In recent speeches, presidential candidates Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have laid out distinct visions for a new U.S. foreign policy.
Both Sanders and Warren argue, in different ways, that the spread of populist authoritarians around the world can be traced to an entrenched global economic order that betrays the interests of ordinary people everywhere. The best way to undermine authoritarianism abroad, they say, is to build a more equitable economy at home.
Another foreign policy vision for Democrats comes from Robert Kagan, who might be described as the most liberal of the neoconservatives. He served as an adviser to Hillary Clinton and so did his wife Victoria Nuland, a former senior State Department official. So his influence in the contemporary Democratic party should not be overlooked.
In a mammoth essay in the Washington Post, Kagan argues that only an assertive United States can challenge the rise of authoritarian governments around the world.
Kagan, unfortunately, doesn’t address the arguments of Sanders and Warren, which leaves the party’s policy choices on foreign policy muddled.
What does Kagan stand for?
“Dangerous’
In a celebrated 2003 book “Paradise and Power,” Kagan wrote a historically-informed, critically-lauded strategic analyses that proved spectacularly wrong. Kagan’s book, published on the eve of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, was understood as a justification for pre-emptive war in the name of democracy. U.S. military intervention, he argued, could expand the orbit of democratic nations and make the Middle East safer.
Let’s just say, it didn’t quite work out that way. Even if we leave morality out of judgments (and Kagan insists that we should not), his policies were a mostly a failure. Iraq has a more democratic political system but the Middle East as a whole is much less secure.
The insular (and dangerous) nature of the Washington policymaking community was illustrated by Kagan’s next book, “Dangerous Nation,” Published in 2006, Kagan stepped back from the cataclysm of Iraq to present and a genial view of the United States has historically dangerous nation because of its ideals of democracy and personal freedoms were a threat to tyrants.
The reality that Iraq had been shattered by U.S. invasion, overwhelmed by the anarchy that followed, and then divided by sectarian civil war seemed to not affect his learned exegesis of American goodness. A million Iraqi civilians were killed in the war he promoted. A million Christians were driven into exile by a war launched by an American president who described himself as Christian. And Kagan could still believe that “dangerous” was a positive adjective for American behavior.
Such is the forgiving nature of Washington policymaking culture that Kagan has returned. His Post essay covered several entire pages of the Sunday news section, an unprecedented allocation of space for an opinion piece.
‘Little Interest’
Kagan (and by extension the Post) singles out progressive Democrats for criticism.
And, just as they opposed responding to the Soviet communist challenge — whether through arms buildups, the strategy of containment or by waging an ideological conflict on behalf of liberal democracy — modern progressives show little interest in taking on the challenge posed by the authoritarian great powers and the world’s other anti-liberal forces if doing so would entail the exercise of U.S. power and influence. The progressive left is more concerned about alleged U.S. “imperialism” than about resisting authoritarianism.
Little interest? Both Sanders and Warren talked in detail about the rise of authoritarianism as a central challenge for the next president.
In her speech, “An American Foreign Policy that Works for All” Warren opened with these words:
Let’s start with a serious problem: Around the world, democracy is under assault. Authoritarian governments are gaining power. Right-wing demagogues are gaining strength. Movements toward openness and pluralism have stalled and begun to reverse. Inequality is rapidly growing, transforming rule by-the-people into rule by-wealthy-elites. And here at home, many American politicians seem to accept – even embrace – the politics of division and resentment.
Here’s Sen. Sanders on “Building a Global Democratic Movement to Counter Authoritarianism.”
There is currently a struggle of enormous consequence taking place in the United States and throughout the world. In it we see two competing visions. On one hand, we see a growing worldwide movement toward authoritarianism, oligarchy, and kleptocracy. On the other side, we see a movement toward strengthening democracy, egalitarianism, and economic, social, racial, and environmental justice.
One question is: had Kagan even bothered to read the speeches of the two leading Democrats?
State of the Debate
Matt Duss, Sander’s foreign policy adviser, responded to Kagan with a trenchant point:
It is just plain wrong for Kagan to claim that Democrats show “little interest in taking on the challenge posed by the authoritarian great powers.” It would be more accurate to say Kagan shows little interest in understanding progressive policy views.
That’s the state of the foreign policy debate in the Democratic party so far: the Clintonian establishment is not yet listening to the left progressives. Stay tuned because this debate is going to get rougher.
