What was most striking about the Obama speech in Berlin was not anything he said so much as the alternative reality it fostered: many American children have never before seen huge crowds turn out abroad to wave American flags instead of burn them.
Frank Rich, New York Times, Sunday July 27, 2008
(Image: BarackObama.com)
As usual, Frank Rich says in 43 words what others devote entire books trying to convey: the power of images. Yes, the “Barack Obama Trip to the Middle East and Europe” was a campaign event, and yes, as such the US Embassy in Berlin prevented its diplomats from attending (see Foreign Service blogger LifeAfterJerusalem’s thoughtful explanation of the Hatch Act and its limitations for political activity by career government employees).
But if the embassy had “covered” the event, like it might for any gathering of 200,000 American flag-waving Germans, it might have caught a sense of the international importance of Barack Obama and his quest for the US presidency. As Frank Rich points out, we haven’t seen this in a very long time.
On the night of September 11, 2001, after a long day “role playing” at an embassy emergency action security scenario – cut short by news of the real life emergency happening in the US – I was at home staying in touch with a large embassy nearby (Washington was shut down). My phone rang, and it was the duty communications officer telling me of a gathering outside the embassy’s gate. At first, in the heightened security posture and the tension of the day’s events, it appeared that it was a demonstration. But no, it was simply a spontaneous flow of local citizens, placing flowers, candles, handwritten messages of condolence and solidarity with the United States in the hour of its tragedy.
You know the rest of the story. The days, weeks, and months following September 11 saw a continuous flow of the same sentiment, at a personal and a governmental level, from Iceland to Iran. The world was with us. Afghanistan, the Taliban, al Qaeda – all the early American actions were supported in word and deed. Then “you’re with us or you’re against us” and Iraq happened. The magic was gone, and we are where we are.
Now there is another moment, and whatever Senator Barack Obama said in his speech in Berlin, or the content of his meetings with leaders from Afghanistan’s Karzai to Great Britain’s Brown, matters less than the popular public reaction to the person and the idea of Barack Obama. Whether you are a Republican McCainiac or Democratic Hillraiser, I challenge you to deny the power that an Obama presidency could bring to America’s engagement with the world.
Public Diplomacy is more than Presidential (candidate) speeches abroad, and deeds must accompany the fine words. But I have no doubt that an Obama Administration, following an act as unilaterally unpopular as the Bush White House, would begin with a massive reservoir of international good will. Something that a McWhat’s His Name (sorry, but most people abroad cannot even identify by name the Republican candidate) Administration would struggle to earn, identified as Senator McCain is with the ignominious incumbent.
And while a President McCain might give a morale boost to the over-70 crowd who want to maintain their relevance, there is no question that a President Barack Hussein Obama has already sparked the hopes of millions of young minority political wannabees, from Harlem to Hamburg. With a head start like this, the "combat-booted" (in Matt Armstrong's words) State Department’s public diplomacy establishment (enthralled by the "war metaphor" according to Pat Kushlis) had better prepare itself for a major overhaul to deal with the flowering of the kind of human-to-human cultural exchange that can build on the Obama Good Will "Bridge" Effect.