Rogues' Gallery
Who Advises Bush and Gore on the Middle East?
<<snip>>
But at present, only one man, Leon Fuerth, seems to exert real influence on Gore's decisions. Fuerth, a one-time foreign service officer and current Cabinet-level foreign policy adviser, prides himself on being a master of discretion. He has described his proper comportment as "nameless, faceless and odorless," since his ideas "belong to the vice president." Fuerth is expected to be national security director if Gore is elected president, and the two men enjoy an unusually close relationship. During President Clinton's cabinet meetings their habit of passing advisory notes to each other become so distracting that protocol was abandoned to let Fuerth sit at the vice president's immediate right. Known for his gruffness, Fuerth has earned in State Department circles the nickname "Darth Vader."
Over the years, Fuerth has consistently encouraged Gore in taking aggressive stands on foreign policy. Fuerth's toughest positions have been with Iraq, Iran and North Korea, places he has privately described as "giant zits on various parts of the body." Fuerth remains firmly unmoved by Iran's attempts at reform, for example. He lobbied fervently for a controversial and expensive plan to transport Caspian Sea oil and gas via a route that will avoid Russia and Iran. In 1998, Fuerth fought unsuccessfully to convince President Clinton to impose sanctions against three foreign companies that were big investors in Iran's energy sector, arguing that to block investment in Iran was worth offending the European Union.
During Gore's run for the nomination in 1988, Fuerth helped him formulate a strongly pro-Israel line.(3) At that time, Gore criticized the Reagan administration for attempting to push Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir into withdrawing from land it occupied in 1967 in exchange for peace with its Arab neighbors. In 1990, after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, Fuerth produced a three-inch-thick binder explaining why Gore should break with other Senate Democrats and vote in favor of going to war. Senator Gore was one of six Democrats to support the war. Fuerth was also a strong advocate for early military strikes against Serbian forces.
Fuerth's outlook on Iraq differs little from that of Bush's advisers. In a recent interview billed as a "gentlemanly discussion," Fuerth clashed on Iraq with Bush adviser Robert Zoellick, former assistant Secretary of State. Their real disagreement, however, was not over whether to use force, but over whose fault -- President Clinton's or President Bush's -- it was that Saddam Hussein was not already dead. The route of diplomacy was not discussed, nor was the option of rigorous military sanctions and enhanced border inspections. Nor did either man mention lifting the economic sanctions that by UNICEF estimates are killing 250 Iraqi civilians a day. Whereas Zoellick has joined his fellow Vulcans in advocating the seizure of Iraqi territory using US air and/or ground forces, Fuerth remains more coy. "Ultimately Saddam Hussein is going to make a mistake that plays into our hands…
hat mistake will confer on us the legitimate right to deal with him," remarked Fuerth, adding that such a US response may or may not be coordinated with the Iraqi opposition.
<<snip>>
http://www.merip.org/mer/mer216/216_urbina.html