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NEWSWEEK: International Editions: Highlights and Exclusives, July 28, 2008 Issue
Sunday, July 20, 2008
COVER: Obama Abroad. An Emerging World View. Newsweek International Editor
Fareed Zakaria writes that in the realm of foreign policy, Barack Obama has
been made out to be a softheaded idealist. John McCain and his campaign,
conservative columnists and right-wing bloggers all paint a picture of a
liberal dreamer who wishes away the world's dangers. Zakaria disagrees. "Over
the course of the campaign ... Obama has elaborated more and more the ideas
that would undergird his foreign policy as president," he writes. "What
emerges is a world view that is far from that of a typical liberal, much
closer to that of a traditional realist. It is interesting to note that, at
least in terms of the historical schools of foreign policy, Obama seems to be
the cool conservative and McCain the exuberant idealist." Zakaria adds that
McCain is a pessimist about the world, "seeing it as a dark, dangerous place
where, without the constant and vigorous application of American force, evil
will triumph." To Obama "countries like Iran and North Korea are holdouts
against the tide of history. America's job is to push these progressive forces
forward, using soft power more than hard, and to try to get the world's major
powers to solve the world's major problems."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/147763
As part of the cover package, ten international writers, professors and
government officials contributed essays on how their country would view an
Obama presidency.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/147678
-- Timothy Garton Ash, a professor of European studies at Oxford
University, writes that the good news from Britain is that they're all
Obamamaniacs now. But enthusiasm for Obama is "equaled by skepticism about his
country. That means there's a lot of ground for him to make up."
-- Dominique Moisi, senior adviser to the French Institute of
International Relations, writes that Obama should know how much he is loved in
France. (85 percent of Frenchmen would vote for him, according to one poll).
"You not only incarnate the best of America but give us hope for the full
integration of our own black and Arab citizens."
-- Josef Joffe, publisher-editor of Die Zeit in Hamburg, writes that Obama
can change the tune of U.S. foreign policy. "But he can't get rid of the brass
and the kettledrums, so when he visits, he might gently prepare Berlin for the
dissonances to come."
-- Tom Segev, Israeli historian and a columnist for Haaretz writes, that
when Obama arrives in Israel, he'll find Israelis are as eager for change as
his supporters at home. And that most Israelis "feel deeply dependent on
America and will not risk major policy differences with the United States.
That means Obama may find them open to a new, more rational approach to the
Middle East conflicts."
-- Marwan Muasher, the former foreign minister of Jordan and author of
"The Arab Center: The Promise of Moderation," writes that Obama, while in the
Middle East, should begin a candid dialogue and to learn about the area's
aspirations. "As you rightly articulated, the United States' approach to the
Middle East needs to be reoriented."
-- Ali A. Allawi, Iraq's minister of Finance from 2005-06 and author of
"The Occupation of Iraq: Winning the War, Losing the Peace," writes, "Obama
should realize that the picture of Iraq he'll get from meetings with military
commanders, U.S. diplomats and senior Iraqi leaders will be incomplete,
offering him only a glimpse of the country's true conditions."
-- Ashraf Ghani, the former Finance minister of Afghanistan and current
chairman of the Institute of State Effectiveness, writes that Washington and
Obama should recognize that Afghanis are "frustrated by the waste and lack of
transparency in the international aid system ... Growing violence, especially
civilian casualties (many inflicted by international forces) are making us
feel less secure. So are rising food prices and a youth-unemployment rate of
40 to 60 percent."
-- Michael Anti, a Chinese political blogger and Nieman Fellow at Harvard,
writes that the one key fact Obama should remember is "trade is now central to
the U.S.-Chinese relationship. China needs more trade-not just for its economy
or its government, but for the sake of its civil society as well."
-- Shekhar Gupta, editor in chief of The Indian Express, writes that the
first thing Obama needs to know about India is that he doesn't need to fix
America's battered image there-and it is a big reason he should have included
India in his travel plans.
-- Luis Fernando Verissimo, a Brazilian journalist and author, writes that
if Obama came to Brazil-and he should-they would impress him with their
bigness in everything. "We might even cause him to ponder just what all this
bigness and ambition means for the United States."
Mediterranean Bridge Building. Special Correspondent Eric Pape reports on
French President Nicolas Sarkozy's recent actions between France and Israel.
Until very recently, France and Israel have had bitterly difficult relations.
But Sarkozy has changed all that by very publicly embracing the Jewish state.
He takes every opportunity to reassure Israel, whether on Iran's nuclear
ambitions or by calling talk of a politique arabe "nonsense," as he did in his
2006 political book "Testimony." Last month Sarkozy lauded the universal
values of Judaism in a speech before the Israeli Knesset. Sarkozy used the
occasion to tell Israel: "The French people will always be [there] when your
existence is threatened."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/147680
BOOK EXCEPT: "Stalin's Children: Three Generations of Love, War, and
Survival." In this book excerpt, Moscow Bureau Chief Owen Matthews writes
about his family's experiences while living in Russia and the effect on his
life there now. "Twenty-six years after my mother finally left Moscow to
marry my father, I moved in the opposite direction, back to Russia. For much
of my time there, I thought I was in a story without a narrative, a constantly
changing slide show of phantasmagoria that Moscow was projecting onto my life
for my personal delectation. But in fact ... I have found myself, time and
again, tripping over the roots of experience that I shared with my parents and
grandparents."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/147688
WORLD VIEW: Poisonous Relations. In the last eight years, Russia has had
serious rows with almost half of the EU's 27 member states. Contrary to
popular opinion these have affected both longtime members of the EU and new,
write Andrew Wilson, senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign
Relations, and Mark Leonard, executive director at the European Council on
Foreign Relations. "Indeed, it seems that too often Russia has been able to
punch above its weight by using underhanded divide-and-conquer tactics-while
Europe has failed to recognize that collectively it is much stronger than its
members are when they act alone ... Europe needs to figure out a way to come
together to fight back."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/147692
THE LAST WORD: Marc Sageman, author, "Leaderless Jihad." Sageman says he
focused on the dynamics of small groups, like the leaders of the 9/11
operation who were in Hamburg, and not on the overall leadership of Al Qaeda.
"I realized it was a bunch of guys that got together and wanted to do
something. They were all very enthusiastic and not just passive recipients of
other people's orders. They generated their own ideas. They went to
Afghanistan looking for Al Qaeda, and when they connected, then Al Qaeda gave
them some direction."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/147690
SOURCE Newsweek
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