The Loneliness of the Liberal Hawk
DONNELLY, TOM
The Loneliness of the Liberal Hawk Some good Democratic foreign policy ideas, but no politician to champion them. by TOM DONNELLY It's tough to be a moderate Democrat. Hatred of George Bush has...
...And there are two very fine essays on military matters...
...Where Pollack imagines, in keeping with the elite conventional wisdom of both parties, that China can easily be made a partner for progress in the region, Mazurek sees that the People's Republic, by its own choices, is creating the conditions for an even greater challenge...
...If there's a big gap between these centrist politicians and the Nancy Pelosi wing in Congress or the MoveOn.org wing at large, there's also a gap between the moderate politicians and those wonks-in-waiting who would likely build the policy factory in a future Democratic administration...
...At bottom, both men seem to see competence—in a kind of "good government" sense—as the true measure of a wartime president...
...Beijing is striking up cordial relationships with a motley array of tyrants and rogue states with which the united States is at odds," he writes...
...Hatred of George Bush has changed the loyal opposition into the bitter opposition, less interested in policy than in punishing their bête noire...
...Tom Donnelly is a resident fellow at AEI and editor of Armed Forces Journal...
...But the Warners and the Bayhs—to say nothing of the rest of the likely candidates—sure aren't there yet...
...Joseph Lieberman, the very model of a modern "defense Democrat"—not to mention the party's 2000 vice presidential nomi-nee—now faces overwhelming votes of "no confidence" from Connecticut Democratic town councils...
...Bayh had given serious thought to these concepts, but, like Warner, he did not convey a sense of urgency about winning...
...our national security departments must work together to win this war, not simply compete against each other," he said...
...It's not picking nits to emphasize the verb "to manage...
...Kenneth Pollack of the Brookings Institution, whose prewar The Threatening Storm made a forceful case for invading Iraq, still sounds like a closet neocon...
...They also have a deep commitment to victory that "leads to anger at what is widely seen as 'defeatism' among those who declare that the Iraq war is 'unwinnable.' . . . What service members want most is to see America succeed in Iraq...
...Warner approached the challenges as though he were still governor...
...She understands that people in uniform "see the defense of our country as a calling, and one of the greatest forms of service...
...GDP than it did during the cold war, on average—will probably need to grow in the short term...
...PPI's own Jan Mazurek is even tougher on Middle East strategy than Pollack...
...The conundrum is acute for the rising generation of moderate Democrats who may run for president, if the performances last week by former Virginia governor Mark Warner and Sen...
...Bayh sounded like nothing so much as a senator...
...Number one," he said, "we can't define America's security only by the strength of our arms...
...PPI's book With All Our Might actually represents an impressive lineup of younger defense and security intellectuals, many of whom worked in the Clinton administration...
...And they're more hawkish, in general, than Warner or Bayh...
...His remarks were laced with cutting-edge rhetoric: "This is . . . our first post-nationstate war...
...It must also be defined by the strength of our economy, the strength of our finances, our energy independence...
...It's the core idea for moderate Democrats, but a very different idea than "to lead," which is what matters in war...
...Bayh put it most revealingly: "There's no greater test of a commander in chief than how [he] manages a war...
...We're at our strongest when our institutions of government are run with competence and coordination...
...All true enough—it's hard to defend the Bush administration or the Rumsfeld Pentagon for competence and coordination—but Warner appeared unwilling to accept that winning the war demands, first and foremost, the use of military force...
...James Blaker and Steven Nider call for an expanded Army and commit the ultimate Democratic apostasy: "The military budget—which currently consumes a much smaller percentage of U.S...
...Withdrawal is not an option: "We cannot simply walk away from Iraq without repercussions...
...In fact, competition between China and the united States for oil and influence in oil-rich countries could become the 21st-century equivalent of the arms race between the united States and the Soviet Union in the cold war...
...It's particularly tough for Democrats who supported the invasion of Iraq, the defining George Bush moment, and who oppose withdrawal...
...Perhaps most surprising is Melissa Tryon's remarkably sensitive examination of current military culture, an essay that should be required reading for all post-Vietnam politicians...
...His essay on "A Grand Strategy for the Middle East" argues that "whether you supported the war or not, it is all about Iraq now...
...It's ironic that the current president, a Republican, is a visionary liberal, while those who seem to be his natural lieutenants are Democrats without the prospect of a commander in chief who shares their commitment...
...While offering a comprehensive critique of Bush administration failures in Iraq, he emphasizes the military and strategic shortcomings...
...Speaking in support of PPI's new collection of essays, With All Our Might—a valiant attempt to define "a progressive strategy for defeating jihadism and defending liberty"—both Warner and Bayh clung safely to the antiBush orthodoxy...
...Neither rose to the occasion as laid out by PPI president Will Marshall: "It's really time to stop reacting to the administration and start defining what we're for on national security, to look beyond the fumbles in Iraq...
...We can't put the whole burden of fighting Islamic terrorism on our armed services," he said, a moment before parroting the very line of the Rumsfeld Pentagon: "As many of our generals themselves have said, Islamic terrorism cannot be defeated by military power alone...
...In that sense, Iraq is decidedly not Vietnam...
...Evan Bayh at an event sponsored by the Progressive Policy Institute are any indication...
...The second thing that characterizes this new phenomenon is . . . the asymmetry of the conflict...
...Pollack sees clearly that the first order of business is to establish security, which means fighting...
...The ever-optimistic Will Marshall thinks the Democratic leadership, the "presidential party," will come around...
...Maybe...
Vol. 11 • May 2006 • No. 34
