Ex-Bush Official’s Thesis Reflects Current Views

John C. Yoo ’89, an architect of the current Bush administration’s drive to increase executive power, began his career as a student of presidential authority during his years at the College.

In his senior History thesis on the foreign policies of former Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy ’40, and Lyndon B. Johnson, Yoo’s current views on the centralization of power in the White House may be seen in his re-reading of the presidents’ foreign policy toward Europe and their relations with Congress.

Often identified as one of the most aggressive critics of international law, Yoo has come under fire in recent months for his support for broad presidential authority during wartime. After the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, Yoo was one of the few members of the Justice Department who had a great deal of experience with war powers, according to The New York Times, and it was in his role as a deputy assistant attorney general in the department’s Office of Legal Counsel that he wrote a series of legal opinions arguing that the Bush administration could disregard the Geneva Conventions and use coercive interrogation methods in its battle against terror.

At Harvard in the spring of 1989, Yoo’s 128-page thesis—which earned him a summa cum laude distinction—comprised an analysis of the three presidents’ foreign policies, but did not advocate for any one of them. He characterized the diplomacy during the sixteen years that he reviewed as a vacillation between two poles: “re-asserting American leadership, or devolving responsibility for defending Europe to the Europeans.”

In particular, Yoo explored the proposed creation of the Multilateral Force (MLF), a joint NATO force proposed in 1960 that would allow Western European nations to have a greater role in their defense while preventing them from developing their own nuclear arsenals.

In addition to relying on recently declassified archival materials obtained from the three presidential libraries, Yoo conducted personal interviews with several scholars who had previously served in government, including McGeorge Bundy, who had been a Harvard professor, and Richard Neustadt, the founder of the Kennedy School of Government.

CLASHES WITH CONGRESS

Organizing his thesis chronologically, Yoo began with Eisenhower, who he said wanted to share nuclear technology with Europe in order to equalize the balance of power.

He wrote that Congress was frustrated by Eisenhower’s polices, which stripped it of some power.

“Following his military instincts, Eisenhower bridled at the thought of keeping modern weapons from his allies,” Yoo wrote. “American and British scientists had already collaborated fruitfully on the Manhattan Project. But Congress had disrupted this cooperation by passing the Atomic Energy (McMahon) Act of 1946, which prohibited the transfer of nuclear secrets to other nations, even close allies like Britain.”

As a result of the restrictions, Yoo wrote that “Eisenhower secretly launched several projects designed to gradually entrust Europe with more nuclear responsibility.”

As a result of his greater sharing of military secrets with the Europeans, Yoo continued that Eisenhower’s actions “provoked concern, and, at times, outrage, in Congress.”

The Joint Committee on Atomic Energy (JCAE) was the principle opponent of Eisenhower’s plans, as it could veto transfers of nuclear technology.

By the end of his two terms, “Eisenhower had developed a profound loathing for the JCAE, which he believed had unconstitutionally usurped executive powers in foreign policy and science.”

KEEPING THE POWER AT HOME

While Eisenhower wished to share nuclear technology with the nation’s allies, Yoo claimed that Kennedy sought to centralize power by keeping military technology from Britain and France.

“Kennedy wanted to strengthen American hegemony,” Yoo wrote. “[His] strategy demanded European subordination to American leadership.”

Yoo accused Kennedy of being disingenuous with his “Grand Design” foreign policy framework, calling it an “eloquently noble facade” that was deigned to cover up “a more reactionary goal.”

“From defense strategy to economics, Kennedy sought to re-assert American dominance,” Yoo wrote. “In nuclear matters especially, Kennedy refused to share the authority or responsibility for decisions, instead choosing to centralize authority in Washington.”

Yoo claimed that it was in this context that Kennedy considered the creation of the MLF—the unified NATO force.

“Washington could siphon off European nuclear aspirations into the MLF, only so long as it operated under American control,” Yoo wrote. “[Secretary of State Dean] Acheson wanted Britain and France to trade in their horse-and-buggies and use the bus, one driven by Washington.”

THE MASTER OF THE SENATE

Yoo turned his attention last to Johnson, who he wrote had the least experience in foreign affairs and thus depended upon others for counsel.

“A great swashbuckling politician with 30 years of congressional experience, Johnson had proved a powerful manipulator of men and institutions,” Yoo wrote. “[But] as he entered the presidency, Johnson was conscious of his ignorance, and decided to rely on Kennedy’s advisers to help carry the load.”

It was in this context that the “Atlanticists” in the State Department—policy wonks who favored stronger and more equal ties with Europe—were able to have a greater say in the administration’s foreign policy.

“The Atlanticists kicked off a major official effort to bring the MLF into being,” Yoo wrote. “Cables went out to European capitals proclaiming that Johnson had made the MLF the heart of his NATO policy.”

But when it became clear that Congress opposed the MLF program, Johnson simply let it drop. Unlike Eisenhower, Yoo claimed, Johnson was not an internationalist at heart.

THE PRESIDENT’S WAR POWERS

Just 12 years after graduating from the College, the careful, if young, scholar of the presidential power became, as one of his former supervisors told the Times, “the go-to guy on foreign affairs and military power issues” for the Bush administration.

Since the great majority of the memos that he wrote for the administration are still classified, it is impossible to know precisely what Yoo has advocated. But of those classified memos reviewed by Times reporters, many are sweeping in their view of the president’s powers.

In one confidential memo, Yoo wrote that two Congressional resolutions regarding the president’s authority to use force did not “place any limits on the president’s determinations as to any terrorist threat, the amount of military force to be used in response, or the method, timing and nature of the response,” according to the Times.

Curtis A. Bradley, a Duke law professor who gained prominence for writing an article critical of international law in the Harvard Law Review, told the Times that “In terms of war powers, you won’t find a tremendous number of scholars who will go as far as [Yoo] does.”

—Staff writer Paras D. Bhayani can be reached at pbhayani@fas.harvard.edu.