Military Force and Foreign Policy - The Rise of the Vulcans Paper
by Jason Vines
How did the members of President George W. Bush?s foreign policy team rise to
power? What events shaped their policy viewpoints and political
worldviews? James Mann, in The Rise of the Vulcans:
The History of Bush?s War Cabinet, seeks to answer
those questions. He describes the careers of the six top ?Vulcans??officials who worked in the foreign policy
apparatuses of past Republican presidents and returned under the latest Bush:
Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, Richard Armitage, Paul Wolfowitz, Dick
Cheney, and Condoleezza Rice. Mann uses the experiences of these six Vulcans as microcosms for the entire generation of
neoconservatives whom the Cold War shaped and who exerted influence before and
after the fall of the Soviet Union.
What set the Vulcans apart from previous generations
of foreign policy gurus, such as the ?Wise Men? who devised containment and the
?Best and Brightest? who stumbled through the 1960?s, was their emphasis on
American military power. That the generations of foreign policy officials
should differ in this regard makes sense, considering their respective
backgrounds. The Wise Men were businessmen, bankers, and lawyers;
naturally, to prosecute foreign policy, they would rely on economics and
institutions, the tools of business and legal professionals. Later, the
Best and Brightest, who hailed from Ivy League academia, would, through a
combination of elitist disrespect for the military and lack of real-world
experience, bollocks up the Bay of Pigs invasion and the defense of South Vietnam. Finally, in the latter stages of the Cold War, the Vulcans
experienced foreign policy through the prism of the Defense Department. At one time or another, Rumsfeld and Cheney served as
defense secretaries; Wolfowitz was an undersecretary
of defense; Rice worked for the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Powell chaired the JCS;
and Armitage worked as an assistant defense
secretary. Also, Powell and Armitage had even
served as military officers. Of course, Powell still was one, as the JCS
Chairman. That the Vulcans would perceive
military power as what ought to be the primary tool of American foreign policy
should be little surprise, then. The military was what these people knew.
As advocates of solving America?s
problems through military might, some of the people who would later become
identified with neoconservatism, early in their
careers, opposed d?tente with the Soviet Union. They did not share foreign policy virtuoso Henry Kissinger?s belief American
power was on the wane, so the United States
should seek accommodation with the Soviet Union. Firstly, the budding neoconservatives did not trust the Soviet
Union to honor the terms and spirit of d?tente. Secondly,
the future Vulcans did not believe American power was
ebbing. They thought the United
States was the most powerful country in the
world, and as such, need not reach accommodations with anyone else. To
counter the Soviets, the Vulcans advocated
buttressing America?s
dominant international position with a military buildup, restoring and
surpassing the might and prestige the American military had before Vietnam.
For this goal, the Vulcans struggled against
Kissinger in the administrations of President Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R.
Ford, slowly eroding Kissinger?s influence as the years passed. The
election of Democratic President Jimmy Carter placed this battle between
Republican moderates and hawks into stasis, but the subsequent Republican
administration of President Ronald Reagan saw victory for the anti-d?tente
forces. Kissinger and his policies of accommodation were out. The
future Vulcans, including neoconservatives who had
been Democrats but defected to the Republicans because they considered Carter
weak on Communism, were in.
The 1980?s saw the neoconservative ideas put into practice: Reagan
massively increased the American military budget. At first, the Reagan
administration displayed no interest in reaching deals with the Soviets. Indeed, Reagan dismissed the USSR
as an ?Evil Empire.? Reagan might have seemed to betray the
neoconservatives when he negotiated with Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev, but
Reagan did not soften his rhetoric about the Soviet Union. In addition, Reagan did not proceed from an assumption the United States
was weakening and so needed to reach an accord with the Soviets. Instead,
Reagan dealt with Gorbachev from a position of strength, given to him by a
preeminent American military. One could say Reagan followed neoconservatism to a natural end by seeking a just peace
with the Soviet Union on American terms, an endeavor partially enabled by America?s
colossal military strength.
After the Cold War, the United
States found itself the one superpower in
the world. The Vulcans wanted to ensure the
permanency of America?s
supreme worldwide influence. They believed the United States should not downsize
its military, in order to cash in on a post-Cold War ?peace dividend,? but enhance
its military strength and expand its military capabilities so much, no other group
of nations could hope to match the American military. Any such
enterprise would not be affordable or feasible for foreign nations or
alliances. With its unchallengeable military domination, the United States
would always be able to ensure its ideas held sway in the international
realm. And it would not have to cooperate or compromise with
anyone. The United
States could unilaterally prosecute its
foreign policy objectives. This neoconservative strategy for Pax America
evoked condemnation from the American left when it became public, but the
Democratic administration of President William J. Clinton did not substantially
deviate from the course the neoconservatives had set for the post-Cold War
United States.
With the current Republican administration of President George W. Bush, the Vulcans are back in power (excepting Powell and Armitage, who left office after Bush?s first term). In the War on Terror, the neoconservatives have profoundly impacted American
foreign policy, using the war as a test bed for their Pax
Americana stratagem of using the military to solve the nation?s foreign policy
difficulties, without recognizing constraints other international actors have
sought to place on us. The United States has refused to
negotiate with governments it views as enemies in the War on Terror. Americans have just issued demands, such as surrender Osama bin Laden or
cooperate with United Nations weapons inspectors, after which the American
military attacked countries that did not comply. In the process, the United States
has eschewed the military aid of its allies, such as NATO. The United States went so far as to shrug off
international opposition to the war in Iraq.
I believe The Rise of the Vulcans superbly
explains how the Vulcans wedded themselves to neoconservatism. Readers get to know much about the Vulcans whom James Mann describes, as well as the
neoconservative philosophy of foreign policy. This allows readers to
understand better why the Bush foreign policy advisers behave as they do. Thankfully, Mann?s swift and cogent prose makes achieving this understanding
easy and fun. If Mann were a historian or political scientist, excess verbiage
and ponderous explanation likely would have made reading The Rise of the Vulcans a chore. But Mann?s writing benefits from
his experience as a journalist, I think, which would have taught Mann to craft
his writing for maximum readability.
The neoconservative ideology Mann describes scares me, to be honest. While I agree with the neoconservative strategy against the determined foe that
was the Soviet Union, I oppose their vision
for a post-Cold War Pax Americana, a.k.a. an American
Empire. To any who would object to that characterization, I ask, how else
could one label a country that uses its military to achieve foreign policy
results, while concurrently aiming for supremacy over the international system
and striving to ignore the preferences of other countries? That is not
the United States
of which the Founding Fathers conceived in 1776 and 1789.
Do not misunderstand me: Even today, I support a powerful military. I am
not a dove; I even thought the idea, at least, of invading Iraq and
toppling the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein was appropriate. But I must
oppose as ?imperial? efforts to use the military to impose Pax
Americana on the world and to act without consideration of our allies or
the international institutions we helped forge after World War II.
Bibliography
Mann, James. The Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush?s War
Cabinet. New York:
Penguin Books, 2004.
