Putting Smart Power to Work
“Putting Smart Power to Work”
By Dick Batchelor
Orlando Sentinel
March 1, 2010
The U.S. Global Leadership Coalition is a group of bi-partisan leaders who work to educate policymakers on the values of engaging with the rest of the world and support more resources for our tools of development and diplomacy. The current co-chairs of the group’s “Putting Smart Power to Work” campaign are former Governor and Secretary of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, and former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. The national organization’s advisory council has General Colin Powell as its honorary chair and includes people like Henry A. Kissinger, Zbigneiw Brzezinski, and James Schlesinger.
Recently, in Marja (Afghanistan), we were able to see this new approach invoked as villagers from areas fully occupied by Taliban foot soldiers were actually asked what needs their communities have. For instance, we can provide them now with “schools in a box”, which can be established and opened in short time, demonstrating to the Afghans that America is there to not only rid their country and the world of the Taliban but to garner their support and reach beyond the battlefield and to their communities. And while not everyone supports the war in Iraq and/or Afghanistan, I think we can all agree on the importance of winning the hearts and minds of the Afghan people. That might be our best hope in mitigating the growing threats to our American men and women in uniform, not to mention our country, and allow them to come home sooner, rather than later.
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