Foreign Policy writer Daniel Drezner writes that Republicans don’t have a unified view on foreign policy - their only real position is to oppose President Obama.
He argues that the GOP is letting the country down because it isn’t coming up with any constructive ideas. He also says the most significant challenge to Obama’s policies comes from his fellow Democrats.
The Republican party is still reeling from the transfer of power and shift in public attitude of the last two elections. In 2004, Bush was president and there were Republican majorities in Congress.
While some leaders in his party disagreed with how the war was being carried out, Republicans were by and large unified by the War on Terror. At that point, we must note, Democrats didn’t present a coherent foreign policy either.
But a key difference between then and now is that many Democrats supported Bush’s policy and there was widespread pressure to stand by the war effort. Congress voted overwhelmingly to give Bush the power to invade Iraq. Even when the Democrats gained a slight majority in Congress after the 2006 elections, they still didn’t act on their power to affect foreign policy.
Today, if Obama pushed for a shift in military presence, say further into Pakistan, would all Republicans oppose him just based on party line?
One can argue that the neoconservative Republican regime had a coherent strategy, but it fell apart after a few years and there was no strategy toward the end of the Bush presidency. The strategy was set in the “Axis of Evil” speech.
The military went into Afghanistan and Iraq, the strategy was to remove repressive regimes and replace them with democracies. They removed Saddam Hussein and displaced the Taliban, but failed at nation-building.
So where does the Republican party go? Do they still hold the hope that nation building is possible? Is Obama shifting to a “nation, go build yourself” strategy with his plan for Iraq?
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