Friday, March 04, 2011

Neoconservatism and the Arab Revolutions

James Kirchick has a good piece exploring the divide that’s opened between American neoconservatives and many Israelis over the revolutions and protests currently roiling the Middle East — with neocons welcoming the fall of Hosni Mubarak and the promise of democratic change throughout the region, even as the Israeli leadership classes wax more pessimistic about the likely consequences of replacing despots with more popular regimes. “Could there be a starker illustration of just how mistaken the neocon-Israeli conflation always was?” Kirchick asks, and he’s right: The last few weeks should bury, once and for all, the foolish idea that neoconservatism’s rhetorical commitment to democracy promotion is just a smokescreen for Likudnik dual loyalties or U.S. imperialism.

There’s a reasonable case to be made that at least in the short term, the Arab revolutions will reduce American influence in the Middle East, weaken Israel’s strategic position, and empower Iran — which is presumably why the Obama White House has been proceeding with an exquisite caution that’s shaded, at times, into unseemly passivity. Yet from ur-neocons like Bill Kristol, Robert Kagan, and Reuel Marc Gerecht to fellow travelers like Christopher Hitchens and Leon Wieseltier, American neoconservatives have spent the last month united in the conviction that the virtues of toppling tyrants trump whatever perils may come next. Indeed, the responses to the Arab 1848 have showcased neoconservatism at its most idealistic, dismissive of crude machtpolitik concerns and insistent that the aspirations of oppressed peoples should take priority over what may seem at first like the immediate interests of both Israel and the United States.

No comments:

opinions powered by SendLove.to