chien-jen cannot compare to his two predecessors, he is not one to do whatever he is told.

But he has run into a president who likes to shoot his mouth off on impulse. As soon as Taipei starts a fire, he has to work hard in Washington to extinguish it.

Although Chen Chien-jen's contacts in Washington are quite good, he does not have the access to the White House that Yeh or Hu had, access that allowed them to immediately clarify misunderstandings or resolve crises.

His Washington friends may be sympathetic as they see his constant efforts at putting out fires, but his credibility suffers.

Anyone involved in diplomacy has heard the following metaphor: A president's relationship with the diplomatic system is like that of a conductor with his symphony orchestra. No matter how well the conductor plays the violin, he cannot play first chair violin or he will not hear the other instruments. As a result, the whole orchestra will lose its rhythm and direction.

The reason that Taiwan's diplomacy is a mess is that the conductor is playing first violin.

There is one almost religious rule in diplomacy -- politics must come to a halt at the water's edge of diplomacy.

But the president has tied foreign policy closely to domestic politics, and politics has therefore muddied the diplomatic waters.

A diplomat's worst nightmare is the nation's leader personalizing and politicizing diplomacy, placing it in the realm of ideology. This is what has now happened to Taiwan's diplomacy.

A diplomat's nightmare among nightmares is having the president go so far in his ideology that his reasons for doing things become unrelated to diplomatic reality, set foreign policy according to this ideology and let short-term political interests (particularly electoral interests) decide diplomatic activities.

This shows just how unfortunate Chen Chien-jen really is.

Taiwan's diplomacy is now a matter for domestic officials and not for diplomats. Foreign affairs officials such as Chen Chien-jen, and even foreign minister Eugene Chien (簡又新), no longer make up the core of decisionmakers.

Instead, the officials in the Presidential Office participate in decisionmaking at an earlier stage in the process, and to a greater extent.

The president and his associates cannot avoid responsibility for the sharp deterioration of the Taiwan-US relationship, and they have only complicated the difficult job that Chen Chien-jen and other diplomats must do.

Wang Chien-chuang is the president of The Journalist.

Translated by Perry Svensson
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