out, such controversies may well lead to what Charles Krauthammer (2005a: 26) calls
‘the maturation of [neoconservatism as] a governing ideology’.
Certainly, here Krauthammer and the like have a vested interest in talking up their own
stocks. Nevertheless, it is mistaken to exaggerate the neocons’ recent setbacks or
underestimate their resilience. Their apparently sudden rise in recent years
notwithstanding, like it or not, the neocons are more than just a ‘moment’ or an
anomaly, but have a deeper root in American foreign policy tradition (George 2005;
Hirsh 2005; Tisdall 2003). Melvyn Leffler (2004: 23) suggests that the ‘differences
between Bush and his predecessors have more to do with style than substance’. Based
on a comparative study of mainstream think tanks in U.S. foreign policy making,
Inderjeet Parmar (2005: 24) observes that there is in fact an emerging ‘cross-party (and
cross-liberal/conservative) consensus behind the new more aggressive, neo-
conservative-inspired phase in US foreign policy’.
Indeed, it is this neocon consensus, rather than the dominance of particular
neoconservative figures that will cast a long shadow on U.S. foreign policy. For
instance, even after the departure of many high-profile neocons from the second Bush
term, neoconservative ideals such as ‘expansion of freedom in all the world’ resonated
strongly with Bush’s second inaugural address. Similarly, controversial as it is, the
doctrine of pre-emptive war remains central to the revamped 2006 National Security
Strategy (White House 2006: 23). In this context, to say that the strategic vision of the
neocons is ultimately ‘intellectually and politically untenable’ (Ikenberry 2004a: 8) is
one thing, but to say that their days are already numbered is a different matter.
While not denying that the neocons’ popularity is indeed on the wane, I argue that their
core grand strategy of preserving U.S. global dominance has been an article of faith
among American leaders and strategic thinkers. Both hardliners and moderates,
Republicans and Democrats agree that America should retain its strategic dominance in
East Asia and the eastern Pacific—China’s backyard (Schwarz 2005: 28). Thus, within
U.S. foreign policy establishment, there is nothing especially radical about neocons’
strategy of preventing any other country from ‘even aspiring to a larger regional or
global role’ (Tyler 1992). And in this new century, such an injunction, as Michael Klare
(2005) points out, ‘can apply only to China, as no other potential adversary possesses a
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Convention