President Clinton’s
foreign policies are controversial some of them had a huge impact on people’s
lives then and have it even now, but there are some that didn’t bring that much
use to the society. But what is signed is already signed, so we will be taking
a critical approach to just analyzing the overall influence and the known facts
that are now known as history .Now we will discuss
the foreign policy of the representative of a democratic party Bill Clinton. He
was the 42th  President of the USA and
came to power under two slogans “returning the house back” and “the
restoration of the American dream”. This takeover of power induced in
society a phenomenal rise of hope for durable alterations. Indeed, during his
reign, America had an epoch of prosperity.

After a few months of
his presidential term he signed two very important contracts that influenced
the future and fate of the country. The first one is called Omnibus Budget
Reconciliation Act –made a probability of future budget surpluses. And the
second one called The North American Free Trade Agreement – created a trade
alliance in North America. These 2 contracts are merely examples of Bill
Clinton’s foreign policy. However, to get a better understanding what foreign
policy actually is, we have denoted a very simple definition. And according to
this definition, a foreign policy is a set of of political objectives that
outlines the way a particular country cooperates with other countries( in turn,
it can be implemented peacefully or through violence and even a war)

 Furthemore, the new President along with his
administration introduced  the first
White House website . It was launched  in
order to make a step towards web communication with US citizens. During the
time of the second term in United States appeared  budget surpluses, which indicated the success
of Bill Clinton’s presidency. However, that 
success did not last long, it was soon darkened by the attempt of  the House of Representatives of impeachment .
These policies are destined to protect national interests, national security ,  economic improvement and so on. This can be
implemented whether in the form of peaceful cooperation or in violence and even
a war.

Let’s analyze the
policies we have talked earlier. For example, North American Free Trade
Agreement, it is clear that it is an agreement between the North American
countries on the creation of trade bloc. The analyses of the economic research
show that this agreement was helpful to the North American earnings and for the
average citizen life. But at the same time was harmful to the workers in the
field of trade game. That gives us a great example of President Clinton
bringing the agreement into work for the greater good of the Americans, and for
the more stable relations with the countries that participated in this
transaction.

Now is the time to
move to the main policy that we are revising and that is the counter-terrorism
policies. The end of the Cold War assigned the United States the task of
rethinking and reshaping their foreign policy. Thus, since the beginning of the
1990s, new challenges and new opportunities were created for the US and in
particular for President Bill Clinton. The winner of the presidential race in
1992 faced a number of difficult tasks, one of the biggest difficulties were
the rise of terrorism and criminal movements.

Nowadays, terrorism is
prevalent all around the world. Terrorism is a criminal activity, which
encompasses a range of activities that are dangerous for people’s lives and
designed to cause a great fear. Just one day before 4 terrorist attacks on
September 11, 2001, former president of the United States confessed that he
nearly got Osama bin Laden and could have got him killed but decided not to do it
because innocent people could be injured. However, it would have prevented the
fatal events on that Tuesday. The terrorist act on September 11, 2001, ushered
the beginning of a new epoch of terror. Fatal events including the modern
attacks in Madrid, London, Bali, and Paris have made counter-terrorism one of
the highest priorities for national governments. Because of it, many
governments decided to limit individual freedoms and civil rights and
furthermore, they raised budgets for anti-terror spending. This has caused
slowing down of social and economic development. Consequently, the most crucial
element of a strategy is how to decrease and minimize the threat and result of
tragic terrorism while protecting public liberties. This global problem existed
back then too.

It all started with
Osama bin Laden becoming known for his actions and growing as an American
enemy, that his capturing had started to be a goal of the US government. On
February 26, 1993, A car with the bomb in it was planted in the World Trade
Center’s Parking by the terrorists known as the members of al-Qaeda, that were
under the leadership of Osama bin Laden. Six people died in the explosion and
1042 were wounded. Clinton immediately commanded his National Security Council
and the FBI to solve this crime and punish those who are responsible. The FBI
determined the vehicle that was used in the bombing and as it turned out it was
stolen in New Jersey 1 day before the crime. The FBI was able to find 5 people
that were involved in the bombing thanks to their lead. All of the guilty were
arrested. Bill Clinton in his 1995 State of the Union address suggested:
“comprehensive legislation to strengthen our hand in combating terrorists,
whether they strike at home or abroad.” It was done in order to extend
federal criminal jurisdiction, make it easier to deport terrorists, and act
against them. After the bombing in Oklahoma City, the president amended that
legislation to increase wiretap. The President started to make actions against
terrorism and In June 1995 he published Presidential Decision Directive 39,
which declared that America should deter, and respond to terrorist attacks on
the territory of the United States and against its citizens.

In this particular
moment, we can observe President Clinton use his presidential power to modify
the American foreign policy for the new occurring threat as terrorism. The
declaration of American’s reaction to the problem brought all democratic parts
of the world against one enemy and increased the effect of terrorism on the
diplomatic schedule.

The CIA set a special
group of officers to analyze the information about bin Laden to develop a plan
of action against him in 1996. This particular unit was the first who
recognized bin Laden was a leader of a giant worldwide terrorist network based
in Afghanistan. With this in mind, the NSC urged the Department of State to
“pay an utmost attention” to this country.

On May 22, 1998,
Presidential Decision Directive 62 was signed by the President of the United
States of America. The main function of this document’s existence is that the
fight against terrorism is now distinguished as a top national security
priority. Here, once more the President uses his executive power to try to stop
terrorism from happening. This PDD is followed by Richard Clarke being
appointed as a leader of newly created Counter-terrorism Security Group in
order to fight against terrorism issues. Shortly after that, a Clinton’s
Counter-terrorism Center began developing a plan of action in order to set up an
ambush for bin Laden in Kandahar. This center was absolutely sure that this
plan could work and therefore they came to White House to get an approval, but
the government considered that project is way too hazardous. But anyway, they
thought that sooner or later bin Laden will make attacks in the territory of
the United States. So, it’s better to start acting on them. The management of
the CIA was distrustful of this plan and decided to stop this operation,
standing in fear of too big financial expenses. We don’t have data confirming
that Bill Clinton was informed about this operation.

Counter-terrorism
Center proceeded to follow bin Laden and at the same time, they realized bin
Laden is planning to make an attack on the national forces. Then Bill Clinton said
the CIA Director is his “personal representative” in operations with
Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabians said they will do everything they can in order to
send bin Laden to the American court. The intelligence chief of Saudi Arabia
arranged several meetings with Taliban chief Mullah Omar and got a confirmation
that bin Laden will be released, however, Omar eventually refused it and got
out of that promise.

Bin Laden hit again in
various places at the same time. The attacks were in The US embassies in Kenia,
Tanzania, and Nairobi on August 7, 1998. The CIA found out and officially
affirmed that the leader of these attacks was none other than bin Laden. After
that they reported that terrorists will have a meeting near Khowst, to discuss
future bombings.

Clinton commanded
rocket strikes on Al-Qaeda camps and factory where bin Laden was supposedly
producing his weapons. Despite all the attempts to kill the leader of the
terrorist group, this goal was not achieved. It was assumed that they had
probably missed bin Laden just by several hours.

Meanwhile, Clinton was
drawn into a big Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, where he was accused of having a
sexual intercourse with 22-year-old White House intern. His reputation suffered
at first, he denied that he had any kind of sexual relationships with this
woman, but later he decided to admit it. 
After that scandal, the President was accused of diverting attention
from his personal life by starting military attacks. Impeachment.

A lot of criticism
followed Clinton, some say that it’s a shame that he wasn’t able to manage an
arrest of bin Laden and he will always be remembered as the one who couldn’t.
Considering all the work that was put on counter-terrorism field by this
president and his office that is shocking that people remember him like that.
How would we live now without these policies? Terrorism would not be seen as
such a threat, if not President Clinton. Just like Nixon opened China for
America, Clinton opened terrorists and it is not the greatest deed, but would
it be any better, if we didn’t know about it. We can make a parallel with the
time we live no, the number of terrorist attacks has decreased, they still do
happen, but it not that big of a problem anymore. Simultaneously, we make a
much bigger deal out of it, we think. It is being advertised to us, it is put
in our heads to know what may happen and remember what already did. The piece
of history that started this overprotectiveness of our generation is the time
when Bill Clinton was a president.

His work on the
foreign policy was hard, understanding that the change you bring may save
people’s lives and if you make a mistake people may be dying. At the time of
his work, relations with other countries were becoming more stable, more allies
came to perspective. America was becoming greater; the main concentration of
the president was to use the foreign policy more for the American good then for
the world’s one. And that makes a total sense, you have to create the safe
place for the things you love and how can a president love anything else that a
country that he or she is ruling.

In conclusion, it is
safe to say that Bill Clinton was a good president, who was trying to do the
best for his country, America met a lot of challenges at that time and it is
amazing that they were able to overcome them. The input of President Clinton on
the international relations of America with other countries is pretty
significant and the counter-terrorism may not have been as important and useful
as it is now. So, one of the things we can do is to thank Bill Clinton for the
safer life that they have brought to us, for the work that he and his office
had put in the realization of the threat and the creation of the ways of
fighting with it.