A Moving Target: Where World Opinion, National Security Intersect

John F. Kerry was ill-advised to brag that some foreign leaders support his election in November because they are so exasperated with President Bush’s foreign policy. Kerry must have known he could never prove the claim without betraying confidences that should not be breached.

But Bush was disingenuous last week in demanding that Kerry name names because he knows that few foreign officials would speak candidly again to an American leader who publicly revealed such a private expression.

In that sense, the argument over Kerry’s comments is superficial and even silly.

Yet behind this shallow sniping is an important choice forced into sharper relief by the stunning fall of the pro-Bush Popular Party in Spain’s recent election. The question is how much America should weigh world opinion in devising an approach to national security.

Bush has pursued a strategy aimed at maximizing American freedom to act against perceived threats, even at the cost of straining relations with longtime allies. Kerry says he would place a greater priority on building international consensus, even if that meant giving others more say in the timing and scope of our actions.

Inevitably, the choice is being simplified in the campaign cross-fire. If Bush disdained allies as much as Kerry suggests, the president would not have pursued two resolutions at the United Nations before invading Iraq, or drafted four other Asian powers into the negotiations with North Korea over its nuclear program. And though a Bush television advertisement charges that Kerry “wanted to delay defending America until the United Nations approved,” the Massachusetts senator explicitly says he “will not wait for a green light from abroad when our safety is at stake.”

Yet Kerry has left no doubt that he would have waited longer than Bush to develop international agreement before invading Iraq. In future crises, Kerry almost certainly would put more emphasis than Bush on building international legitimacy, while Bush would be more willing to pursue military action without broad consensus, much less U.N. authorization.

A comment from Vice President Dick Cheney criticizing Kerry last week was especially revealing of the administration’s mind-set. Challenging Kerry’s claim of foreign support, Cheney asked, “What is he saying to foreign leaders that makes them so supportive of his candidacy?”

The barbed suggestion is that Kerry could attract foreign support only by sacrificing U.S. interests. Cheney, perhaps inadvertently, signaled that he sees a zero sum world in which the United States can only be more respected if it is less secure.

Kerry argues exactly the opposite: that America can become safer only if more countries respect it and share its goals. Kerry insists Bush has undercut American security through “unilateral” actions that have “driven away our allies and cost us the support of other nations.”

Kerry’s formulation slights what he previously acknowledged: the culpability of nations like France in the estrangement. But there’s no doubt the controversy surrounding the Iraq invasion has battered America’s image in the world.

In surveys released last week by the Pew Global Attitudes Project, majorities of around three-fifths or more expressed negative opinions about the United States in Turkey, Pakistan, Jordan, Morocco, France and Germany, six of the eight foreign countries polled.

At least two-thirds of those polled in those six countries -- as well as 60% in Russia and 57% in Great Britain, the other two nations surveyed -- viewed Bush unfavorably.

The election in Spain, where polls have found similar attitudes, showed that these volatile sentiments could be mobilized into an electoral majority. In socialist Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Spanish voters chose a politician who promised to distance the nation from the United States over the handpicked successor of Bush’s closest ally on the European continent during the Iraq war, Jose Maria Aznar.

That, of course, wasn’t the only dynamic at work in the election: The unexpected result may have reflected a desire among distraught Spanish voters to negotiate a separate peace with terrorists. No American politician could endorse such an impulse, which is probably why Democrats have been reticent about raising the result as evidence for their charge that Bush is alienating traditional allies.

Yet the Spanish election is relevant for the debate here because it is likely to be relevant in Europe. In the last two years, governments in Germany and now Spain have been elected on a platform of tilting away from America. These results could discourage other European leaders from allying on security issues with an American administration generating the public unease evident in the Pew polls.

“There is no question now that it is more dangerous to support a position taken by the U.S. administration in this arena because of the potential backlash from public opinion,” says Tom Bentley, director of Demos, a London-based think tank close to the Labor government.

At the same time, Bentley believes the Madrid bombings will force the hand of European governments critical of Bush’s strategy for combating terror. Those who maintain Bush has relied too much on military force, he predicts, will have to show they can protect their countries with alternatives that place greater emphasis on alliances, law enforcement, diplomacy and encouraging social progress in the Islamic world.

Kerry faces much the same challenge. Polls show that Americans would prefer the United States act in a way that attracts support from other nations, as he’s urging. But, above all, in an age of brutal terror, Americans want Washington to protect their families, even if others object to the means. Kerry’s promise to collaborate more in the struggle against terrorism will help him only if he can convince Americans that more friends abroad mean more security at home.

Ronald Brownstein’s column appears every Monday. See current and past columns on The Times’ website at www.latimes.com/brownstein.