In his final four years, will Bush mimic Reagan and change his spots?

ON the campaign trail President George W Bush refused to admit a mistake and defended some of the most controversial moves of his first four years.

The million dollar question is: was this stubbornness political or genuine?

Does Bush intend to carry on with the policies of his first term or will he use his moment of triumph as an opportunity to forge a new direction? Speculation is rampant and plausible cases are being made for two scenarios. The first scenario might be called the “Reagan option.” Ronald Reagan’s first term saw a ratcheting up of tension with the Soviet Union and an escalation of the Cold War. However, his second term was very different, characterised by historic arms control agreements and better relations with the Soviets even though many of Reagan’s neo-conservative supporters strongly disagreed with that shift.

Despite his reputation abroad, Bush is plenty smart. He knows who gave him good advice and bad advice. He knows what policies created more trouble than they are worth and which deserve more attention. He could not fire senior staff or acknowledge the futility of individual policies over the past year because it would have been taken as a sign of weakness and used to destroy him. Now, he is free to make his move.

The second scenario, “staying the course”, is the mirror image of the first. If Bush used his narrow win in 2000 as a mandate then he could hardly be expected to reverse course following a popular vote majority of over 3.5 million.

Given that Bush based his campaign on a staunch defence of his first four years, expect to see the advancement of this agenda in the second term. The answer to the second-term riddle is likely to be found in Bush’s senior foreign policy appointments.

Colin Powell is the man to watch. Speculation has been rampant for over two years that he would leave at the end of the first term and either go back into private life or become president of the World Bank. Powell is thought to be tired and frustrated with the innumerable, and usually losing, battles with the civilian leadership at the Pentagon.

However, Powell has let it be known recently that he may consider remaining in the cabinet. Powell would only stay if he believed he could accomplish something significant and wrest control of foreign policy away from the neo-conservatives. In fact, there has even been speculation that Powell could be a potential replacement for his old nemesis, Donald Rumsfeld, as Secretary of Defence.

Sending Powell to the Pentagon would be the clearest signal possible that Bush had decided to clean house and turn against the neo-conservatives who have used senior positions inside the Department of Defence to chart the course of US foreign policy. As such, it is likely to be widely resisted by many in Bush’s inner circle, not least Rumsfeld himself and Vice-President Dick Cheney. Rumsfeld is thought to want to stay on, although probably not for a full term, so he can improve America’s position in Iraq and avoid the appearance of leaving following failure.

If Powell does leave the State Department potential replacements include national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, UN ambassador John Danforth, or some of the leading neo-conservatives, including Paul Wolfowitz.

Question marks also hang over the direction of a Bush term even if the hardliners continued to control the ship of state.

Conservative columnist Robert Novak has reported that senior Bush administration officials said the US would withdraw from Iraq following elections in the spring to avoid getting bogged down in a protracted civil war. Rice, Wolfowitz, and Rumsfeld were reportedly now of this view.

In the realm of domestic policy one of the administration’s most divisive figures, Attorney General John Ashcroft, is expected to retire and return to Missouri, largely for personal reasons. However, although the faces may change, there is every reason to believe that domestic policy will stay the same.

Tom Wright is a research fellow at the JFK school of politics, Harvard.