Centerfield

I can't imagine another preemptive invasion, at least in the next 10 years. Iraq presented a unique situation in that regard. I can, however, imagine a preemptive strike on nuclear facility or a terrorist training camp.

I'd have to say I'm with Todd--I don't see another preemptive invastion. That being said, I don't think anyone is completely sure exactly what is policy is. "Spread freedom" tends to be a very vague goal.

The problem is, I--and everyone else--can't seem to figure out if the D's actually have a foriegn policy. Opposing everything George Bush supports does not constitute vision. If Ted Kennedy is the foriegn policy guru for this party, they aren't going to see the inside of the White House anytime soon.

the simple arithmetic which showed that relatively minor tweaking would put off any real Day of Reckoning until mid-century

ROTFLOL

The Bush Doctrine? Why do people think that some sort of carefully enumerated policy covering every eventuality is some sort of solution?

Bush has 3 or 4 years to go. On foreign policy the US is going to keep trying to foster Iraqi democracy, and elsewhere will emphasize diplomacy backed by aggressive saber rattling to try and cajole. The whole point of disproportionate response to 9/11 via invading Afghanistan and Iraq is to make other nations think our saber rattling is not a bluff.

The outcomes will depend on the circumstances. Decisions about responses to nations words and actions are going to be made on a case by case basis, depending on a variety of details specific to each situation, much more so than overarching simply stated doctrines.

We're going to do our best to try to limit trafficking in nukes and other WMDs, promote democracy, and handcuff terrorist activity. We'll try to look big, powerful, and aggressivew if we think that helps, but we realize our resources are finite. So what this all looks like will differ from case to case. That's just the way it is.

For example, NK already has nukes, and since we don't want NK to use them, all we have left as policy is disapproval and attempts at isolation. Iran doesn't yet, so our policy is different.

I may be in a small minority, but I don't think these sorts of things are that hard to predict, and I also don't think our policies would be substantially different if President Kerry were in charge today, other than that we might be seeing more photos of smiling and handshaking between western allies in the news these days, regardless of whether more smiling and handshaking was going on..

bk,

I don't think we need to have a carefully enumerated policy, but as I see it, our current justification for the war in Iraq represents a shift from the originally declared Bush doctrine. Thus, I don't know how to predict what comes next. I don't agree that Kerry would be doing the same thing as Bush. Ideas do matter.

I think it's beyond question that our invasion of Afghanistan unequivically demonstrated that we do more than just bluff. For that reason I simply do not buy the argument that we needed to also invade Iraq to demonstrate something which we'd already decisively demonstrated in no uncertain terms.

If saber rattling wasn't good enough for Iraq then what possible reason do we have for concluding that it'll be seen by Bush as good enough elsewhere?

Kevin,

Where is Bush going to get the bodies to invade another country? We are already over extended as it is.

How is he going to get congressional approval? Iraq was a special case because both parties and the UN had been condemning Iraq for a decade before Bush invaded.

The cost of the Iraq war in both human and monetary costs greatly exceeded original expectations, so Bush has to be somewhat gun shy about another invasion.

I think it's beyond question that our invasion of Afghanistan unequivically demonstrated that we do more than just bluff.

Boy, i couldn't disagree more. Nearly everyone was in favor of it domestically. Neither our allies nor most of our enemies even said boo. It was what everyone expected. It was the proportional response. Doing only the expected convinces people that nothing has changed, and that they can keep on with business as usual.

It's the disporportionate response that signals things are different. Invading Iraq was the signal that we were not willing to tolerate a host of things we used to tolerate, and that we wouldn't be stymied by international stalemate.

Rick, what was the "originally declared Bush doctrine?" I think I missed that. Oh, and BTW, I didn't say Kerry would be the same, I said I expected his foreign policy wouldn't be substantially different. Kerry's speeches about the things he wanted to do had substantial overlap with what Bush was already doing. Kerry just claimed he could magically do them better.

Oh, and Kevin? The US rattled it' saber at Iraq for a decade for WMD inspections compliance before invading a 2nd time. If that doesn't show patience, what does?

From wikipedia, which refers to http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.html

The salient elements of the Bush Doctrine may be summarized as:

Preemption
A policy of pre-emptive war, should the US or its allies be threatened by terrorists or by rogue states that are engaged in the production of weapons of mass destruction.

Unilateralism
The right of the US to pursue unilateral military action when acceptable multi-lateral solutions cannot be found.

Strength Beyond Challenge
The policy that "United States has, and intends to keep, military strengths beyond challenge", indicating the US intends to take actions as necessary to continue its status as the world's sole military superpower. See Bush administration doctrine of military preeminence

Extending Democracy, Liberty, and Security to All Regions
A policy of actively promoting democracy and freedom in all regions of the world. As Bush stated at West Point, "America has no empire to extend or utopia to establish. We wish for others only what we wish for ourselves -- safety from violence, the rewards of liberty, and the hope for a better life."
The new policy was fully delineated in a National Security Council text entitled the National Security Strategy of the United States issued on September 17, 2002 [1] (http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.html).

To clarify, when I'm referring to the originally declared Bush doctrine" I'm referring to the above, not to the "Initial formulation" mentioned in the wikipedia entry.

It seems to me that the Bush doctrine has shifted from the initial formulation, to the preemption formulation, to a third, vaguely articulated formulation.

It was the proportional response. Doing only the expected convinces people that nothing has changed, and that they can keep on with business as usual.

You're changing your tune here. Previously you said:

The whole point of disproportionate response to 9/11 via invading Afghanistan and Iraq is to make other nations think our saber rattling is not a bluff.

That's what I responded to. Now you're wanting to draw a distinction which is at odds with your previous statement.

Oh, and Kevin? The US rattled it' saber at Iraq for a decade for WMD inspections compliance before invading a 2nd time. If that doesn't show patience, what does?

Um... you've just undercut your own argument vis-a-vis saber rattling vs. future military invasions by Bush.

What's interesting about Iraq, saber rattling and WMD inspections is that this was the Clinton Doctrine in action. Under Bush there were WMD inspectors on the ground in Iraq and they were ordered out so that Bush could invade. Subsequent searches of Iraq by our own experts and while Bremer was in control yielding zero evidence that the Clinton policy of saber rattling and WMD inspections had been fruitless - in direct contradiction to Bush et al's claims about Iraqi WMD prior to invading.

Kevin, it's one thing to call these ideas inconsistent. it would be another thing to actually make an effort to show that they are inconsistent, which you didn't do.

Maybe you think that when I say "saber rattling" I mean bluffing, but I don't. Saber rattling only works when the other guy can't tell whether or not it's a bluff, and isn't willing to risk his wad to find out. That's the whole point. People were willing to risk their wad because they thought they could stalemate us into not using the saber, that they could jerk us around.

We patiently rattled our saber at Iraq for 10 years. When that didn't work, we used it.

Kevin's tombstone 50 years hence:

Where are the WMD?

Hopefully they'll be selling t-shirts of his tombstone on the boardwalks of a democratic Iraq by then, too.

Rick, do you consider wikipedia to be some sort of authoritative reference? Your citation reads like cant. Who wrote it, Dennis Kucinich?

Interesting that we've had all of this discussion centered on the foriegn policy of George W Bush. I guess I go to one of my original points...do the Democrats have a coherent foriegn policy? Or, is it merely opposing what Bush supports. I guess I see the value of two (or more) clearly defined views. That does not currently seem to be the case.

Brian:

First you said that our invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq was a disproportionate response to 9/11. When I question that you changed your tune and said that only the invasion of Iraq was disproportionate. I provided the direct quotes. What more do I need to do to show the inconsistency? If you mispoke the first time then just say so. No need to get snarky about it.

Further, you are drawing an artificial distinction between bluffing and saber rattling. The difference isn't between bluffing and saber rattling. They're synonymous terms. Rather it's an issue of the difference between a successful bluff and an unsuccessful bluff. One can saber rattle all one wants and if the object of said saber rattling ignores it then the bluff has effectively been called.

What my tombstone may or may not say is irrelevant to the known facts about Iraqi WMD.

bk,

I take offense at your suggestion that I'm slipping Kucinichisms in here. Wikipedia entries can be written by anyone, so there is sometimes political conflict over them, and some have even been frozen as a result. An example of that is this entry

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush

However, the entry I've cited seems balanced, initially presenting the Bush doctrine in a positive light, then presenting a section at the end from the perspective of critics. Quote the text that is "cant"

Rick IMO calling a coalition that includes some allies but not others unilateral is misleading cant. So is conflating pre-eminence with "beyond challenge." That's over-inflation, a common rhetorical tool. I call that cant. YMMV.

Kevin, I said this:
The whole point of disproportionate response to 9/11 via invading Afghanistan and Iraq is to make other nations think our saber rattling is not a bluff.

afghanistan + Iraq = disproportional

does not imply that

afghanistan = disproportional

You inferred what I meant. If I was less than 100% spot on concise, my bad. But if you weren't trying so hard to make me look bad, you might have at least noticed that the statements could be seen as consistent.

I further disagree that bluffing and saber rattling are synonymous. They are related but distinct. If you are bluffing, there's no recourse when your bluff is called. If you rattle your saber, you may or may not be willing to use it. If someone thinks you are bluffing when you rattle your saber, and they call your bluff, they might get their head cut off.

All bluffs are bluffs. All saber rattles are NOT bluffs.

The point is that many nations had become willing to think our saber rattling was almost always an empty threat that could be safely ignored except under the extreme circumstances of direct connection to violence already committed. Afghanistan was an example of such an extreme circumstance, which is why I say that invading there was the expected and proportional thing.

Whatever its merits, Bush announced a new way, that we'd be willing to use force BEFORE we got attacked if we were worried enough. And then we invaded Iraq to show everyone that this policy was NOT a bluff. For a long time now it has been my take that this was the real reason for invading Iraq, that we wanted to respond disproportionately, and Iraq was the best choice.

I have mixed feelings about whether we should have tried to explain things to the public this way, or else have eschewed the saber use if we couldn't get public support. I doubt we'd be in a better spot now if the rest of the world was still wondering whether we were more willing to go to the mat than we'd been in the past.

The Bush team probably doesn't have it hashed out either. Clearly the doubt its created "Would they really consider invading _______ (Syria, Iran, others)" is part of the doctrine. For me, in a way that's good because it always seemed the UN was only going to say in any situation "Now this time I REALLY mean it". Having said all that I very much doubt you'll any pre-emptive strikes in the future.

Now as to the Dems, if things continue to gradually "look up" in the Mid East (and that's aBIG if) the Dems better come up with some coherent foreign policy or they run the risk of seeming somewhat irrelvant.

Exactly! That's the merit of the disproportionate response. No one feel comfortable assuming we're bluffing anymore, and that has made a difference.

If we'd only invaded Afghanistan, and backed down at the UN over Iraq, lots of countries would still be assuming they could jerk us around and play diplomatic chicken.