![]() His administration was less than seven months old when Communist East Germany closed the Berlin border and began building the infamous Berlin Wall. Planning for the ill-fated invasion of Cuba by American-trained exiles had begun under Eisenhower, but Kennedy went along with it and took responsibility for its failure. President Kennedy was in office only two months when the Bay of Pigs debacle occurred. This was certainly the case with Presidents Harry Truman (World War II), Dwight Eisenhower (the Korean War), John Kennedy (the Bay of Pigs invasion), Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford (the war in Vietnam), and Bill Clinton (the commitment of American forces to Somalia). In most of these cases, the new president was dealing with the aftermath of decisions made or situations left behind by his predecessor. 11.Īt the same time, first-year presidents ended the war in Korea, resisted sending American combat forces into Cuba, began the withdrawal of American forces from Vietnam, decided against re-engaging militarily when Vietnam fell, and got the troops out of a bad situation in Somalia. Baghdad was bombed during a new president's first year in office. ![]() ![]() American combat forces were sent into Vietnam, an island off Cambodia and Somalia. Cuba, Panama and Afghanistan were invaded. Five times, they ordered American troops into action.īroadening our historical horizon underscores the drama of presidents' first years. In eight crises the new presidents have had to exercise their responsibilities as commander in chief, making decisions about the use of military force. But they have tended to create dangerous international situations that the United States, given its prominent role in the world, has to address. Not all new-president crises involve direct attacks on the United States or on U.S. Only President Jimmy Carter escaped a major foreign policy or military decision during his first months in office (although his decision to withdraw American troops from South Korea provoked congressional anger and public criticism by an American general who Carter then fired). Six of the nine last presidents confronted foreign policy crises during their first year in the White House – eight counting inherited on-going wars. It's a safe bet, then, that Obama will face a major foreign policy crisis during his first year in office, if not the first few months. Over the 48 years since President John Kennedy took office, there have been more than 50 foreign policy crises, from the Berlin Wall to the Sept. It is simply that many new presidents have confronted major foreign policy crises within their first year in office. Joe Biden observed during the presidential campaign that a new President Barack Obama "will be tested by an international crisis within his first six months in power," he was on solid historical ground.īiden was not implying that there is a band of bad guys hiding in some cellar conjuring up a crisis specifically to take on Obama.
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