Analysis: 2 very different surge speeches - Marine Corps News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Marine Corps Times

Analysis: 2 very different surge speeches

WASHINGTON — Two American presidents have given military “surge” speeches in less than three years, but neither Barack Obama nor George W. Bush actually used the word in that context.

That’s one of the few similarities between Obama’s Tuesday night speech committing 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan and Bush’s Jan. 10, 2007, speech committing 20,000 more to Iraq.

The goals are similar. Secure a country and beat back insurgents so a flailing and mistrusted post-war government can survive.

But the rhetoric could not be more different. The two surge speeches showed Bush, the unilateralist, and Obama, the multilateralist, throughout.

The differences begin with the end game. Obama laid out one on the calendar, July 2011. He barely took a breath between committing more troops and saying when he’d start bringing them home. Bush only vaguely talked about the end.

Both presidents argued their plans needed urgent action and that the United States had no open-ended commitment.

Obama couched his warning this way: “The days of providing a blank check are over.” The very next sentence after saying he was committing additional American troops: “After 18 months, our troops will begin to come home.”

Bush was less declarative. “I have made it clear to the [Iraqi] prime minister and Iraq’s other leaders that America’s commitment is not open ended.” He predicted only that “over time” that “daily life will improve, Iraqis will gain confidence in their leaders, and the government will have the breathing space it needs to make progress in other critical areas.”

Bush’s defenders said his plan has done just that, to the point that Obama is fulfilling a campaign promise to slowly withdraw from Iraq.

Collaborative language

A rhetorical analysis through the Web site tagcrowd.com revealed that Obama used more collaborative language (he said “world” 12 times to Bush’s three, “partner” six to Bush’s one, and “people” 25 to Bush’s 12). Obama was almost twice as likely to use the word “security” (33 to 17 for Bush).

“That says to me that he wants to set a goal of keeping America secure [from] attacks,” said John M. Murphy, a communications professor and expert on presidential rhetoric at the University of Illinois. “Bush wanted to spread democracy.”

Obama advocated a “civilian surge” of non-military aid for Afghanistan.

Bush didn’t use the word, but he was roughly twice as likely as Obama to use military action language such as “forces” and “commanders” and “operations.”

Bush also mentioned “peace” five times in his Iraq surge speech; Obama used it once.

Bush was more likely to portray the threat of “terrorists” (nine times to Obama’s two), talk about “enemies” (5-1), and use the words “succeed” or “success” (10 mentions to six for Obama).

“This reflects different orientations in their overall foreign policy,” Murphy said.

Unilateralism vs. multilateralism

“Bush was very much a unilateralist. He thought foreign allies and international institutions slowed us down and created problems. Obama is very much a multilateralist,” Murphy said. “For him, America is most effective in the world when it operates within and through these institutions.”

Murphy said Obama’s most powerful multilateralist imagery may have been when he said the United States had “joined with others to develop an architecture of institutions — from the United Nations to NATO to the World Bank — that provide for the common security and prosperity of human beings.”

“That metaphor of architecture is powerful,” Murphy said. “It gives a sense of, ‘We are building. We are designing.’ ”

By contrast, Bush’s imagery focused on American exceptionalism: “Throughout our history, Americans have always defied the pessimists and seen our faith in freedom redeemed.”

Political wordsmith Frank Luntz said that while both speeches had one thing in common, “clear definition of the consequences of failure,” they “could not have been more different.”

Bush’s 2007 speech, he said, “had an air of defiance to it, whereas I heard a fair bit of resignation in Obama’s language and tone.”

Murphy said that while Obama made a highly structured and carefully delivered case for intervention, he questioned Obama’s use of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks as a threat basis.

“I thought he needed to make a better case for the problems that are posed now,” Murphy said. “He, like President Bush, tended to rely on the 9/11 area rather than show us, ‘Here is how they can hurt us now. Here is what they are planning now.’ Instead, we got the 9/11 narrative again, which is powerful. But boy, it’s been eight years.”