Great Issues and Limited Perspectives on What America Should Fight For

On Thursday, October 13, Dartmouth heard from two national security experts as they sought to answer one of the questions of our time: just what exactly should the United States fight for?
Joseph Cirincione — professor, author, non-proliferation expert, and former President of the Ploughshares Fund — was undoubtedly tapped to provide a progressive perspective. Similarly, it seems that Kori Schake, Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, was to provide a conservative perspective or, at the very least, a hawkish one. And yet at the Obenshain Family Great Issues Lecture, organized by the Dickey Center, students were treated to anything but a display of ideological contrast. The moderator, Director of the Dickey Center Victoria Holt, promised students at the (delayed) start of the lecture a “discussion not a debate.” Instead, the audience got an echo chamber.

The event began with opening remarks by each of the speakers.

Professor Cirincione opened with a simple statement that “the world is at a pivotal moment” and that “this decade will be decisive.” He continued by going down a list of the foreign policy brushfires the Biden Administration is simultaneously dealing with: a rebellion in Iran led by women under the age of 25, the destruction of the United States’ “bedrock” relationship with Saudi Arabia, climate change, “the Pandemic [that] is not over,” globalization leading to frustration and ultimately fascism, and — finally — Vladimir Putin’s invasion of “a peaceful, democratic, non-threatening Ukraine.” Listed this way, the challenges facing American policymakers did seem overwhelming. And yet if you expected a national security expert to call for nuance and level-headedness at the end of such a litany, you thought wrong. Ending his opening, Cirincione explained that he came from an anti-imperialist, anti-war, and pro-disarmament background but that he was not a pacifist and condemned the idea of “off-ramps” or concessions in Ukraine. “There are things worth fighting for,” Cirincione stated.

While in her opening Shake expressed disagreement with certain lines of Circincione’s remarks, the thrust of her argument was virtually indistinguishable from her colleague’s. On the subject of Ukraine, she remarked, “We should always be on the side of people fighting for their freedom.” “[Ukraine] has earned our support, even more support than we are giving them,” Schake stated. She emphasized that we should not fear consequences of a Ukrainian victory in the current conflict, including the restoration of the country to its pre-2014 borders. For in her view, Ukraine has been doing the United States’ work for us, destroying the Russian military. Remarking specifically on the risk of Putin deploying or using tactical nukes, Schake argued that they would not make any difference in the conduct of an already brutal war (though she explained that she has a nightmare of Putin nuking Kiev to claim victory). She ended her opening with an exhortation for Biden to stop publicly worrying about the possibility of a third world-war or “armageddon.” According to Schake, Ukraine fights for liberty, Russia is cratering, and Ukraine will win the war no matter what.

The rest of the “discussion” launched off of Schake’s remarks.

Cirincione, despite his progressive resume, was unashamed of previous American foreign policy in Eastern Europe, remarking, “None of our mistakes caused this war.” Over the course of the discussion, he condemned the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft (which he recently quit). The professor criticized, to applause from Schake, the organization for “blam[ing] the West for provoking Putin” and tying the Russian invasion to US interventionism. At the same time, Cirincione took a direct shot at realist foreign policy expert John Mearsheimer, who famously claimed the situation in Ukraine even as early as 2014 was the West’s fault, saying that the Ukraine conflict is “not a war of limited objectives.” In Cirincione’s view, Putin’s threats of using nuclear weapons against the Ukrainians may not just be diplomatic or political bluffs but actual military threats and that the United States must enforce a “nuclear taboo” to prevent their realization. Simultaneously, however, the non-proliferation and anti-war advocate ruled out the possibility of a deal between the West and Moscow, calling it “morally and strategically wrong.”

Schake, meanwhile, said little that indicated any tension with Cirincione’s arguments. Her analysis of Putin’s actions in Ukraine were simple, saying that “Putin is not fighting an army but purposefully targeting and terrorizing a civilian population.” To prevent the Russian president from utilizing nuclear weapons to move the conflict forward, she advocated for a six-step solution. The first four steps were common sense and included the publication of indications of Russian preparations for a nuclear strike, providing Ukraine intelligence/military assistance to pre-empt such an attack, rushing NATO nuclear warfare teams to help deal with the aftereffects of a successful strike, and international condemnation of the Russian Federation. The two other steps were more radical: the lifting of concerns on Ukraine targeting Russian territory and the hunting down and bringing to justice of anyone involved in the order to use nuclear weapons.

“I don’t think any of those are bad ideas,” Cirincione said in response to these suggestions. Nevertheless, later on in the Obenshain lecture, he went even further than Schake. The professor explained that the United States should utilize psychological and cyber operations directly against Russia. Specifically, he proposed turning off Moscow’s power grid (“turning it dark”) and a strategy used to great effect in the 2003 Invasion of Iraq — calling military leaders at their home to threaten their families unless they submit to American interests.

After an hour or so, the lecture transitioned into an audience Q&A. Like the rest of the event, what was billed as a “dialogue” was anything but. Indeed, Circincione and Schake seemed to agree with almost everything substantive the other said. Both agreed that the success of Ukraine in the current conflict is in the United States’ interests. Both agreed, on the subject of Iran, that America should have rejoined the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action at the same time as the Biden Administration signed back onto other international agreements Donald Trump canceled. Further, both agreed that American foreign policy should be fundamentally peaceful. “I want peace,” Circincione stated. Decrying regime change, Schake explained her support for “humane and reasonable” policy, manifested — for example — as support for rebel groups. Nevertheless, in the same Q&A, the American Enterprise Institute scholar stated that she “pray[ed]” for Putin’s overthrow.

All in all, the Obenshain Family Great Issues Lecture was anything but the sober examination and dialogue of America’s international role that the Dickey Center promised. The term “dialogue” presupposes challenge and rebuttal. The audience got none of that. Instead, we received from one foreign policy expert, notionally on the left, and his counterpart, notionally on the right, almost complete and total convergence. What did we learn? Nothing that couldn’t have been absorbed in a more time-friendly manner from MSNBC or Foreign Policy. Indeed, the deepest insight this author gleaned from this event is that neoconservatism is alive and well on both left and right and that intelligent, reasoned, and nuanced discussion of just how involved the United States should be in Ukraine or in general is hard to find, most especially at an Ivy League institution.