The Legacy of Jimmy Carter’s Foreign Policy

Ray Takeyh is Hasib J. Sabbagh Senior Fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Jimmy Carter, who won the U.S. presidency in 1976 after serving one term as the governor of Georgia, brought an eclectic mix of experiences to office. They informed a foreign policy that fit no easy categorization.

Carter was a foreign policy neophyte, idealistic about efforts to achieve Middle East peace and driven by a Christian faith that informed his vocal but inconsistent focus on human rights. Yet, he was also a traditional Cold Warrior and pushed back on the Soviet Union’s influence. Zbigniew Brzezinski, a U.S. national security advisor and Sovietologist, was his foreign affairs mentor and closest White House confidant. And after leaving office, Carter redefined the post-presidency through his considerable efforts as a diplomat and humanitarian.

Here are the foreign policy highlights of Carter’s career:

Elevating the Vice Presidency

As a presidential candidate, Carter lacked federal government experience. It was therefore a logical and savvy choice to bring Walter Mondale on as his running mate. Mondale had served nearly fourteen years as a U.S. senator from Minnesota, and he was a member of the prestigious and high-profile Church Committee, which investigated executive-branch intelligence abuses. Due to this clout, Mondale was instrumental in convincing respected Admiral Stansfield Turner to serve as director of the CIA when Carter was forced to pull his previous nominee from contention.

In return, Carter gave Mondale unprecedented intelligence access for a vice president and included him in foreign policy meetings with Brzezinski and Secretary of State Cyrus Vance. This amounted to a major elevation from the traditional pro forma trappings of the vice presidency, presaging the increased importance of the position in later administrations. As a member of the National Security Council, Mondale was a central figure in high-level foreign policy discussions, including nuclear weapons negotiations with the Soviet Union and Arab-Israeli peace talks.  

The Panama Canal Treaties of 1977

The Carter administration began its term with the intention of resetting and improving relations with Central and South American countries. Carter hoped to undo perceptions that Washington injected itself into the affairs of these states for its own gain.

The U.S. military had controlled the Panama Canal—which sat on a slice of unincorporated U.S. territory called the Canal Zone—since 1903. By the late seventies, there was concern that the status quo could lead to a guerrilla campaign against U.S. forces there, so the Joint Chiefs of Staff agreed to support negotiations over the canal’s future. In September 1977, Carter completed negotiations on two treaties with Panamanian leader General Omar Torrijos Herrera. The first ensured the neutrality of all ships passing through the canal and gave the United States the right to defend against any threats to that neutrality. The second treaty outlined a pathway to Panamanian control of the canal, starting with the dissolution of the Canal Zone at the end of 1979 and culminating in full control at the end of 1999.

Carter displayed uncharacteristic finesse in persuading the Senate to ratify both treaties. However, the U.S. withdrawal angered and mobilized the Republican opposition, who considered it a strategic folly. At the treaty signing, Carter spoke of a United States that dealt with other countries using “fairness, not force.” U.S.-Panama relations continued to strengthen despite tension over Manuel Noriega’s 1983–89 dictatorship, and the turn-of-the-century transfer went smoothly.

The 1978 Camp David Accords

Carter’s Middle East policy began with the hope of comprehensive regional settlement. It ended with one of his most significant and pragmatic achievements, a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, which had been in a state of conflict since 1948.

The president’s plan for peace discussions between Israel and the surrounding Arab states had its foundations in the multilateral Geneva talks that followed the 1973 Yom Kippur War. The Arab states viewed Washington as a reliable broker, and previous negotiations had established a “land for peace” model of compromise.

There were tremendous hurdles: Jordan insisted on a Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) presence at the negotiations, a nonstarter for Israel; Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Syria wanted to negotiate as a bloc and feared that Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, who faced domestic instability, would seek to negotiate bilaterally. In addition, because the Arab-Israeli conflict continued to play out as a proxy war between the United States and the Soviet Union, the two superpowers had to navigate their differences. Meanwhile, Carter’s dream for the Middle East faced opposition at home—many in the American Jewish community were wary of his evangelical faith and vocal support of Palestinian rights.

Two events stopped the Geneva process and opened the way for bilateral Egypt-Israel talks instead: the election of right-wing Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin in June 1977 and Sadat’s subsequent announcement that he sought to visit Jerusalem and address Israel’s parliament. After Sadat’s visit to Israel, working groups from both countries began negotiations, though mutual distrust led to a shaky start. Carter, with the help of advisors like Brzezinski and Vance, shuttled between Begin and Sadat, keeping either side from abandoning talks.

By the summer of 1978, Carter had earned the trust of both leaders and arranged for a summit at Camp David, a presidential retreat outside of Washington, DC. The president’s intense desire for an agreement and his ability to personally connect with both Begin and Sadat proved critical. Carter led negotiations for two weeks that October, often meeting with the two leaders separately; Begin and Sadat weren’t on speaking terms. Carter’s persistence prevailed and the resulting accords were historic. Israel emerged with a framework for peace with Egypt, which would be signed six months later. In exchange, Begin withdrew Israel’s forces from the occupied Sinai Peninsula.

Egypt and Israel also signed an agreement outlining a plan for a larger regional peace deal, including a mechanism to create a self-governing authority in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. This started a process that continued during the George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations and ended with the 1993 and 1995 Oslo Accords, which established mutual recognition between Israel and the PLO and outlined a path to Palestinian self-governance in the West Bank and Gaza.

Restored U.S. Ties With China in 1979  

Carter’s normalization of relations with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) proved to be a watershed moment for U.S. foreign policy in Asia and set conditions for decades to come. The two countries had little contact until the early 1970s, when U.S. President Richard Nixon’s visit to China provided an opening for talks. Negotiations to establish formal ties had been frozen for several years when Carter took office, but he quickly approved plans to move ahead.

On January 1, 1979, the two countries officially recognized one another, exchanging ambassadors and opening embassies. The United States also officially acknowledged the PRC’s position that there is “one China” that includes Taiwan, a policy the United States maintains today. Additionally, the Carter administration agreed to sever the mutual defense treaty with Taiwan but continue to unofficially support the island. That decision drew backlash from Congress, which passed the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), one of the seminal pieces of congressional foreign policy oversight. The TRA, which Carter signed, required the United States to provide defensive arms to Taiwan and “maintain the capacity to resist” any attempts by force or coercion to harm the security of Taiwan and its people.   

The 1979 Iranian Revolution and Hostage Crisis

The long-standing strategic relationship between Washington and the regime of Iran’s shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was a test for Carter’s emphasis on human rights. Iran under the shah was a bastion against Soviet influence in the Middle East, and Carter did little to push Pahlavi on human rights. In fact, protests had begun in 1977 because of the shah’s oppressive policies, as well as a spiraling economy, and these soon led to nationwide strikes. By November 1978, it was clear to the U.S. ambassador, William Sullivan, that the shah held an increasingly loose grip on power. But Carter continued supporting the shah in public and private.

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, a leading Shiite Muslim cleric exiled by the shah nearly two decades earlier, had been instrumental in fomenting the protests, and the administration increasingly feared he was likely to take control. Desperate to keep Khomeini out of power, Carter sent North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) General Robert Huyser to Iran to assess the Iranian military’s capabilities for carrying out a coup. Huyser’s own reports and U.S. intelligence suggested that the military was ready if asked. Nearly a week into Huyser’s trip, however, in January 1979, Pahlavi went into exile, leaving Prime Minister Shapour Bakhtiar in charge. The collapse of the monarchy was swift, as the shah’s generals—who deserted and fled despite promises to Huyser—proved as feckless as the leader they served.

At first, there was hope that the post-revolutionary government led by the Khomeini-appointed moderate Mehdi Bazargan could have positive relations with the United States. But the real power was with Khomeini, who had returned to Iran in February 1979, and the revolutionaries who abhorred the “Great Satan,” as Khomeini had termed the United States.

For months, Carter had resisted calls to grant the shah refuge in the United States. But after learning that Pahlavi had lymphoma, Carter let him seek treatment in New York City in October 1979. On November 4, Iranian student protestors furious at this decision stormed the U.S. embassy in Tehran, taking fifty-two hostages. The resulting hostage crisis would span the rest of Carter’s term and for many was the defining foreign policy challenge of his presidency.

Carter’s team pursued a diplomatic resolution, but by April 1980, with talks faltering, he was ready to pursue a military rescue. While Secretary of State Vance was vacationing, Carter convened the National Security Council and authorized Operation Eagle Claw [PDF]. (Vance learned of the operation upon his return and promised to resign as soon as it was over.) The mission ended in disaster: several helicopters were grounded outside of Tehran in a sandstorm, eight special forces members were killed when their helicopter crashed, and Iran captured U.S. equipment and intelligence. Meanwhile, the chaos was televised. Many historians regard the failed rescue as the point of no return for Carter’s presidency; he would go on to lose the 1980 presidential election to Ronald Reagan.

The 1979 Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan

The invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union in December 1979 was an additional international crisis, coming right on the heels of the Iranian Revolution and hostage fiasco. Until then, the Carter administration had avoided any major proxy wars or escalations of tensions with Moscow. Carter had successfully negotiated the second Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT II), an agreement to limit strategic nuclear weapons stockpiles, with Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev just months earlier.

But one anti-Soviet government in the region—Iran—had already collapsed, and Carter, who had been blindsided by the Afghanistan invasion, responded with increasingly hawkish actions. He authorized the transfer of lethal military aid to the anti-Soviet Islamic fighters known as the mujahideen, using Pakistan’s intelligence service as an intermediary. (Washington had been providing non-military aid to the Afghan rebels since the previous April.) Carter also asked the Senate to halt its ratification of the SALT II treaty.

As a result, Carter’s “fairness not force” slogan was replaced with a new “Carter Doctrine,” an aggressive national security strategy focused on the Persian Gulf and the wider Middle East that included a 5 percent annual increase in defense spending. He also called for a boycott of the 1980 summer Olympic Games in Moscow. Carter’s support of the mujahideen was continued by the Reagan and Bush administrations, ending officially after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1992.

An Extensive Post-presidency

Jimmy Carter had perhaps the most prolific post-presidency of any former president. In 1983, he founded the Carter Center, a nongovernmental organization that aimed to tackle diplomatic and humanitarian issues. One of Carter’s priorities was the fight against neglected tropical diseases (NTDs), and the center is credited with helping to essentially eradicate human cases of Guinea worm disease. The Carter Center is now considered one of the premiere organizations dedicated to disease eradication.

Between the center’s inception and 2015, Carter led more than one hundred trips to dozens of countries across the world to monitor elections, take part in negotiations, broker peace agreements, and observe the organization’s health and humanitarian projects. Carter’s diplomatic efforts were not always well received, however. Particularly controversial was his staunch criticism of Israel, including his 2006 book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, and also followed his meetings with Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad and senior Hamas leadership.

This work represents the views and opinions solely of the author. The Council on Foreign Relations is an independent, nonpartisan membership organization, think tank, and publisher, and takes no institutional positions on matters of policy.