In the July/August 2008 issue of the bimonthly political magazine, Foreign Affairs, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice published a long essay titled "Rethinking our National Interest in which she reflected on the foreign policy of the Bush administration over the past eight years. She expounded on her claim that promoting the values of freedom, human rights and democracy globally is a matter of national interest for the United States. While not much "re-thinking was reflected in the essay, as the same rhetoric has been used incessantly by Rice and other members of the administration over the past eight years, it still provides interesting insights into what Rice sees as US foreign policy priorities. The main problem unfortunately is that despite labeling her foreign policy approach "unique American realism , Rice revealed in this essay her utter disregard to the facts of the real world and relied heavily on half truths, distorted logic and unjustified projections to convince the reader of the soundness of her judgment and the sincerity of her beliefs, a strategy which I believe failed miserably. First of all, she starts with giving us a glimpse of some of the regions in the world where there is ample evidence to suggest that the US "has not been neutral on the importance of human rights and the superiority of democracy as a form of government, both in principle and practice. Starting by the Americas she explains that "strategic partnerships with key democracies like Chile, Colombia and Brazil, were built to "expand the ranks of "well-governed, law-abiding, democratic states. Surprisingly there is no mention of well-governed, law-abiding, democratic states in the region which the US is not only vehemently opposed to, but is working hard to undermine notably, Bolivia, Ecuador and Venezuela. As for Africa, Rice boasts about the "emerging democratic allies and the role the US plays in solving the continent's conflicts. Needless to say, Rice did not refer to the largest and strongest US ally in Africa to explain how democracy and human rights are the core foundations of her foreign policy. This of course is understandable as any reference to Ethiopia would certainly lead to the immediate collapse of Rice's theory and the shrinking of her eight-page essay into a few sentences. Not only is Ethiopia one of the least democratic countries in the world but the Ethiopian government has a human rights record that would make Zimbabwe look like a haven of freedoms. Furthermore with the blessing and acquiescence of Rice and co. Ethiopia has invaded Somalia, creating what is described by many as one of the worst humanitarian crises of our time and a conflict with no end in sight, which Rice claimed in her essay she was working hard to resolve. Rice however did not shy away from the US's support for dictators and addressed this issue head on in the section she dedicated to analyzing her foreign policy in the Middle East. Her contention was that partnership with the region's authoritarian leaders is needed in the global fight against terror and in order to reconcile this partnership with the main premise of her essay, Rice incredulously claims that the US uses diplomacy to push her "non democratic partners to reform and "supports civil society to bring about change from within - as if this somehow exonerates her and keeps the tenets of her theory intact. She gives us an example of Pakistan, where apparently democracy has been restored, evidenced by the changing attire of the president and the holding of an election before which the main opposition leader was killed, many believe at the hands of Rice's dictator friend. More importantly she clearly believed that her logic was so convincing that she did not deem it necessary to shed some light on how this policy was successful in the restoration of democracy and human rights in Egypt, Jordan or Saudi Arabia. To her credit though, Rice did not attempt to reconcile the values of freedom and human rights with indefinite detentions in Guantanamo Bay, secret prisons, rendition and torture: she chose the more reasonable path of avoiding the subject all together. However, nothing in the essay was more amusing than the ending, which sounded like a farewell speech and an attempt to explain to all those who might try to hold her accountable for her actions that this could only be done at an unspecified date in the future, probably somewhere around the year 3025; as only then would we be able to fully comprehend the reasons for her actions and appreciate her wisdom. As if sensing that her arguments were not persuasive enough, Rice lamented that "today's headlines are rarely the same as history's judgment. Ironically, Rice was plagiarizing Fidel Castro's infamous words, "history will absolve me , which he uttered during his 1953 trial for attacking a military barracks, an event which signaled the beginning of the Cuban Revolution. While some might argue that history might indeed absolve Castro for this particular action, it takes some very wild imagination to believe that history will do anything but condemn Dr. Rice. Tawfik El Kheshen is a Cairo-based former Protection Consultant at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). He holds an LLM degree in Human Rights Law from Essex University.
