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Kurt Wallace: This is Kurt Wallace and our guest today on Rare is Herbert London president of the London Center for Policy Research and Senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Herbert thanks for being with us today on Rare.
Herbert London: Pleasure to be with you Kurt.
Kurt Wallace: Let’s talk about the broader perspective on foreign policy in the United States. I’m a libertarian and we have certain ideas on how foreign policy should work in this country and then we have this policy that we’ve seen over the last decade of more of an intervention in the Middle East and around the world that sort of thing. What is your position at the London Center for Policy Research on foreign policy.
Herbert London: Well let me give you my position on this matter. Because I don’t like labels like libertarian or neoconservative or conservative or any of the above. The United States has certain foreign policy obligations. The president of the United States seems to believe that the alternatives are either war or capitulation. I don’t accept either of those.
I don’t think we should be going to war, I don’t think intervention is necessary. But there are times that American interests are at stake and those are the times when some sort of policy has to be developed for a strategy for dealing with those issues. It doesn’t necessarily mean the deployment of forces. But it might very well be a whole range of activities from a show of force to obviously providing some assistance to our allies. So, there’s an awful lot in this game rather than neo-isolationism where the United States says to the rest of the world ‘we don’t care, we’re not involved, we’re not going to be involved in any of the activities that you’re engaged in at the moment’. The notion that the United States does not want war is understandable. But as Trotsky, and I don’t normally quote Trotsky, once said ‘You may not want war but war may want you’.
The spill over of the effects of the Middle East to the United States are profound. They occurred on 9/11 and they could occur again. So, for the United States to simply say we’re going to put our head in the sand, we’re not going to respond to any of the events on world affairs is on its face rather absurd. To suggest that the United States could be policemen of the world is equally absurd. But in between these two extremes lies some element of American strategy and policy that I think is worth pursuing.
Kurt Wallace: It sounds like you’re looking at it more of a foreign policy of restraint vs. one of the other – burying our heads in the sand or going out policing and looking for monsters to slay so to speak. This issue has to be dealt with as also something that represents the American people and where does that fit in constitutionally?
Herbert London: Well the American people obviously are largely a manifestation of the foreign policy direction. However, the American people are led. They need a leadership. In WWII for example up until 1941 December 7th of 1941 the American people were opposed to any war with Japan or Nazi Germany. And yet after 1941 things changed very dramatically. Now Roosevelt obviously provided some leadership on that matter. And there are presidents who provide leadership and change the character of national opinion. National opinion is critical, foreign policy doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It exists in large part because of the way in which people think about the deployment of American forces – the use of force under any circumstances.
So, the president to some degree is limited by what the American people think. That is when one talks about the Constitution the president of the United States is our foreign policy maker as the commander in chief of the armed forces. He makes those decisions. Of course a declaration of war has to be approved by the congress. That we know, but at the same time if we’re not declaring war but engaged in as I indicated in a variety of different actions, those are largely in the purview of the President of the United States with a responsibility for the national security. So again, I think you can operate constitutionally. But if you’re going to declare war it seems to me you’ve got to do more than simply say we think this is a war like moment we’ve got get approval of the congress to do so.
Kurt Wallace: Let’s look at the beheading of an American journalist by ISIS. Krauthammer is calling it an act of war. Sean Hannity, a lot of people that are considered neocons, Dick Cheney, they’re looking at this as an act of war. Where do you see this?
Herbert London: I see this as more than simply a simple act that requires policing action. We now know something about the fellow who committed the act. And I certainly hope that he will be brought to justice. But it’s far more significant than that. It’s the barbarity and savagery of ISIS that has already made it clear that it intends to create a caliphate across the Middle East. It is a powerful army, it has a very interesting logistics. It has attained American equipment as it marched through the both Iraqi territory as well as Syria. And so it is a dangerous force in the Middle East and I would regard not that one act but the variety of acts on the part of ISIS as a casus belli. So, my feeling is it is an act of war and the United States has an obligation to respond. Particularly because our allies are put in jeopardy. I’m not merely referring to Israel here, I’m referring to Egypt, I’m referring to Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Kurt Wallace: Well they have more enemies than just that they’re really making enemies all around them ISIS is. In terms of cause and effect though, we went in there. Dick Cheney said back in the early 90’s said that if we go in there we’ll create a vacuum. It’s a big mistake to go into Iraq. We actually did that during the Bush administration and now we’re seeing whats unfolding here and some could argue that it’s because Obama withdrew too early but how long are we supposed to stay in a country and police that country and really the only option that I could see is that we would go in there and colonize it and make it a US territory if we’re really going to do something with it.
Herbert London: Well that’s an absurd point. we’re not going to make it a US colony. The deployment of American forces, say something in the order of say 15,000 per brigade, would not have meant that we’ve colonized Iraq. It would have forestalled any of the activities of ISIS and keep in mind we maintained forces in Korea and it has maintained a relative peace between North and South Korea since the 1950s.
So, when you say that it’s not a good idea to maintain forces we do not like the idea of playing global policemen. But at the same time we don’t like disequilibrium either. And the fact is that the stability that has been provided most places on the globe have been brought about because of the United States military. And we cannot overlook that fact. Now if the United States had deployed forces in Iraq and the President had stood up to Maliki and said you know something I think that the standing agreement is something that we want to pursue instead of simply bugging out, I think we could have forestalled the activities of ISIS. That a guess of course, there’s no way of knowing what might have happened. But at the same time and I think that it makes sense for the United States to maintain a force in Iraq considering the extraordinary accomplishments of the United States army.
Kurt Wallace: Now the actual cause of this though is that we created the vacuum by going in there in the first place.
Herbert London: Well that’s another question but you’re overlooking one central fact here. It’s something called 9/11. On 9/11, this country was attacked. Cheney to use one of the examples of the Bush administration said ‘we’ve got to clean this swamp’. And while Iraq didn’t seem to be the prime player people forget that the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center was organized in a large part in Iraq. So, Iraq also had extremist that need to be dealt with. So when you see the evidence of that now. Who was the Suni radical that we were so concerned about is in fact the father of ISIS. So, there is no question that there is a relationship between what happened in 9/11 and the deployment of American forces. Should we have engaged in building a nation in Iraq? I don’t think so.
I think we should have gone in, gotten rid of Saddam Hussein and gotten out. But that’s again no more than playing Monday morning quarterback. And that’s not an entirely fair historical perspective. If I were in Cheney’s shoes I don’t know how I would have responded when 3,000 Americans lost their lives in both the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. So, you have to remember this country was attacked. More formidably than in WWII, more formidably than Pearl Harbor. And so Americans were looking for a response and you talked about national opinion. Well it was very strong nationalistic sentiment that was organized during that period. That was manifest in the way in which Americans responded to this attack. So, there was a natural understanding that we would go into Afghanistan and Iraq. At least two of the nations that were part of the swamp.
Kurt Wallace: Now I would have supported the use of force against Afghanistan. I also would have supported the use of the Letters of Marque and Reprisal to actually target terrorist groups as a strategy that renders the enemy blind to who they can trust, having the so-called wanted dead or alive on their head and the pay for performance aspect of that. Rather than draining our resources and putting out military as targets in Afghanistan or Iraq. And that was introduced back in 2001 right after 9/11 a month after Congressman Ron Paul introduced that as a measure of and sort of a declaration of war against a terrorist organization rather than invading and policing countries, like you’re saying, has also not worked.
Herbert London: Well, I indicated already that attempting to build a nation an infrastructure in Iraq made any sense. Nor do I believe that you can simply export democracy. But at the same time just as you or I are engaged in Monday morning quarterbacking, so are you. Because you’re telling me that this strategy would have been more effective. There’s no way of knowing that. So, I think it’s an engaging experience to talk about the speculation. But it’s entirely speculation. You recognize that and I recognize that.
Kurt Wallace: Now is war a last resort policy?
Herbert London: In my judgement it is. War should be a last resort. The difference that I very often had with Ron Paul among others is I believe preemption is a very sensible policy. That is there are times when as the U.N. charter seems to indicate anticipatory self-defense. Where the United States goes out and attacks an enemy that we know wants to attack us.
Now again there are some who believe that preemption is basically immoral. I do not. I believe it is a moral way of dealing with foreign policy. If you are sure that a nation is going to attack then you should attack them first. Israel did that in 1967. I believe that is was quite appropriate for Israel to do so. The troops were marshalled along the Arab borders and Israel attacked first recognizing the fact that they could not allow the Arabs to attack them. When they did not attack first in 1973 they almost lost the country. So, again it is a question of what you think is an appropriate action in order to protect the people in your state.
Kurt Wallace: Now a declaration of war would mean that the war already exists which means that we have already been attacked and that’s when congress would act on a declaration of war, so in the construct of the Constitution that’s what it looks like. But what you’re saying is that if it’s eminent then we should attack first.
Herbert London: That’s correct. That’s exactly what I’m saying. And I think that it’s a question of how do you judge an eminent attack? It’s not easy but it seems to me that there are times when you have to behave in that manner. I’ll just give you one scenario very briefly. Let’s assume that a nation for example possessed nuclear weapons. Let’s also assume that it possessed the missiles to carry and capable of delivering those missiles. And let’s also say that they said time and again “we want to use these missiles to destroy you”. And that they have of course strategy for putting those missiles in place. A logistical plan for using those missiles against the United States. Would it be wise to simply wait for a nuclear weapon to strike the United States before we declared war? Or would it be appropriate to declare war against them before the missiles hit the United States? You answer the question.
Kurt Wallace: Well, you know Reagan demonstrated a foreign policy of restraint by building up a massive military and we never went to war under the circumstances that you’re describing. So, I would say that there are measures that we could take to avoid war through policy and strength and leadership.
Herbert London: Peace through strength is obviously not only the statement of Ronald Reagan. It’s a statement that goes back to Biblical history and I happen to believe in it. But Ronald Reagan never confronted a situation of the kind that I’m describing. It was more on the order of the Cuban missile crisis. Where in fact the president of the United States did in fact avoid war but only by threatening war of his own. So, again you know the circumstances vary from place to place and time to time. The point that I’m trying to make is that preemption of one kind or another may be necessary. You want to avoid it but may be necessary in order to protect the people of your own country.
Kurt Wallace: Herbert London President of the London Center for Policy Research thanks for being with us today on Rare.
Herbert London: Great pleasure to be with you Kurt, thank you so much.