What is Sen. Rand Paul Actually Advocating on Foreign Policy?
What is Sen. Rand Paul Actually Advocating on Foreign Policy?
April 8, 2015
Yesterday Sen. Rand Paul announced his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination in a speech in Louisville, Kentucky. Sen. Paul has been an outlier among conservatives in the Senate and has set himself apart from the hawks within his party, particularly on civil liberties and foreign intervention issues. Last December, he cited the National Security Network while discussing the precedent for placing limitations on the U.S. intervention in Iraq and Syria during a Senate markup of a proposed authorization for use of military force (AUMF). But his speech yesterday showed a marked departure from his previous positions – arch-neoconservative Bill Kristol noted his policies were more hawkish. The result was a confusing muddle of Republican pabulum and libertarian pandering. When it comes to national security issues such as Iran, counterterrorism, Pentagon spending, and foreign aid, Sen. Paul will have to do a better job of articulating his policies or voters will struggle to understand what his platform really entails.
Sen. Paul suggests he would support the Administration’s Iran deal, but is working to undermine it in Congress. Sen. Paul said yesterday that a comprehensive agreement must “end Iran’s nuclear ambitions and have strong verification measures.” He’s in luck: The framework announced by the Obama Administration would ensure Iran’s civilian program remains peaceful and verified via “the most intrusive and robust monitoring system ever negotiated,” writes Greg Terryn of the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation. But Paul’s actions in Congress threaten to undo the progress he says he wants. Sen. Paul boasted that he’s “cosponsored legislation that ensures that any deal between the U.S. and Iran must be approved by Congress.” The bill, proposed by Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), would do more than that, though. It could potentially delay the implementation of an agreement while Congress and the Administration go through a rushed process of vetting the deal and Iranian compliance, while just passing it at this point would signal to Iranian negotiators that the United States might not be able to follow through on commitments made in the talks. As Edward Levine, who sits on the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation National Advisory Board, noted when Sen. Corker’s bill was proposed, “Congress can pass a law undoing an international agreement whenever it has the votes. It may be unwise; it may undermine the world’s respect for international law and for the United States. But Congress does not require Senator Corker’s bill to stop implementation of an Iran nuclear agreement…its major impact would be to remind the world that the United States might not fulfill its obligations under the agreement.” [Greg Terryn, 4/3/15. Edward Levine, 3/15]
Sen. Paul is more interested in labels than policy when it comes to counterterrorism. Echoing Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-TX) announcement speech last month, Sen. Paul said yesterday, “Without question we must defend ourselves and American interests from our enemies, but until we name the enemy, we can’t win the war.” He promised to “do whatever it takes to defend America from these haters of mankind.” But Sen. Paul did not articulate how to achieve this, other than saying that it would be “unencumbered by overseas nation-building.” In Congress, he has expressed concerns about the current U.S. intervention in Iraq and Syria and even cited NSN’s work when arguing against an expansive, open-ended war authorization to fight the Islamic State. When Sen. Paul does get around to presenting a strategy for confronting the Islamic State, we hope he continues to recognize the limits of force and advocates an approach that appropriately balances military and diplomatic power to contain and selectively roll back the Islamic State’s occupation of eastern Syrian and western Iraq.
Rand Paul flip flops on Pentagon spending, calling for massive increases without explaining the strategy he wants to fund. In his campaign speech, Sen. Paul seemed to double down on the measure he recently introduced to dramatically increase Pentagon spending, an about face from the candidate that previously called for reducing funds to the Department of Defense. Time reports, “Under Paul’s original proposal, defense spending would have dropped from $553 billion in the 2011 fiscal year to $542 billion in 2016. War funding would have plummeted from $159 billion to zero. He called it the ‘draw-down and restructuring of the Department of Defense.’ But under Paul’s new plan, the Pentagon will see its budget authority swell by $76.5 billion to $696,776,000,000 in fiscal year 2016.” The plan would be paid for by cuts to domestic agencies like the Department of Education. Sen. Paul has neither explained this change in position nor outlined his vision for what the Pentagon should do with the additional funds. [Time, 4/7/15]
Sen. Paul wants to cut U.S. foreign aid, a bipartisan tradition vital to U.S. national security. In his speech, Sen. Paul railed against foreign aid. “Let’s quit building bridges in foreign countries and use that money to build some bridges here at home,” he said, singling out Pakistan for particular attention. “I say it must end. I say not one penny more to these haters of America.” Sen. Paul is pandering to the majority of Americans who overestimate the U.S. foreign aid budget. A poll last December found that, on average, Americans think that 26% of the federal budget goes toward foreign aid – even though the actual answer is less than 1%. Foreign aid is not charity, it’s a critical national security investment for the United States, often providing useful diplomatic leverage. As Secretary of State John Kerry has said, “Deploying diplomats today is much cheaper than deploying troops tomorrow.” This is one of the few things on which Republicans and Democrats have traditionally agreed, and Sen. Paul’s previous populist appeals to cut foreign aid have been rebuked not only by liberals, but by conservatives citing the example of President Reagan. “It’s an eventual goal…to eliminate all aid,” Sen. Paul said last October. If he still believes this, it should disqualify him as a presidential contender or a serious foreign policy thinker. [John Kerry, 2/20/13. Rand Paul, 10/10/14]
Crafted by Cornershop
