How the US presidential debate played overseas

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR

9/29/08

How the US presidential debate played overseas

Barack Obama's tough talk scared Pakistanis and the Russians. But Afghans applauded. Iranians and Iraqis shrugged.

Mark Sappenfield

NEW DELHI - Pakistani political scientist Hasan Askari Rizvi is of two minds about Friday night's presidential debate in the United States. On one hand, he flinches at Barack Obama's swashbuckling comments about taking out Al Qaeda leaders on Pakistani soil – with or without Pakistan's consent. No policy could make him more unpopular in Pakistan, Mr. Rizvi says.

Then again, Rizvi acknowledges, he cannot rid himself of the idea that, despite his nuanced arguments Friday, Republican John McCain will be "George Bush III."

In the countries for which Friday night's debate perhaps held the most relevance – Pakistan, Afghanistan, Russia, Iran, and Iraq – the clear desire is for fresh ideas from US leaders. While this has generally led to more sympathy for Mr. Obama, Friday's debate did little to project this image in several regions central to US foreign policy.

"The debate [in Pakistan] is how much policy is going to change," say Rizvi. "Many are concerned by Obama's tough talking."

Indeed, the debate in many ways represented a reversal of expectations. "The line John McCain took was quite reasonable," says Rasul Baksh Rais, a political scientist at the Lahore University of Management Sciences, who teaches a class in American politics. "Extending the war into Pakistan has really aroused Pakistanis and made them much more interested in this race," he says.

The same is true in Afghanistan, but for the opposite reasons. Many Afghans see one of the main sources of their problems as being across the border in Pakistan, where Al Qaeda and the Taliban find refuge from the coalition forces in Afghanistan.

"[President] Bush said that after 9/11, he would smoke the terrorists out of their caves. But we know now that the terrorists aren't living in caves, they are living in luxury villas in Pakistan," says Haroun Mir, director of the Afghanistan Center for Research and Policy Studies in Kabul.

Right or wrong, this widespread perception in Afghanistan has led many people to favor Obama's tough talking. His comments Friday played well.

"He said that he will help Afghanistan fight terrorism," says Fazel Qazizada, a former political science student at Kabul University.

But he adds, "In the end, we think that Obama and McCain are not radically different from each other. We see some hope from the election campaigns and debates that they represent a new direction in American policy, but ultimately we will need to wait and see."

This caution is apparent throughout the region. Among Pakistan's highly educated, English-speaking classes – those most aware of the debate – there was an understanding that the event played to Americans, not the world.

"The candidates have to play to the gallery," says Professor Rais.

A sinking feeling in Russia

That was small solace in Russia, which received a bipartisan bludgeoning Friday. The exchange between McCain and Obama about Russia – in which both took a hard line, blaming it for aggression in Georgia – received massive play in the state TV news programs Saturday.

"This new consensus emerging in US politics, reflected by their exchange in the debate, is very worrisome," says Boris Kagarlitsky, director of the independent Institute for Globalization and Social Movements in Moscow. "There is this sinking feeling in Russia, listening to these two men, that the bad relations between us are just going to keep getting worse."

The traditional view is that Democrats talk moderately while Republicans talk tough, but it's the Republicans who end up delivering good things for Russia: détente and the end of the cold war, for example.

But this view is waning. In Russia, Bill Clinton was instrumental in bringing Russia into the G-8, and George W. Bush's relationship with former President Vladimir Putin has soured.

"It looked like a bidding war to see who could bash Russia harder to score points," says Peter Lavelle, a commentator for the English-language, state-run satellite TV station, Russia Today. "Russia is being turned into a whipping boy to hide the fact that the US has overreached itself and is not a positive force for change in the world."

In general, Pakistanis feel the same way. Though the Pakistani government has benefited most during Republican administrations – most notably the Eisenhower and Reagan years, when Pakistan was on the front lines of containing Communism – common Pakistanis resent their country's alliance with the US under Bush, seeing his policies as overbearing. "The [pro US] position Pakistan has taken is not popular in the streets," says Rais.

Iraq and Iran shrug

Yet most of the Muslim world paid little heed to the debate. The holy month of Ramadan ends this week, marking the biggest holiday of the Muslim calendar. In Iraq, for instance, citizens have spent their nights breaking the daily fasts with family and watching soap operas – Ramadan is Iraq's answer to sweeps week in America, featuring all the best shows.

Even when photo technician Zaid Nathem takes a break from watching a new Syrian miniseries, he says he focuses on Iraqi news. "Of course the US elections are important for us, but I don't spend my extra time following them," he says.

Although almost all Iraqis acknowledge that the results of the US election will have a major effect on their situation, they also know it is not their decision. Says Jabar Abu Ali, a restaurant manager in Baghdad: "Maybe [the candidates] will promise to withdraw troops, but after the elections we will find the same policy still in effect."

Though Iran was a key topic in the debate, it got little coverage. "Frankly speaking, the Iranian people don't care about this debate," says Saeed Laylaz, editor of the Sarmayeh or "Capital" economic newspaper in Tehran. "Iranians are suffering from local mismanagement of the economy much, much more than the atomic issue. This talk, and even the new UN Security Council resolution against Iran [passed on Saturday], is not very new."

As a critic of Iran's conservative government, he prefers Barack Obama. "Historically, the Republicans have been better for radicals and conservatives in Iran," says Laylaz. "And when Mr. Obama says that 'We have to talk to the Islamic Republic of Iran,' it is not so good for radicals in the country."

• Reported by Anand Gopal in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tom A. Peter in Baghdad, Mark Sappenfield in New Delhi, Scott Peterson in Istanbul, Turkey, and Fred Weir in Moscow.