THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume VIII, Issue # 118, July 9, 2006
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
THE U.S.A. DEFENDS ITS ALLIES
By Dr. Michael Rubin
UNITED STATES FOREIGN & NATIONAL SECURITY POLICY: U.S. DEFENSE OF ALLIES FROM AGGRESSION IS A POLICY
REMARKABLT CONSISTENT & BIPARTISAN -- THE U.S. CONGRESS UNITES IN THE FACE OF AGGRESSION AGAINST THE
U.S.A. OR ITS ALLIES -- THE PLEDGE OF U.S. PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH TO PROTECT ISRAEL MILITARILY AGAINST IRAN IS
NEITHER UNIQUE NOR COUNTER TO AMERICAN NATIONAL INTERESTS
FULL STORY:
Asked on February 1, 2006, whether the United States of America would protect Israel militarily against Iran, President
George W. Bush left no doubt: "You bet, we'll defend Israel."
To some realists, his statement was evidence that Israel had become a strategic liability to the U.S.A. A few prominent Jewish
leaders, worried that Jews might be blamed for any military conflict with Iran, urged Bush to tone down his statements
pledging support for Israel.
Abraham Foxman, National Director of the Anti-Defamation League, explained:
"We are basically telling the President: We appreciate it, we
welcome it. But, hey, because there is this debate on Iraq,
where people are trying to put the blame on us, maybe you
shouldn't say it that often or that loud."
In reality, though, Bush's pledge of support to Israel is neither new nor special. While critics of U.S. foreign policy and the
Bush administration suggest that U.S. wars are fought for either Israel or oil, history suggests otherwise. In the last 15 years,
the U.S. military has intervened, not only in Iraq and Afghanistan -- both part of the war on terrorism -- but also in Somalia,
Haiti, Bosnia and Kosovo, in each case for humanitarian purposes.
That the U.S.A. would act to defend its allies should not surprise anyone. While U.S. professors proffer informed comment
that Iranian leaders do not mean what they say, policymakers have learned to take the opinion of academic experts with a
grain of salt. One week before Iraq invaded Kuwait, The Times (London) reported, "The consensus among Middle
East experts ... was that Iraq would not invade Kuwait."
After Saddam Hussein demonstrated that sometimes dictators mean what they say, President George H.W. Bush did not go
wobbly. Before a joint session of Congress, on September 11, 1990, Bush declared,
"Our objectives in the Persian Gulf are clear, our goals
defined and familiar: Iraq must withdraw from Kuwait
completely, immediately, and without condition.
Kuwait's legitimate government must be restored."
Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt may receive plaudits in certain crowds for arguing that Israel is a strategic
liability to the United States, but the fact remains that the U.S.A. went to war in 1991 not to protect Israel, but to protect
Saudi Arabia and liberate Kuwait. That it did so was correct.
U.S. defense of allies from aggression is not limited to the Middle East. In both Korea and Vietnam, invasions by Communist
states of U.S. allies sparked full-scale war. President Harry S Truman recorded the lowest popularity ever among U.S.
Presidents, in part because of high casualties and domestic criticism of his engagement in an "open-ended" conflict. He
understood -- as have subsequent Presidents -- that U.S. credibility among its allies is more important than any snapshot poll.
Today, the U.S.A. maintains 35,000 troops in South Korea, and Truman ranks among the top five Presidents in polls by
American historians.
As costly as a war with China would be, U.S. administrations have made clear that Washington would consider military action
to defend Taiwan from Chinese aggression. In 1979, Congress passed the Taiwan Relations Act that declared it necessary to
provide arms to Taiwan and "to maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of
coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people of Taiwan." Early in his first term,
against the backdrop of a crisis with Beijing, George W. Bush declared that, if the Peoples' Republic of China attacked Taiwan,
the U.S.A. would do "whatever it took to help Taiwan defend itself".
Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad may believe their anti-Israel rhetoric resonates
with both their domestic audience and the Arab street. They may believe that Washington is too weak to respond. Addressing
the United States on the seventeenth anniversary of the death of Islamic Republic founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini,
Khamenei asked, "Why do you [the U.S.A.] not admit that you are weak and your razor is blunt?"
But, despite Bush administration equivocation about its democratization policy, the strain of U.S. involvement in Iraq and
Afghanistan and the failure of the White House to stand by its previously declared red lines, Tehran would be mistaken to
believe that the U.S. government neither had the will nor the capacity to stand by Israel or any other ally. If forced to act,
Washington would and could. The U.S. Air Force and Navy remain unencumbered. While no serious policymaker discusses
occupation of Iran, the Islamic Republic's leadership would not likely survive, should it push the White House into conflict
over Israel or, for that matter, over Washington's allies in the Persian Gulf.
On certain issues, U.S. policy is remarkably consistent and bipartisan. No matter how poisonous political battles are in
Washington, Congress unites in the face of aggression against the United States or its allies. Bush's pledge to protect Israel is
neither unique nor counter to U.S. interests. For Tehran or any other state to believe otherwise or engage in policies that would
challenge the White House on its fundamental duties to its allies would represent a serious miscalculation.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
War & Peace in the Real World
Page Two
Page One
The Israeli-Arab Conflict
The Middle East & the Problem of Iran
The Far East & U.S. Foreign Policy
Islamism & Jihadism -- The Threat of Radical Islam
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
Middle East -- Arabs, Arab States,
& Their Middle Eastern Neighbors
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
Counterterrorism & U.S. National Security
U.S. National Security Strategy
Dr. Michael Rubin, a Ph.D. in History (Yale University) and a specialist in Middle Eastern politics, Islamic culture and Islamist
ideology, is Editor of the Middle East Quarterly and a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute for Public
Policy Research. Dr Rubin is author of Into the Shadows: Radical Vigilantes in Khatami's Iran (Washington Institute
for Near East Policy, 2001) and is co-author, with Dr. Patrick Clawson, of Eternal Iran: Continuity and Chaos (Palgrave
Macmillan, 2005). Dr. Rubin served as political advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad (2003-2004); staff
advisor on Iran and Iraq in the Office of the U.S. Secretary of Defense (2002-2004); visiting lecturer in the Departments of
History and International Relations at Hebrew University of Jerusalem (2001-2002); visiting lecturer at the Universities of
Sulaymani, Salahuddin, and Duhok in Iraqi Kurdistan (2000-2001); Soref Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East
Policy (1999-2000); and visiting lecturer in the Department of History at Yale University (1999-2000). He has been a fellow at
the Council of Foreign Relations, the Leonard Davis Institute at Hebrew University, and the Carnegie Council on Ethics and
International Affairs.
The foregoing article by Michael Rubin was originally published in Bitterlemons International, July 6, 2006, and can
be found on the Internet website maintained by the Middle East Forum.
Republished with Permission of the Middle East Forum
Reprinted from the Middle East Forum News
mefnews@meforum.org (MEF NEWS)
July 9, 2006
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