Where’s the Principle in the Foreign-Policy Debate? : Power: When the President is vulnerable, and there’s no pre-emptive Republican favorite, presidential politics is the name of the game.

Funny thing about the foreign-policy crisis now going on here. It isn’t like any other we’ve experienced during the last 50 years.

Why is this crisis different?

In all other crises, Americans have rallied to the President’s side, even when he got in trouble. President John F. Kennedy’s approval ratings peaked after the Bay of Pigs fiasco in 1961. President Jimmy Carter shot up in the polls after Iranian students seized American hostages in 1979.

In this crisis, Americans are turning against the President. Bill Clinton’s approval ratings have slipped nine points this month in the Gallup poll. His foreign-policy ratings are down 19 points. So much for rallying around the flag.

In all other crises, politics was temporarily set aside. The President’s foes held off on attacking him as long as the United States was in a vulnerable position. Politics stopped at the water’s edge.

In this crisis, the President’s opponents have been mercilessly attacking him from Day 1. Republicans have been outbidding each other to show their contempt for Clinton’s foreign policy. Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), who chaired the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 1985-86, condemned “the virtual collapse of presidential leadership in foreign matters.”

In an interview with U.S. News and World Report, former Defense Secretary Dick Cheney called Clinton’s policy in Haiti “stupid.” Former Vice President Dan Quayle said, “The President is conducting on-the-job training in the foreign-policy field.” Even former President George Bush broke his pledge not to criticize Clinton for a year.

But it was Senate minority leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) who had the top bid. He tried to introduce legislation prohibiting Clinton from using force in Haiti or Bosnia without prior congressional approval.

Dole’s move was a transparent political ploy, playing directly to public opinion. In an ABC News poll taken Oct. 12, two-thirds of the public said Congress should have the power to prevent a President from sending troops to participate in a U.N. mission. Americans don’t want to see any more pictures of dead U.S. soldiers being dragged through the streets.

Clinton condemned Dole’s move as a blatant--and unconstitutional--encroachment on the President’s foreign-policy powers. “I think I have the votes,” Dole said on Monday. He didn’t. He had to settle for a non-binding resolution expressing “the sense of the Senate” that Congress should authorize in advance any U.S. military operations. Clinton said he would “welcome and encourage” congressional authorization, as long as it was not a legal requirement.

Lugar was probably right, however, when he said, “People have stood beside (the President), but not because they agree with him. They are doing it solely out of loyalty to the Constitution and the role of the commander-in-chief.”

What’s unusual about this foreign-policy crisis is that there are no principles involved. That’s what makes it different from all other foreign-policy crises.

During the Cold War, every foreign-policy crisis involved deep ideological convictions. For 20 years after World War II, a period of bipartisan foreign-policy consensus, it was the free world vs. communism. For 20 years after Vietnam, a period of intense ideological conflict, it was interventionism vs. “the Vietnam syndrome.”

The Cold War is over. Now what? The simple answer is that foreign policy has become politics-as-usual.

Look at the debate over the Dole amendment. Not a principle in sight. Dole was an ardent defender of presidential prerogatives in Central America, Granada, Panama and Iraq. He had nothing but scorn for members of Congress who wanted to limit presidential authority. But those Presidents were Republicans.

Dole even reversed himself this month. Two weeks ago, he helped block congressional efforts to force the Administration to withdraw troops immediately from Somalia. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) sponsored just such a resolution.

Last week, Dole and McCain switched positions. Dole tried to limit the President’s authority to intervene in Haiti and Bosnia. McCain opposed him, saying, “I don’t see how the Congress should tell the President prospectively what he is going to do or not going to do.”

McCain claimed that the principle involved was prior restraint. In Somalia, things clearly went wrong. We got in trouble, so we should get out. But we haven’t gotten in trouble yet in Haiti. So the President should be free to act.

Dole claims a different principle is involved. U.S. forces are already in Somalia. Challenging the President there puts those forces at risk. But “we haven’t sent them yet to Haiti,” Dole said on Monday. ‘So let us speak before it happens.”

Those don’t sound much like great principles. They sound like ad hoc justifications. But so do Clinton’s explanations.

When Clinton addressed the nation two weeks ago, after Americans were brutally attacked in Somalia, he said we would put pressure on Somali forces that were cutting off supply routes and attacking Americans. Last week, however, he decided to withdraw those forces. Now the U.S. military commander in Somalia says our mission is wholly defensive.

Haiti is no clearer. The Administration says the United States is prepared to use force to restore the government of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, promote democracy and enforce a United Nations embargo. It is at least arguable whether any of those missions is in the U.S. national interest.

Last week, the Administration played its trump card. Secretary of State Warren Christopher asserted that since Haiti is “very much in our back yard,” we must restore democracy there to avoid a new flood of refugees. That argument is certainly xenophobic, conceivably racist and not entirely logical. Is it our job to improve other countries’ politics so their citizens won’t become disgruntled and try to get into the United States?

The American public is not convinced by any of this. In the ABC News poll, seven in 10 Americans felt Clinton does not have a clear purpose in either Somalia or Haiti.

Foreign affairs used to be the domain of causes--expressions of great national purpose. What we are doing in Somalia and Haiti, however, isn’t really a cause. It’s just a policy. And like all policies, it’s the subject of political contention.

Dole claimed he was trying to “find a balance between what the President finds critical and the concerns that Congress has.” That’s exactly what happens on a budget bill--interests override principles. Dole even admitted that if he were President, he would oppose the very restrictions he was proposing.

So why did he propose them? Because he is running for President. McCain, as far as we know, is not. Quayle, Cheney, Lugar and most of the other Republicans who have attacked Clinton are. Their interest is to weaken the current holder of that office.

It’s unusual for the race to begin so early--three years ahead of time--and with so many potential contenders. At least 15 Republicans have been mentioned. Five of them have already been to New Hampshire, including Dole, Cheney and Lugar.

Why all the action? Two reasons. One is that Clinton looks as if he might be vulnerable. The other is that there is no “man to beat” in the Republican field.

This far out, there is usually some consensus on who the leading candidate is. If the party can renominate the President for another term, then he’s the leading candidate. If it can’t, then the vice president is the leading candidate (Richard M. Nixon in 1960, Hubert H. Humphrey in 1968, Bush in 1988). If the party doesn’t hold the White House, its most recent vice president is usually the leading candidate (Edmund Muskie in 1972, Walter F. Mondale in 1984). Or the candidate who nearly won the nomination the last time (Reagan in 1980, Gary Hart in 1988). Or a figure of towering stature in the party (Edward M. Kennedy in 1976, Mario M. Cuomo in 1992).

This time it’s different. There’s no obvious man to beat in the Republican Party. Quayle is the most recent vice president, but he’s not exactly a 500-pound gorilla. Dole is Mr. Republican. But he has already run for President twice and for vice president once. He will be 73 years old in 1996. And he’s the consummate Washington insider.

With no strong front-runner, a lot of positioning is going on. That means figuring out where Clinton is vulnerable. Right now, that’s foreign policy. So Republicans are competing for the mantle of foreign-policy leadership.

They may be fooling themselves, however. If Clinton gets mired in pointless and costly foreign adventures, and if his commander-in-chief image continues to suffer, the candidate voters will turn to will not be Dole or Cheney or Lugar or Quayle. It will be someone who hasn’t expressed a word of criticism about Clinton’s policies in Haiti or Somalia. He doesn’t have to. His credentials as a military leader are impeccable. The man of the moment will be Gen. Colin L. Powell (U.S. Army, retired).