America's know-nothing diplomacy

Gary Johnson, the Libertarian candidate for U.S. president in the recent elections, recently said something astonishing in ‎defense of his foreign policy ignorance: "The fact that somebody can dot the i's and cross the t's ‎on a foreign leader or a geographic location then allows them to put our military in harm's way." ‎In other words, not knowing where a place is, is a good thing because, in Alice Ollstein's witty ‎summary, "You can't get into a war with a country you can't find."‎

As a student of U.S. foreign policy, this struck a chord -- not because it's an outlandishly wacky ‎statement but precisely because it is mainstream. Really. Here are three notable precedents from ‎the last century:‎

In 1919, President Woodrow Wilson dispatched the International Commission of Inquiry ‎‎(commonly known as the King-Crane Commission) to Palestine and Syria to ascertain the ‎political wishes of their residents. The leaders of this potentially influential commission ‎monumentally lacked qualifications for the undertaking. Henry C. King was a philosopher and ‎president of Oberlin College; Charles R. Crane was a busybody, anti-Semite, and heir to the ‎fortune from his family's plumbing fixture company. Strikingly, their ignorance was seen as an ‎advantage; a presidential aide explained that Wilson "felt these two men were particularly ‎qualified to go to Syria because they knew nothing about it."‎

Secretary of State Robert Lansing, who thought Wilson wrong on this, explained that the ‎president did not want to appoint "persons who are familiar with the subject" of political and ‎territorial questions. Instead, Wilson thought that "an empty mind is more receptive of the truth ‎than one affected by experience and study." Indeed, ignorance is an "essential qualification for ‎an investigator."‎

The King-Crane Commission report, not surprisingly, was (in the words of historian Elie ‎Kedourie) "as ill-informed as its influence on policy was negligible."‎

In 2003, the George W. Bush administration announced John S. Wolf as the new U.S. presidential Middle ‎East envoy (more formally, "chief, U.S. Coordinating and Monitoring Mission for the Middle ‎East peace process"). The Washington Post (in an admiring article titled "For Mideast envoy, rookie status may be an advantage") quoted a senior administration official saying that "it's a ‎good thing that he has exceptional negotiating skills and very little direct experience in the area."‎

Wolf himself admitted a complete lack of experience in the Middle East and later admitted his ‎surprise at the appointment: "I asked Secretary [Colin] Powell, National Security Adviser ‎‎[Condoleezza] Rice and President [George W.] Bush -- why me-" Because they wanted "someone ‎with a fresh view." Wolf agreed on this approach, saying, "My lack of experience was an ‎advantage. I learned that in the Middle East, people always tend to look back, and I was asking ‎them to look to the future."‎

Not surprisingly, like the King-Crane Commission, Wolf's diplomatic foray had negligible ‎impact; a mere 14 months into his mission, he wandered off to became the president of the ‎Eisenhower Fellowships, a nonprofit.‎

In 2006, the U.S. government's Iraq Study Group consisted of ten members embodying the same ‎‎"know-nothing" approach. James A. Baker, III, and Lee H. Hamilton served as co-chairs, with ‎Robert Gates, Rudy Giuliani, Vernon E. Jordan, Jr., Sandra Day O'Connor, Leon E. Panetta, ‎William J. Perry, Charles S. Robb, and Alan K. Simpson the members. Not a single one of these ‎individuals brought expertise on Iraq to the table, virtually guaranteeing that the commission ‎would produce a politically nuanced but strategically useless report.‎

Indeed, the Iraq Study Group Report turned out to be even worse than expected and had ‎minimal influence. As I wrote at the time, it "dredges up past failed U.S. policies in the Middle ‎East and would enshrine them as current policy. Most profoundly, regarding the American role in ‎Iraq, the report moronically splits the difference of troops staying or leaving."‎

Through a century, American presidents and other leaders celebrate Mark Twain's "innocents ‎abroad" mentality that Gary Johnson has just regurgitated. As someone who's spent his nearly 50-‎year career working on this topic, the notion that ignorance makes for better diplomacy is pretty ‎depressing; what have I been doing and for what purpose all this time-‎

That said, given the abominable state of Middle East studies and the wretched record of Foreign ‎Service Officers like the Arabists, I must admit that avoiding specialists may have some merit. ‎But surely that does not mean turning to ignorami.‎

Daniel Pipes (DanielPipes.org, @DanielPipes) is president of the Middle East Forum.