Examining Jimmy Carter's Foreign Policy Record

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Jimmy Carter: Served as President from 1977-1981

Personal Characteristics: Empathetic, Diplomatic, Detail-Oriented

Different Priorities than Most: One of Carter’s major policies was human rights, one of which was not at the forefront of America’s perceived political issues at the time. Carter’s desire to guarantee rights for all exemplified his empathetic nature. William Kashatus expanded upon this by stating: “Carter, a Democrat and strong proponent of détente, paid more attention to human rights and third-world problems than did either of his Republican predecessors.” These human rights initiatives will come into play often during his presidency.

An Institutional Politician: Although Carter desired for and carried out foreign policy initiatives which were focused on guaranteeing human rights and reducing conflict, he still held some policies that made him appear as the prototypical politician. Thomas Paterson, when discussing Carter Administration policy in Latin America and Africa, stated, “Carter launched an active diplomacy toward Latin America and Africa. In Latin America, Carter championed human rights and worked to accommodate nationalism.” 

A Micromanager: Many of Jimmy Carter’s policy initiatives would be bogged down by his micromanaging. Attention to detail is a positive in many cases, but became detrimental toward policy implementation as he tried to oversee and critique every detail possible that went into the job. This fact is made worse by the reality that, while Carter served as president, the American foreign policy arena was possibly at its busiest of the Cold War era. Although this personality trait may have been detrimental, at least Carter had the desire to make sure that all foreign policies in the executive were broached with him. As stated previously, however, his attention to detail is a reason why he ended up president. “Carter cherished hard work, family responsibility, and religion. Energetic and self-confident, he seemed to some people sanctimonious and arrogant. A quick learner, he paid meticulous attention to details.”   

The International Context:

Unrest in the Middle East: Disarray in the Middle East was a common theme during the latter part of the Cold War era, and Carter’s era was no exception. Prior to his political interventions within the states of the region, there was much strife between the neighboring states. Palestinian terrorism struck once again, as they forced a collapse of the government in Lebanon. Following this, states in the region such as Egypt, Israel, and Syria all attempted to consolidate their resources, leading to U.S. intervention to calm down the tensions. 

Nicaraguan Rebellion: Although this issue would be one of great interest to the Carter Administration, especially since the U.S. already had dealings with the state, this issue occurred without the influence of the United States. According to Paterson, “A long-smoldering popular rebellion exploded in 1978, led by leftist Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). Business executives, Catholic clergy, and intellectuals joined the crusade to unseat the Somozas and reduce U.S. influence. General Anastasio Somoza Debayle, a graduate of West Point, answered with torture, executions, and bombings of civilians.” 

Zimbabwe/Rhodesia: The developments here occurred at a pretty rapid pace. Prior to Carter’s election, the state had a major civil war between the leading whites and rebelling black population. The only influence Carter had in the region was declaring that he would not support all-white elections, following up on his human rights policy. Besides that, it was mostly internally hammered out or carried out with British assistance. However, this assistance would end up not working as intended. “Finally, British-led negotiations culminated in an all-race, nationwide election held in April 1980, which produced a new government for Zimbabwe led by the former black rebel Robert Mugabe. By the early twenty-first century, Mugabe’s rule, which had begun with such optimism, had lapsed into dictatorship.” 

The Iranian Revolution: While the issue of the Iranian Revolution was within America’s interests because of its relationship with the Shah, along with the upcoming hostage crisis to drag the U.S. into the conflict, this was still an uprising mostly outside the bounds of American influence, yet was caused in part by backlash against America and the West. According to Gaddis Smith, “In August and September 1978, all hell broke loose in Iran. Terrorists set fire to a movie theater in the oil-refinery city of Abadan, and 377 people died. Rioting throughout the country intensified and hundreds were killed when the Shah’s forces faced the mobs. Demonstrations were banned and martial law declared.” The worst event, which truly sparked revolution, came from the infamous “Black Friday” massacre, in which at least 200+ Iranian civilians were killed by the Shah’s troops in Jaleh Square, Teheran. 

Russian Invasion of Afghanistan: This was a major development not only for America, but the entire globe as it greatly hindered the The Strategic Arms Limitations Talks (SALT), which were nuclear proliferation discussions. “Some 50,000 Red Army troops marched into neighboring Afghanistan to sustain a Soviet client challenged by Islamic rebels. The Soviets also intervened because they wanted to maintain Afghanistan as a ‘buffer’ against the spread of Islamic fundamentalism in central Asia.” 

Key Foreign Policies: 

Human Rights: I consider this to be Carter’s most admirable yet unrealistic policy, but I’ll delve into that later. Carter based this policy around his democratic beliefs, thinking that all states should guarantee all people certain human rights. Carter expanded upon his policy for human rights, stating, “First, we have reaffirmed America’s commitment to human rights as a fundamental tenet of our foreign policy. In ancestry, religion, color, place of origin, and cultural background, we Amercians are as diverse a nation as the world has ever seen. No common mystique of blood or soil unites us. What draws us together, perhaps more than anything else, is a belief in human freedom.” Furthermore, “The Soul of American foreign policy, Carter insisted, should be the defense and expansion of human rights for foreign peoples.” So, Carter felt as if America had an obligation as the most powerful democracy in the world to spread its principles revolving around equality and human rights, somewhat akin to the policies of Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt.

Toning Things Down: Unlike President Nixon and his Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, Carter sought a lessening of military intervention and spending. “For the new president, the Nixon-Kissinger approach to international affairs contained too much bluster, too much military posturing, and too much insensitivity toward Third World Peoples. Carter promised to reduce military budgets, bring some of America’s overseas forces home, trim arms sales abroad, and slow nuclear proliferation. He berated the Republicans for supporting dictatorial regimes.” 

The Middle East: The Middle East was a major priority of Carter’s foreign policy, as it was for most administrations of the time. In tune with his desire to ease tensions in general, he brought that policy to the Middle East, finding his administration acting in a much more neutral manner than many before him. Following the collapse in Lebanon, Carter doubled his effort to ensure stability in the region, mainly by trying to find peace between Egypt and Israel, two of the biggest rivals in the area. Carter and the U.S. had aligned interest with the Soviets in this aspect, both sought peace in the region and supported a Middle Eastern peace conference to ensure stability. And, although Carter supported human rights and peace initiatives, he still showed some backbone on the international stage through the Carter Doctrine. “By 1979 Carter, having moved closer to Brzezinksi’s views, sounded the familiar Cold War calls for ‘a more muscular foreign policy.’ The following year he proclaimed the Carter Doctrine, or containment in the Persian Gulf. Confrontation more than cooperation came to characterize Soviet-American relations under Carter.” 

The Carter Doctrine: The basis of the Carter Doctrine was quite simple: ‘An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America’ and ‘will be repelled by use of any means necessary, including military force.’ However, “serious problems impeded implementation. When Washington offered $400 million to Pakistan, its prime minister scoffed ‘Peanuts!’ and demanded more. The Saudis refused to let the U.S. military use their facilities. Most nations rejected Carter’s call for an Olympics boycott.” 

Positive Achievements:

Camp David: Following the desire of the Carter Administration to bring peace to the Middle East, Carter himself followed through on this endeavor. Following tensions between Israel and Egypt following Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, he was able to bring the leaders of both of the states to Camp David, named after Dwight Eisenhower’s son. In these negotiations, Carter proved his worth as a mediator, expertly sifting through the negotiations with the two sides, and eventually striking a deal. “Egypt and Israel signed two Camp David Accords. The first stated goals: negotiations leading to self-government for the West Bank and Gaza and subsequent participation of Jordanians and Palestinians in the peace process. The second, a ‘framework’ for peace, provided for Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai in exchange for Egyptian diplomatic recognition.” This accomplishment was notable for Carter, as it showed a president directly assisting with the negotiations, not a subordinate, subtly showing Carter’s attention to detail approach to life. It’s a shame that Carter’s skills in these negotiations would be overshadowed by a justifiably much worse drawback in Iran. 

The Panama Canal: The issue of the Panama Canal became one of the most contentious topics of the Carter presidency. Dan Flood, a former politician with a solid amount of influence in Congress, had a deep desire to keep the Panama Canal in the United States’ hands. Jimmy Carter was able to sign two treaties with the Panamanians, which switched sovereignty over the Canal back to them, with the guarantee that the U.S. would only come to defend the Canal from external threats.  While this was met with significant opposition from Congress and Dan Flood, it showed Carter’s willingness to act in ways that were unpopular in the moment, but beneficial in the long-term. House Representative Joe McDade, a good friend of Dan Flood, agreed with the President, stating, “‘We were losing support down there and the best way for us to maintain a good relationship with Panama–to keep her from joining the Communist countries–was to give her the canal.’” Following this move, Carter ruined many relationships with those in the House of Representatives, along with indirectly ruining the political careers of those who supported his Panamanian endeavors. However, I think this shows how Carter had different political intentions than not only most president’s but most politicians. He was able to finalize the sovereignty of the Canal to Panama, a policy that Nixon and Kissinger started, but did so for the greater good while damaging his reelection prospects, making it an honorably successful policy initiative. 

Some Positives with Human Rights: The human rights policies implemented by the Carter Administration were not only abnormal for the time, but far too ambiguous to be actually successful. However, there were some instances in which the policy scored victories, albeit indirectly, for the most part. Not only did his human rights policies influence states such as Haiti, Argentina, and the Dominican Republic, but according to Argentinian journalist, Jacobo Timerman, the policies built up a ‘democratic consciousness in the United States.’ This democratic consciousness was shown in places like Indonesia, which faced a democratic transition following the implementation of Carter’s human rights policies. Now, the policy cannot be directly applied to the transition, but does give the policy some credence. Furthermore, some political prisoners that the Carter Administration worked to have released ended up becoming influential in the state they were from or immigrated to, showing the positives of pressuring some states. 

Furthering Chinese/African Relations: As mentioned previously, Jimmy Carter was able to capitalize on the opening of relations with China by the Nixon Administration. Similar to Nixon, Carter also sent his National Security Advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinski to meet with the Chinese. Following the failed SALT initiative, Carter sent Brzezinski to China. Brzezinski stated, “But that, in turn, led to the President’s decision to send me to Beijing in mid-1978 to accelerate normalization of relations with China–which then became one of Carter’s principal and lasting accomplishments.” In terms of Africa, things were a bit quieter, at least for U.S. foreign policy. However, the continent as a whole was vitally important, and Carter was able to create the greatest U.S. presence in the region to that point, while also improving trade with states within the continent. 

Negative Drawbacks: 

Human Rights Failures: While there were some definite positives with the human rights campaign by the Carter Administration, it was horribly flawed. The main issue came from how to define what a human right is. Furthermore, when the characteristics of a human right were put under too large of an umbrella, it made it difficult to pressure states that were “violating” human rights, as many of the “transgressors” were allies. Moreover, once the concept of human rights was thought to have been firmly established, it cast such a wide scope that it could apply to most states in the world, making it an unnecessarily difficult issue for the Carter Administration to solve. In the end, it was a noble strategy to try to promote human rights like Carter did, but, similar to Wilson’s desire to democratize the globe, it was simply unfeasible at the time. 

The Iran Hostage Crisis: The worst drawback of the Carter Administration, and one of the most well-known crises in American history, is the Iran Hostage Crisis. The handling of the crisis was an all-systems failure by the Carter Administration, in which he shoulders much of the blame. Prior to the Iranian Revolution, Carter visited Teheran and stunned “observers and enraged Iranian dissidents when he praised the Shah for making Iran ‘an island of stability in one of the more troubled areas of the world.’” So moronic was this decision, but the mistakes did not stop there. Following the “Black Friday'' incident, in which the Shah’s troops killed at least 200 hundred civilians, President Carter, while expertly negotiating between Egypt and Israel at Camp David, called the Shah to express his support and sympathy for the violence his regime placed on its people. This was an extremely irresponsible oversight by Carter. However, it did not light the flame of revolution on fire, but another narrow-minded move of his did. 

The clearance given by the Carter Administration to bring the Shah in for cancer treatment set off Revolution and caused the taking of the U.S. embassy in Iran.  The nail in the coffin came from the failed rescue operation following failed negotiations to release the hostages. Following the failed mission, in which eight Americans died in a crash, Carter admitted to the public the failed operation, which caused his Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance, to resign. The resolution to release the hostages was finally completed once Jimmy Carter was out of office, replaced by Ronald Reagan, (ibid., 411) making this event a complete and utter failure that would forever stain the Carter Administration. 

Final Grade: C-/ It’s difficult to pinpoint a specific grade for Jimmy Carter. I would say if the Iran Hostage Crisis never occurred, or was at least quickly resolved, his grade would be much closer to an A. However, because of the severity of the issue and ineptitude shown, it drags him all the way below Kissinger to a C-. Carter had some positive initiatives, such as human rights and the promotion of peace in the Middle East. Yet, most of the policies that he pushed out, even some of those that I put into the positive achievements list, were either of little importance or faced much domestic dispute. I also don’t believe that history has painted him in a better light. The mistakes he made were real and consequential. Even if someone has the desire to pursue “good” through democratic policies with the intellectual capacity to do so, it does not mean that they will. Jimmy Carter most certainly did his best, but it was unfortunately not enough.

References:

1. “Carter's Human Rights Foreign Policy, May 1977,” in Gambone, ed., Documents of American Diplomacy: From the American Revolution to the Present (Westport, CT), 401-3.

2. Zbigniew Brzezinski, “The Carter Foreign Policy in Retrospect,” in Chester, ed., Scope and Variety, 500-2. 

3. Thomas Paterson, et al., “Mixed Signals: Carter’s Contradictory Course,” “Engaging the Third World: Latin America and Africa,” “Middle East Highs and Lows: Camp David and the Iranian Hostage Crisis,” “Détente’s Downfall: Soviet-American Rivalry, Afghanistan, and the Carter Record,” American Foreign Relations, 7th ed., vol. II (Independence, KY: Cengage Learning , 2010), 398-414.   

4. William Kashatus, “Panama’s Public Enemy No. 1,” DapperDan Flood: the Controversial Life of a Congressional Power Broker (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 229-250.

5. Gaddis Smith, “Iran, the Shah, and the Hostages,” Morality, Reason, and Power: American Diplomacy in the Carter Years (New York, NY: Hill and Wang, 1986), 180-207.