Canwest News Service: Bush hailed as great leader
Mike Blanchfield, Canwest News Service
OTTAWA – History will judge George W. Bush one of the “great leaders” of our times, the U.S. ambassador to Canada said on the eve of the unpopular president’s final 9-11 anniversary.
That’s because Bush kept the United States and its North American neighbours, including Canada, safe from a repeat of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and because his controversial war in Iraq ultimately will bring peace and prosperity there, U.S. envoy David Wilkins told Canwest News Service on Wednesday.
“I think a lot of people, including many Canadians, will miss President Bush whether they realize it now or not,” said Wilkins. “I think history is going to view our president much kinder in the long run . . . George W. Bush is going to be seen as one of the great leaders of our times.”
In an interview from the U.S. embassy in downtown Ottawa, Wilkins fired back at critics both in Canada and the U.S., who contend the U.S. decision to invade Iraq in 2003 distracted it from Afghanistan, where al-Qaida plotted 9-11.
Wilkins said Bush “has protected North America and I think he deserves a large amount of the credit for the fact there has been no terrorist attack since 9-11.”
Furthermore, he said, “those that want to use Iraq as a reason to be negative towards the United States,” also have been proven wrong because last year’s surge in Iraq an unpopular move advanced by Bush as dampened down the insurgency there.
Former deputy prime minister John Manley told Canwest News Service Wednesday that momentum was lost in Afghanistan because of the U.S. decision to invade Iraq.
“Focus was lost and I hope it’s not too late for it to be regained,” said Manley, who headed the independent panel that called for a more robust international effort in Afghanistan. In the days following 9-11, Manley was one of the strongest supporters of the Bush administration to be found in the then-Liberal government.
Bernard Finel, a senior fellow with the American Security Project in Washington, told Canwest News Service Wednesday that the Bush legacy has suffered greatly because of his administration’s conduct of the war on terrorism.
“In retrospect, we’ll look at President Bush as having been well-intentioned but strategically misguided in terms of his approach to the war on terror,” Finel explained. “To the extent that we will have a successful strategy in the future, it will come by virtue of building on the failures of the Bush administration.”
Finel said that while some gains have been made in the U.S.-led war on terrorism, significant progress remains a long way off.
That’s because polls show the U.S. is perceived throughout Muslim countries as trying to “exert political domination or weaken and divide the Islamic world.”
Al-Qaida’s black market sources of financing, including the narcotics trade, kidnappings and ransom, are flourishing as legal fundraising such as charities have been shut down, he said.
Moreover, Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants remain at large and feel so secure that they have launched a renewed propaganda effort in the last year, with a dramatic increase in Internet broadcasts and video releases, Finel said.
“That does show that these guys are feeling pretty confident about the level of security they are living under,” he said.
“There is no question that our efforts in Iraq, though there have been some success over the past year there, has been counter productive as a whole, both in reinforcing this negative narrative about the United States and also in terms of sucking up tonnes of resources, which might have been better used to stabilize Afghanistan and perhaps to pursue al-Qaida leadership into Pakistan.”
Wilkins rebutted the notion that the U.S. took its “eye off the ball” in Afghanistan.
“We’ve had more troops in Afghanistan from Day 1 than anybody else,” he said, noting that the U.S., with 31,000 troops, accounts for half the international forces in Afghanistan, and has suffered the most casualties there at 514.
“Now, we’ve had some great allies like Canada, like Great Britain, but nobody can say we haven’t taken the lead over there.”
Bush leaves office with his popularity low at home and abroad, a fact underscored yet again Wednesday with the release of a report of the German Marshall Fund of the United States that tracked the decline in popularity of the 43rd U.S. president.
In 2002, 64 per cent of Europeans viewed U.S. leadership in the world as “desirable,” while 38 per cent approved of Bush’s handing of international policy. In 2008, 59 per cent of Europeans found U.S. leadership “undesirable” while Bush’s approval rating fell to 19 per cent.
Despite the numbers, Wilkins said it has been “pretty easy” and the “privilege of a lifetime” to represent Bush in Canada.
Wilkins will step down after the inauguration of Bush’s successor in January.
“If anything, George W. Bush does not make decisions by the popular view at the time. He doesn’t put his finger in the air and get the wave or the breeze of popularity. He makes what he thinks are the tough decisions for the protection of the American people. And he’s made them.”
© Canwest News Service 2008
