Barack Obama made an excellent — even inspiring — speech Sunday, before American and other coalition troops in Afghanistan. He expressed a boundless appreciation of our soldiers and a sense of ongoing commitment to the fight there.
The president told the audience in uniform, “You’ve earned your place next to the very greatest of American generations.” That’s more than an expression of gratitude; it’s a declaration that reflects the historic magnitude of their fight.
On winning, Obama said, “I am confident all of you are going to get the job done right here in Afghanistan,” and he described “our mission” to “disrupt and dismantle, defeat and destroy al Qaeda and its extremist allies.” One could quibble with the absence of the word victory, but it hardly seems worth it. After all, as he talks about the “defeat” of our enemies, our own victory is self-evident.
The line that earned the biggest spontaneous show of enthusiasm was about commitment: “The United States of America does not quit once is starts on something. You don’t quit, the American armed services does not quit. We keep at it and we persevere, and together with our partners we will prevail. I am absolutely confident of that.” After the long, uncertain policy-decision period last fall, it’s important that he hammer that message home as frequently as possible.
Obama talked about “bringing hope and opportunity to a people who have known a lot of pain and a lot of suffering.” It would have been nice to hear him mention freedom or consensual governance, but it’s important to remember that this was not a policy speech. It was a morale booster for the men and women fighting abroad.
The president offered his most robust defense of American exceptionalism since his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech in December. “In an uncertain world the United States of America will always stand up for the security of nations and the dignity of human beings,” he said. “That is who we are. That is what we do.”
This was a contender for the best speech of Obama’s presidency thus far. May he continue to inspire on Afghanistan. And may some of that inspiration leak into other foreign policy areas, where notions of America’s commitment and the protection of human dignity have been found disgracefully absent.
Rare Praise for Andrew Sullivan
I don’t often give props these days to Andrew Sullivan, but give credit where it’s due: Andrew is willing to (tacitly) concede error. After accusing me of “glossing over” General Petraeus’s supposed criticisms of Israel, he now links to my Commentary item and to an item I had linked to by Philip Klein of the American Spectator explicating Petraeus’s actual, even-handed position — in the general’s own words. Andrew quotes another commentator acknowledging, “There really does seem to be not very much to the story about Petraeus,” and says the point is well taken.
True, Andrew does make a weak attempt to salvage something out of a story that has not gone his way:
Whatever. I don’t think even the most rabid pro-Israel partisan would argue that American and Israeli interests are 100 percent the same. For instance, the U.S. had a major interest in toppling Saddam Hussein, whereas most Israelis didn’t care much whether he stayed in power or not. (Putting the lie, incidentally, to the risible Walt-Mearsheimer claims that the Zionist Lobby was behind the Iraq War.)
But in the present instance, Andrew is a model of intellectual honesty compared to Diana West and her acolytes on the extreme Right who continue to fulminate against Petraeus (and me) — see, e.g., this and this – posts that display, as usual with this crowd, an utter disregard for basic facts and the conventions of rational debate. Ironically, after suggesting that Petraeus is an “Islamic tool” and that General Stanley McChrystal is “a zealot” and “a high priest of the multicultural orthodoxy,” La West accuses me of engaging in “ad hominem attacks.” Pot, kettle.
I’ve probably given West and her ilk more attention than they deserve because their work is so utterly inconsequential and uninfluential. But I do believe there is a duty to police one’s own ideological precincts, and because West & Co. claim to be conservatives, I think it is important for conservatives to condemn their extremist rhetoric — as has previously happened with Pat Buchanan, Joe Sobran, and other right-wing embarrassments.