Charlie Arlinghaus – President of the Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy

“It is critical that America be thoroughly engaged globally through international exchange, diplomacy, development and trade to address today’s global challenges and prepare our next generation of leaders.”

Representative Richard Swett – Former Congressman – NH’s 2nd District

“Going it alone is not a policy option for the United States in the 21st century. Our non-military tools of global engagement – particularly diplomacy and development – are underutilized given the challenges before us.”

Representative Charles Bass – Former Congressman – NH’s Second District

“The next President will face extraordinary challenges in redefining America’s role in the world and restoring our country’s global respect.”

The two Democratic presidential contenders were among several policy leaders who made impassioned pleas for a new comprehensive foreign policy that went beyond military power, returning to an emphasis on diplomacy, free trade and foreign aid, known as tools of “soft” or “smart” power.

The forum was hosted by the Center for U.S. Global Engagement and the New Hampshire Institute of Politics and also featured as keynote speakers Jack Kemp, a former Republican vice presidential candidate, and General Barry McCaffrey, a drug czar under President Bill Clinton.

“I’m proud to stand with both organizations because of what they stand for,” Biden said. “We have a common vision for the future. It’s a vision of an America that embraces the power of its example as well as the example of its power. It’s the vision of an America that recaptures the totality of its strength.”

Saying little about Iraq, Afghanistan or Iran, Biden instead focused on Pakistan, where President Pervez Musharraf recently suspended the constitution and declared martial law.

“It’s hard to imagine a greater nightmare for America than the world’s second-largest Muslim nation becoming a failed state in fundamentalist hands, with an arsenal of nuclear weapons and a population larger than those of Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and North Korea combined,” Biden said.

History won’t repeat itself in Pakistan, he said, only if the next American president builds a long-term relationship with the country.

U.S. funding for the Pakistani military should be continued only if the Pakistani military is able to effectively fight al-Qaida and the Taliban and if Musharraf restores democratic reforms, Biden said.

Richardson urged a doubling of U.S. foreign aid to 2 percent of the federal budget, or more than $50 billion. He said democratic countries that respect human rights would be given preference over those that oppress their peoples.

The former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations also said membership on the U.N. Security Council should be opened up to other countries, such as Japan, Germany and India. South America and Africa, he said, should also get to pick their own representative for the council.

READ MORE: http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Biden, Richardson call for ‘soft’, ‘smart’ diplomacy&articleId=5f91a754-6820-43cd-85c7-cf3600fdbb9b

Manchester, NH — Presidential candidates Governor Bill Richardson and Senator Joseph Biden today responded to a bipartisan group of New Hampshire business, civic, political and academic leaders who have joined a growing national campaign to urge all of the presidential candidates to strengthen and elevate America’s non-military tools for global engagement. Republican former Vice Presidential candidate and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Jack Kemp and four-star General (Ret.) and former White House drug czar Barry McCaffrey also joined the New Hampshire leaders for the launch of Impact ’08 in New Hampshire: Building a Better, Safer World.

Governor Richardson stressed the need for the use of the full slate of America’s foreign policy tools to meet the increasingly dynamic threats of the 21st century, noting, “The challenges that the world faces now are transnational: jihadism, terrorism, disease, climate change, our dependence on foreign oil. I believe that our foreign policy needs to employ our smart power tools – diplomacy, development, and making use of America’s moral leadership – to confront these issues.”

Senator Biden emphasized the need to increase America’s investments in development and diplomacy, highlighting the current political crisis in Pakistan as an example. Biden laid out a new plan for U.S. policy toward Pakistan which includes tripling non-security aid to $1.5 billion dollars annually for at least a decade. As he explained, “The aid would be unconditioned; it is our pledge to the Pakistani people. Instead of funding military hardware, it would build schools, clinics, and roads to help support the moderate majority in that country…. Democracies do not flourish in places where economies fail.”

Biden also said there is a need to restore America’s moral leadership in the world, and commended the Center for U.S. Global Engagement for convening the forum. “I’m proud to stand with this organization because of what they stand for. We have a common vision for the future. It’s the vision of an America that embraces the power of its example as well as the example of its power. It’s the vision of an America that recaptures the totality of its strength.” He added, “We should have an equally powerful civilian force to match our military force.”

In a message in a full-page ad in today’s Manchester Union Leader, New Hampshire GOP State Chairman Fergus Cullen, Democratic Party State Chairman Ray Buckley and dozens of business, religious, civic and political leaders from across New Hampshire said that the prosperity and security of America and New Hampshire are linked to those of other nations and their people, and that the next President must be prepared to lead with a bold, new vision of America’s role in the world. To view ad with full list of signatories go to www.usglobalengagement.org

Other Democratic and Republican candidates were also invited to speak.

Former US Reps. Charles Bass, Republican, and Dick Swett, Democrat, reflect the political diversity of the New Hampshire Impact ’08 group. Bass said, “The next President will face extraordinary challenges in redefining America’s role in the world and restoring our country’s global respect.”

Charles Arlinghaus, President of the Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy, summed up the views of many of the leaders from New Hampshire, Iowa, South Carolina and Nevada who have joined the Impact ’08 effort in early primary and caucus states. “It is critical that America be thoroughly engaged globally through international exchange, diplomacy, development and trade to address today’s global challenges and prepare our next generation of leaders.”

About the Organizers

The Center for U.S. Global Engagement unites business, civic, faith-based and military leaders in New Hampshire and around the country to promote greater understanding about America’s role in the world. For more information about the Center and Impact ‘08, visit www.usglobalengagement.org.

The New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College serves as a resource for students, scholars, politicians, and the general public. Founded on the premise that engaged citizens are vital for a healthy democracy, the Institute conducts programs and research that are designed to enlighten and encourage people for a lifetime of civic participation. For more information, visit www.anselm.edu/nhiop.

With the New Hampshire primary just weeks away and the candidates heading into nail-biting time here in the Granite State, there are two absolute certainties.

One, which will come as a surprise to no one, is that the two of us will not vote for the same candidate. But the other is something we hope our fellow New Hampshire voters will reflect carefully upon as they assess the positions of the various candidates – and that is our shared belief that whoever wins the White House must implement a new, strategic vision for U.S. global leadership in the 21st century.

The next president will face extraordinary challenges in redefining America’s role in the world and restoring our country’s leadership and global respect. It will not be enough to be simply a fresh face on the world scene. Our foreign and national security policies must be reassessed and reinvigorated to reflect global realities that cannot be wished away. The first of these realities is that military power alone will not keep America safe.

Our military and intelligence communities understand this. General David Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Iraq, has pointed out that war is “80 percent political action and only 20 percent military,” while the 9/11 Commission Report, the 2006 Department of Defense Quadrennial Review and the 2006 National Security Strategy have all said that we must focus more on diplomacy and foreign assistance to ensure global stability and guarantee American security.

The second reality is that “going it alone” is not a policy option for the United States in the 21st century.

We cannot reverse the technology that has made it possible for ideas, goods, capital and people to flow across international borders. Nor would we want to. This has been good for New Hampshire, with more than 2,000 companies in the state – most of them small and medium sized businesses – exporting $2.5 billion in goods to nearly 160 foreign markets.

But a more interconnected world also makes it easier for terrorism and infectious diseases to cross borders and pose risks to us here at home.

We cannot hope to keep America safe when millions of infants around the world are dying of preventable diseases, 77 million children are not attending school and more than one billion people are lacking clean water.

The third reality is that our non-military tools of global engagement – particularly diplomacy and development – are underutilized given the challenges before us.

READ MORE: http://www.cmonitor.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071205/OPINION/712050309/1028/OPINION02

]]> http://www.usglc.org/2007/12/05/center-op-ed-diplomacy-is-the-better-investment-concord-monitor/feed/ 0 http://www.usglc.org/2007/11/08/biden-outlines-pakistan-strategy/ http://www.usglc.org/2007/11/08/biden-outlines-pakistan-strategy/#comments Thu, 08 Nov 2007 22:42:01 +0000 Tom Vogel http://www.usglobalengagement.org.php5-8.websitetestlink.com/?p=694 The U.S. must overhaul its relationship with Pakistan in order to eliminate the potential threat of the world’s second-largest Muslim state with nuclear weapons coming under fundamentalist control, said Democratic presidential candidate and Sen. Joe Biden (D., Del.) today at a speech at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at St. Anselm College. Biden, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who has made his foreign-policy experience the foundation of his lagging presidential bid, outlined a series of steps he believes the U.S. needs to embrace.

Biden

They include: a tripling of nonsecurity related aid to $1.5 billion annually, with a commitment that the aid is unconditional and guaranteed for at least the next decade and stricter monitoring of the estimated $1 billion annually the U.S. provides to Pakistan in aid to fight al Qaeda and other terrorist threats. “I’d spend more if we get better returns — and less if we don’t,” Biden said. Additionally, Biden has urged army chief and President Pervez Musharraf to uphold his commitment to hold elections in January, and said he would increase nonsecurity aid by $1 billion in the first year if Pakistan demonstrates “progress in developing democratic institutions and meeting good-governance norms.”

Biden also faulted the Bush administration for advocating what he called a “Musharraf First” policy and for failing to act more promptly in the wake of Musharraf’s decision last Saturday to suspend the constitution and invoke military rule. “The Bush Administration’s ‘Musharraf First’ policy was understandable at first. Musharraf had broad support, and in the wake of 9/11 he seemed committed to the fight against al Qaeda,” Biden said, “Six years later, the general is diverting his military, his police, and his intelligence assets from the fight against the terrorists to a crackdown on his political opponents.”

Biden argues that the U.S. needs to focus more directly with the Pakistani people and what he calls the “moderate majority,” as well as regroup our military effort in Afghanistan. “Redoubling our efforts in Afghanistan – not just with more troops but with the right kind and with a reconstruction effort that matches President Bush’s Marshall Plan rhetoric would embolden Pakistan’s government to take a harder line on the Taliban and al Qaeda,” he said.

READ MORE:http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2007/11/08/biden-outlines-pakistan-strategy/

In a speech today at St. Anselm’s College in Manchester, New Hampshire, Biden criticized President Bush for mishandling the current political crisis and called for a change of approach in dealing with Pakistan. He called for the U.S. to “be far more pro-active, not reactive and make it clear to Pakistan that actions have consequences.”

Biden continued, “President Bush’s first reaction was to call on President Musharraf to reverse course. Given the stakes, I thought it was important to actually call him – which is exactly what I did. I also spoke to opposition leader Benazir Bhutto.”

The senator, who chairs the Foreign Relations Committee and has been working on world conflict for years, described his conversation with President Musharraf as “very direct and detailed… I told him how critical it is that elections go forward as planned in January, that he follow through on his commitment to take off his uniform, and that he restore the rule of law to Pakistan.”

READ MORE: http://blog.washingtonpost.com/44/2007/11/08/post_188.html

Biden, a U.S. senator knowledgeable on international relations, says what is happening in Pakistan is linked to broader U.S. foreign policy goals. He says U.S. policy should be shifted from one focused solely on President Pervez Musharraf to one based on Pakistan as a whole.

READ MORE:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21687583/

The campaign is growing around the nation, with recent support in New Hampshire from many professionals and leaders from different fields within and outside of politics. The campaign appeals to many who believe that new strategies must be enacted towards the U.S global image and communication, as well as more effort put into diplomacy. The campaign is being heralded as a call to the President to be aware of this growing demand for a new approach to foreign policy on all fronts, but perhaps even more so a message to potential presidents in 08.

READ MORE: http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/442459/bill_richardson_joe_biden_jack_kemp.html?singlepage=true&cat=8