The Neocons Implode

So, it’s finally come to this in Iraq:

BAGHDAD, March 27 (Reuters) – Iraq’s ruling Shi’ite Islamist Alliance bloc demanded on Monday that U.S. forces return control of security to the Iraqi government after what it called "cold-blooded" killings by troops of unarmed people in a mosque.

It has been fascinating to watch the neocon establishment in Washington form into a circular firing squad as they watch their excellent experiment in democratic nation-building through war dissolve into a bloody civil war. The leading thinker of the movement – Francis Fukuyama – was the first neocon apostate, and in his new book America at the Crossroads he calls into question the basic guiding neoconservative principle: using preemptive war to create democracy.  Fukuyama discussed this his interview in Der Spiegel last week:

Fukuyama: Wir glaubten, dass die Motive der Vereinigten Staaten besser sind als die von anderen Leuten und dass man uns diese Art von Macht anvertrauen kann. Die Neokonservativen haben gedacht, dass Amerika moralischer sei als andere Länder und dass andere Leute verstehen, dass unsere Hegemonie so viel wohlwollender ist als die von vergangenen Imperien. Das haben sie falsch eingeschätzt. […] Der Irak-Krieg hat natürlich eine ganze Menge Schaden in allen möglichen Bereichen angerichtet. Es wird mindestens eine Generation dauern, um die vorherige Modellrolle Amerikas und den Respekt, den es genossen hat, in der Welt wieder herzustellen. Wenn wir jetzt von Demokratie sprechen, denken die Leute doch nur an Abu Ghureib und Guantanamo.

(Note: you can read the Spiegel interview in English here and listen to an interview with Fukuyama about his book here).

Fukuyama’s words have drawn blood in Washington among the neocon taithful.  Today, the torture apologist Charles Krauthammer delivers a scathing attack on his former friend Fukuyama in the Washington Post.  In particular, Krauthammer scoffs at Fukuyama’s rejection of preemptive war:

Fukuyama’s book is proof of this proposition about the lack of the plausible alternative. The alternative he proposes for the challenges of Sept. 11 — new international institutions, new forms of foreign aid and sundry other forms of "soft power" — is a mush of bureaucratic make-work in the face of a raging fire.

Krauthammer has been one of the most vocal advocates in Washington for military strikes against Iran. 

Now other neocons are changing their tune and pointing fingers.  William Kristol defends the "idea" of the war, but now says its execution was bungled through incompetence.  Kristol calls for Rumsfeld’s resignation. And the grandfather of the movement – William F. Buckley – calls on President Bush to "admit defeat". Michael Leeden loves preemptive war in theory, but Iraq is "the wrong war, wrong time, wrong way, wrong place." Richard Perle would never admit he was wrong, but says he"got the war right and the aftermath wrong." Finally, war-lover Andrew Sullivan moans that under Bush and Rumfeld’s incompetent leadership the US military had abandoned "America’s long tradition of humane warfare."  Humane warfare?? Is Sullivan thinking of Vietnam, perhaps?  Or maybe the atomic bomb in Hiroshima?

It would be very amusing to watch this necon meltdown if the human consequences of their delusions had not been so tragic.

Fukuyama neoconservatism Iraq Irak-Krieg