American presidents, particularly those who leave office in controversial circumstances, feel the urgent need to present to the world their side of the story, hoping to engender a more favourable assessment from their countrymen even as they write the first draft of their own history. Given his sharply polarising presidency, Bush’s book, Decision Points, is not a standard memoir: he focuses only on certain specific, contentious issues that he handled. Thus, 9/11, Afghanistan and Iraq constitute the bulk of the book, though there are substantial chapters devoted to domestic issues such as Katrina, stem cell research and the financial crisis.
At the outset, Bush makes clear that religious faith is central to his personality. His first chapter, “Quitting”, speaks of the religious influence that finally made him give up alcohol, making possible his subsequent career as Governor of Texas and US president. He says he begins the day by reading the Bible which gives him divine solace and guidance, particularly in times of crisis. Again, he conveys his love for history: Decision Points is peppered with several references to books, particularly biographies of former presidents; Lincoln is a great favourite.
The events of 9/11 defined Bush’s personality and presidency. Page after page, he speaks of his anger at the “evil” that had wreaked violence upon his nation; for Bush, “our way of life, our very freedom (was) under attack”. He resolved that retaliation would be “deliberate, forceful, effective”.
Though Bush led his country to two bloody wars, causing the deaths of a few thousand Americans, he sees his actions not as vengeance but as the pursuit of freedom, the great American national value that, he believes, should be the legacy of all mankind. Within the framework of this idealist commitment, Bush is able to justify every cruelty sanctioned by him, be it the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq or the torture of suspected terrorists, on the ground that this has made America safer and freedom has become more widespread.
Bush’s faith involves a messianic divide between good and evil. He reserves his greatest venom for Saddam Hussein who he sees as truly satanic as the sponsor of terror, sworn enemy of America, a threat to his neighbours, a violator of international sanctions, a repressor of his people and a pursuer of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Bush admits “we got things wrong in Iraq”, but proudly states: “because the United States liberated Iraq and then refused to abandon it, the people of that country have a chance to be free.” In the face of all evidence to the contrary, he confidently believes that Iraqi freedom “has changed the direction of the Middle East for generations to come”.
Not surprisingly, in Bush’s world, Ariel Sharon is a great hero figure, “a leader who understood what it meant to fight terror”. Hence, it was understandable that, in the face of Palestinian violence in the Intifada, “the Israeli people responded to the violent onslaught the way any democracy would: They elected a leader who promised to protect them, Ariel Sharon.”
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While all memoirs recall the past selectively, Bush’s account is remarkable for several things he fails to mention. In discussing Afghanistan, there is no reference to the US role in organising the global jihad in the 1980s, and the close ties maintained by the US with the Taliban up to August 1998. There is no reference to the Pakistani role in evacuating the top Taliban and Al Qaeda leadership to safe havens in Pakistan after the rout of the Taliban in late-2001. Above all, there is no mention of the neocons, who shaped his presidency and polarised his country.
The book does bring out many of the characteristics associated with the former president: a warm-hearted and loving family man with an earthy, self-deprecating sense of humour, loyal to his friends and allies, and imbued with deep patriotism. He is most emotional when he speaks of the loss of life in war (though only of American lives; there is no reference to the hundreds of thousands of Afghans and Iraqis killed in the US wars). Bush was a people person, pursuing engagements even at the highest political levels on the basis of instinct and “personal diplomacy”. This could be a double-edged weapon since he would permanently ostracise any leader who lost his trust, usually for lying (Arafat) or for letting him down (German Chancellor Schroeder in regard to the Iraq war).
Bush has little patience with dissent: most of his critics are dismissed as “the left” who shamelessly betray national interest. This includes Democrats, some Republicans, journalists and even the Supreme Court. Recalling his low approval ratings at the time of his departure, Bush takes solace in the fact that Truman too, at the end of his presidency, had an approval rating in the twenties, though now he is regarded as one of the best presidents of the US.
Right wing politicians have the luxury, denied their liberal counterparts, of complete confidence in the correctness of their belief and position, and complete clarity about who their enemies are, with divine sanction for their destruction. The Bush presidency truly exemplifies the era when the worst were full of passionate intensity.
The author is an Indian diplomat whose book, Children of Abraham at War — The Clash of Messianic Militarisms, was published recently. The views expressed here are personal
DECISION POINTS
George W Bush
Virgin Books
497 pages; £25