Representative Peter Lantos, D-Calif., told about 40 students last night that American foreign policy in the next century must proceed in an overtly interventionist manner because the U.S. is the only superpower left capable of exerting a stabilizing democratic influence in today's world.
Lantos delivered the speech titled "The Direction of U.S. Foreign Policy at the Turn of the Century," in Room 2 of the Rockefeller Center.
"This country has to act like a leader," he said. "As the only superpower on the planet we cannot escape the job of leadership."
Lantos said American politicians cannot shy away from using military force when the situation requires it, despite the fact that casualties are politically unpopular.
"The notion that the military should suffer some losses in order to prevent infinitely greater losses has become taboo," he said.
This has to change if America is to assume its role as a world leader, he said.
Lantos drew on his extensive experience in foreign policy to assess recent American foreign policy mistakes and successes in order to present a plan for the future.
He said he was one of only a few congressional Democrats who voted in favor of then-President George Bush's decision to begin the Gulf War against Iraq in January 1991. He said the policy was necessary in order to maintain stability in the often volatile Middle East.
He called the effort a "huge success" of American foreign policy and one that should be used as an example for future efforts.
As an example of an inept American foreign policy initiative, he cited the ongoing devastation in the former Yugoslavia.
"The marvel of Central Europe is shattered, in shambles and will never be rebuilt ... and for nothing," he said.
Instead of giving the aggressors free reign in Bosnia, Lantos said America should have exhibited a "credible threat of force" in order to deter Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic.
"A credible threat of force by NATO kept the Soviet Union from moving a centimeter in Europe for two generations," he said. "If the Soviet Union didn't budge then surely a two-bit dictator like Milosevic would have listened."
He also presented American inaction after the fall of the Soviet Union as an example of the failures of American foreign policy.
America simply expected a democratic market economy to emerge after the fall of the Soviet Union, and was unwilling to lend the financial support necessary to allow that to happen, he said.
"When the Soviet Empire imploded, we exhibited an absolutely inexcusable tendency of trying to get something for nothing," he said.
The result is that Russia is one of the most unstable nations in the world, and currently America is not able to deter the Russians from selling arms indiscriminately to the Third World, he said.
He said American inaction can be traced to short-sighted politicians too quick to succumb to fickle public opinion polls.
"Churchill offered the British people toil, sweat, blood and tears. What he gave them is freedom," he said, pointing out that today's politicians seem less willing than those of old to make tough decisions.
"Political leadership is not to lick your finger and hold it into the wind ... Political leadership is to convince the people of the wisdom of your policies," he said.
Lantos said that his staunch interventionist views come from his younger days as a firsthand witness to the brutality of World War II. Lantos is the only Holocaust survivor ever to be elected to Congress and his experiences are not lost on him.
"In my day, the bad guys were not Democrats or Republicans they were first the Nazis and then the Communists," he said.
