It Takes A Little Longer for Things to Register with Dubya

It's About Aid, and an Image

CRAWFORD, Tex., Dec. 29 - As Asia suffers through a 9/11 of its own - a natural calamity instead of a man-made one, but at least 25 times more deadly - President Bush's response in coming weeks may well determine his success in repairing relations strained by three years of relentless American focus on terrorism.

It took 72 hours after the tsunamis washed away countless villages and tens of thousands of lives before Mr. Bush appeared in public to declare that the United States had the rudiments of a plan for addressing "loss and grief to the world that is beyond our comprehension." His aides said it took that long to understand the magnitude of the tragedy and to plan a recovery effort that must stretch from remote villages of Indonesia to the eastern coast of Africa.

But the aid effort that has now begun presents Mr. Bush with an opportunity to battle, with action rather than just words, the perception that took root in his first four years in office that he is all about America first.

"It's a tragedy but it is also an opportunity to demonstrate that terrorism doesn't drive out everything else," said Morton Abramowitz, who served as American ambassador to Thailand a quarter century ago and went on to become one of the founders of the International Crisis Group, which helps prepare governments to respond to unexpected shocks. "It's a chance for him to show what kind of country we are."

Mr. Bush and his aides have long argued that the administration's reputation around the world is undeserved.

Andrew S. Natsios, the administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, said on Wednesday that American funds for disaster relief alone were $2.4 billion last year, 40 percent of the worldwide contributions for this purpose. "We are by far the largest donor," he said. "No one even comes close to us."

That argument underlay the president's testy response when asked, at his ranch, about the comments of Jan Egeland, the United Nations relief coordinator, who charged on Monday that rich Western nations had been "stingy" in doling out foreign aid before the tsunami.

"I felt like the person who made that statement was very misguided and ill informed," Mr. Bush replied, ticking off the magnitude of increases in American aid.

But perceptions set in a first term have a way of becoming the political canvas of the second. And America's response to this tragedy, some administration officials acknowledged, is crucial in places like Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, where the earthquake and tsunami first hit and where Islamic fundamentalism, never a political force during the cold war, is seeking to make inroads.

Any missteps by the United States in the country's politically volatile environment, noted a senior American official who is frequently in Southeast Asia, "will be exploited by the Islamic extremists to bolster their own case."

In this case, early reports indicate that even in a holiday week, the bureaucracy swung into gear fairly quickly.

To some degree, the war of perceptions has to do with whether the Asian nations believe Mr. Bush focuses on the tsunami tragedy with the same kind of energy he put in to making sure that other nations signed on to his counterterrorism agenda after Sept. 11. Just weeks after those attacks, Mr. Bush traveled to Shanghai for the annual summit of Asian leaders and made clear he would judge allies on the basis of how well they joined the fight. Among the first visitors to the Oval Office after the attack was Megawati Sukarnoputri, then Indonesia's president. She pledged to join the hunt for Al Qaeda operatives on her territory, and largely made good on the promise.

On Wednesday morning Mr. Bush, operating from a trailer just across the road from his ranch that has been converted into a secure communications center, called the leaders of Sri Lanka, Thailand, Indonesia and India to pledge his support.

"I assured those leaders this is only the beginning of our help," he said of the $35 million that the administration has pledged so far.

Mr. Bush's aides are aware that the depth of America's compassion will be compared to what other nations are spending, what Washington spends on lesser disasters at home, and what is now being spent in Iraq.

Spain has publicly committed about $68 million. Australia has pledged $27 million. American officials say those comparisons can be misleading because the United States is providing airlift and other services in an aid coalition with Japan, India and Australia.

Then there are the domestic comparisons. Congress has approved roughly $13 billion for aid related to the hurricanes that hit the country in the late summer. Most of that is going to Florida, where Mr. Bush loaded fresh water and dry goods into the trunks of cars.

Of course, that was home turf, and an election campaign was under way, and even Mr. Bush's critics do not expect spending on that scale for the far greater disaster in South Asia.

And there are already signs that Democrats want to link the response to this disaster to spending in Iraq. "I just about went through the roof when I heard them bragging about $35 million," Senator Patrick J. Leahy, the Vermont Democrat and a persistent critic of how the American rebuilding operation has gone in Iraq. "We spend $35 million before breakfast in Iraq."

Speaking by telephone from his home in Vermont, Mr. Leahy, who is the ranking Democrat on the foreign operations subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee, urged that a portion of the largely unspent $18 billion for Iraq reconstruction be re-directed for Asian relief efforts.

DAVID E. SANGER
NY Times