The Norman Transcript
Norman — Monday’s foreign policy conference at the University of Oklahoma served up a common theme among campus foreign policy speakers: The United States has lost face among its allies and it’ll take some heavy lifting to bring us back to the prominence we once enjoyed.
Speakers at this year’s conference included some heavy hitters: CIA director Leon Panetta and former national security advisers Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft. Mr. Panetta is serving; Mr. Brzezinski served President Jimmy Carter and Gen. Scowcroft served Presidents Gerald Ford and George Bush Sr.
Monday’s evening pre-dinner discussion touched on diplomacy, terrorism, Afghanistan, Iraq and China. They were just getting warmed up when President David Boren announced he had promised the two former advisers they could leave by about 7:30 p.m. And that was even before they talked about the Arab-Israeli situation.
Lasting world peace, they said, would come with mutual respect and understanding and agreements that benefit all countries. The days of what’s good for he United States is good for the world are no more.
The United States was the strongest country standing after World War II but recovery came to most nations. Mr. Brzezinski said a Chinese diplomat recently told him that the decline of the U.S. was happening too quickly, impacting China’s ability to sell us products.
The timeline for an end to war on one front may help us with some but the buildup on another won’t hasten our own recovery.
