My latest piece on foreign policy in the Presidential election campaign has been published by my friends at ForeignPolicy.com's Shadow Government blog.  This was actually supposed to appear in the Wall Street Journal a few weeks ago, but then the Benghazi attack that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stephens overshadowed my relatively mild argument here.

(And yes, I'll get back to posting pure non-political/manhunting/War-on-Terror pieces more frequently once the side project I've been overwhelmed with the last few months is complete).

If Obama's foreign policy has been so successful, then why are we talking about Romney's advisors?

Prior to the terrorist attack that killed U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and the subsequent anti-U.S. demonstrations throughout the Muslim world, the conventional wisdom held that President Obama was unassailable on foreign policy during the election campaign. Yet rather than tout the administration's successes -- which have produced an edge in polls as to who the public trusts on foreign affairs -- the Obama campaign and its allies seem more eager to warn voters that Mitt Romney is planning to bring back George W. Bush's foreign policy than tout the president's "successes." "Of Romney's 24 special advisors on foreign policy, 17 served in the Bush-Cheney administration," wrote Adam Smith, the most senior Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee -- and that's "a frightening prospect." Similarly, during the Democratic convention, Senator John Kerry said: "[Romney] has all these [neoconservative] advisers who know all the wrong things about foreign policy. He would rely on them." Now, noted foreign policy scholar Maureen Dowd has written not one, but TWO columns decrying "neocon" influence over Romney's foreign policy.

This is an especially odd line of attack given that most of the Obama administration's foreign policy achievements are little more than extensions of Bush administration policies.
President Obama frequently boasts that he fulfilled his promise to "end the war" in Iraq. In reality, he merely adhered to the U.S.-Iraq Status of Forces Agreement negotiated and signed by the Bush administration in 2008. What's more, as a senator Mr. Obama opposed the 2007 surge of U.S. forces that made this agreement possible. The Obama administration's only policy innovation on Iraq was last year's failure to broker a new strategic framework agreement with Iraq, a deal they had previously insisted was necessary and achievable.

Then there's the operation that killed Osama bin Laden. To be sure, the president deserves credit for launching the raid against the advice of so many of his advisors, including Vice President Joe Biden. But Mr. Obama fails to acknowledge that the intelligence chain that led to the Abbottabad raid began with detainee interrogations at Guantanamo Bay and CIA "black" sites that he vowed to close upon taking office.

What about drones? President Obama deserves credit for the successful "drone war" against al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan, but the uptick in U.S. drone attacks there began in July 2008. The Obama administration's continuation of this policy is an acknowledgment -- unspoken, of course -- that the Bush administration was correct to treat the war on terror as an actual war rather than a global law-enforcement campaign.

On Iran, President Obama brags that "Iran is under greater pressure than ever before, "and "few thought that sanctions could have an immediate bite on the Iranian regime." Putting aside the fact that these sanctions were imposed upon the president by a 100-0 Senate vote, and that Obama's State Department has granted exemptions to all 20 of Iran's major oil-trading partners, this triumphalism ignores that the Bush administration worked for years to build multilateral support for sanctions (both at the United Nations and in national capitals). The Obama administration broke from this effort for two years, attempting instead to engage the Iranian leadership. When this outreach predictably failed, the Obama administration claimed that Tehran had proven itself irrevocably committed to its nuclear program -- precisely the conclusion the Bush administration had reached years earlier.

Yes, there's more to the Obama administration's foreign-policy case, but the other "achievements" are muddled ones. Even before the Benghazi attack, post-Qaddafi Libya was so insecure that the State Department issued a travel advisory warning U.S. citizens against "all but essential travel to Libya," and NATO's intervention in Libya raised the inconvenient question of why the administration intervened to alleviate a "medieval siege" on Benghazi but sits silently as tens of thousands of civilians are slaughtered in Syria.

In Afghanistan, the surge ordered by President Obama in December 2009 had the operational effect intended. But even in taking this step, the president undermined the policy by rejecting his military commander's request for 40,000 troops, declaring the surge would end according to a fixed timeline rather than conditions on the ground, and announcing the withdrawal of the last 20,000 surge forces before the Afghan fighting season ended (but before the November election). The Bush administration veterans advising Governor Romney surely know more about the importance of seeing a policy through to its fruition.

The Bush administration made many foreign policy mistakes during its eight years in office, most notably the conduct of the Iraq War after the fall of Baghdad. And Governor Romney still needs to provide details demonstrating why he would be a better steward of U.S. national security than President Obama. But the potential devolution of the Arab Spring into anti-U.S. violence demonstrates why both candidates owe the American people a serious discussion about foreign and defense policy. Hopefully in the election campaign's waning weeks the Democrats will offer much more than the ad hominen anti-Bush attacks they have provided to date.

Today in Manhunting History: September 4, 1886 -- Geronimo's Final Surrender

Chiricahua Apache war captain Geronimo had evaded U.S. forces for 16 months since his escape from the San Carlos Reservation in May 1885

Captain Henry W. Lawton’s command had escorted Geronimo the remaining renegade Chiricahuas across the Mexican border, arriving at Skeleton Canyon in Arizona just before nightfall on September 2. The canyon was given its name from the still visible remains of 19 Mexicans ambushed and killed there by the Tombstone outlaw Curly Bill and his gang, who more than a century later would be immortalized as the Earp brothers’ antagonists in the film “Tombstone.” Despite this grisly legacy, the canyon actually presented a serene landscape as its stream wound lazily from the low Peloncillo Mountains down to the arid San Simon basin. Lawton and Geronimo found several commands of regular soldiers already there when they arrived, which triggered the Chiricahuas’ fear of treachery. Lawton sent another desperate message through the chain of command, and the next day the Acting Assistant Adjutant General of the Department, William Thompson, heliographed Brigadier General Nelson A. Miles (Commander of the Arizona Territory): “Lawton says the hostiles will surrender to you, but if he does not see you today he is afraid they will leave.”



Finally, after days of delay, Miles and his entourage arrived at Skeleton Canyon at 3PM on September 3. Geronimo immediately rode down from his campsite in the rocks overlooking the stream. He dismounted from his horse and approached the general.

The glade in Skeleton Canyon where Geronimo met Brigadier General Nelson A. Miles (Images via http://abell.as.arizona.edu/~hill/4x4/skeleton/skeleton.html)

Geronimo shook Miles’ hand. The interpreter said, “General Miles is your friend.”

Geronimo replied: “I never saw him, but I have been in need of friends. Why has he not been with me?”

The tension broke as everyone within earshot burst into laughter.

As the conference began in earnest, Miles told Geronimo: “Lay down your arms and come with me to Fort Bowie, and in five days you will see your families now in Florida, and no harm will be done to you.” Miles became frustrated with the laborious translation procedures that transformed English into Spanish into Apache and back again. He picked up some stones and drew a line in the dirt, and said “This represents the ocean.” He placed a stone near the line. “This represents the place where Chihuahua is with his band.” He then placed another stone a short distance from the first and said, “This represents you, Geronimo.” He picked up a third stone and put it near the second one. “This represents the Indians at Camp Apache. The President wants to take you and put you with Chihuahua.” He then picked up the stones representing the Apaches in Arizona and put them beside the one representing Chihuahua in Florida. “This is what the President wants to do, get all of you together.”

Miles indicated the stay in the East would be of indefinite duration, but that eventually the Apaches would be returned to Arizona. He concluded: “Tell them I have no more to say. I would like to talk generally with him, but we do not understand each other’s tongue.”

Geronimo turned to Gatewood and smiled. “Good,” he said in Apache, “you told the truth.” He shook Miles’ hand and said that no matter what the others did he was surrendering.

Brigadier General Nelson A. Miles, the vain, ambitious (and later controversial) officer who accepted Geronimo's formal surrender 126 years ago today.

The next morning a formal surrender ceremony was held. On September 5 Geronimo, Naiche, and other warriors were placed in Miles’ wagon and set out for Fort Bowie. Looking at the Chiricahua Mountains near the end of their journey, Geronimo said to Miles: “This is the fourth time I have surrendered.”

“And I think it is the last time,” Miles replied.

Four days later the prisoners were assembled on the parade ground at Fort Bowie and packed into heavily guarded wagons for the trip to the rail station. As they departed, the 4th Cavalry band played “Auld Lang Syne.” Geronimo was left to wonder why the soldiers jeered and laughed as they sang “Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind.”

The Geronimo Surrender site, on Highway 80 near Apache, Arizona, looking East toward Skeleton Canyon.