Handy Guide to Barak Obama's Foreign Policy Experience and Advisors

[zulchzulu]

Senator Barack Obama is on the Senate Committees for Foreign Relations; Homeland Security; Veterans Affairs; Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. He's gone on three major trips overseas as part of an official Senate delegation, meeting with U.S. generals, and/or foreign leaders.

He and Senator Lugar travelled to the former Soviet states to inspect the destruction of WMDs; he traveled to Iraq and met with U.S. generals, and also toured Kuwait, Jordan, Israel, Palestinian territories; he visited various African countries, including Kenya (his father's homeland).

Some of the countries he has visited while Senator:

2005
Moscow
Kiev
Baku
Azerbaijan

2006
Qatar
Kuwait
Iraq
Jordan
Israel
South Africa
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Kenya
Djibouti
Chad

http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/002595.php

Here is a list of some of those who worked with Bill Clinton who are now on Barack Obama's team:

For counterinsurgency strategy, Mr. Obama has Harvard University's Sarah Sewall, who worked in the Pentagon under President Clinton. Mr. Obama has Harvard University's Sarah Sewall, who worked in the Pentagon under President Clinton.

For overall security issues he leans on Mr. Clinton's former national security adviser, Anthony Lake.

What about fighting AIDS or boosting U.S. trade in Africa? For that and more, he has former Clinton administration diplomat Susan Rice.

(snip)

Mr. Ivo Daalder, who worked in the Clinton White House in the mid-1990s and is now at the Brookings Institution, describes the difference between Sens. Clinton and Obama as "the difference between what do we do about Iran and its nuclear program now versus how do we deal with nuclear proliferation writ large."

(snip)

Mr. Obama did get a well-timed boost recently from one of his party's foreign-policy eminences, Zbigniew Brzezinski. The 79-year-old former Carter national security adviser not only backed Mr. Obama but panned Mrs. Clinton's views as "very conventional" and merely a continuation of "what we had eight years ago."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118895877299317784.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Here is a list of advisors on his campaign team and description (some are mentioned above):

Former Amb. Jeffrey Bader, President Clinton’s National Security Council Asia specialist and now head of Brookings’s China center, national security adviser

Mark Brzezinski, President Clinton’s National Security Council Southeast Europe specialist and now a partner at law firm McGuireWoods, national security adviser

Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter’s national security adviser and now a Center for Strategic and International Studies counselor and trustee and frequent guest on PBS’s NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, foreign policy adviser

Richard A. Clarke, President Clinton and President George W. Bush’s counterterrorism czar and now head of Good Harbor Consulting and an ABC News contributor, sometimes Obama adviser

Gregory B. Craig, State Department director of policy planning under President Clinton and now a partner at law firm Williams & Connolly, foreign policy adviser

Roger W. Cressey, former National Security Council counterterrorism staffer and now Good Harbor Consulting president and NBC News consultant, has advised Obama but says not exclusive

Ivo H. Daalder, National Security Council director for European affairs during President Clinton’s administration and now a Brookings senior fellow, foreign policy adviser

Richard Danzig, President Clinton’s Navy secretary and now a Center for Strategic and International Analysis fellow, national security adviser

Philip H. Gordon, President Clinton’s National Security Council staffer for Europe and now a Brookings senior fellow, national security adviser

Maj. Gen. J. (Jonathan) Scott Gration, a 32-year Air Force veteran and now CEO of Africa anti-poverty effort Millennium Villages, national security adviser and surrogate

Lawrence J. Korb, assistant secretary of defense from 1981-1985 and now a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, informal foreign policy adviser

W. Anthony Lake, President Clinton’s national security adviser and now a professor at Georgetown’s school of foreign service, foreign policy adviser

James M. Ludes, former defense and foreign policy adviser to Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., and now executive director of the American Security Project, national security adviser

Robert Malley, President Clinton’s Middle East envoy and now International Crisis Group’s Middle East and North Africa program director, national security adviser

Gen. Merrill A. ("Tony") McPeak, former Air Force chief of staff and now a business consultant, national security adviser

Denis McDonough, Center for American Progress senior fellow and former policy adviser to then-Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle, foreign policy coordinator

Samantha Power, Harvard-based human rights scholar and Pulitzer Prize winning writer, foreign policy adviser

Susan E. Rice, President Clinton’s Africa specialist at the State Department and National Security Council and now a Brookings senior fellow, foreign policy adviser

Bruce O. Riedel, former CIA officer and National Security Council staffer for Near East and Asian affairs and now a Brookings senior fellow, national security adviser

Dennis B. Ross, President Clinton’s Middle East negotiator and now a Washington Institute for Near East Policy fellow, Middle East adviser

Sarah Sewall, deputy assistant secretary of defense for peacekeeping and humanitarian assistance during President Clinton’s administration and now director of Harvard’s Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, national security adviser

Daniel B. Shapiro, National Security Council director for legislative affairs during President Clinton’s administration and now a lobbyist with Timmons & Company, Middle East adviser

Mona Sutphen, former aide to President Clinton’s National Security adviser Samuel R. Berger and to United Nations ambassador Bill Richardson and now managing director of business consultancy Stonebridge, national security adviser

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/opinions/documents/the-war-over-the-wonks.html

[jackson_dem]

1. Is this true?

I've heard folks say most of Obama's foreign policy advisers originally opposed the Iraq war while most of Hillary's supporting it at first. Does anyone know if this is true or is it an internet rumor?

[zulchzulu]

2. Look at the list...

Obama has the advice from those that knew Bush was full of bull plop when it came to trying to link Saddam to 9/11.

Hillary has her PNAC appeaseniks fully on her side...and why not? She's clearly in PNAC's camp.

[jackson_dem]

11. I don't know what Greg Craig's position on Iraq was

Who their advisers are tells us a great deal about they really think. The list you posted is a good.

[blm]

7. Hillary's advisor was Bill Clinton and he was 100% for war with Iraq - ask Tony Blair

and the Senate Dems in DC who Bill advised - based on information HE KNEW as president. Fockin con artist for fascists.

[havocmom]

3. to the Greatest page with ya

Thanks for posting this informative, positive and sound reason to support your candidate.

So sad that with all the mud slinging and neener neener neener name calling shit going on, and pleas for POSITIVE posts supporting candidates instead of just tearing down the other and calling out supporters, THIS substantive post has so few replies.

DU needs to eat more fruit and get back on track.

[zulchzulu]

5. It's just too easy pointing out why I support Obama...

If you put a little interest in what he stands for and where's he's been, it just makes sense for this time. No, he's not perfect. No, I'm not in a cult. I just want to turn the page. Going forwards means NOT going backwards.

[havocmom]

9. The gentleman does have a brain and your post helps us understand

that he uses it to find other good minds to expand his knowledge and areas of expertise.

One might suggest that is a more pertinent type of experience than living in the WH for eight years.

[returnable]

4. Clarke and Powers cinched it for me awhile ago.

:kick:

[Occam Bandage]

6. CW-popping kick.

[DUyellow]

8. GOBAMA

[TexasObserver]

10. Obama's advisors portend a much wiser foreign policy

than do Clinton's.

[progressive_realist]

12. Not to overlook the main point of the thread, but...

Moscow, Kiev, and Baku are cities, not countries. Unless they have gone and become Sparta-style city-states while I was busy working.

:yoiks:

[halobeam]

13. thanks for the info