PHILADELPHIA, October 28 (RIA Novosti) — Throughout most of American history, the country followed an eminently realist foreign policy. Despite the best efforts of several revisionist historians, people like Robert Kagan and Walter Russell Mead, to argue otherwise, there was surprisingly little concern among American diplomats and politicians about abstract ideological concepts. America sometimes had extremely contentious relations with democratic countries and sometimes had very productive relationships with autocratic ones. The key focus was on what was in the national interest, and this was formulated along quite limited and conservative precepts.
Ever since the onset of the Cold War, American policy has gradually become more ideological and more structured around the defense of values such as free market capitalism and democracy. This gradual and conflicted process, which had moved in fits and starts over the course of several decades, greatly accelerated during George W. Bush’s two terms in office. For the first time in its history, America not only had a president who talked about the supreme importance of values but one who actually formulated his policies accordingly.
Barack Obama became president in no small part because of the backlash against Bush-era foreign policy and, to his credit, he has made an attempt to un-do some of the worst excesses of the preceding eight years. A close look at his cabinet, though, clearly shows that he is absolutely not a “realist,” of the classical or any other variety. Indeed many of Obama’s closest supporters (Samantha Power, Susan Rise, and former ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul) are “liberal hawks,” an ideological group whose value system is essentially indistinguishable from neo-conservatism. Liberal hawks still want America to export its value system to other countries and still place a heavy emphasis on the importance of US-style democracy; they differ only in their more modest estimation of the efficacy of America’s military force.
The primary fight in American foreign policy over the past decade, and arguably since Ronald Reagan first came to office, was thus about tactics, not strategy. Most Democratic and Republican office-holders, and certainly those who held any real power, were in agreement that America needed to remake other countries in its own image, they simply disagreed about the speed at which this should occur and how large of a bill should be run up in the process. Few dared to disagree with this consensus for fear of being branded “weak” or naïve, and so the policy proceeded along on a sort of autopilot.
Rand Paul, the junior senator from Kentucky, is the first politician in a long time who could conceivable shake up this situation. The son of a famously outspoken (albeit politically weak) congressman from Texas, Paul has quickly become one of the most recognizable voices in US politics. Trained as an eye doctor, and with a successful career in medicine, Paul was an unlikely senator, and his first few years in Washington were not without their share of gaffes and embarrassments. To say he got off to a rocky start would be charitable.
The really important question in politics, though, is not whether someone will make a mistake (everyone will, eventually) but whether they will learn from it. And Paul seems to have gradually grown far more comfortable and eloquent in expressing his disappointment with recent US foreign policy. Indeed after a recent speech in New York, it’s safe to say that Rand Paul is at the forefront of a small but genuine resurgence in realist thinking (a resurgence that I think has its deeper roots in America’s recent economic problems).
To an extent that shocks both neoconservatives and liberal hawks, Paul is comfortable arguing that not every bad situation in the word can or should be solved by the United States. Indeed Paul has argued that foreign policy ought to be judged by a calculus similar to that which governs every other sphere of government activity: a careful weighing of inputs and outputs. Senator Paul believes that simply increasingly spending (that is, increasing our “input” into foreign policy) doesn’t necessarily do anything to increase the output. After seeing the staggering sums of money that the US has invested into Iraq and Afghanistan to little discernible effect, it’s hard to contradict this point.
Paul, of course, has been careful not to tread too far, and voiced his disdain for the Chinese regime, Vladimir Putin, the ayatollahs in Iran, and various other foreign governments. He has repeatedly gone out of his way to note just how distasteful he finds America’s rivals, and how the American model is still the best yet devised. This combativeness, however, is what sets Paul apart. Realists always run the risk of appearing too “soft” in dealing with foreign adversaries, particularly in the American system, where “strength” in foreign policy is still a sine qua non of serious presidential contenders, a sense that someone is too weak-willed to operate effectively on the global stage can be a political death sentence.
Paul has, at least so far, managed to combine genuine policy re-adjustments with effective political posturing. It remains a difficult task and the road ahead is fraught with obstacles, but if realism is going to re-emerge as a genuine political force (and polling suggests the American public are receptive) Rand Paul is the most likely standard bearer.
The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not reflect the official position of Sputnik.
