Vice President Biden is more vocal but no different in substance from any other senior U.S. politician in either party. None of them are in the least concerned with protecting the United States. Wheeling out the old Arkansas skirt-chaser to kiss the Dear Leader's butt is typical of what these people regard as a "foreign-policy victory." Whether its hugging Qadhafi, bowing to the Saudi tyrant, posing with the Dear Leader for photos, championing the Chavez-wannabe, or getting our soldiers and Marines killed in Afghanistan so Mrs. Muhammad can vote and abort in Afghanistan, the senior leaders in both parties and their endlessly reappearing political-appointee acolytes are the stuff from which national security nightmares are made.

Mrs. Clinton's placing of a wreath in the memory of the U.S. citizens killed in the East Africa embassy bombings is emblematic of the triumph of show over substance in the current bipartisan practice of U.S. foreign policy. As a weepy Mrs. Clinton deploys the wreath, the media is cheering her husband, whose deliberate refusal as president to kill or capture bin Laden is the sole reason the wreath is necessary. And around the president? Well, just as a small sampling, there is Leon Panetta, Clinton's chief of staff and the supporter of a president who ran away from defending America whenever he could and who now -- like the former president -- thinks it is a bad thing to kill al-Qaeda leaders. Then there is John Brennan -- see the puff piece about this lion of a man in today's Post -- who with George Tenet helped to cancel a CIA operation to capture bin Laden in late-May, 1998, because they had "convinced" the Saudi regime to buy him from the Taleban and turn him over to us. Seventy-five days after Brennan helped to stop the CIA operation and delegate responsibility for U.S. national security to the fundamentally anti-American Saudi regime the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam were smoking, blood-stained ruins.

You might notice that thanks to Clinton, Panetta, Brennan, and Tenet, Osama bin Laden is still alive and -- between 9/11 and Mr. Bush's two unwon wars -- more than 10,000 Americans are dead, with many, many more to come. If the return of some of these men and their ideas to positions of power are an indication that Americans are being "well-served" in the field of national security by Obama‘s foreign-policy team, well I hope that God is still looking out for drunks and the United States of America.

(P.S.) And if you think the Republicans would be any better, you would be wrong. Note Republican congressman Eric Cantor’s current visit to Israel, his country of first allegiance. Read the Israeli media coverage of what this man is saying to his fellow Israeli citizens and you will come away wondering who wants war with Iran more, Cantor or Netanyahu? That’s a toss up, but what you can bet is that the lives of America’s soldier-children have absolutely no place in their considerations except in so far as their deaths are useful in the defense of Israel.

As several contributors have already pointed out, the beauty of our democracy rests, in part, on the fact that we don't have "party lines" that senior government officials must hew to, or else...they and three generations of their family get exiled to cold northern labor camps. And in our system it is sometimes helpful for an administration to have officials go "off the reservation," either deflecting domestic or foreign criticism, misleading foreign (or domestic) audiences, "trial-ballooning" ideas or policies, etc. So, if the price for having control over what senior administration officials are saying all the time, is that sometimes they say something that the White House really didn't want them to say -- and the administration pays for in the foreign policy realm -- by and large most of us would agree that it is worth it. And if someone really messes up, the President can always fire them.

So, on to the next topic: Former President Bill Clinton. Bravo. This is exactly the right kind of mission for him. It remains to be seen whether this was a Carter turning point (I have an op-ed submission on this pending...) or not, but he accomplished his humanitarian mission with grace. I am certain that much as George W. Bush used his father and President Clinton in the wake of the tsunami -- and history is replete with other examples -- President Obama will see fit to employ former President Clinton's skills and services in other instances. In the meantime, I'm curious to see what the latter can do for Haiti....

In responding to Paul's query re. 'The Clintons,' I think it helpful to reverse the sequence of the two phrases. Instead of "Bill Clinton's mission to North Korea, resulting in the release of the two U.S. journalists," I believe a more accurate statement is "Kim's decision to release the two U.S. journalists was conditioned on getting a big name to come to Pyongyong" for the sake of maximum publicity. Who bigger than the former American President. (Although cynics, knowing of Kim's love for Hollywood films, might have suggested Brooke Shields or Angelia Jolie. Perhaps it is the fact that Kim and Bill share a passion for pizza that pointed to the latter's choice as the symbolic emissary).

Seriously, all reports indicate that Bill conducted no negotiations. Whatever backdoor communications occurred, there again is no evidence of their involving more than working out the details of the release. As for HRC's public statements, I see nothing at all remarkable in them. In the future, I do agree that Bill Clinton should be kept on tap for further celebrity appearances since he obviously has found his metier. The true tests for a still awkward Secretary of State await her, and the administration, in Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Palestine, Moscow.

I hasten to add that none of these comments about 'The Clintons' are personal; it's just business - as someone or other said.

cheers

Corrected Version. Sorry about the typos.

In foreign policy, careless language certainly can have consequences -- consider Kaiser Wilhelm II's infamous "Kruger Telegram," which helped to accelerate the deterioration in Anglo-German relations that eventually culminated in World War I -- but by and large, governments pay less attention to words than to behavior. As annoying as the Brits found them, Wilhelm's rantings were less important in the end than Germany's imprudent efforts to challenge Britain's naval supremacy.

It's only when action begins to reinforce assertion that governments are apt to sit up and take notice. President George W. Bush's announcement of a "preemptive" strategy prompted relatively little international reaction. His insistence on applying that strategy to Iraq generated antagonism even among long-time allies that has yet fully to dissipate. In contrast, President Obama's efforts to dial down the temperature of U.S. dealings with other powers, including Russia and Iran, have built a cushion of tolerance likely at least for a little while to survive the occasional careless utterance even by other senior officials.

In the end, however, important as it is, rhetorical self-restraint isn't a foreign policy. Others contributing to this blog have complained of the administration's failure thus far to articulate a coherent grand strategy. Such complaints probably are premature -- Obama & CO have been in charge for only six months, during which they've had a few other matters to deal with -- and in any case, history furnishes surprisingly few examples of (successful) preconceived grand strategies. But it certainly is true that, absent the articulation of some consistent ratonale for America's international behavior, the risk increases that careless expressions will be perceived as indicators of policy intention. For that reason if no other, the President's team needs to get its foreign policy act together.

“Every ruler or elected head of state wants his opera,” Michael Vlahos notes in his blog post. Yes indeed, and it might be added that there are many varieties of opera, running from the exuberantly melodramatic to the ponderously tragic and on occasion reaching the sublime. Intriguingly, our bloggers are divided on the question of whether the Obama foreign-policy opera, with its large and diverse cast of voices, is proving an effective production. “At this point, I'm willing to give the Obama administration the benefit of the doubt and accept the idea that it's still getting its sea legs. If the cacophony persists a year from now, it will be cause for worry,” Steven Metz writes from a skeptical vantage point. “All in all, the president has an exceptional and well coordinated foreign policy team. The many difficulties that they face would crush most people. The notion that American foreign policy is not well served by them is simply wrong,” Pat Lang counters. Michael Brenner fiendishly wonders whether the Obama multiple-voices approach is, among other possibilities, “a clever scheme to confuse our enemies by overloading their information systems with extreme amounts of contradictory data.”

Today’s headline news of the Bill Clinton mission to North Korea, resulting in the release of the two U.S. journalists held captive there, adds a new dash of dramatic spice to this week’s question. Is Bill Clinton now back as a player in U.S. diplomacy—and if so, what is his role, and what should be his role, in giving voice to Administration aims, especially considering that his wife is the Secretary of State? Does he now retreat off-stage? As we enter the dog days of August, all comments are of course welcome, no matter the locale of the happily vacationing, or not vacationing at all, commentator. And thanks to all of those who have already contributed.

People should take notice of the dexterity with which the Obama foreign policy team has obtained the release of the two women journalists from the awful fate that they had been condemned to in a North Korean labor camp. Would they have survived their prison sentences? Doubtful. In the event, Secretary Clinton made all the right noises in a recent speech on the subject. General Jones played a very significant role in the decisions that led to that speech. "Charming Bill" was then despatched to retrieve the two ladies in distress. The North Koreans are said to have greeted him with an enthusiasm denied to more stable folk. That sounds like an opportunity. Those who do not think the Clintons are playing an effective role in support of President Obama should consider this incident in somethig other than envy. President Obama will be re-nominated and re-elected if the economy recovers enough to make the voters think he can be relied on in a second term, If the economy does not recover, nothing will get him re-elected.

Colleagues,

Paul has posed for us the vexed question of why the unharmonious sounds issuing from our senior foreign policy-makers. Our commitment to a Gulf security umbrella, attitudes toward Israeli threats to bomb Iran, the reset button on relations with Russia vs distaining it - dissonant voices are heard on all of them. One can form four hypotheses that conform to the facts as we know them.

An unseemly pattern of uninhibited commentary due to lax discipline on the part of the White House. Obama may take too literally the notion that giving his subordinates a loose rein in expressing their views is a positive thing, and they in turn have not fully internalized the norms as to what is permissible behind closed doors and what is permissible outside them. General James Jones reportedly runs a tight ship. We are told that order and clarity are his watch words, and that they accord with Presidential preferences. If he in fact is the responsible party, then his efforts have come up short. The task of ensuring Presidential prerogatives prevail, though, is shared with the Chief of Staff. Rahm Emanuel is involved in all matters presidential. Let us recall that it was he, and only he, who was pictured sitting beside Obama when the President met with King Abdullah in Riyadh. Perhaps Emanuel has been too preoccupied trying to calm the raucous kennel of Blue Dogs to hold up his end. That is hypothesis one.

A clever scheme to confuse our enemies by overloading their information systems with extreme amounts of contradictory data. It has the double advantage of blurring all clues as to what is wheat and what is chaff while sowing dissension among their analysts. Two arguments can be levied against this idea. It presumes an impossible level of craftiness on our part, and we often manage to produce this effect without trying. That is hypothesis two.

Parallel plots by HRC and Joe Biden to prepare the ground for a run at the White House in 2012 in the event that Obama loses the Mandate of Heaven. By this logic, the aim is not for them to position themselves in apposition to the White House’s thinking, but rather to draw attention. It is a singular feature of our times that popular celebration is the road to riches, fame and thereby power. As the old Hollywood dictum has it: “there is no such thing as good publicity or bad publicity; there is just publicity.” That is hypothesis three.”

The unsettling discrepancy between boldly stated goals and unclear strategies for reaching them means less than adequate guidance for the players in the diplomatic orchestra. Soloists by temperament can produce harmonious sound only where there is a concertmaster who interprets the entire score and keeps a steady beat. More time in the rehearsal hall and less globetrotting is needed in order to blend individual flair with effective music-making.

There is a distinctive Obama style that is peculiar to him and his sense of governmental leadership. The process begins with a firm statement of the problem, a clarion call for action, and a pledge to force change. Then, there is the period of eerie calm – no plan is unveiled, no diplomatic strategy executed. Obama makes brief public appearances punctuated by further proclamations of the imperative to act, still without any specifics, concrete acts or sustained effort. His approach to the Palestinian issue is the purest example. Space thereby is opened for intentional or incidental remarks by his subordinates that do not fit well with the original, abstract policy declaration. That is hypothesis four.

My bet is that history will deny hypotheses two and three. By a process of elimination, that leaves some combination of hypotheses one and four.

Vice Presidents, cabinet officers, and senior staff going off the reservation? I am shocked and horrified. This is, of course, part and parcel of American politics. Indeed, some of these folks who are out on a limb are actually being used to signal a shift in policy. This is not the case here.

"Reset" and engagement is Obama's policy toward Russia and the Vice President, talking tough and Cheney-sertive, stomped on the party line. The problem is there are no such gaffe licenses in the Kremlin. Thus, many seniors in Russia think Biden was talking for Obama or stating the real policy underpinning of the "reset" declaratory policy. Most gaffes by seniors are just so much theater. This one, however, will cost the Administration. Secretary Clinton, who is showing herself to be a fine team player, will have to do damage control on this one.

James Carafano has wisely pointed out, below, that the Obama foreign policy is Obama's foreign policy. The President clearly has his hands full. His objective must be to channel the Vice President's considerable foreign policy talents into more useful venues. Gore had the Gore-Chernomyrdin Commission on US-Russian issues, and Biden needs something on which to focus his powers. Perhaps China or non-proliferation issues might be fertile ground for using his talents.

Abiding Biden

The Vice President aside, it is becoming clear that there is “one” foreign policy in this administration and its being made by the president—period. There is clearly an emerging “Obama Doctrine” and its not just talk. There is meat on the bones.

Here are rules.

#1. Everybody gets to play. Biden is a player. So are a lot of others. The president is listening to lots of people.

#2. Foreign policy matters. The notion that the president wants to concentrate on domestic policy is just not true. Obama sees foreign policy as an extension of domestic policy. That’s why he often appears to use the same campaign style tactics over there that he stumps with here.

#3. Obama call the shots. He intuitively knows what he thinks is the right answer…and while he might accept the opinion of others, I suspect he goes with his hunch. Allies are already starting to see this. They are told more than consulted…and they already starting to chaff (though they won’t say that publicly because they don’t want to criticize a president they all played cheerleader for).

#4. Structures matter. Obama is not a realist—farthest thing from it. Obama believes if you set the rules right and establish proper norms conflict will disappear. That’s his blind spot. Dictators play by the rules only to manipulate the system…they are using that weakness to tie him up in knots. In other cases, he kowtows to bad guys trying to “lure” them into the system—reasoning once they are on the inside he can control them.

#5. Obama knows what is best—not just for the United States, but for the world. This really makes some allies nervous—“if you don’t have a seat at the table you are on the menu.”

#6. The president’s ambitions are global. No part of the world will go unaddressed in the Obama Doctrine.

#7. Hard power is a weakness. Having a strong military is actually an impendent to peace. On the other hand…..

#8. Appearing “weak” on national security is not an option. This administration is incredibly sensitive to this charge and goes to great lengths to convince people that they are being tough, even when they are cutting back. The president’s pronouncement that is for “proven and cost-effective” missile defense and “smart and tough” immigration enforcement are two exquisite examples. In other cases, they continue with Bush polices (like Iraq, Afghanistan, and GITMO) even though they detest them…because to abandon them would make reveal them to be weak on national security.

#9. The future doesn’t matter. Obama is less concerned with long-term competition because he believes his polices will make the world safer. When we get to the future there won’t be any enemies.

#10. Crisis-management is not permitted. The president does not like foreign-policy crises because they challenge his desire that foreign policy is something to be stage-managed. Thus, when challenges do occur, the tendency of the White House is to pretend there is no challenge.

History suggests that Democratic administrations initially are less disciplined than Republican ones in terms of speaking with one voice. But we must remember that staying on message can also mean that dissenting positions are not given serious consideration with adverse consequences--witness the decision to intervene in Iraq.

Perhaps the best approach is one with vigorous debate behind closed doors followed by a single message once the president makes a decision. But that requires a president experienced enough to wade through dissention and overrule powerful, articulate, and loyal advisers.

At this point, I'm willing to give the Obama administration the benefit of the doubt and accept the idea that it's still getting its sea legs. If the cacophony persists a year from now, it will be cause for worry.

Foreign policy is a mysterious literary artifact. Try comparing it to foreign relations. “Relations” are the stuff of the day-to-day between states, rooted in a mutually acknowledged lineage of national interest tied to the familiarity of daily processing.

Think of foreign relations as reality-TV. Think of foreign policy in high brow contrast as theater: grand stage and proscenium, company and sets — and toney audience. Maybe such a foreign policy production, if it is really good, even rises to opera.

Every ruler or elected head of state wants his opera. Moreover the people want it too: They need to be able to fit their collective lives into coherent national narratives framed by leaders. Hence foreign policy is one of the organizing narratives of our times — of our life — to be fitted into, and maybe even raised up to, an exalted place in the sacred narrative of the nation through time.

So typically each president has his opera-in-waiting: First-run starting 20 January. But the debut does not always mean a hit play. Consider JFK’s magnificent libretto: “Pay any price, bear any burden,” which quickly turned into the Bay of Pigs, Congo, Berlin, a Cuban missile crisis, and Vietnam. Grand opera at its best, but somewhere along the line the script was shredded.

This is the difficulty: Incoming administrations labor demonically before anointment on perfecting their libretto, and by 20 January they have booked the theater, signed the orchestra, hired the stage hands, and seduced the singers. Once the singers get their Congressional contract, the foreign policy opera is ready to debut.

The problem with impresario Obama’s opera is that it was imagined art. Eisenhower or Kennedy or Nixon and the rest could all step up to a true-life scenario that set up their libretto: For Eisenhower in was the Korean War (and Stalin’s death), for JFK it was the Soviet surge and the Red threat to the Third World, for Nixon it was the red-truck fire brigade for Vietnam — and then Israel.

Obama’s opera was presented as mythic fantasy: As the romantic story of “The Return of Ulysses” — of Liberal Internationalism leading America back to world leadership and to humanity’s necessary progress to its future, globalized millennium.

But this is backward looking, romantic, even fictive libretto. Now Ulysses’ return to Ithaca looks more like Kazantzakis than Homer. Our epic Iraqi Iliad was more than a neurosis: It marked a strategic absence, where we return at last to a transfigured world.

So perhaps Biden merely gives voice, inchoately, to this gathering recognition. The breathlessly imagined and lovingly idealized realization that should have attended the Hero’s return now seems as an ashen landscape, a wreck of hope. Everyone now says that the future is BRIC, climate change, a nasty Russia and a supine EU, an Iran-Israel nuking, and a resplendently primitive Africa and Islam — where we end up sidelined, disconsolate and forlorn.

But American foreign policy is notorious for its record on second-runs. Consider the Bush administration. It finally took over the property to announce that the United States was not in the business of nation building like parvenu-imperialist Bill Clinton.

Less than a year later the unofficial banner was “Draining the Swamp.” Global conversion by the sword was the watchword of the day. The triumphant new libretto was written in the space of weeks, even days — after 9-11.

This parable has its cautionary moral: Presidential foreign policy opera should always be “based on a true story.” Through away all old tropes, no matter how preciously preserved just for this day, just this moment. Forget it. Sequels here do not pay off like Hollywood.

Find the world-story and then find America’s place in it — and only then write a libretto that positions your chieftain-president-story as well into the larger national sacred narrative. This administration’s story should take a breath, look around, and get into rewrite mode. A new script might not be a bad idea.

Then it should take the new production to the Schubert for a short run before coming back to Broadway.

It could be a hit.

Vice President Biden’s apparently careless talk is a minor issue that President Obama could easily deal with if he wished. If Biden is a problem, then Obama can stop giving him anything to do. The American vice presidency is a separately elected constitutional office. The vice president is not a subordinate of the president. By law he or she is merely the president’s designated successor in the case of the president’s death or incapacity in office. The only real control that the president has over him is the implicit threat of exclusion from the administration’s inner circle. The notion that the vice president is a sort of prime minister or deputy president is a new feature of American government. It need not be continued; perhaps it should not be continued. President Bush signed executive orders that delegated much of his own authority to Vice President Cheney. If President Obama does not renew those extraordinary documents, Vice President Biden will have no power at all over anything but his office. Surely, Obama will or does control whatever statements the vice president makes on behalf of the government.

President Obama evidently likes to deal directly with major foreign policy problems through the mechanism of a group of personal envoys coordinated through the personality of the Secretary of State. These people seem very effective operating in that way. He made a fortunate choice in picking Hillary Clinton for State. She has the mind needed for the position and thus far has been very supportive. Her willingness to subordinate herself to his goals was reflected in her recent statement to the effect that she “understands the way the American government works.” Translation? Obama is president and she believes that her task is to help him rather than to become a problem. If that means “carrying water” for him on every continent, then she is going to do it. The president is similarly well served by his national security adviser. General Jones is a truly non-political military intellectual. The scope of his experience in peace and war is wide and is complemented by a personality that brings to mind men like George Marshall. Unfortunately, both Clinton and Jones have been the targets of much “sniping” and “leaking” through selected media. “The Lobby” does not like Jones. It does not consider him to be a reliable friend of Israel. The result has been a steady trickle of stories engineered in the press to foster the image of conflict and discontent between Jones and the president. This is classic “logrolling.” The method is simple. The hope is that if something is said enough it will come to be. In the case of Clinton, some members of the victorious political team in last year’s election still seem to think that they are running against her in the Democratic primaries. Their efforts to undermine her position do not serve the president well.

All in all, the president has an exceptional and well coordinated foreign policy team. The many difficulties that they face would crush most people. The notion that American foreign policy is not well served by them is simply wrong.

Washington cognoscente love to refer to various books to support their varied and, often, less than well thought out positions. One of the books of choice recently adopted is Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book, “A Team of Rivals – The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln.” A well done study of the Lincoln Administration in the Civil War, it delineates how Lincoln managed to balance off a number of people in his cabinet who not only had opposed him but run against him for the Presidency. I think someone in the White House needs to do something beside quote the title and fully read the book.

Charitably, the Obama White House is barely six months into its first term. Coming in the door, it made no bones about wanting to (in fact, having to) concentrate on a domestic agenda. Besides, an economy in near free fall, President Obama has taken on the Gordian knot of health care. Foreign policy is viewed as a stage on which the White House can act in large and magisterial ways. The details are being left to the Team of Rivals – and there are too many unguided cooks in this broth.

Lincoln’s Team of Rivals approach was a hands on one. Lincoln made no bones about who was in charge and what the decisions would be. This is not apparent in the current White House. From the outside world, there is the appearance not of chaos, but dissonance. And, worse, too many “cooks” representing American interests to the world – not always speaking from the same page.

In the modern age, the President’s man on foreign policy tends to be the National Security Director. Gen. Jim Jones is that man. He is a straightforward, bright, military man who has a reputation as a good administrator. His political clout, however, is in some doubt. Less to due to his political savvy than dealing with numerous political players with power bases in and outside the Administration and a clear message from the President who is in charge.

The most effective NSC Directors had enormous clout of their own – normally based on the public backing and private arm-twisting of the President over his cabinet. Kissinger-Nixon and Scowcroft-Bush are two the best examples in the last thirty years. For all their closeness personally, Rice-Bush II never jelled as Bush never really pushed back at Vice President Cheney or Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld.

In the top Obama diplomatic tier, Vice President Biden, despite the occasional gaffes, has deep foreign policy experience as former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and is well respected. He is also ranging all over the world.

Secretary of State Clinton is having her troubles getting her footing. Despite her DC experience, this is the first major appointed position she has occupied in the Executive Branch. While on the road a great deal of the time, she is undermined by a system of “special envoys” based in State Department ranging from former Assistant Secretary Dick Holbrook on Afghanistan, to former Majority Leader Senator George Mitchell on Israel-Palestine, to former Middle East negotiator Dennis Ross. Few could control this group – Clinton simply has not yet been able to do so.

On Defense and Intelligence issues, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates stands astride all. He has also some form of diplomatic suzerainty over Iraq, Afghanistan, and even North Korea. Mindful of his past as a DCI, Gates and Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair have made moves to rework issues within the Intelligence community. However, Director of CIA, former Congressman Leon Panetta is fighting with Blair over who represents the Intelligence Community overseas. And Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano is still trying to work through where she gets her intelligence support and how that connects with her work of protecting all fifty states writ large.

It is always easy to criticize from the sidelines. The day-to-day “inbox” of all these people is overwhelming and immediate. But the Team of Rivals approach only works from the top down. If the President does not step in and control this jockeying through publicly and privately backing NSC Director Jones to coordinate and keep this group on message, we are going to have a real mess when something really big happens. And, as history shows, it will.