WP: Critics Assail Bush's Strategy of Restraint in Liberia

[Nambe]

CRAWFORD, Tex., Aug. 9 (Washington Post)

President Bush built lofty expectations around the world about his willingness to help staunch the bloodshed in Liberia, and now is facing widespread criticism for sending only a handful of troops, with no promise of combat forces, after five weeks of delay.

Bush authorized six to 20 Marines to go ashore this week to help Liberia's West African neighbors with the logistics of humanitarian efforts. But he made no provision for reining in the rape, looting and gunfire that is terrifying residents of the capital, Monrovia. ---

"This feeds into the wider debate within the international community about what the United States really cares about," said Gayle Smith, the National Security Council's director for African affairs in the Clinton administration. "When we're telling countries they have to be for us or against us, it hurts our credibility if we are not responsive when the rest of the world is saying there's something they need us to do."

Chester A. Crocker, assistant secretary of state for African affairs for eight years under President Ronald Reagan, said the administration had "not handled the perception management on this very well," and had offered what could be seen as a timid response when "a credible force on the ground could have made a real difference." ---