Presidential War Power by Louis Fisher

Author:Louis Fisher
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780700619788
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Published: 2017-03-22T04:00:00+00:00

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MILITARY ACTIONS BY CLINTON

Throughout Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign, he spoke out forcefully in favor of an activist, interventionist foreign policy. Repeatedly he expressed a willingness to use military force. His image as a credible Commander in Chief had been damaged by conflicting stories about his draft record during the Vietnam War. Various accounts surfaced on his efforts to avoid military service. Yet in an interview in June 1992, he insisted that he could be trusted to be Commander in Chief, serving notice of his willingness to use military force in Bosnia.1

Clinton’s capacity to serve credibly as Commander in Chief was questioned shortly after he took office and proposed that gays be allowed to serve in the military. Objections to that policy came from the Joint Chiefs of Staff. At a news conference on March 23, 1993, Clinton was asked: “Mr. President, you seem to be having some difficulty with the Pentagon. When you went to the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt, the sailors there were mocking you before your arrival, even though you are Commander in Chief. The services have been undercutting your proposal for permitting gays to be in the military. . . . Do you have a problem, perhaps because of your lack of military service or perhaps because of issues such as gays in the military, in being effective in your role as Commander in Chief, and what do you propose to do about it?”2 Clinton denied he had a problem being Commander in Chief. Within a few months, he would have what White House officials considered an opportunity to demonstrate his military “toughness.”

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