Robert Kagan says the U.S. goes to war because the American people want them -- and both candidates

[Douglas Carpenter]

are listening

Tuesday, Apr 17, 2012 10:00 PM 00:22:37 UTC+1000

Do Americans love war?

By Jefferson Morley


Mitt Romney, Bob Kagan and Barack Obama (Credit: AP/Wikipedia/Salon)


In a much-noted passage in his State of the Union address, Obama echoed Kagan’s argument that America, despite a decade of war and a near-bankrupt economy, is not a declining or foolish power but the world’s indispensable nation. “Anybody who says America is in decline doesn’t know what they’re talking about,” Obama declared after making a point of letting Foreign Policy’s Josh Rogin know he had recommended Kagan’s thesis (as excerpted in the ) to his advisors. Kagan also serves on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s Foreign Affairs Policy Board, whose agenda is “shaped by the questions and concerns of the Secretary.”

At the same time, Kagan’s bona fides as a Republican hawk are indisputable. He got his start in the State Department under Reagan and wrote with Bill Kristol in 1996 “Toward a Neo-Reaganite Foreign Policy,” the foundational document of modern Republican foreign policy. Unsurprisingly, he was an enthusiastic supporter of the Bush administration’s invasion of Iraq in 2003. He serves on the board of directors of the Foreign Policy Initiative, a conservative think tank that routinely finds fault with Obama’s leadership. Kagan now advises Romney, saying he has met regularly with the candidate over the years, most recently for a few hours last summer. Bipartisanship in U.S. foreign policy is alive and well — with a neoconservative flavor.

“I actually believe in a bipartisan foreign policy, not for its own sake,” Kagan tells Salon, “but because I think there actually is a bipartisan consensus on foreign policy. There are plenty of neoconservatives in the Obama administration and there were plenty in the Clinton administration, if you would define ‘neoconservative’ as I would. What’s lost on people not in Washington is how close this community really is.”

Military interventions have occurred “under Democratic presidents, Republican presidents, idealist realists, you name it,” Kagan explains. “America keeps returning to these policies.” People may be sick of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, he argues, but polls show support is high for an attack on Iran.

“So even as the American people tire of one war, they’re getting ready for the next one,” he says. “If this system is warlike, it’s the tendency that flows from the public.”

http://www.salon.com/2012/04/17/do_americans_love_war/singleton/

[invictus]

1. "His vision of U.S. foreign policy anticipates near-constant war abroad ..."

"His vision of U.S. foreign policy anticipates near-constant war abroad and a smaller pension for Grandma at home. In the close community of policymakers in Washington, that’s what passes for bipartisan common sense. Outside of that community, many Americans from the liberal left to the libertarian right want a choice, or a least a debate, about the wisdom of permanent war. But we’re not likely to get it in 2012, not with Bob Kagan advising both candidates."
http://www.salon.com/2012/04/17/do_americans_love_war/singleton/

[Douglas Carpenter]

5. "near-constant war abroad and a smaller pension for Grandma" - that pretty much sums it up

[Enrique]

2. and the less they know what war is, the more they like it

which is why the media rarely shows the reality of war. In so many ways, the effect on the target country most of all, but also on the veterans.

And neocons like Kagan NEVER talk about those realities, they only talk about war in grand terms.

[laundry_queen]

3. bingo.

When the media reports on a war as if it was a Super Bowl, then yes, people are going to respond in kind.

Media sets the narrative. Media manipulates the people into thinking whatever they want them to think. So really, it's media that loves wars. And the ratings it brings.

[KoKo]

10. ......1

[xchrom]

4. du rec. nt

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

6. Erect bogeyman. Wave flag. Send in the bombers/drones/troops. Demand more money for "defense".

Works every time.

Just to be on the safe side, throw in some grim looking generals in fatigues, some screaming pundits, and a few choruses of "God Bless America".

[KoKo]

7. Kagan's view: "...near-constant war abroad and a smaller pension for Grandma at home."

from the conclusion of the article:

And thus Kagan quietly acknowledges the costs, as well as the benefits, of America’s global empire that he champions. His vision of U.S. foreign policy anticipates near-constant war abroad and a smaller pension for Grandma at home. In the close community of policymakers in Washington, that’s what passes for bipartisan common sense. Outside of that community, many Americans from the liberal left to the libertarian right want a choice, or a least a debate, about the wisdom of permanent war. But we’re not likely to get it in 2012, not with Bob Kagan advising both candidates.

[Egalitarian Thug]

8. Eliminating the draft necessitated the economic draft.

That's why we got this system installed. The corporate parasites cannot exist without a credible military threat ensuring their freedom to steal with impunity. They learned that an "all volunteer military" doesn't bring enough fodder in to feed the machine when young people have options, so economic necessity is even better because there are no more embarrassing question about how the ruling class avoids service.

K&R

[KoKo]

9. I assume Kagan and his family live very comfortably....

What an incredible sense of entitlement that man has..

[Marr]

11. "What’s lost on people not in Washington is how close this community really is.”

It's not lost on us-- we just don't have a voice. Our foreign policy has always been built around serving the interests of big business, and they long ago purchased both parties.

Kagan cites high support for a war on Iran and says it shows the impulse originates with the people. But who asked the public if we should attack Iran to begin with? Does he actually think we just have this urge to attack *something*, and would demand our government wage war if it stayed quiet long enough? Asinine.

Does the low support for the invasion of Iraq prior to that war (and the government's subsequent rush to an invasion anyway) suggest anything to him? Americans may or may not love war-- but it doesn't really matter. Their opinion is not part of the equation.

[MrSlayer]

12. Sure, it's great when you don't have to fight in them.

It's easy to cheerlead and be "patriotic" when there is no chance that you will be killed or maimed or have to actually do some up close killing yourself.

It would be a different story if the circumstances were otherwise.