by Jim Lobe

As some readers may recall, I wrote a long essay shortly after last July’s military coup d’etat against Egypt’s democratically elected Morsi government on differing attitudes within the neoconservative movement toward the coup and democracy itself. Given the complete lack of consensus among leading neocons as to how [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

As some readers may recall, I wrote a long essay shortly after last July’s military coup d’etat against Egypt’s democratically elected Morsi government on differing attitudes within the neoconservative movement toward the coup and democracy itself. Given the complete lack of consensus among leading neocons as to how the U.S. should react to the coup — indeed, the fact that most neocons favored the coup and urged Washington to maintain its military assistance to the coupists — I concluded, contrary to conventional wisdom and the way that neocons have often sought to depict themselves, that “democracy promotion can’t possibly be considered a core principle of neoconservatism.” I followed that up a month later with a short post noting how the two “princelings” of the neoconservative movement and co-founders of both the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) and its successor organization, the Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI), Bob Kagan and Bill Kristol, had themselves split on the issue, with Kristol (citing Israel’s position) expressing doubt about the wisdom of cutting military aid, and Kagan demanding that it be cut.

Kristol hasn’t had much to say about Egypt recently, but Kagan came out in yesterday’s Washington Post with a stunning denunciation (also featured on FPI’s website) not only of continuing U.S. military aid for Egypt, but also of lobbying by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in Congress for continuing that assistance AND of Israel’s support for the regime. The op-ed, entitled “A Partnership That Damages the U.S.”, is particularly critical of Israel’s attitude toward both Egypt and democracy in the region, something that the ironically named (and Likudist) Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) may wish to consider. Here are the relevant paragraphs:

Many members of Congress also believe that by backing the Egyptian military they are helping Israel, which, through the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, has actively lobbied Congress for full restoration of military aid. Even though the Morsi government did not pull out of the Camp David Accords or take actions hostile to Israel, the mere presence of a Muslim Brotherhood government in Egypt frightened the Israeli government.

To Israel, which has never supported democracy anywhere in the Middle East except Israel, the presence of a brutal military dictatorship bent on the extermination of Islamism is not only tolerable but desirable. Perhaps from the standpoint of a besieged state like Israel, this may be understandable. A friendly observer might point out that in the end Israel may get the worst of both worlds: a new Egyptian jihadist movement brought into existence by the military’s crackdown and a military government in Cairo that, playing to public opinion, winds up turning against Israel anyway.

Israel has to be the judge of its own best interests. But so does the United States. In Egypt, U.S. interests and Israel’s perceptions of its own interests sharply diverge. If one believes that any hope for moderation in the Arab world requires finding moderate voices not only among secularists but also among Islamists, America’s current strategy in Egypt is producing the opposite result. If one believes, as President Obama once claimed to, that it is important to seek better understanding between the United States and the Muslim world and to avoid or at least temper any clash of civilizations, then again this policy is producing the opposite result. [Emphasis added.]

It’s really a remarkable column that deserves to be read in full because of its very trenchant critique of Obama’s policy as well. If only it represented a preponderance of neoconservative opinion, which it unfortunately doesn’t.

Kagan is writing in the context of a whole lot of bad human-rights news coming out of Egypt in recent weeks in spite of which the Obama administration approved the delivery of 10 Apache helicopters, the transfer of which was held up by a partial suspension of military aid to the regime last fall. Since then, Sen. Patrick Leahy, who chairs the key Senate subcommittee that oversees foreign aid appropriations, has called for halting all military aid, including those items, like the helicopters, that are supposedly earmarked for “counter-terrorism.” As noted by Kagan, AIPAC is lobbying on behalf of the Netanyahu government against such a cut-off.

Indeed, for AIPAC’s (and Israel’s) talking points, you need look no further than a policy analysis entitled, “Resuming Military Aid to Egypt: A Strategic Imperative”, published this week by Eric Trager of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), a think tank spun off by AIPAC in the 1980s but still very much in the lobby group’s orbit. While Trager predictably deplores the abuses that have taken place, he argues, dubiously, that somehow the military is not accountable for them because of the “severely fractured …competing power centers” that supposedly characterize the Egyptian state at the moment. He goes on:

…[W]ithholding aid could still jeopardize Washington’s ability to ensure Egypt’s longer-term cooperation. For one thing, Russia is trying to expand its influence in the Middle East by selling weapons to Cairo, and various Persian Gulf states — which have sent billions in aid to keep the current Egyptian government afloat — are strongly supporting Moscow’s efforts. Moreover, after years of refusing to do so, the Egyptian military has been actively fighting Sinai-based jihadists since September, so withholding aid now would send a very confusing message about Washington’s strategic priorities. The United States also stands to lose other strategic benefits if the aid is withheld, including overflight rights and preferred access to the Suez Canal.

by Jim Lobe

The neoconservative Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI), the successor organization of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), has just published another open letter (reproduced below) to Congressional leaders that implicitly endorses what I have called the “Kirk-Menendez Wag the Dog Act of 2013,” known officially [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

The neoconservative Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI), the successor organization of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), has just published another open letter (reproduced below) to Congressional leaders that implicitly endorses what I have called the “Kirk-Menendez Wag the Dog Act of 2013,” known officially as the Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act of 2013 (S. 1881). I say implicitly, because it doesn’t come right out and urge support for the specific bill, which AIPAC and the Israel lobby, for which AIPAC is the vanguard, are flogging as hard as they possibly can. But the intention is pretty clear.

This letter — like PNAC, FPI is essentially a “letterhead organization” that issues manifestos, rather than a real think tank or grassroots membership organization — was signed by 72 “former U.S. government officials and foreign policy experts,” the vast majority of whom are easily identified as neoconservatives, as opposed to “conservatives,” the highly questionable term used by the Daily Beast’s Josh Rogin, who reported on the letter even before it was published on the FPI website to describe the signatories. (One wonders whether Rogin was given the letter on the condition that the authors be described as “conservatives” rather than “neoconservatives,” which really has become something of a dirty word over the past decade due to its association with the Iraq war and their enthusiasm over other ill-advised military adventures.)

Of the 72, I counted at least 25 who signed PNAC letters — most of them dealing with Iraq and the Middle East — dating back to its 1997 founding by Bob Kagan and Bill Kristol to its unceremonious demise in 2005. (Kagan and Kristol also co-founded the FPI with Dan Senor two years later during Bush’s second term when most of the neocons who championed the Iraq War had either left the administration or been successfully marginalized by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Pentagon chief Bob Gates.) Among them are stalwarts from the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), such as Danielle Pletka, Michael Rubin, Fred Kagan, and Gary Schmitt (and now Joe Lieberman!), which acted as a kind of annex to Doug Feith’s Office of Special Plans (OSP) at the Pentagon in the run-up to and the immediate aftermath of the Iraq invasion.

Other signatories include AEI alumni Joshua Muravchik and Reuel Marc Gerecht, who also championed the Iraq debacle, but who, like Michael Ledeen, has since moved to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) — a seemingly Likudist front that has increasingly partnered events, letters and policy papers with FPI. FDD signatories include Clifford May (who also signed PNAC letters); Mark Dubowitz, the Canadian citizen who has played a key role in crafting U.S. sanctions legislation and waging what he has repeatedly called “economic warfare” against Iran; John Hannah, who served as Dick Cheney’s national security adviser during Bush’s second term after the departure of Scooter Libby; as well as Gerecht. Then there’s a group from the Hudson Institute, which also beat the drums of war in the run-up to the Iraq invasion, including its president, Ken Weinstein, Seth Cropsey, Jack David, Lee Smith, and Doug Feith himself.

As for former Bush officials, there are plenty: Elliot Abrams and his deputy on the NSC, Michael Doran; Feith and his successor as the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, Eric Edelman (and an FPI director along with Kagan, Kristol, and Senor); Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) czar Jerry Bremer (and his then-spokesman, Senor); Cheney’s deputy, the aforementioned Hannah; former head of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Jeffrey Gedmin; former Pentagon Comptroller Dov Zakheim; former Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Robert Joseph and his deputy, Stephen Rademaker (Pletka’s spouse); former Bush speechwriter Peter Wehnher; former Undersecretary of State for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky; and then a couple of people who worked in Rumsfeld’s Pentagon or with the CPA, including AEI’s Dan Blumenthal and Rubin, and Michael Makovsky, the current head of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, or JINSA, whose motto is “Securing America, Strengthening Israel”.

What I found particularly curious about the list of signers was the absence of some of the most visible (aside from Kristol) neoconservative champions of the Iraq war; in particular, AEI’s Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle, and James Woolsey (as well as John Bolton, who is more of an aggressive nationalist than a neocon, but who also has pooh-poohed any diplomatic process with Iran from the get-go.) I don’t think this is an indication that they disagree with the contents of the letter; rather, I believe they have decided (or been advised by their friends at AIPAC) that their public involvement in the debate could prove counter-productive precisely because they were so outspoken — and so disastrously wrong — about Iraq.

But, of course, anyone even remotely acquainted with the run-up to the Iraq war knows the roles played by PNAC, AEI, FDD, the Hudson Institute, as well as by many of the individuals — as noted above, almost all of whom are neoconservatives — who have signed the letter. Which is why I think it actually proves counter-productive to their purposes, even without the endorsement of Wolfowitz, Perle, and Woolsey. And while there are a few token Democratic signatories, such as former Congresswoman Shelley Berkley (for years, the biggest beneficiary of “pro-Israel PAC” money in the House behind Kirk himself, according to the Center for Responsive Politics) and Lieberman (if he can be considered a Democrat), the overwhelming majority are identified with the Republican Party and/or the Bush administration. We’ll soon see if this letter backfires by further portraying the Iran sanctions bill as a GOP/conservative-backed issue.

Indeed, while AIPAC has just about doubled the number of co-sponsors for the “Wag the Dog” Act since it was first introduced by Kirk and Menendez on Dec. 19 from 26 senators — equally divided between Republicans and Democrats — to 53 today, all but two of the new co-sponsors are Republicans. In other words, with each day, the bill is looking increasingly partisan in nature — a very worrisome trend for AIPAC and the lobby, which have long considered bipartisanship as key to their success, especially in Congress.

The more Republican the bill appears to be, the less inclined Democrats will be to desert their president. The fact that a strong majority of Senate Democrats is still resisting pressure from AIPAC and its donors to co-sponsors is highly significant, as, I think, is the statement issued today by the National Jewish Democratic Council (NJDC) that “We encourage Congress to support the President’s foreign policy initiative by making stronger measures available should they be required.” (Emphasis added.) A cleverly worded non-endorsement of the bill from an organization that routinely toes the AIPAC line.

Here’s the full text of the FPI/PNAC letter:

January 9, 2014

Dear Speaker Boehner, Senator Reid, Senator McConnell, and Representative Pelosi:

We write in support of efforts to enforce Iranian compliance with the Joint Plan of Action that Iran agreed to on November 24, 2013, and in support of the ultimate goal of denying Iran nuclear weapons-making capability. Congress has a chance to play an important role in making clear the consequences of Iranian violations of the interim nuclear deal, in clarifying expectations with respect to future nuclear talks with Tehran, and in creating incentives for Iran to conclude a comprehensive nuclear agreement that protects the national security interests of the United States and its allies.

We support the use of diplomacy and non-military pressure, backed up by the military option, to persuade Iran to comply with numerous U.N. Security Council Resolutions and verifiably abandon its efforts to attain nuclear weapons-making capability.  Congressional leadership has been indispensable in creating the framework of U.S.-led international sanctions that brought Iran back to the negotiating table.  However, given Tehran’s long history of violating its international nuclear obligations—and the lack of any explicit enforcement mechanisms in the Joint Plan of Action’s text—congressional leadership is once again required to set clear standards for enforcing Iranian compliance with the interim nuclear deal.

As talks go forward, it is critical that Iran not use diplomatic talks as subterfuge for continued development of various aspects of its nuclear program.  It is worth recalling Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s claim that, when he served as Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator a decade ago, he used diplomatic talks to buy time for Iran to advance its nuclear program.  Congressional leadership can help prevent Iran from using future negotiations as cover to further the growth of its nuclear weapons-making capability.

Congress should also use this opportunity to describe its expectations for a comprehensive nuclear agreement with Iran.  Such an agreement would irreversibly close off Iran’s path to a nuclear weapon through uranium enrichment or plutonium reprocessing, bring Iran into compliance with its international obligations for full transparency and cooperation regarding its nuclear program, and permit extraordinary inspection measures to safeguard against any undeclared Iranian nuclear activities.

Commenting on the likelihood of getting Iran to agree to a comprehensive nuclear agreement, President Obama recently commented, “I wouldn’t say that it’s more than 50/50.”  We can do better than a coin-toss.  Congress now has the opportunity to make clear the consequences for Iran if it violates the interim nuclear deal or fails to conclude a comprehensive nuclear agreement. Congressional action can thus substantially improve the prospect that Iran’s growing nuclear threat will be verifiably and irreversibly halted without the use of force.  We urge Congress to seize this opportunity.

Sincerely,

by Jim Lobe

If one thing has become clear in the wake of last week’s military coup d’etat against Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, it’s that democracy promotion is not a core principle of neoconservatism. Unlike protecting Israeli security and preserving its military superiority over any and all possible regional challenges (which is [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

If one thing has become clear in the wake of last week’s military coup d’etat against Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, it’s that democracy promotion is not a core principle of neoconservatism. Unlike protecting Israeli security and preserving its military superiority over any and all possible regional challenges (which is a core neoconservative tenet), democracy promotion is something that neoconservatives disagree among themselves about — a conclusion that is quite inescapable after reviewing the reactions of prominent neoconservatives to last week’s coup in Cairo. Some, most notably Robert Kagan, are clearly committed to democratic governance and see it pretty much as a universal aspiration, just as many liberal internationalists do. An apparent preponderance of neocons, such as Daniel Pipes, the contributors to the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board and Commentary’s ’Contentions’ blog, on the other hand, are much clearer in their view that democracy may be a universal aspiration, but it can be a disaster in practice, especially when the wrong people get elected, in which case authoritarian rulers and military coups are much to be preferred.

The latter group harkens back to the tradition established by Jeane Kirkpatrick and Elliott Abrams, among others, in the late 1970’s when anti-communist “friendly authoritarians” — no matter their human rights records — were much preferred to left-wingers who claimed to be democrats but whose anti-imperialist, anti-American or pro-Palestinian sympathies were deemed too risky to indulge. These leftists have now been replaced by Islamists as the group we need “friendly authoritarians” (or “friendly militaries”) to keep under control, if not crush altogether.

Many neoconservatives have claimed that they’ve been big democracy advocates since the mid-1980’s when they allegedly persuaded Ronald Reagan to shift his support from Ferdinand Marcos to the “people power” movement in the Philippines (even as they tacitly, if not actively, supported apartheid South Africa and considered Nelson Mandela’s ANC a terrorist group). They were also behind the creation of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a quasi-governmental organization headed by one of Kirkpatrick’s deputies, Carl Gershman, and designed to provide the kind of political and technical support to sympathetic groups abroad that the CIA used to supply covertly. (Indeed, the NED has not been wholly transparent, and some of its beneficiaries have been involved in highly undemocratic practices, such as agitating for military coups against democratically elected leftist governments, most recently in Haiti and Venezuela. I was at a dinner a few years ago when, in answer to my question about how he perceived neoconservative support for democracies, Zbigniew Brzezinski quipped that when neoconservatives talk about democratization, they really mean destabilization.) In a 2004 op-ed published in Beirut’s Daily Star, I wrote about how neoconservatives have used democracy promotion over the past quarter century as a means to rally public and Congressional support behind specific (often pro-Israel, in their minds at least) policies and strategic objectives, such as the invasion of Iraq.

The notion that neoconservatives really do promote democracy has now, however, become conventional wisdom, even among some foreign-policy realists and paleoconservatives who should know better. In his 2010 book, NeoConservatism: The Biography of a Movement, Justin Vaisse, then at the Brookings Institution and now head of policy planning at the French foreign ministry, included democracy promotion among five principles — along with international engagement, military supremacy, “benevolent empire” and unilateralism — that are found at the core of what he called “third-age neoconservatism,” which he dates from 1995 to the present. (In a rather shocking omission, he didn’t put Israel in the same core category, although he noted, among other things, that neoconservatives’ “uncompromising defense of Israel” has been consistent throughout the movement’s history. In a review of the book in the Washington Post, National Review editor Rich Lowry included “the staunch defense of Israel” as among the “main themes” of neoconservatism from the outset.)

In his own recent summary of the basics of neoconservatism (and its zombie-like — his word — persistence), Abrams himself praised Vaisse’s analysis, insisting that, in addition to “patriotism, American exceptionalism, (and) a belief in the goodness of America and in the benefits of American power and of its use,”…a conviction that democracy is the best system of government and should be spread whenever that is practical” was indeed a core element of neoconservatism. (True to form, he omits any mention of Israel.)

It seems to me that the coup in Egypt is a good test of whether or not Vaisse’s and Abrams’ thesis that democracy is indeed a core element of neoconservatism because no one (except Pipes) seriously contests the fact that Morsi was the first democratically elected president of Egypt in that country’s history. I will stipulate that elections by themselves do not a democracy make and that liberal values embedded in key institutions are critical elements of democratic governance. And I’ll concede that Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood were not as inclusive and liberal as we in the West may have wished them to be.

But it’s also worth pointing out that their opposition — be it among Mubarak holdovers in the judiciary and the security forces or among the liberals and secularists who played catalytic roles in the 2011 uprising against Mubarak and now again against Morsi — did not exactly extend much in the way of cooperation with Morsi’s government either. (Indeed, Thursday’s New York Times article on the degree to which Mubarak’s cronies and his so-called “deep state” set out to deliberately sabotage Morsi’s rule recalls nothing more than what happened prior to the 1973 coup in Chile.) And we shouldn’t forget that Morsi not only won popular elections outright, but that that Islamists, led by the Brotherhood, gained a majority in elections for parliament (that was subsequently dissolved by the Mubarak-appointed Supreme Constitutional Court). Morsi and his allies were also able to muster 64 percent of the vote in a referendum to ratify a constitution, however flawed we may consider that (now-suspended) document to have been. In any event, the democratic election of a president is not a minor matter in any democratic transition, and ousting him in a military coup, especially in a country where the military has effectively ruled without interruption for more than half a century, does not exactly make a democratic transition any easier.

Now, if Vaisse and Abrams are right that democracy is a core principle of neoconservativism, one would expect neoconservatives to be unanimous in condemning the coup and possibly also in calling for the Obama administration to cut off aid, as required under U.S. law whenever a military coup ousts an elected leader. (After all, the “rule of law” is an essential element of a healthy democracy, and ignoring a law or deliberately failing to enforce it does not offer a good example of democratic governance — a point Abrams himself makes below. Indeed, the fact that the administration appears to have ruled out cutting aid for the time being will no doubt persuade the Egyptian military and other authoritarian institutions in the region that, when push comes to shove, Washington will opt for stability over democracy every time.)

So how have neoconservatives — particularly those individuals, organizations, and publications that Vaisse listed as “third-age” neoconservatives in the appendix of his book — come down on recent events in Egypt? (Vaisse listed four publications — “The Weekly Standard, Commentary, The New Republic (to some extent) [and] Wall Street Journal (editorial pages) — as the most important in third-age neoconservatism. Almost all of the following citations are from three of those four, as The New Republic, which was still under the control of Martin Peretz when Vaisse published his book, has moved away from neoconservative views since.)

Well, contrary to the Vaisse-Abrams thesis, it seems third-age neoconservatives are deeply divided on the question of democracy in Egypt, suggesting that democracy promotion is, in fact, not a core principle or pillar of neoconservative ideology. If anything, it’s a pretty low priority, just as it was back in the Kirkpatrick days.

Let’s take the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page as a starter.

Here’s Bret Stephens, the Journal’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Global View” columnist even before the coup:

[T]he lesson from Egypt is that democracy may be a blessing for people capable of self-government, but it’s a curse for those who are not. There is a reason that Egypt has been governed by pharaohs, caliphs, pashas and strongmen for 6,000 years.

The best outcome for Egypt would be early elections, leading to the Brotherhood’s defeat at the hands of a reformist, technocratic government with military support. The second-best outcome would be a bloodless military coup, followed by the installment of a reformist government.

And here’s the Journal’s editorial board the day after the coup:

Mr. Obama also requested a review of U.S. aid to Egypt, but cutting that off now would be a mistake. Unpopular as America is in Egypt, $1.3 billion in annual military aid buys access with the generals. U.S. support for Cairo is written into the Camp David peace accords with Israel. Washington can also do more to help Egypt gain access to markets, international loans and investment capital. The U.S. now has a second chance to use its leverage to shape a better outcome.

Egyptians would be lucky if their new ruling generals turn out to be in the mold of Chile’s Augusto Pinochet, who took power amid chaos but hired free-market reformers and midwifed a transition to democracy.

Now, consider the New York Times’ David Brooks (included by Vaisse as a third-age neocon in his Appendix) writing a column entitled “Defending the Coup”, just two days after the it took place:

It has become clear – in Egypt, Turkey, Iran, Gaza and elsewhere – that radical Islamists are incapable of running a modern government. Many have absolutist apocalyptic mind-sets. They have a strange fascination with a culture of death.

…Promoting elections is generally a good thing even when they produce victories for democratic forces we disagree with. But elections are not a good thing when they lead to the elevation of people whose substantive beliefs fall outside the democratic orbit.

…It’s not that Egypt doesn’t have a recipe for a democratic transition. It seems to lack even the basic mental ingredients.

And Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute writing on July 7:

Now is not the time to punish Egypt… If democracy is the goal, then the United States should celebrate Egypt’s coup.

…Rather than punish the perpetrators, Obama should offer two cheers for Egypt’s generals and help Egyptians write a more democratic constitution to provide a sounder foundation for true democracy.

And Frank Gaffney, Center for Security Policy (in Vaisse’s Appendix), July 4:

On the eve of our nation’s founding, Egypt’s military has given their countrymen a chance for what Abraham Lincoln once called ‘a new birth of freedom.’

…Whether anything approaching real freedom can ever take hold in a place like Egypt, however, will depend on its people’s rejection (sic) the liberty-crushing Islamic doctrine of shariah. Unfortunately, many Egyptians believe shariah is divinely mandated and may wage a civil war to impose it.

…If so, we should stand with those who oppose our common enemy – the Islamists who seek to destroy freedom worldwide. And that will require rooting out the Muslim Brothers in our government and civil institutions, as well.

Or the AEI’s Thomas Donnelly (also in Vaisse’s Appendex) writing in The Weekly Standard  blog on July 3:

In some quarters, the prospects for progress and liberalization are renewed; the Egyptian army may not be a champion of democracy, but its intervention probably prevented a darker future there.  Egyptians at least have another chance.

Commentary magazine, of course, has really been the bible of neoconservatism since its inception in the late 1960’s and has since served as its literary guardian, along with, more recently, Bill Kristol’s Weekly Standard, ever since. So what have its ‘Contentions’ bloggers said about the coup and democracy?

Here’s Jonathan Tobin on July 7:

The massive demonstrations protesting Morsi’s misrule that led to a military coup have given the president a chance to reboot American policy toward Egypt in a manner that could make it clear the U.S. priority is ensuring stability and stopping the Islamists. The question is, will he take advantage of this chance or will he, by pressuring the military and demonstrating ambivalence toward the possibility of a Brotherhood comeback, squander another opportunity to help nudge Egypt in the right direction?

…The problem with so much of what has been said in the past few days about Egypt is the misperception that what was going on in Cairo before the coup was somehow more democratic than what happened after it. It cannot be repeated too often that there is more to democracy than merely holding an election that enabled the most organized faction to seize power even if it is fundamentally opposed to democracy. That was exactly what occurred in Egypt in the last year as the Brotherhood won a series of votes that put it in a position to start a process by which it could ensure that its power would never be challenged again. Understood in that context, the coup wasn’t so much a putsch as it was a last ditch effort to save the country from drifting into a Brotherhood dictatorship that could not be undone by democratic means.

And here’s Tobin again, a day later and just after the apparent massacre by the military of some 51 or more peaceful Brotherhood demonstrators:

But it would be a terrible mistake if Washington policymakers allowed today’s event to endorse the idea that what is at stake in Egypt now is democracy or that the Brotherhood is a collection of innocent victims. Even if we concede that the killings are a crime that should be investigated and punished, the conflict there is not about the right of peaceful dissent or even the rule of law, as the Brotherhood’s apologists continue to insist. While our Max Boot is right to worry that the army’s behavior may signal an incapacity to run the country that could lead to a collapse that would benefit extremists, I think the more imminent danger is that American pressure on the new government could undermine its ability to assert control over the situation and lead the Brotherhood and other Islamists to think they can return to power. But however deplorable today’s violence might be, that should not serve as an excuse for media coverage or policies that are rooted in the idea that the Brotherhood is a peaceful movement or that it’s [sic] goal is democracy. The whole point of the massive protests that shook Egypt last week and forced the military to intervene to prevent civil war was that the Brotherhood government was well on its way to establishing itself as an unchallengeable authoritarian regime that could impose Islamist law on the country with impunity. The Brotherhood may have used the tactics of democracy in winning elections in which they used their superior organizational structure to trounce opponents, but, as with other dictatorial movements, these were merely tactics employed to promote an anti-democratic aim. But such a cutoff or threats to that effect would be a terrible mistake.

Despite the idealistic posture that America should push at all costs for a swift return to democratic rule in Egypt, it needs to be remembered that genuine democracy is not an option there right now. The only way for democracy to thrive is to create a consensus in favor of that form of government. So long as the Islamists of the Brotherhood and other groups that are even more extreme are major players in Egypt, that can’t happen. The Brotherhood remains the main threat to freedom in Egypt, not a victim. While we should encourage the military to eventually put a civilian government in place, America’s priority should be that of the Egyptian people: stopping the Brotherhood. Anything that undermines that struggle won’t help Egypt or the United States. [My emphasis]

So far, the picture is pretty clear: I’m not hearing a lot of denunciations of a coup d’etat (let alone a massacre of unarmed civilians) by the military against a democratically elected president from these “third-generation” neocons and their publications. Au contraire. By their own admission, they’re pretty pleased that this democratically elected president was just overthrown.

But, in fairness, that’s not the whole picture.

On the pro-democracy side, Kagan really stands out. In a Sunday Washington Post op-ed where he attacked Obama for not exerting serious pressure on Morsi to govern more inclusively, he took on Stephens’ and Brooks’ racism, albeit without mentioning their names:

It has …become fashionable once again to argue that Muslim Arabs are incapable of democracy – this after so many millions of them came out to vote in Egypt, only to see Western democracies do little or nothing when the product of their votes was overthrown. Had the United States showed similar indifference in the Philippines and South Korea, I suppose wise heads would still be telling us that Asians, too, have no vocation for democracy.

As to what Washington should do, Kagan was unequivocal:

Egypt is not starting over. It has taken a large step backward.

…Any answer must begin with a complete suspension of all aid to Egypt, especially military aid, until there is a new democratic government freely elected with the full participation of all parties and groups in Egypt, including the Muslim Brotherhood.

Kagan clearly played a leadership role in gathering support for his position from several other neoconservatives who comprise, along with a few liberal internationalists and human rights activists, part of the informal, three-year-old “Working Group on Egypt.” Thus, in a statement released by the Group Monday, Abrams, Ellen Bork from the neoconservative Foreign Policy Initiative (successor to the Project for the New American Century), and Reuel Marc Gerecht of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies joined Kagan in complaining that “the reliance on military intervention rather than a political process to resolve crises severely threatens Egypt’s progression to a stable democracy.”

As to the aid question, the group argued that:

The Obama administration should apply the law that requires suspending $1.5 billion in military and economic aid to Egypt following the removal of a democratically-elected leader by coup or military decree. Not only is this clearly required under U.S. law, but is the best way to make clear immediately to Egypt’s military that an expedient return to a legitimate, elected civilian government—avoiding the repression, widespread rights abuses, and political exclusion that characterized the 18 months of military rule after Mubarak’s fall—is Egypt’s only hope. It is the only way to achieve the stability and economic progress that Egyptians desperately want.Performing semantic or bureaucratic tricks to avoid applying the law would harm U. S. credibility to promote peaceful democratic change not only in Egypt but around the world, and would give a green light to other U.S.-backed militaries contemplating such interventions.

The Egyptian military has already shown its eagerness to secure U.S. and international acceptance of its action; Washington should not provide this cost-free. The military helped sow the seeds of the current crisis by failing to foster consensus on the political transition, and its promise to midwife a democratic transition now is just as uncertain. Suspending aid offers an incentive for the army to return to democratic governance as soon as possible, and a means to hold it accountable. Cajoling on democracy while keeping aid flowing did not work when the military ruled Egypt in the 18 months after Mubarak’s fall, and it did not work to move President Morsi either.

Remarkably, in an apparent break with its past practice regarding the Group’s statements, this one was not posted by the Weekly Standard. That may have been a simple oversight, but it may also indicate a disagreement between the two deans of third-age neoconservatives — Kagan and Bill Kristol — who also co-founded both PNAC and FPI. The Standard has pretty consistently taken a significantly harder line against U.S. engagement with political Islam than Kagan. Curiously, FDD, whose political orientation has bordered at times on Islamophobia, also did not post the statement on its website despite Gerecht’s endorsement. (Indeed, FDD’s president, Clifford May, wrote in the National Review Thursday that he agreed with both Brooks’ conclusion that “radical Islamists are incapable of running a modern government [and] …have absolutist, apocalyptic mind-sets…” and with the Journal’s recommendation that Washington should continue providing aid to the generals unless and until it becomes clear that they aren’t engaged in economic reform or guaranteeing “human rights for Christians and other minorities…”)

Abrams’ position has also been remarkable (particularly in light of his efforts to isolate and punish Hamas after it swept Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006 and his backing of the aborted putsch against the Hamas-led government in Gaza the following year). On Wednesday this week, he argued in the Standard that U.S. aid must be cut precisely for the reasons I cited at the beginning of this post.

Look back at all those things we want for Egypt, and the answer should be obvious: We will do our friends in Egypt no good by teaching the lesson that for us as for them law is meaningless. To use lexicographical stunts to say this was not really a coup, or to change the law because it seems inconvenient this week, would tell the Egyptians that our view and practice when it comes to law is the same as theirs: enforce the law when you like, ignore the law when you don’t. But this is precisely the wrong model to give Egypt; the converse is what we should be showing them as an ideal to which to aspire.

When the coup took place last week, Abrams took the same position, noting that “coups are a bad thing and in principle we should oppose them.” He then noted, however, that

…[M]ost of our aid to Egypt is already obligated, so the real damage to the Egyptian economy and to military ties should be slight – if the army really does move forward to new elections. …An interruption of aid for several months is no tragedy, so long as during those months we give good advice, stay close to the generals, continue counter-terrorism cooperation, and avoid further actions that create the impression we were on Morsi’s side.

In other words, follow the law because we, the U.S., are a nation of laws, but, at the same time, reassure the coupists and their supporters that we’re basically on their side. This is a somewhat more ambiguous message than that conveyed by Kagan, to say the least.

Indeed, despite the fact that coups are a “bad thing,” Abrams went on, “[t]he failure of the MB in Egypt is a very good thing” [in part, he continues, because it will weaken and further isolate Hamas]. Washington, he wrote, should draw lessons from the Egyptian experience, the most important of which is:

[W]e should always remember who our friends are and should support them: those who truly believe in liberty as we conceive it, minorities such as the Copts who are truly threatened and who look to us, allies such as the Israelis who are with us through thick and thin. No more resets, no more desperate efforts at engagement with places like Russia and Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood. A policy based on the simple principle of supporting our friends and opposing our enemies will do far more to advance the principles and interests of the United States.

Despite his call for Washington to stand faithfully by Israel, Abrams and the call to suspend aid were harshly criticized by Evelyn Gordon, writing in Commentary’s Contentions blog Wednesday, in which she argued that Israel’s security could be adversely affected by any such move:

The Republican foreign policy establishment, headed by luminaries such as Senator John McCain and former White House official Elliott Abrams, is urging an immediate cutoff of U.S. military aid to Egypt in response to the country’s revolution-cum-coup. The Obama administration has demurred, saying “it would not be wise to abruptly change our assistance program,” and vowed to take its time in deciding whether what happened legally mandates an aid cutoff, given the “significant consequences that go along with this determination.”

For once, official Israel is wholeheartedly on Obama’s side. Senior Israeli officials from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on down spent hours on the phone with their American counterparts this weekend to argue against an aid cutoff, and Israeli diplomats in Washington have been ordered to make this case to Congress as well. Israel’s reasoning is simple: An aid cutoff will make the volatile situation on its southern border even worse–and that is bad not only for Israel, but for one of America’s major interests in the region: upholding the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty.

Indeed,the implications of the coup on Israel and its security have been an explicit preoccupation for some neoconservatives. In her first jottings in the coup’s immediate aftermath, Jennifer Rubin, the neoconservative blogger at the Washington Post, praised the coup, called for massive economic assistance to stabilize the situation, and worried about Israel.

…Egypt may have escaped complete ruin by a skillfully timed military intervention, and there is no use denying that.

The primary and immediate crisis there is an economic one. As one Middle East observer put it: “They are broke. They can’t buy diesel. Without diesel they can’t feed their people.” This is precisely why the army was hesitant to again take over. Directly ruling the country would mean the economic meltdown becomes the army’s problem.

The United States and our Gulf allies should consider some emergency relief and beyond that provide considerable assistance in rebuilding an Egyptian economy, devastated by constant unrest and the evaporation of tourism.

Beyond that immediate concern, it will be critical to see whether the army-backed judge will adhere to the peace treaty with Israel and undertake its security operations in the Sinai. Things are looking more hopeful in that department if only because the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas’s parent, is now gone and disgraced. Egypt’s military has had good relations with both the United States and Israel so the issue may be more one of limited capability to police the Sinai (the army has to be fed, too) than lack of will.

Now, in fairness, none of this means that many — maybe even most — neoconservatives wouldn’t prefer a democratic Egypt as a general principle. Indeed, much of the advice offered by them over the past week has urged the administration and Congress to use aid and the threat of its withdrawal to coax the military into returning to the barracks, respect human rights, transfer power to civilians and eventually hold new elections in which Islamists should be permitted to participate in some fashion — if, for no other reason, than a failure to maintain some sense of a “democratic transition” (however cosmetic) could indeed force a cut-off in military aid. Such a move could present serious challenges to general U.S. security interests in the region and, as Gordon stressed, raise major questions about the durability of Camp David. But a democratic Egypt in which Islamists win presidential and parliamentary elections, draft a constitution ratified by a clear majority of the electorate and exercise real control over the army and the security forces? Judging from the past week’s commentary, most neoconservatives would much prefer Mubarak or a younger version of the same.

So, what can we conclude from this review about the importance of democracy promotion among the most prominent “third-era” neoconservative commentators, publications, and institutions? At best, there’s no consensus on the issue. And if there’s no consensus on the issue, democracy promotion can’t possibly be considered a core principle of neoconservatism, no matter how much Abrams and Vaisse would like, or appear to like it to be.

Photo Credit: Jonathan Rashad

As the situation on the ground in Syria becomes ever more fluid and the Assad regime appears to be tottering, a familiar group of hawks is calling for U.S. military action to fill the void. As reported by Foreign Policy‘s Josh Rogin, on Tuesday two prominent neoconservative groups, the [...]]]> via Lobe Log

As the situation on the ground in Syria becomes ever more fluid and the Assad regime appears to be tottering, a familiar group of hawks is calling for U.S. military action to fill the void. As reported by Foreign Policy‘s Josh Rogin, on Tuesday two prominent neoconservative groups, the Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI) and Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), released an open letter to President Obama calling for the use of U.S. airpower to establish “safe zones” in rebel-held areas. The letter suggests that “the United States cannot outsource its strategic and moral responsibilities to cynical great powers, regional actors who do not fully share our values, or international mediators. Only resolved U.S. leadership has the potential to halt the bloodshed and ensure the emergence of a Syria that advances America’s national security interests.”

The letter’s sixty-plus signatories include only three Syrians, but the roster will be rather familiar to those who remember the various open letters released by the FPI’s predecessor group, the Project for the New American Century (PNAC). These letters played a key role in the public runup to the Iraq war. Soon after the September 11 attacks, for example, a group of many of the same signatories as today’s letter claimed that “even if evidence does not link Iraq directly to the attack, any strategy aiming at the eradication of terrorism and its sponsors must include a determined effort to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.”

While the FPI/FDD letter includes a handful of Syrian opposition activists and human rights officials (notably Amnesty International’s Larry Cox), it remains dominated by neoconservative pundits (such as William Kristol, Robert Kagan, Michael Ledeen, Martin Peretz, and Cliff May) and Bush administration veterans (such as Karl Rove, Elliott Abrams, Douglas Feith, and John Hannah). (More information about most of these individuals can be found at RightWeb.) The full text and list of signatories can be found here, courtesy of Josh Rogin.

Weekly Reads/Watch:

Weekly Reads/Watch:

*This week’s must-reads/watch:

*Perhaps we spend too much time on hawkish commentary about Iran in the media and [...]]]> In response to a worrying trend in U.S. politics, Lobe Log publishes “Hawks on Iran” every Friday. Our posts highlight militaristic commentary and confrontational policy recommendations about Iran from a variety of sources including news articles, think tanks and pundits.

*Perhaps we spend too much time on hawkish commentary about Iran in the media and not enough on information that can be used to end the U.S.-Iran political impasse without the use of force. With that in mind, here’s a longer round-up of this week’s must-reads:

Ken Dilanian: U.S. intelligence chief sees limited benefit in an attack on Iran 

Fareed Zakaria: How history lessons could deter Iranian aggression

 

Scott Peterson: What would happen if Iran had the bomb? (+video)

Seyed Hossein Mousavian: How the Standoff Looks From Iran

Paul Pillar: Talks and Triumphalism

Matt Duss: The neocons’ big Iran lie

Mainstream Media and Pundits:

Wall Street Journal: Rarely does a week go by without the Journal’s editorial board publishing rabid, unsigned articles against Iran (rumored to be authored by former Jerusalem Post editor, Bret Stephens) while dismissing diplomacy and predicting military conflict. From “Iran Versus Everyone: The Islamic Republic’s belligerence threatens more than Israel”:

The larger story is that Iran is coming close to openly making war on the country it wants to wipe off the map. That’s an escalation from the more veiled (and often more deadly) warfare the Islamic Republic has waged against Israeli and Jewish targets for decades. It’s also an indication that the mullahs, far from seeking to de-escalate tensions with the West, are scrapping for a fight. They might get one.

It is in nobody’s interest, least of all America’s, to see a regional war erupt in the Middle East. It is even less in America’s interests to back our allies in Jerusalem into a corner where they feel they have no choice other than to fight, as they did in 1967. An Iran that seeks to murder diplomats across the globe is a threat to global security. The U.S. has an even larger interest than Israel in stopping it.

Alan Dershowitz in the WSJ: The pro-Israel Harvard Law Professor discusses how the U.S. can go to war with Iran:

U.S. retaliation could take the form of military action against Iran’s nuclear facilities. Though such action might be pre-emptive in its intention, it would be reactive as a matter of international law, since it would be in response to an armed attack by Iran. It wouldn’t require Security Council approval, since Article 51 of the U.N. Charter explicitly preserves the right of member nations to respond to any armed attack.

This is not to argue against such an attack if Iran decides not to go after soft American targets. It may become necessary for our military to target Iranian nuclear facilities if economic sanctions and diplomatic efforts do not succeed and if the Iranian government decides to cross red lines by militarizing its nuclear program and placing it in deep underground bunkers. But the legal justification for such an attack would be somewhat different. It would be predominantly pre-emptive or preventive, though it would have reactive elements as well, since Iran has armed our enemies in Iraq and caused the death of many American soldiers.

Daniel Schwammenthal in the WSJ: Director of the “AJC Transatlantic Institute in Brussels”, Daniel Schwammenthal, claims that containing Iran isn’t an option. His argument is published during the same month that an Iran anti-containment bill which would further restrict diplomacy options is being floated in Congress. Schwammenthal criticizes former President Jimmy Carter, journalist Fareed Zakaria and German diplomat Wolfgang Ischinger, for allegedly “downplaying the significance of the country’s weapons program”, even though U.S. and I.A.E.A. intelligence reports show there is no proof that Iran has a “weapons program”. Schwammenthal doesn’t call for war directly. Instead he rules out non-confrontational options while offering no solutions, but he does end his argument with a heavy dose of alarmism:

Following an atomic attack against a Western city, it would take investigators weeks if not months to determine the culprits, who may never be identified beyond reasonable doubt. It is hard to imagine any Western leader ordering a retaliatory nuclear strike, and thus the deaths of untold numbers of Iranian civilians, on the basis of inconclusive evidence months after the initial attack. Tehran would be quite rational to count on Western scruples in such a case.

The day after Iran’s first nuclear test would not be a normal day. Nor could the danger be contained.

(Check out another frightening article about Iran that was published in the WSJ’s opinion section this week: The Iranian Threat to New York City)

Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post: While quoting well-known hawks, the staunchly pro-Israel blogger seems worried by the prospect of talks between U.S. and Iranian officials:

Meanwhile, critics of the administration are increasingly worried that, in downplaying talk of a military option and dangling the hope for a “diplomatic” solution, the president is headed for a diplomatic morass — either because he naively thinks there is a deal to be made or because he doesn’t want conflict in an election year. Jamie Fly of the Foreign Policy Initiative tells me, “To accept this regime as a serious negotiating partner at this point is ludicrous and will only give them more time to enrich uranium and take the final steps towards a nuclear weapons capability. Just as serious sanctions are finally being implemented is the worst time to ease the pressure.”

Mike Singh of the Washington Institute also cautions: “I think that the real risk is that Iran will once again use talks simply to delay and distract, rather than for a serious discussion of international concerns regarding its nuclear activities. The Iranian regime has a strong incentive to dissipate the considerable momentum of the sanctions campaign.”

James Kirchick in Haaretz: The Foundation for Defense of Democracies fellow and New Republic contributing editor, James Kirchick, urges the U.S. to pursue regime change in Iran:

…the long-term goal of the United States and the entire free world should be the downfall of the mullahs. Washington ought to pursue nonviolent ways of preventing Iran from attaining nuclear weapons, and work to limit its destabilizing behavior. But it must never adopt a policy that would consign the Iranian people to indefinite tyranny.

Weiss mainly focuses on Israel-Palestine and human [...]]]> As the humanitarian horrors in Syria continue, the debate about foreign intervention intensifies. Today the Daily Telegraph published a pro-intervention blog post by Michael Weiss, who heads Communications and Public Relations at the Henry Jackson Society, a self-described “non-partisan” think tank with neoconservative affiliations.

Weiss mainly focuses on Israel-Palestine and human rights in the Middle East. He also headed “Just Journalism”, a media monitoring organization focused on “how Israel and Middle East issues are reported in the UK” prior to its September 2011 closure (lack of funding was cited). His own work has been widely published and last month Foreign Affairs printed his “What it Will Take to Intervene in Syria“, where he argued that intervention “at this moment would be premature” and then proceeded to describe how it could be executed anyway. Less than a month later the crux of Weiss’s position is that Bashar al-Assad is no longer a legitimate leader and Iran and Russia are already “intervening” in Syria, so the West should too:

…Russia, Iran and Hezbollah have all been “intervening” in Syria’s internal affairs for ten months now. Meanwhile, the Arab League, the United States and the European Union have all determined that any claim to sovereignty Assad might have had in 2011 is null and void in 2012. What is needed, therefore, is not condemnations, demarches and shuttered embassies but a Western equivalent of intervention in Syria, namely in the form of:

• Humanitarian “safe areas” to provide food, aid and medical supplies to the civilian population and give the various opposition groups a headquarters inside their own country
• Advanced weapons and communication devices for the Syrian rebels
• A no-fly zone to stop the regime from using its aircraft to conduct reconnaissance, offload security personnel and – yes – strafe rebel strongholds from the sky.

Weiss also strongly criticizes the US, UK and France for not working to push the Assad government out more forcibly:

Hillary Clinton, William Hague and Alain Juppe can grumble all they like about travesties at Turtle Bay and the inevitability of Assad’s fall. Even if they got their toothless Security Council resolution calling for Assad’s departure, then what? Would he pack up and go quietly? If so, where to? How’s the tabouleh in the Black Sea?

Shadi Hamid of the Brookings Institution, who supported intervention in Libya in the very early stages of the uprising, wrote in CNN today that Russia and China’s vetoing of last week’s United Nations draft Security Council resolution on Syria has made the reality on the ground more dangerous for Syrians. He accordingly urges more consideration of the “various military options available” (while conceding that taking such action is currently premature) and makes the case that Western powers have in fact been reluctant to intervene despite growing necessity:

The “anti-imperialists” will, as they often do, cry foul. This time, though, they will find themselves on the wrong side. None of the Western powers has come out in even tepid support of military intervention. Consumed by their own internal problems, this is not at all something they want. But it may be something the Syrian people need.

Yesterday US intelligence veteran and foreign policy analyst Paul Pillar wrote that one reason why Russia and China vetoed the UN draft resolution was because of their experience with Libya:

The Russians in particular made it clear they were determined not to fall again for what they regarded as a bait and switch on Libya, in which a NATO military intervention that received multilateral support on humanitarian grounds quickly morphed into support for toppling the Libyan regime.

Pillar appears to be adamantly on the anti-intervention side. He argues that foreign intervention in Libya has given Iran and North Korea “the worst possible message” with respect to their own security interests and alleged nuclear ambitions and that “Sectarian divisions in Syria would make the aftermath of even a low-cost regime-toppling intervention messier than Libya.”

The American Security Projects’ Joshua Foust also weighed in on the Libya/Syria comparison in the context of the intervention debate in the Atlantic today:

In a vacuum, intervening to prevent mass killings in Libya made sense. Libya, however, did not (and does not) exist in a vacuum. It has both internal and regional politics. So does Syria. The failure to gain international buy-in to do something — not necessarily militarily but some response — to the atrocities there is a direct consequence of interventionists ignoring politics in their rush to do good. Unfortunately, the people of Syria are now paying the price, and will continue to do so.

As reported by Josh Rogin in Foreign Policy, this weekend several members of congress touched on the Syria intervention debate at the 2012 Munich Security Conference as well. Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman John Kerry echoed Pillar and Foust’s argument that “Syria is not Libya” but added that:

…nobody should interpret that statement to suggest that it means that Syrian leaders can rely on the notion that they can act with impunity and not expect the international community to assist the Syrian people in some way.

Interestingly, while senate hawks John McCain and Joe Lieberman had harsher words for Russia and China, they, like Kerry, avoided advocating intervention directly. According to Lieberman:

What’s happening in Syria today is exactly what we got involve in Libya to stop from happening…. I understand Syria is more complicated, but one choice we don’t have is just to stand back and let the government kill people who are fighting for their own freedom.

Pro-interventionists like Weiss aside, many of whom have been arguing for the West to go into Syria for months (consider the output of the hawkish Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Foreign Policy Initiative on the issue), the trend in Washington seems to be that more could and should be done about Syria, but other considerations are getting in the way. Meanwhile, according to a poll conducted by Shibley Telhami in October, an overwhelming majority from the Arab countries he surveyed support the Syrian rebels over the government, but are divided about foreign intervention. During the question-answer period of the poll’s launch event at the Brookings Institution, Telhami added that Syrians themselves are also “divided” on the issue: “My suspicion is many Syrians want international intervention, many don’t.”

It will be interesting to see how ongoing brutality by Assad’s forces will affect this debate not only among the most important actors, the Syrian people, but foreign governments too.