The neo-conservative dream faded in 2006

The ambitions proclaimed when the neo-cons’ mission statement “The
Project for the New American Century” was declared in 1997 have turned
into disappointment and recriminations as the crisis in Iraq has grown.

“The Project for the New American Century” has been
reduced to a voice-mail box and a ghostly website. A single employee
has been left to wrap things up.

The idea of the “Project” was to project American power and influence around the world.

The 1997 statement (written during the administration of President Bill Clinton) said:

“We seem to have forgotten the essential elements of the Reagan
Administration’s success: a military that is strong and ready to meet
both present and future challenges; a foreign policy that boldly and
purposefully promotes American principles abroad; and national
leadership that accepts the United States’ global responsibilities.”

Among the signatories were many of the senior officials who would later
determine policy under President George W Bush – Dick Cheney, Donald
Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Elliot Abrams and Lewis Libby – as well as
thinkers including Francis Fukuyama, Norman Podheretz and Frank
Gaffney.

The neo-conservatives were called that because they
sought to re-establish what they felt were true conservative values in
the Republican Party and the United States.

They wanted to stop what they felt were the
isolationist tendencies that had developed under President Clinton, and
even under the pragmatic President George Bush senior.

They saw the war in Iraq as their big chance of showing how the “New American Century” might work.

They predicted the development of democratic values in a region lacking
in them and, in that way, the removal of any threat to the United
States just as the democratisation of Germany and Japan after World War
II had transformed Europe and the Pacific.

Attack

Since so much was pinned on Iraq, it is inevitable that the problems there should have undermined the whole idea.

“Neo-conservatism has gone for a generation, if in fact it ever
returns,” says one of the movement’s critics, David Rothkopf, currently
at the Carnegie Endowment in Washington, and a former official in the
Clinton administration.

“Their signal enterprise was the invasion of Iraq and their
failure to produce results is clear. Precisely the opposite has
happened,” he says.

“The US use of force has been seen as doing wrong and as inflaming a region that has been less than susceptible to democracy.

“Their plan has fallen on hard times. There were flaws in the
conception and horrendously bad execution. The neo-cons have been
undone by their own ideas and the incompetence of the Bush
administration.

“George Bush is about the last neo-conservative
standing, Cheney as well maybe. Bush is not an analytical person so he
just adopted the neo-cons’ philosophy.

“It fitted into his Manichean, his black and white view
of the world. After all, he gave up his dissolute youth and was born
again as a new man, so it appealed to his character.”

In-fighting

The fading of the dream has led to a falling-out among the neo-conservatives themselves.

In particular, two leading neo-conservatives, Richard Perle and Kenneth
Adelman, attacked the Bush team in Vanity Fair magazine. Both had been
on a Pentagon advisory board. Both had argued for war in Iraq.

In an article called “Neo Culpa”, Richard Perle
declared that had he known how it would turn out, he would have been
against it: “I think now I probably would have said: ‘No, let’s
consider other strategies’.”

Kenneth Adelman said: “They turned out to be among the most incompetent teams in the post-war era.

“Not only did each of them, individually, have enormous flaws, but together they were deadly, dysfunctional.”

Donald Rumsfeld “fooled me”, he said.

He declared of neo-conservatism after Iraq: “It’s not going to sell.”

Defence and counter-attack

Other neo-conservatives defend their record, arguing strongly that the
original idea had an effect, and pressing the point raised by Perle and
Adelman that it was the execution of the idea not the idea itself that
was wrong.

Gary Schmitt used to be a senior figure at the “New American Century”
project. Now he is director of strategic studies at the American
Enterprise Institute (AEI), and he says the project has come to a
natural end.

“When the project started, it was not intended to go
forever. That is why we are shutting it down. We would have had to
spend too much time raising money for it and it has already done its
job.

“We felt at the time that there were flaws in American
foreign policy, that it was neo-isolationist. We tried to resurrect a
Reaganite policy.

“Our view has been adopted. Even during the Clinton
administration we had an effect, with Madeleine Albright [then
secretary of state] saying that the United States was ‘the
indispensable nation’.

“But our ideas have not necessarily dominated. We did
not have anyone sitting on Bush’s shoulder. So the work now is to see
how they are implemented. Obviously it makes life difficult with the
specific failure in Iraq, but I do not agree with Richard Perle that we
should never have gone in.

“I do argue that the execution should have been better.
In fact, I argued in late 2003 that we needed more troops and a proper
counter-insurgency policy.”

Indeed, not all neo-conservatives have given up all hope in Iraq.

The AEI, which has become the natural home for refugees from the
American Project, is promoting an article entitled: “Choosing Victory:
A Plan for Success in Iraq”.

The article calls not for a withdrawal of US troops but
for an increase. President Bush’s decision is expected in early
January.

Paul.Reynolds-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk