Joe Biden is taking heat for saying that running mate Barack Obama will face a manufactured foreign policy crisis designed to test his leadership if he is elected. Republicans say this is precisely why a seasoned John McCain will make a better president. Democrats say the new president, no matter who it is, will have early challenges to deal with.

While Republicans seized on Biden’s remark to raise doubts about Obama, they ignored Biden’s own conclusion about Obama’s response to such a foreign test: “They’re going to find out this guy’s got steel in his spine.”

History shows presidents of both political parties have had to cope with unexpected overseas crises within a year of taking office. Few of those events could be considered the intentional work of foreign meddlers, as Biden seemed to predict Sunday, but foreign leaders, rebel groups and others have taken advantage of crisis or misfortune to gauge the resolve of new American administrations.

BIDEN: “Mark my words, it will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking. We’re about to elect a brilliant 47-year-old senator president of the United States of America ... Watch. We’re going to have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy.”

McCAIN: “Sen. Biden guaranteed that if Sen. Obama is elected, we will have an international crisis to test America’s new president. We don’t want a president who invites testing from the world at a time when the economy is in crisis.”

OBAMA: “A period of transition in a new administration is always one where we have to be vigilant, we have to be careful. We have to be mindful that as we pass the baton in this democracy that others don’t take advantage of it, that’s true whether it’s myself or Sen. McCain.”

THE FACTS:

Current Bush administration: Well before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the Bush administration confronted its first serious foreign policy challenge and the event sent relations with a nuclear-armed rival into a nosedive. On April 1, 2001, an American spy plane collided with a Chinese fighter over the South China Sea and made an emergency landing on China’s Hainan island where it and its 24 crew were detained. The ensuing standoff marked a low in U.S.-China ties and the young administration struggled for more than a week to get the crew freed as tensions soared and the Chinese government demanded an apology. The crew was finally released after 11 days when the U.S. sent a letter expressing regret for the incident that claimed the life of the Chinese pilot. China kept the damaged plane another three months.

Clinton administration: The first President Bush sent U.S. troops to Somalia in the waning days of his administration, a situation inherited by President Bill Clinton when he arrived at the White House in January 1993. Conditions deteriorated as warlords interrupted the troops’ humanitarian work. Nine months later, Clinton was faced with the “Battle for Mogadishu,” which precipitated the withdrawal of American forces from Somalia. The events of Oct. 3 and 4, 1993, during which 18 American soldiers died and 73 were wounded, became the basis for the book and film “Black Hawk Down.” Clinton’s decision to withdraw the troops as a result has been cited by conservative critics as boosting Islamic extremists like Osama bin Laden, whose al-Qaida network claims to have had ties with the Somali fighters.

President George H.W. Bush administration: The first President Bush faced his first foreign policy crisis as commander in chief shortly after taking office: the refusal of Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega to step down after elections in May, 1989. Bush’s repeated calls for Noriega to respect the will of the people were ignored and the situation deteriorated. In October, Bush’s reluctance to take bold action against Noriega led to charges he was a “wimp.” Finally in December of that year, after the killing of an American soldier, Bush ordered U.S. troops to oust Noriega. The “wimp factor,” as it was dubbed, is believed to have stung Bush badly and may have contributed to his quick decision to build up forces for what became the Gulf War after Saddam Hussein’s Iraq invaded Kuwait a year later.

Reagan administration: President Ronald Reagan took office in 1981 intent on not allowing the Soviet Union to expand its influence in the western hemisphere. As he began his first term, Marxist rebels stepped up attacks in El Salvador with Soviet, Cuban and Nicaraguan backing. This prompted the new administration to begin sending billions of dollars to prop up the country’s right-wing government despite allegations of atrocities and human rights abuses by Salvadorian troops. Reagan’s Latin America policies, including his support for the anti-Sandinista “contras” in Nicaragua were directly affected by his decisions in El Salvador, which was embroiled in civil war for much of the 1980s.