The results of the Iowa caucuses represent the second electoral repudiation of the failed national security policies of the Bush administration and its conservative allies in Congress -- the first came in the 2006 mid-term elections, and similar results are likely in the coming weeks.
Although many factors explain the Iowa caucus results -- extraordinary turnout boosting Barack Obama, Mike Huckabee's strength among the conservative Christian base -- the two victors also have issued some of the strongest criticisms of the Bush administration's foreign policy. Obama, like most Democrats, has strongly distanced himself from the path carved out by Bush on foreign policy, especially on Iraq and Iran, with his overarching message of change that distinguished him from the other front-runners. Last month, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice assailed Huckabee's assessment that the Bush administration had a go-it-alone foreign policy as "ludicrous."
Though it is still early in the race, the pendulum may be swinging, and the 2008 election may end up being a strong repudiation of the Bush foreign-policy agenda. The outcome will depend on whether progressives continue to present a real choice and true contrast on national security.
The 2008 election is shaping up to be a hybrid of 1992 ("It's the economy, stupid") and 2004 -- candidates will have to demonstrate their competence on both the economic and national security fronts. Skyrocketing gas prices, mortgage foreclosures, and growing gaps between the haves and have-nots will require candidates for president and Congress this year to offer credible ideas for making Americans economically secure. On economics, progressives have the advantage, with strong majority support in most polls. But progressives also need to play to win on national security, not just debate the issues in order to meet conservatives halfway. More than electoral victories are at stake -- it's about Americans' safety.
Of course, there are sound political reasons why progressives should steer clear of the calls for bipartisanship from several quarters of the foreign-policy elite. Conservatives have stumbled so badly during the past seven years that their decades-long advantage on defense and national security has eroded. In the eyes of American voters, Democrats have moved to parity with Republicans on these issues.
In addition, there is a substantive policy reason for progressives to offer a clear contrast: Americans are less secure at the start of 2008 because of a failure of conservative ideology. Growing instability around the world is not simply a result of mismanagement or poor implementation. How conservatives view the world and the role of government is at the core of America's inability to tackle global terrorism in the nearly seven years since 9-11. The conservative push for ever smaller government at home and an obsession with tax cuts has not only weakened America economically, it has also created a budgetary house of cards that could collapse and create strains on America's ability to project its power and influence in the world in the years to come.
At some point in 2008, the out-of-pocket costs for the strategy that President George W. Bush mapped out in response to the September 11 attacks will reach $1 trillion. That number does not include hidden costs such as the untold hundreds of millions of dollars in long-term health-care needs for our troops, nor does it include the billions that will be needed to restore military equipment worn down mostly by the war in Iraq, which has consumed about three-quarters of that money spent by Washington. That's a trillion dollars spent to fund a national security policy that has not made Americans safer. On Bush's watch, lawless zones of instability have grown. In recent years, U.S. intelligence agencies have reported that the threat posed by global terrorist groups morphed, mutated, and filled the spaces left in ungoverned corners of the world.
This is due, in part, to some dangerous threats in the world -- but it is also due to the conservative response to these threats. The hot spots where terrorist organizations thrive around the world -- Gaza, Somalia, Iraq, and Afghanistan -- are places exhibiting many of the same characteristics that conservatives advocate for America: small government (or no government at all), everyone having a gun, and extremist religion dominating the politics. Conservative ideology, and not just failures of policy implementation, contributes to problems in the key trouble areas-- areas like Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
This week, Bush is visiting the Middle East on a trip aimed at picking up the pieces of his broken policy toward that troubled region of the world. He is trying to make up for past mistakes, all emanating from misjudgments by conservatives about how this vital region of the world works. In 2003, Bush and his supporters argued that the road to peace in the Middle East ran through Baghdad and that the Iraq War would stabilize the region. By getting rid of Saddam Hussein, the United States would set into motion a democratic wave that would topple dictators and autocrats who supported and harbored terrorists. Five years later, it is clear -- even to the president himself now -- that this strategy has backfired.
Iraq is experiencing a lull in conflict, perhaps temporary, in the aftermath of a brutal year of sectarian cleansing and record population displacements that pushed millions of Iraqis out of their homes. Though about 1 percent to 2 percent of these Iraqis have returned to their homes and the violence has subsided, the fundamental objective of the 2007 U.S. troop surge -- to advance Iraq's political transition and strike a sustainable power-sharing deal among Iraq's leaders -- remains elusive. The recent efforts to support competing security forces in Iraq could amount to little more than arming up different sides of Iraq's internal conflicts and producing an even deadlier environment in the years to come.
Bush will spend his remaining year in office continuing his efforts to make up for lost time in the Middle East, and probably the best Americans can hope for is reinvigorating the regional framework and international support so that America's next president can help the region take real steps forward in resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict.
It is also up to Bush (and his successor) to pull Afghanistan and Pakistan back from the brink of disaster. Recent turmoil in Pakistan and the escalating violence throughout 2007 in Afghanistan has put this area -- the global headquarters of al-Qaeda's leadership -- back in the headlines. In Afghanistan, a resurgent Taliban, working with support from global terrorist networks like al-Qaeda, escalated its violent attacks against Afghanistan's fledgling government and international troops. The safe havens provided across Afghanistan's eastern border in Pakistan contributed to greater instability in the region.
Events over the past three months in Pakistan, culminating with former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto's tragic murder last month, threaten to sink the country into deeper turmoil, something that America and the rest of the world cannot afford. Today Pakistan represents the perfect storm of national security threats -- international terrorism, nuclear weapons, violent politics, religious extremism, and widespread poverty. This situation did not emerge overnight; it is the legacy of decades of short-term, reactive, and make-it-up-as-we-go-along policy toward Pakistan. Under Bush, conventional wisdom in Washington has offered unquestioned and unconditional support to Pakistan's leaders, resulting in $11 billion in assistance that has not helped move the country any closer to stability or away from extremism and autocracy.
As in the Middle East, Bush is likely to muddle through on the Afghanistan-Pakistan front, managing emerging crises but not fundamentally improving the situation. Bush has already become a lame-duck president, so it is unlikely that his administration will achieve major gains. In addition, the conservative prescriptions on Afghanistan and Pakistan have proven to be ineffective. A conservative line of argument that centers on conventional military action ignores two key fundamental factors. First, non-state terrorist groups use asymmetrical warfare and media campaigns as a primary means to advance their agendas. Second, some of the most important assets in the struggle against terrorist organizations are the intelligence operatives, police officers, judges, and lawyers who help build a strong civil and social fabric to defend against terrorist groups.
Based on their record from the past seven years, it is clear that conservatives are stuck in a 20th-century mindset and are incapable of updating their rhetoric and strategies to reflect 21st-century challenges. With the primaries underway, the country is beginning to think about the day after Bush. In recent months, some progressives have argued that the main thing for progressives to do is to reach across the aisle and push for a bipartisan approach on Iraq and other key national security questions. One must wonder: Did these foreign-policy experts experience the same train wreck that we witnessed during the last six years? Have these experts really listened to how leading conservatives on Capitol Hill and candidates for president are talking about Iraq and national security?
If not, let's do a quick review. In 2001, Bush ignored intelligence warnings, did nothing, and America suffered the deadliest attack on its own soil in history. This president started to track down the perpetrators by going into Afghanistan, but then took a wrong turn into an unnecessary war in Iraq. Bush used the drumbeats for the Iraq War to bludgeon his political opponents in 2002 and 2004, securing a slim majority with an effective, but short-lived, public relations campaign.
The bottom began to fall out in 2005 when the reality started to sink in that we are much less safe. Americans began to witness the consequences of being trapped refereeing Iraq's civil wars: a decline in U.S. military readiness and Osama bin Laden still on the loose. In 2006, progressives created an amazing turnaround in the mid-term elections in large part by offering a clear alternative on Iraq in support of a strategic redeployment. Progressives should learn from the failures of 2002 and 2004 and from the successes of 2006.
Good policy and good politics are finally aligning for progressives -- and the best advice is to meet in the middle? No, thank you. Even in their weakened state, some conservatives like John McCain and Rudy Giuliani are on the rhetorical attack and aligned strongly behind the least popular president since Nixon. With the wind in our sails, progressives need to continue to redefine national security policy and politics. What's to be done?
First, progressives need to continue to provide a clear alternative on the key issues like Iraq and the fight against global terrorist groups. Saying "me too" and just simply stating that we're "tough and smart" didn't work before, and it won't work in the coming year.
Second, progressives need to beware of muddled arguments to blindly move to the "center" without evaluating the reality (which is exactly what progressives did in 2002 when they mistakenly supported bad arguments for invading Iraq). In addition, the center has shifted on national security, and Americans want a clear alternative that puts more emphasis on other components of American power like diplomacy and economic might.
Finally, progressives should also avoid tactical arguments like the ones presented in 2004, such as plans on how America will train Iraq's troops effectively. Americans want to hear more from their leaders about how they are going to revive American power and moral authority after eight years of Bush and his allies in Congress making the wrong choices.
This means making tough strategic choices to shift resources and attention away from Iraq and back to completing the mission left unaccomplished in Afghanistan. The vast majority of the $1 trillion spent in Bush's global war on terrorism has gone to Iraq, and it is time for a strategic reset of America's entire approach that redeploys U.S. troops from Iraq and dedicates more resources to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Conservatives have opposed making this shift; progressives need to continue pushing for reallocating resources from Iraq in order to make Americans safer.
Looking for bipartisan consensus is always a fine thing to do -- and necessary after the elections, but progressives should not let their national security deficit disorder drive them instinctively to a split-the-difference approach when it is not in the country's interests before the election is won. Americans want a real debate on national security, and recent events in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan demonstrate that it's a debate that America sorely needs to have.
