David Sanger writes this so I don't have to

Certainly happy to see Drum looking foolish - I was kicked from the comments section of his blog several months ago for suggesting Obama was too liberal to be an effective President - a sentiment that apparently Obama himself shared given the choices he's made.

That being said - knowing that Bush failed in Afghanistan is not the same as having a workable plan of one's own - Obama would do well to tread lightly.

I certainly look forward to a radical rethinking of our foreign policy. But I hope the evidence on two smaller points cited above is not indicative.

"He also denounced “the gutting of America’s ability to engage, assist and communicate with other parts of the world — the ‘soft power’ which had been so important throughout the cold war."

The problem isn't a gutting of this ability but the failure of it to meet new demands for which it isn't designed. The purpose of soft power in the past was (where possible) to bring educated people on both sides into personal contact and to bring U.S. views, and views of the U.S., to audiences abroad. We've been doing these things in almost exactly the same way since the 1950s. The change since 2001 is that instead of regarding these activities as open-ended adjuncts to the open-ended policy of containment, we have been expecting these activities to change foreign public and elite attitudes in a compressed timeframe on behalf of a new open-ended policy.

"But he went on to describe why the United States and its allies were not winning: After nearly seven years of fighting, they had failed to develop a strategy that could dependably bring reconstruction projects and other assistance into areas from which the Taliban had been routed — making each victory a temporary one, reversed as soon as the forces departed."

The reason civilian reconstruction can't be sustained in Afghanistan is the lack of troops to hold areas after they have been cleared. Things like a "civilian reserve corps" presuppose a security situation in which they can function.

A radical rethinking of soft power would decouple new ends from past bureaucratic means instead of looking for ways to make the existing bureaucracy serve them. A radical rethinking of our strategy in southwest Asia would begin by asking first what we really want to accomplish and would then align means with these ends.

I'd like a radical rethinking of foreign policy, but this seems like the opposite of what I was hoping for. The whole soft power dream died under Clinton with our soldiers being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu. And one of the lessons of Iraq is these projects are worthless unless you put the manpower on the ground to secure the populace. It's no good building a school and then having terrorists pour acid over the faces of all the female students.

I agree wholeheartedly with the notion that there's a limit to what military power can accomplish, but it seems to me this argues for fewer engagements, rather than some dream of mythical 1950s-type soft power. Those days are long gone. Reagan was universally hated; Clinton was greeted by riots when he visited Europe; surveys show that in many of our staunchest allies over half the population thinks 9/11 was an inside job.

The notion that we have the expertise to nation build is a very dangerous illusion.

Referring to the last sentence of the Sanger post: One would sure like to see the list of nations to which these "nation-building" teams would (prospectively) be deployed. Maybe Dan can speculate on that a little bit.

[...] David Sanger writes this so I don’t have to: Dan [...]

I find it funny as a Democrat I trust the GOP Sec of Def more than the Democratic (close to being the candidate for President!) Sec of State.

I largely agree with Rob - and I'd like to add two other comments. First, you can only really do good counter-insurgency and the like (or even good peacekeeping) when you have such an edge in conventional combat that the opponent has to resort to subversion rather than simply fighting you outright (like what the Taliban does with the Pakistani Army, which they fight outright). Witness what happened in the Congo, where UN peacekeepers sent to protect the population proved completely inadequate to the task because they were a less well-trained and armed force than Nkunda's troops.

The point will probably be made that this isn't about counter-insurgency; Obama's Expanded Diplomatic Corps will more or less just be civilian assistance and guidance. However, counter-insurgency and protecting the population has frequently been a key part of helping in states that are at risk for failed states, so I don't think that's going to go away.

The second point is that we need to be careful of how much we re-orient towards this type of thing, particularly if it involves slashing funding for modernization in the conventional military (which takes a long time and is expensive). Right now, enemies resort to terrorism and the like because the US has an overwhelming conventional military advantage. If that disappears, then the incentive to use unconventional methods weakens - and due to the multipolar world we seem to be entering into, that means that weapons (particularly advanced weapons) are being traded around the world, including to countries we don't like.

In fact, I almost wonder if this is why Gates is also in favor of building the next generation of nuclear warheads and ABM defense (both good ideas, by the way). Maybe he figures that with the US's geographic edge and a modern defense/nuclear offensive capability, the US can afford to let conventional abilities decay to focus on this kind of stuff.

Does it bother anyone else here that Obama is ignoring inconvenient parts of the Constitution so early on, by selecting Hillary?

Care to explain how? As far as I know, it's not unconstitutional for a former First Lady and current Senator to take the offer of appointment (by the way, she isn't actually in the position yet; she has to pass the Senate Confirmation Hearings).

Oh, right, the media isn't covering it at all:

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2008/11/022158.php

Ah, I see what you're getting at. But it's not really an issue in this case, since Clinton will have to resign her Senate seat before actually taking the Secretary of State post (right now she's just a nominee, and hasn't gone through confirmation hearings yet).

It'd only be a problem if she tried to hang on to her Senate seat while being Secretary of State, and she won't.

But the clause states "No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States, which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased during such time."

She should only be eligible after her elected term ends.