International Relations 101

By Robert M. Gates Published: March 31, 2004

Osama bin Laden and other terrorists are on the brink of achieving an unanticipated victory, one that could have long-term consequences for the United States. Over the decades, millions of young people from other countries have come to America to study at our colleges and universities. Many have remained here to start companies, to keep us at the forefront of scientific and technological discovery, to teach in our schools and to enrich our culture. Many others have returned home to help build market economies and to lead political reform. After 9/11, for perfectly understandable reasons, the federal government made it much tougher to get a visa to come to the United States. Sadly, the unpredictability and delays that characterize the new system -- and, too often, the indifference or hostility of those doing the processing -- have resulted over the last year or so in a growing number of the world's brightest young people deciding to remain at home or go to other countries for their college or graduate education. Thousands of legitimate international students are being denied entry into the United States or are giving up in frustration and anger. At 90 percent of American colleges and universities, applications from international students for fall 2004 are down, according to a survey by the Council of Graduate Schools that was released earlier this month. According to a recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education, applications from China have fallen by 76 percent, while those from India have dropped by 58 percent. Applications to research universities from prospective international graduate students are down by at least 25 percent overall; here at Texas A&M, international student applications have fallen by 38 percent from last year. Not surprisingly, universities in Australia, Britain, France and elsewhere are taking advantage of our barriers and are aggressively recruiting these students. According to the Chronicle, foreign student enrollment in Australia is up 16.5 percent over last year; Chinese enrollment there has risen by 20 percent. Why should we be concerned? For starters, it is a sad reality that relatively small numbers of American students pursue graduate degrees in engineering and science. As a result, the research efforts at many American universities depend on international graduate students. They do much of the laboratory work that leads to new discoveries. More troubling is the impact that declining foreign enrollments could have in the war on terrorism. To defeat terrorism, our global military, law enforcement and intelligence capacities must be complemented with positive initiatives and programs aimed at the young people in developing nations who will guide their countries in the future. No policy has proved more successful in making friends for the United States, during the cold war and since, than educating students from abroad at our colleges and universities.

I take a back seat to no one in concern about our security at home in an age of terrorism. I am now the president of Texas A&M, but I spent nearly 30 years at the Central Intelligence Agency, ultimately serving as director under President George H. W. Bush. I learned during that time that protecting our security requires more than defensive measures; we have to win the war of ideas, too. For this reason, we simply cannot tolerate a visa process that fails to differentiate quickly and accurately between legitimate scholars and students -- and individuals who may pose genuine security risks.