The President Who Couldn’t Quit: Jimmy Carter’s Foreign Policy Legacy Goes Beyond the White House

Jimmy Carter, the centenarian ex-president who lived long enough to see Donald Trump re-elected but he died just before the start of the new year, he has a foreign policy legacy that was not only defined by his four years in the White House.

During the term of his presidency, the first Governor of Georgia he could boast of helping to establish peace between Israel and Egypt and to restore relations with China. But when he suffered one of the nation’s most decisive defeats at the hands of President Ronald Reagan in 1980, Carter still had ambitions he was unwilling to give up.

Carter is largely celebrated for the altruistic nature of his post-presidency, volunteering with Habitat for Humanity into his 90s. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his peace negotiations, but some accused the former president of meddling in international affairs without any official title.

Here’s a look at Carter’s forays onto the world stage, both as president and beyond:

North Korea’s Unauthorized Peace Treaty

In 1994, Bill Clinton took office amid a standoff with North Korea over the communist country’s nuclear program. The United States floated the idea of ​​sanctions, and even considered a pre-emptive strike on North Korea’s nuclear facilities to destroy its capabilities.

Carter had received invitations from North Korea to visit and was anxious to try to defuse the situation and reach an agreement to unify North and South. As Clinton weighed her options, Carter called. He had negotiated the framework of a peace agreement, without authorization.

Carter had flown to North Korea with a CNN crew and signed the deal. He called Clinton to let him know he was about to go on CNN to announce the deal, which infuriated the Clinton White House, according to Carter biographer Douglas Brinkley’s book, “The Unfinished Presidency.”

Carter also accepted a dinner invitation from Kim Il-Sung, where he claimed that the US had stopped pursuing sanctions at the UN, which was not true. In a corner, Clinton had to accept the peace agreement and stop pursuing sanctions.

Carter’s discussions with leader Kim Il-Sung may have averted conflict with North Korea in the 1990s. The nation, of course, continued to pursue nuclear weapons and acquired them in 2006.

Carter Tells Arab States To Leave US In Bush’s Gulf War

In the Middle East, Carter declared that he could have resolved the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a second term, a prospect no president has yet achieved.

“Had he been elected to a second term, with the prestige, authority, influence and reputation he had in the region, we could have moved on to a final solution,” he told The New York Times in 2003.

During the 1990s, Carter befriended Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) leader Yasser Arafat and coached him on how to appear more moderate in the West, although Arafat continued leading attacks against Israel and led the Second Intifada in 2000.

JIMMY CARTER, PIONEER OF THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT

When President George HW Bush decided to launch the Persian Gulf War after Iraq’s Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, Carter vehemently opposed the idea. Five days before Bush’s deadline for Hussein to withdraw, Carter wrote to the leaders of nations on the U.N. Security Council and to key Arab states — Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Syria — imploring them to leave the U.S. and their war efforts.

“I urge you to publicly call for a delay in the use of force while the Arab leaders seek a peaceful solution to the crisis. You may have to forgo the approval of the White House, but you will find that the French, the Soviets and others fully support. And most Americans will welcome this move.”

The move prompted former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft to accuse Carter of violating the Logan Act, which says private citizens cannot negotiate with foreign governments.

Carter meets with Hamas, angering the Bush administration

In 2008, of President George W. Bush Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice publicly dragged Carter into meeting with Hamas, a designated terrorist group, after the administration explicitly told him not to.

Rice told reporters that Carter’s meeting could confuse the message that the US would not work with Hamas.

“I don’t want there to be any confusion,” Rice said. “The United States will not deal with Hamas and we had certainly told President Carter that we did not think meeting with Hamas would help” a political settlement between Israel and the Palestinians.

JIMMY CARTER, 39TH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, DIED AT THE AGE OF 100

Carter, a staunch supporter of the Palestinians after his presidency, claimed that Israel’s policies amounted to apartheid worse than South Africa’s.

Egypt-Israel peace treaty

In 1978, the groundbreaking possibility of Egypt and Israel’s normalization of relations had stalled. Egyptian President Anwar Sadat suggested ceasing contact with the Israelis.

In September of that year, Carter brought Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to Camp David, where Carter spent more than a week mediating negotiations on an agreement between the two sides. From that meeting came a framework of a treaty known as the Camp David Accords, and six months later, Egypt became the first Arab state to establish relations with Israel.

The deal included the return of the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt and a “pathway” for Palestinian self-rule in Gaza. Sadat was assassinated in 1981 after Arab fury over the peace accord.

Normalization of US-China relations

In 1978, after months of secret negotiations, Carter established formal US relations with China, breaking decades of hostility between the two nations. That meant terminating a defense treaty with Taiwan, where Carter remains a controversial figure.

He also pushed Congress to pass the Taiwan Relations Act to continue providing arms to Taiwan and “maintain the ability to resist” any attempt to take it over.

1979 Iranian Hostage Crisis

In 1979, the of the Iranian regime the shah, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi and Carter had a strategic relationship, with Carter silent on his questionable human rights record, even as the shah’s power was slipping.

Protests had erupted in Iran over the Shah’s oppressive policies, but Carter continued to support him, fearing the alternative: Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Pahlavi fled into exile in January 1979, and Carter initially resisted requests to grant him asylum in the US before allowing him to seek cancer treatment in New York City in October that year And on November 4, Iranian students angry at the decision stormed the US embassy in Tehrantaking 52 hostages.

The hostage crisis spanned the remainder of Carter’s tenure and, for many, defined his legacy on the world stage. With no resolution, in April 1980, Carter moved to a military bailout.

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The mission ended in tragic failure: several helicopters were grounded outside Tehran in a sandstorm, and eight members of the special forces were killed when their helicopter crashed. Iran captured US equipment and intelligence.

The hostages were not released until January 20, 1981, minutes after the president Ronald Reagan was inaugurated

Signature of the Panama Canal back to Panama

President-elect Trump has thrust Carter’s Panama Canal treaties back into the spotlight, arguing Tuesday that offering control of the canal to Panama lost Carter the 1980 election.

Despite fierce opposition from the right, Carter believed that returning the canal would improve US relations in Latin America and ensure peace between US shipping lanes, fearing that opposition to US control could lead to violence on the waterway.

“It is obvious that we cheated the Panamanians out of their channel,” Carter wrote in a diary entry. But he had also received information that he might need 100,000 troops to defend the canal in the event of an uprising.

In recent days, Trump has suggested taking back the canal, claiming the US is paying too much to use it and that it is controlled by China.

“Giving the Panama Canal to Panama was a big reason why Jimmy Carter lost the election, even more so than the hostages,” Trump said.