Sidetracking Debate on U.S. Security

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/14/us/14iht-letter14.html

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WASHINGTON — The nomination of former Senator Chuck Hagel to be the U.S. defense secretary could generate an important debate over national security. That will only happen if critics skip sideshows like accusations that he is anti-Semitic or pro-terrorist and avoid cherry-picking his votes.

The real debate is whether to return to the early foreign policy of President George W. Bush — a unilateral, aggressive interventionism requiring a robust military — or adopt a more selective approach in which the United States is the dominant force in the world but depends on alliances and sets priorities. “This battle has not as much to do with Chuck Hagel or any comments he made on Israel,” says Joseph Nye, a former top Defense Department official who teaches at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. “This is about relitigating major changes in foreign policy.”

Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican who has supported most Obama administration cabinet nominees, should have credibility when he assails the choice of his former Senate colleague. “Chuck Hagel is out of the mainstream,” Mr. Graham says, “on most issues regarding foreign policy.”

Nonetheless, Mr. Graham and other critics, in particular the so-called neoconservatives who dominated Mr. Bush’s first term, obfuscate the central issues with dubious charges.

Mr. Hagel is accused of being anti-Israel. “He would be the most antagonistic secretary of defense toward Israel in our nation’s history,” Mr. Graham charges.

More antagonistic than the third defense secretary, George Catlett Marshall, who told his commander in chief, President Harry Truman, that he would vote against his re-election if the United States recognized the state of Israel?

Mr. Hagel once carelessly referred to the “Jewish lobby” to describe the powerful pro-Israel lobby in Washington. That prompts neocons like Elliott Abrams, who served in foreign policy positions for President Ronald Reagan and for Mr. Bush, to call Mr. Hagel anti-Semitic.

In two Senate terms, Mr. Hagel voted for every measure containing aid to Israel. He is a critic of some of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies; so is President Barack Obama.

The Nebraska lawmaker’s conversion to opponent of the Iraq war rankles neocons, especially his criticism of the troop surge in 2007. “I’ll have a hard time supporting anybody to be secretary of defense who believes the surge was a foreign policy blunder,” Mr. Graham says.

Yet Mr. Graham says he supports the nomination of Senator John Kerry to be secretary of state. The Massachusetts Democrat opposed the surge, as did Republican senators like Susan Collins of Maine and Norman Coleman of Minnesota, as well as Democrats like Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Mr. Obama, as a senator from Illinois.

As secretary, Mr. Hagel, a 66-year-old decorated Vietnam combat veteran, would face huge decisions on budget and spending priorities; he would have to enlist deputies better versed in Pentagonese.

That concerns Mr. Graham and other neocons who see the United States as under siege and as the only guarantor of freedom in a world beset by a plethora of threats: Iran and North Korea developing nuclear weapons; terrorism; Afghanistan hanging in the balance; the unraveling of the Arab spring and the rise of China.

In contrast to Mr. Hagel — or the president — they express few reservations about intervening in places like Syria or carrying out a military strike against Iran’s nuclear capacity. In the Middle East, they are unswervingly pro-Israel.

These policies require an ability to simultaneously take action in multiple trouble spots, which means a beefed-up Pentagon budget and more forces and weapons.

Mr. Hagel and Mr. Obama aren’t completely in sync; the president seems to take a harder line on dealing with Iran, though he also believes sanctions and pressure might succeed. On Israel, both are generally supportive, with reservations about the current Israeli government’s policies.

Mr. Hagel and Mr. Obama believe that the United States can’t police the world, that multilateral alliances are central to a successful foreign policy and that new policy priorities — foremost in Asia — and a leaner military budget are inevitable. “They believe in a more efficient, as opposed to just a greater, use of American power,” says Mr. Nye, who supports Mr. Hagel, with whom he served on the Defense Policy Board.

He sees the Nebraska Republican, out of sync with his own party today, as emblematic of President Dwight Eisenhower’s foreign policy of the 1950s. “Ike felt that forces of occupation in poor countries where they are not welcome are losing propositions,” Mr. Nye says. (Eisenhower’s granddaughter has championed Mr. Hagel’s nomination.)

Mr. Graham’s charge that Mr. Hagel is “out of the mainstream” is refuted by the nominee’s roster of supporters, including prominent Republicans like Colin Powell, a former secretary of state; Brent Scowcroft, a former national security adviser; Tom Ridge, a former homeland security chief; and Bob Gates, a former defense secretary. Mr. Hagel also has the backing of leading Democrats, including Zbigniew Brzezinski, a former national security adviser; Madeleine Albright, a former secretary of state; and two top defense experts in the Senate, Jack Reed of Rhode Island and Carl Levin of Michigan. His supporters also include more than a dozen former top generals and prominent ambassadors, including six who served in Israel.

The public, on issues ranging from the Iraq war to Afghanistan to the size of the defense budget, appears more in tune with Mr. Hagel than with the neocons. Israel has strong support; an attack on Iran doesn’t.

The nominee will be confirmed, and a healthy debate over these matters might show the public who is the more mainstream: Mr. Hagel or Mr. Graham.