It’s a good baseline rule to take the opposite view of Ben Rhodes on any major foreign policy issue.
A good example of this good guiding tenet comes via the documentary, “The Final Year,” which follows former President Barack Obama’s final year of foreign policy. But at one point in the film, we see Obama’s then-top foreign policy adviser, Ben Rhodes, react with outrage at a Russian air strike on a civilian convoy in Syria.
What’s most telling is that Rhodes is genuinely shocked by what the Russians have done. Even at this point late in the Obama presidency, Rhodes still doesn’t realize that the Russians were doing what they were doing in order to undercut U.S. credibility. Rhodes’ failure of understanding encapsulates the unmitigated disaster that was the Obama-Rhodes handling of Vladimir Putin.
Now consider Rhodes’ tweet on Tuesday lamenting President Trump’s leadership of America in the world.
Trump has decimated America’s standing in the world in less than two years. This is what the Republican Party – which claims to stand for strong leadership – has enabled. https://t.co/pKhFRy3hVt
— Ben Rhodes (@brhodes) September 25, 2018
Don’t get me wrong: I recognize that President Trump is deeply unpopular in much of the world, to include America’s closest allies such as Britain and France (although Trump is popular in Israel). Still, that Rhodes views popularity and leadership as one and the same speaks volumes about why his boss’ foreign policy was such a debacle.
Popularity is not the same as leadership. To mistake the two concepts as one and the same is to break one of the most basic rules of command leadership: the need to remain absolutely focused on the mission. This isn’t a complicated concept. Indeed, it is a fundamental precept of all the U.S. military academies, where young cadets and midshipmen are constantly reminded that their job is to look out for the interests of those under their command in concert with the need to accomplish the mission.
When it comes to being president, getting the job done does not mean being popular. Obama and Rhodes saw things differently. In their apology tour through France, their catastrophic decision to withdraw from Iraq without regard to conditions on the ground, and their showmanship on the streets of Havana, Obama and Rhodes always put prestige before good policy.
And in that self-deception, they neglected the necessity of leadership: being willing to do unpopular things.
Unpopular things such as introducing sanctions and a more robust military presence to contain China’s imperial rise in the Indo-Pacific. Unpopular things such as countering Russian aggression to deter Putin’s threats. Unpopular things such as threatening North Korea into serious negotiations. Unpopular things such as refusing to accept European demands that the Iran nuclear agreement be deferential to Iranian interests on issues such as ballistic missile research. Unpopular things such as enforcing the bedrock of international order by ensuring that American red-lines are commonly understood as consistently unbreakable.
Of course, as shown by his tweeting of an opinion poll shows, for Rhodes it has always been about choices that sell well and easily. He never had an appetite for the hard choices that ultimately inspire the confidence of our allies and the fear of our adversaries.
