Even without the parameters laid down by his predecessor, the world Obama had visions of transforming just wasn't going to cooperate. America wasn't in absolute decline, but its own broken economic house and the new competitiveness of a number of powers great and small made challenges to American leadership and power more than credible.
This new world is defined by asymmetrical wars in which tribal politics, ethnic divisions, and loyalties trump military power; by historical conflicts driven by trauma, memory, and religion, immune to the charms and persuasions of American diplomacy; by the presence of spoiler states like Iran and Syria with regional ambitions that conflict with America's own; by nonstate actors like Hamas and Hezbollah that America can neither engage nor destroy; and by allies -- some close (Israel), some not so (Pakistan) -- that have proved to be tough traders when it comes to protecting their interests.
In this world, being loved counted for very little. Being respected -- even feared -- mattered far more. And the president was not nearly as respected, let alone feared, as he needed to be. Sadly, for the great power, president "yes we can" heard "no you won't" far too frequently. From Hamid Karzai to Nouri al-Maliki, from Benjamin Netanyahu to Mahmoud Abbas, everyone said no to America without much cost or consequence -- all of which undermined U.S. street cred.
Still, despite the flaws, uncertainties, messy outcomes, and screw-ups, an honest man or woman would have to say that Obama has fared pretty well in this less-than-brave new world. He isn't a transformer of U.S. foreign policy offering bold new visions or spectacular military victories or diplomatic triumphs. He's more the cautious actor searching quite deliberately for that middle ground between what's desirable and what's possible.
And he's getting better at it. His call to leave Iraq by the end of 2011 was a sound one. In doing so, he found the balance between what America's staying could possibly have achieved and the positive benefits of extrication from a war in which America's direct presence no longer really mattered. And even though he surged in Afghanistan, he's on a glide path toward extrication from a war that can't be won there too.
The same search for the middle was evident in Libya, where Obama found the right balance -- however messy it was -- between doing nothing and everything unilaterally. He assembled a coalition for cover (consisting of the U.N. Security Council, NATO, and the Arab League, too) that actually succeeded in removing Muammar al-Qaddafi without putting America in a position where it would have to own yet another Muslim country.
His reaction to the Arab Spring was another balancing act: try to get on the right side of historic political change, but understand that Washington's role and influence really aren't determinative anymore. Obama seems to understand intuitively that if you stand in the way of history's power you'll likely get run over by it. So he operated from the sidelines, supporting change in Egypt, Yemen, and Tunisia, precisely where America belonged.
We see the same wise caution on Syria, where the president has rightly resisted the calls from Congress and the chattering classes for half-baked ideas that could get America in an encumbering, open-ended intervention with no clear goals. America may yet be drawn in, but it will only be after all other options have been exhausted and a strategy with clear goals, with responsibility shared with others, and without illusions emerges.
Iran may yet constitute Obama's greatest challenge. There may simply be no middle ground. But the president has found a "just right" Goldilocks approach for the moment. He has also bought time and space for diplomacy and the heightening of nonmilitary pressures on the Iranian regime. But unless the mullahs back down on the nuclear issue -- or the Israelis do -- we're drifting toward a confrontation.
All presidents make mistakes. The only question is whether they learn from them and make the necessary adjustments.
Barack Obama set out to end two wars and improve America's global image in the process. His goal was not to withdraw from the world, but to be wiser about how and where the United States projects its power. We can forgive him for setting expectations way too high and for overreaching, in large part because -- unlike his immediate predecessor -- he has steered clear of disaster. In the process, the president has learned to respect history's power, the future's uncertainties, and America's limitations. And for that he has made America's foreign policy all the stronger.
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