In what was clearly a significant event in the unfolding US presidential campaign, Governor George W. Bush delivered his first major foreign policy speech of his campaign for the Republican nomination.
Bush delivered his 35-minute speech at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in the dry hills outside Simi Valley, a suburb 64km northwest of downtown Los Angeles, with considerable aplomb, turning in a well-versed, well-drilled performance that on several occasions rose to a presidential level.
He quoted Burke and Pericles and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, and he even echoed a bit of Churchillian rhetoric when he promised a foreign policy built upon "idealism, without illusions; confidence, without conceit; realism, in the service of American ideals."
Foreign policy seldom plays a central part in American presidential campaigns. But it can prove decisive if a candidate gives the impression that the management of the nation's affairs overseas is beyond his reach.
In his speech, Bush called for an end to international aid to Moscow unless the Russian government stops "killing women and children."
"We cannot excuse Russian brutality," Bush said. "When the Russian government attacks civilians, it can no longer expect aid from international lending institutions."
Bush walked a fine line, balancing tough talk with more moderate formulations.
But he made it clear at the outset that he would hew to the internationalist principles of his father and fight those in his own party as well as those outside it who have sought "to build a proud tower of protectionism and isolation."
"This," he said, "is the shortcut to chaos."
While the governor implicitly criticized those Republicans who reject trade agreements with China and turn their backs on the UN, he was more explicit in his criticism of President Clinton, accusing him, without citing him by name, of allowing the nation "to move from crisis to crisis like a cork in a current."
Bush argued that "unless a president sets his own priorities, his priorities will be set by others -- by adversaries, or the crisis of the moment, live on CNN."
Consistency was one of Bush's main themes, especially on China. Again without naming Clinton, he said the administration had called the Chinese leadership "the butchers of Beijing" one year and embraced the Chinese leadership as a "strategic partner" only a few years later.
For his part, the governor said, he would stand up to China if it threatened democratic nations in its region, like Taiwan and South Korea. He promised again to help Taiwan defend itself.
And he welcomed the idea of Chinese entry into the WTO, while warning that "it will take a strong administration to hold them to their word," given what he termed "China's poor record" in honoring international agreements.
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