The paths that American presidents take to craft a legacy for the history books are well known. A new president usually stumbles in the first year in office, as the new team struggles with the levers of power. Sometimes, as in the case of Bill Clinton, allies in Europe roll their eyes and wonder why Americans love to put provincial amateurs in the White House. Eventually the team learns how to drive the machine, and usually notches up enough credibility to get re-elected.
The second term is when the president may address some tougher challenges, as Mr Clinton tried – and failed – with the Middle East peace process. Sometimes presidents leave office with a bang. In his final speech in January 1961, Dwight Eisenhower warned the American public to beware of the political influence of the “military-industrial complex” and the danger that it would swallow too many resources and distort the priorities of science.
With Barack Obama, this narrative has been turned on its head. Even while campaigning for the presidency in 2008, Mr Obama made a hugely popular speech in Berlin and was applauded by some as the saviour of the world.
During his first year in office the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded him the peace prize, by way of encouragement. Instead, the medal turned into an albatross around his neck. Showered with plaudits even before he got down to work, Mr Obama was never likely to meet expectations. With half a year left in office, Mr Obama now finds himself under siege by the US foreign policy establishment. He set out to put relations with Russia and China on a new footing, but now they are just as fraught with tension as in the past. Attempts to end the US interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq have not brought peace, while Libya has become a failed state and the collapse of Syria is spreading instability throughout Europe.
His soaring rhetoric about change and hope has been reduced to the cautious maxim, “don’t do stupid stuff”. The key note of the Republican presidential challenge is that Mr Obama has been a “weakling”.
This is unfair. Mr Obama understood that western power is in decline for three reasons: after the 2008 financial crisis the US cannot afford to be the world’s policeman; power and wealth are moving away from the Euro-Atlantic community to Asia, with China determined to flex its muscles; and Americans have no stomach for military engagements abroad, however much they respond to Donald Trump’s slogan of “make American great again”.
The world is now reconciled to the fact that Mr Obama is not going to undertake any major initiative in Syria, or send troops in large numbers to Libya. Diplomats dealing with the Syria crisis understand that have to wait out the election.
The world should perhaps be grateful that Mr Obama is too honest a man to launch a quick war to salvage his reputation, as Ronald Reagan did after 241 US servicemen were killed in a bomb attack in Beirut in 1983. He invaded the tiny Caribbean island state of Grenada (population 91,000), to wide acclaim at home.
Instead Mr Obama is devoting his last months in office to a quixotic attempt to convert the world to understanding the principle that guides him: Washington’s default position, that all foreign problems can be solved by US military might, has to change.
Norma Percy, producer of the BBC’s four-part documentary series Inside Obama’s White House, revealed this week that her attempts to secure an interview with the president all failed until January when the communications team was joined by someone whose job was to think about the Obama legacy.
At the last minute, when the series had already started airing, Mr Obama agreed to the interview in time for it to be included in the third part, entitled “Don’t Screw It Up” – Mr Obama’s advice to his envoys about to open secret talks with Iran.
The effect of this early attempt to smooth the legacy can be seen in the media – a series of interviews with The Atlantic magazine in which Mr Obama called his European allies “free riders” and a New York Times portrait of Ben Rhodes, deputy national security adviser, who dismisses the Washington foreign policy establishment as the “blob”.
The common theme is that Mr Obama is proud of what the “blob” sees as his original sin: his decision in 2013 not to bomb Syria for using chemical weapons, an act which he had previously declared a “red line”. For the president, this was when he faced down those clamouring for military action.
Already it seems his media offensive is losing traction. Philip Gordon, Mr Obama’s former Middle East adviser, told the BBC on Tuesday that his decision had repercussions on US credibility which went beyond the Syria crisis.
“If other countries get the impression that you are not prepared to do something even when you have said you will, inevitably it raises questions. We see this everywhere, from the Middle East to Asia and Eastern Europe.”
His comments follow a rare expression of dissent by 51 US Foreign Service officers who signed an internal critique of Mr Obama’s Syria policy, saying a peace settlement was impossible without a more muscular US military component. The administration says all options have been considered, and rejected.
Clearly there are limits to how much a president can mould his own legacy. But this is not just a question of Mr Obama’s place in history. The real issue is the fate of what he sees as his major achievement – the nuclear deal with Iran.
If his foreign policy as a whole goes down as a failure, it will be hard for his successor to defend the Iran deal against its many enemies in Washington and abroad.
And that would mean returning anew to the big question which Mr Obama has tried to address in his professorial way: the limits of US power in the 21st century.
Alan Philps is a commentator on global affairs
On Twitter @aphilps