Brzezinski: Obama may be tested

Press TV
Nov. 11, 2008

A former US national security adviser says President-elect Barack Obama may be tested by terrorists after he takes office on Jan. 20.

"It's possible. There's no way of predicting that. It's a possibility, but it's by no means a certainty," former Carter administration national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski said in an interview with Deutsche Welle.

Brzezinski said that history shows that every new US president is tested by transitional challenges and circumstances.

"I think that Obama has shown that he is very calm, very rational and very deliberate in his approach to issues and I think if he is tested he will respond cogently and rationally and effectively," said Brzezinski.

The last two US presidents have been tested early in office - the two attacks on the World Trade Center occurred in the first year of Democrat Bill Clinton's and Republican George W. Bush's presidencies.

Brzezinski added that changing the substance of US policies is not as easy as it sounds and Obama may be incapable of bringing a 'dramatic change' to Washington.

"You have to think of foreign policy as, for example, a boat moving on the sea. A huge ocean liner doesn't change its course in the way that a fast motor boat does. Therefore it is not possible for the United States dramatically to change every one of its policies. But I think there will be a significant shift in substance and in tone," Brzezinski concluded.