©Fawcett Book
When a traveling companion and I flew into Hanoi from Hong Kong in 1997 a young State Department officer, and his wife and child occupied seats nearby. He was taking up a rather high-level post in the new, amicable relations between America and its erstwhile adversary. We only got to chat a little, he being preoccupied somewhat equally with his young daughter and his portfolio. He seemed eager and not at all apprehensive going into what would seemingly be a relationship of some delicacy; one could still discern what I took to be bomb craters in the verdant countryside on our approach.
I remember at the time having a recollection of the book, The Ugly American, a novel by Eugene Burdick and William J. Lederer, set in a fictitious S.E. Asian country back in the 1950s, when Communism was winning many hearts and minds as colonialism crumbled into what came to be called, somewhat charitably, “developing countries.” It was later made into a movie that starred Marlon Brando as some sort of consular official who somehow just doesn’t get what’s going on with the incipient nationalism and sort of blows it. It was a harbinger for a number of misguided American policies to follow, such as “domino theories” and miscontructions of nationalism and communism. From such faulty intelligence, as we know even today, things can get really “ugly.”
My discomfort with the term “ugly American” was thankfully contradicted by the friendliness of people we had rained bombs on for several years. Americans might be “ugly” in diplomacy, and their nation’s policies might be at times woefully misguided, but Americans themselves are generally liked by people in foreign countries, even countries we have dropped a lot of bombs upon. I say this not only on the basis of short acquaintance with Vietnam, but from the experience of travel to over 60 countries, in the past 25 years, often escorting groups of American tourists, some of whom did not always conduct themselves in an endearing manner.
Once, a Coptic tailor in Cairo pulled me into the back room of his shop and proudly showed me his picture of Jimmy Carter, telling me that he regarded the former president as an honorable man and good Christian. I recall a cab driver in Shanghai explaining to me that he thought Clinton was a great American president because the Chinese leadership respected and feared him. In other places, when I would identify myself as an American in would get a thumbs up sign and hear “Cleenton,” or “Clintone, good.” My cyclo driver in Saigon, Minh (no relation to Ho Chi), probably wasn’t born when the Americans who fled in helicopters from the roof of the American Embassy that he pointed out to me, told me of his dream of going to America. There might be the occasional snide remark, but usually it was from those of the more educated classes, and from those in the more developed countries.
Misguided American policies have been responsible for losing the respect of foreigners in the past, but no American president and his policies have produced the ruinous results as those of G.W. Bush. With his simple-minded dichotomizing of a world that is either “with us or against us,” he has appealed to morons and neo-cons, while insulting and alienating millions of people around the world, forcing the American forces he has unleashed in the putative cause of bringing freedom to fight and die with only token support of bribed and strong-armed “coalition” allies. American troops entering Baghdad, who were supposed to be greeted like those who rode down the Champs Elysee in 1944, have been sniped and car-bombed by the hundreds; the Muslim world in general has been lumped with extreme jihadists, insulting millions of allies and driving others closer to Islamic fundamentalism; the administration continues to cozy up with fundamentalists such as the Saudi family; and the its policies leading to the atrocities at Abu Ghraib have shamed Americans before the entire world and provided “justification” for brutal acts of retaliation. Never have Americans had to face so much ill will from foreigners, never have we had so much to answer for, never has our reputation been put so low.
Most civilian Americans will, of course, not be going abroad, where they might encounter slights, or worse, from foreigners. Those going abroad in uniform will have reason to feel their job has been made more perilous. Some Americans might just feel too ashamed to take out their U.S. Passport. That’s a long way down for a country that once enjoyed wide love and respect from freedom-loving peoples around the world. It is a hard reality to bear for Americans who live, work and travel abroad.
George Bush might have the arrogant face of the quintessential “Ugly American,” but he has put a face on the rest of us to the entire world that looks bad.
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©2004, James A. Clapp (UrbisMedia Ltd. Pub. 8.2.2004)