Yesterday I saw the neoconservative Robert Kagan on Charlie Rose. It was an astonishing performance, as it suggested the psychic torment that those who pushed the Iraq war are evidently now undergoing and suppressing at the same time.
Kagan’s message re Iraq was, Look Charlie, it’s nothing new for the U.S. to get a bad image in the eyes of the world. Guess what, these things are inevitable when you are powerful. Yes Abu Ghraib and the mishandling of the occupation have made us look bad, but we’ve been there before.
His specific claims: from 1968 to 1974, the U.S. was also hated worldwide, from Vietnam to Kent State to Watergate. We were "far from perfect" then also. The latest cycle of hatred of the U.S. actually began in ’98 and ’99, when Samuel Huntington wrote that we have become the "lonely superpower" and a French minister called us a "hyperpower." I.e., Iraq came along much later and was merely another pretext for disliking the big guy on the block. And let us be clear: by Iraq War, Kagan seems to mean only Abu Ghraib and the "mishandling"
of the occupation. The invasion itself was a brilliant idea. Bush and Rumsfeld screwed it up. (Personal message to Donald Rumsfeld: I hear you have chosen to give away all the money for your book. You have my great admiration for that decision. I hope you tell us all about the geniuses you listened to in the runup to the war).
I found Kagan’s performance astonishing because he was doing his offhanded utmost to market arrogance as a humane trait (hundreds of thousands dead through the abuse of power), and of course to avoid getting tagged for the error he made. But it is Out damn spot time. It seems apparent that like McNamara and Bundy and the other Vietnam thinkers, Iraq is now and forever The only thing the neocons have ever done; and they will be twisting and turning over that mistake for the rest of their lives. Though it is a marvel they still get a platform to do so. Kagan’s intellectual airshow is the exact opposite of the performance by the brave young men who served in Iraq and went to Congress to tell about the nightmares they have experienced.
I believe I heard Kagan call himself a "progressive" too, trying to evade the neocon label. Charlie Rose is a smart guy, he should have confronted Kagan over Iraq. As it is, the commenters on Charlie Rose are raising the usual questions about Kagan’s Israel-views.
