Commentary | Oudom Hean and Sek Sophal, Holding Students Hostage: the Military Scholarship Program and the Decline of American Foreign Policy in Cambodia
U.S.-Cambodia bilateral diplomatic relations, particularly military-to-military relations, reached a new low on July 1, 2021, after the U.S., without any notification in advance, terminated its military scholarship program for the six Cambodian students studying at American military academies. “Following Cambodia’s curtailment of cooperation in several areas of traditional bilateral military-military engagement,” U.S. Embassy spokesman Arend Zwartjes told Voice of America, “the country lost its eligibility for the U.S. military service academy program.” The U.S. decision to terminate the military scholarship program was made just a month after the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman paid an official visit to Cambodia on June 1, during which a series of diplomatic tensions over the alleged Chinese naval base in Cambodia flared up again. However seriously the bilateral diplomatic tensions between the two countries have become, taking students as hostages is not a rational diplomatic approach for the U.S. Not only is the decision miscalculated, but it is counterproductive.
The scholarship termination suggests that some U.S. leaders and diplomats do not understand the importance of soft power, a term coined by Joseph Ney, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs and a political scientist at Harvard University. “Soft power,” according to Ney, “rests on the ability to shape the preferences of others.” In other words, it is the political ability to get others to want the outcomes that you want by co-opting them rather than coercing them. Aside from the influx of foreign immigrants, the popularity of film, television programs, and music, the number of Internet websites hosted, or the rank of Nobel prizes, education has stood out as one of the most important sources of American soft power. Of the 5.3 million international students enrolled in universities outside their home countries in 2019, almost 1.1 million students went to American universities, while about 500,000 went to universities in the UK.
Scholarship programs for foreign countries, whether in a civilian or military framework, are a strategic development policy serving the long-term interests of American foreign policy. Investing in those young talented students is an investment in young future leaders empowered by American values, leadership and culture. As former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell articulated in an 2001 statement on International Education Week, “I can think of no more valuable asset to our country than the friendship of future world leaders who have been educated here.” Each year, only a few Cambodian students are recruited and admitted to the best military academies in the U.S. The budget size allocated for the scholarship program for Cambodia is therefore relatively small. Yet, the program has generated a huge positive impact by promoting American military supremacy and global leadership in the eyes of people in Cambodia. Many young Cambodian students are strongly passionate about this scholarship program and committed to studying very hard to master their skills in mathematics, science, and English to win a place at one of the most prestigious American military academies. American soft power, however, has been tarnished by the decision to suspend the scholarship program.
The suspension of the scholarship program amid the rising diplomatic tensions, furthermore, is a costly strategic mistake. Even with rising diplomatic tensions and a decline in military-to-military relations, taking a tough diplomacy against education programs means limiting diversity in diplomacy. Besides failing to shape the diplomatic position of the Cambodian government, holding the educational program hostage will further narrow the room for diplomatic engagement and maneuvering. No matter how deeply the U.S. and Cambodia mistrust each other, it is very important that the two countries still need more diverse diplomatic channels of communication. Fruitful diplomatic negotiation starts with non-sensitive topics. Nothing is more suitable than talking about education and student exchange programs.
The decision to terminate the scholarship program in response to the growing frictions over military-to-military relations signals the return of the classic diplomacy of carrots and sticks. Punishing the six Cambodian students in this way, however, is unreasonable. As the host country, the U.S. reserves all rights to terminate any scholarship and expel any scholarship recipient from the universities if they fail to fulfil their academic requirements, or if they make serious mistakes, such as committing a crime. Yet, this is not the case of the six Cambodian students at the American military academies. According to the U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh, the academic performance of the six Cambodian students is excellent, and they are able continue their studies until they graduate. It is crucial to note that they were recruited by the U.S. Embassy and admitted to the military academies years ago. Some are now in the last year of their studies and about to graduate. Holding them accountable for the current downward spiral of diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Cambodia is not fair.
Besides taking the importance of soft power and long-term strategic engagement for granted, termination of the scholarship program highlights the lack of strategic clarity in the U.S. Asia strategy. This strategic challenge has resulted partly from a long-standing crisis within the State Department, where major reforms in organizational structure and culture, policy management, education, and training are urgently needed. According to Revitalizing the State Department and American Diplomacy, a report published by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in 2020, the U.S. Department of State experienced a 22% decline in the number of candidates taking the Foreign Service Officer (FSO) test between 2017 and 2018, marking the lowest point since 2008.
A new research study by the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University in early July 2021 highlighted more critical trends of the crisis at the U.S. Department of State. According to the report, one-third of the current career diplomats, well-trained Foreign Service Officers (FSO) and professional Foreign Service Specialists (FSS) are planning to leave the Foreign Service as soon as they get their new jobs. Interpersonal bias, promotions, assignments, racial and ethnic discrimination, and family issues are the key driving forces behind the decision to leave the jobs.
In addition to the lack of career diplomats and well-trained FSO and experienced FSS, the U.S. Department of State has been preoccupied by the unrealistic belief that diplomats are “born, not made.” As a result, many diplomats at the U.S. Department of State receive only informal on-the-job training. Such an organizational culture, as career FSO Andrea Susana Martinez Donnally and Christina T. Le wrote in The Foreign Service Journal, has prevented the U.S. Department of State from recognizing the values of proper education, professional training, and the full potential of staff diversity.
In order to play critical roles on the ground, career diplomats must be well-equipped with skills in negotiation, crisis management, local language and culture, domestic political systems, and communication. These highly-specialized skills, however, require systematic and intensive training rather than on-the-job training. Without comprehensive and reliable information provided by career diplomats, FSO, and FSS on the ground, the U.S. Department of State relies heavily on the U.S. military. Such a reliance has proved disastrous in several countries. As Anne Woods Patterson, former U.S. Ambassador to Egypt, Pakistan, Colombia and El Salvador, wrote in 2019, “Our aversion to risk means that we know less—in fact, we are blind in critical countries.” “So we made mistakes in Libya, in Egypt and in Saudi Arabia, because we did not have a good understanding of the local scene.”
The ongoing diplomatic tension between the U.S. and Cambodia exactly replicates the statement of Richard N. Haas, President Council on Foreign Relations: “Sometimes serious diplomacy is sidelined in favor of unrealistic calls for regime change or demands that the other party cannot reasonably be expected to meet.” It is unlikely for both the United States to reverse its decision and for Cambodia to adjust its diplomatic position. In one of his most outstanding academic works, Just and Unjust Wars, Michael Walzer, a prominent American political theorist and professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study, writes “War is most often a form of tyranny,” paraphrasing Trotsky's aphorism about the dialectic, “You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.” The American decision to terminate the scholarship program, holding six Cambodia students hostage in the process, is not only an abnegation of American soft power, but a tyrannical attempt at imperialist regime change.
Oudom Hean, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor of Finance at North Dakota State University and a faculty scholar at the Challey Institute for Global Innovation and Growth.
Sek Sophal is a researcher at the Center for Democracy Promotion, Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University in Beppu, Japan. He is also a writing contributor to The Bangkok Post and Southeast Asia Globe.
To cite this essay, please use the entry suggested below:
Oudom Hean and Sek Sophal, “Holding Students Hostage: the Military Scholarship Program and the Decline of American Foreign Policy in Cambodia,” criticalasianstudies.org Commentary Board, July 14, 2021. https://doi.org/10.52698/BYUS4544.