Kagan on the Kerry Doctrine

Robert Kagan of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace identifies a misleading (or ignorant) statement about the United States' historical use of force and entry into war that John Kerry made in his speech accepting the Democratic Party nomination:

As president, I will bring back this nation's time-honored tradition: The United States of America never goes to war because we want to; we only go to war because we have to. That is the standard of our nation.

As Kagan points out, going to war only out of necessity is clearly not the standard of the United States: "The United States has sent forces into combat dozens of times over the past century and a half, and only twice, in World War II and in Afghanistan, has it arguably done so because it "had to"." However, more disturbing than Kerry's rewriting of history is the effect that this may have on the international stage. Only enbarking upon wars that are "necessary", which I assume would limit it to situations where the United States' interests are directly threatened, would create an image of a United States as an aloof, arrogant power without concern for the rest of the world. As Kagan argues, this stand would rule out many of the military activities that the US has committed itself to in the last decade:

If Kerry has revealed himself in an unusual moment of honesty, it's time everyone took an equally honest look at where he would lead the country if elected. Kerry's "doctrine of necessity," if seriously intended, would entail a pacifism and an isolationism more thorough than any attempted by a U.S. government since the 1930s. It would rule out all wars fought for humanitarian ends, all interventions to prevent genocide, to defend democracy or even, as in the case of the Persian Gulf War, to uphold international law against aggression. For those are all wars of choice.

For someone who professes to seek better relations with the rest of the world, Kerry's doctrine of necessity would base American foreign policy on narrow, selfish interests far more than the alleged "unilateralism" of the Bush administration. Some Europeans have been quietly worrying that what they consider Bush's overambitious foreign policy will be followed in the United States by an isolationist backlash. After hearing Kerry's speech, they may worry a bit more.

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