Combined with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the notion that U.S. military supremacy was unmatched and unchallengeable gave rise to neocon theories about turning "diplomacy" into nothing more than the delivery of U.S. ultimatums. In the Middle East, that was a view shared by Israeli hardliners, who had grown tired of negotiating with the Palestinians and other Arabs.
Instead of talk, there would be "regime change" for any government that would not fall into line. This strategy was articulated in 1996 when a group of American neocons, including Richard Perle and Douglas Feith, went to work for Benjamin Netanyahu's campaign in Israel and compiled a strategy paper, called "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm."
Iraq was first on the neocon hit list, but next came Syria and Iran. The overriding idea was that once the regimes assisting the Palestinians and Hezbollah were removed or neutralized, then Israel could dictate peace terms to the Palestinians who would have no choice but to accept what was on the table.
In 1998, the neocon Project for the New American Century, founded by neocons Robert Kagan and William Kristol, called for a U.S. invasion of Iraq, but President Bill Clinton balked at something that extreme. The situation changed, however, when President George W. Bush took office and the 9/11 attacks terrified and infuriated the American public.
Suddenly, the neocons had a Commander-in-Chief who agreed with the need to eliminate Iraq's Saddam Hussein -- and Americans were easily persuaded although Iraq and Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11. [See Consortiumnews.com's "The Mysterious Why of the Iraq War."]
The Death of "Realism"
The 2003 Iraq invasion sounded the death knell for foreign policy "realism" in Official Washington. Aging or dead, the old adult voices were silent or ignored. From Congress and the Executive Branch to the think tanks and the mainstream news media, almost all the "opinion leaders" were neocons and many liberals fell into line behind Bush's case for war.
And, even though the Iraq War "group think" was almost entirely wrong, both on the WMD justifications for war and the "cakewalk" expectations for remaking Iraq, almost no one who promoted the fiasco suffered punishment for either the illegality of the invasion or the absence of sanity in promoting such a harebrained scheme.
Instead of negative repercussions, the Iraq War backers -- the neocons and their liberal-hawk accomplices -- essentially solidified their control over U.S. foreign policy and the major news media. From The New York Times and The Washington Post to the Brookings Institution and the American Enterprise Institute, the "regime change" agenda continued to hold sway.
It didn't even matter when the sectarian warfare unleashed in Iraq left hundreds of thousands dead, displaced millions and gave rise to Al Qaeda's ruthless Iraq affiliate. Not even the 2008 election of Barack Obama, an Iraq War opponent, changed this overall dynamic.
Rather than standing up to this new foreign policy establishment, Obama bowed to it, retaining key players from President Bush's national security team, such as Defense Secretary Robert Gates and General David Petraeus, and by hiring hawkish Democrats, including Sen. Hillary Clinton, who became Secretary of State, and Samantha Power at the National Security Council.
Thus, the cult of "regime change" did not just survive the Iraq disaster; it thrived. Whenever a difficult foreign problem emerged, the go-to solution was still "regime change," accompanied by the usual demonizing of a targeted leader, support for the "democratic opposition" and calls for military intervention. President Obama, arguably a "closet realist," found himself as the foot-dragger-in-chief as he reluctantly was pulled along on one "regime change" crusade after another.
In 2011, for instance, Secretary of State Clinton and National Security Council aide Power persuaded Obama to join with some hot-for-war European leaders to achieve "regime change" in Libya, where Muammar Gaddafi had gone on the offensive against groups in eastern Libya that he identified as Islamic terrorists.
But Clinton and Power saw the case as a test for their theories of "humanitarian warfare" -- or "regime change" to remove a "bad guy" like Gaddafi from power. Obama soon signed on and, with the U.S. military providing crucial technological support, a devastating bombing campaign destroyed Gaddafi's army, drove him from Tripoli, and ultimately led to his torture-murder.
"We Came, We Saw, He Died"
Secretary Clinton scurried to secure credit for this "regime change." According to one email chain in August 2011, her longtime friend and personal adviser Sidney Blumenthal praised the bombing campaign to destroy Gaddafi's army and hailed the dictator's impending ouster.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
3
2
2
