Julian Zelizer: What Obama's 'best and brightest' should know
[Julian E. Zelizer is a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School. He is completing a book on the history of national security politics since World War II, to be published by Basic Books. Zelizer writes widely on current events.]
... In many respects, the current White House is as impressive as the one that Kennedy and Johnson assembled. Obama has drawn on the nation's best universities, the most talented pool of campaign operatives and writers, and the top echelons of the national security and economics establishments.
While there is nothing inevitable about talent making mistakes, there are weaknesses that [David Halberstam in The Best and the Brightest] saw in Kennedy's generation that would be worth remembering today. The first is hubris.
Halberstam's account traces how Kennedy's team, which had extensive experience in the national security establishment and had built the institutions of the Cold War, were so confident in their vision and ability that they didn't have a sense of their own limitations.
Though he understood, early on, the enormous challenges that the U.S. confronted in defending South Vietnam, the "Whiz Kid" Robert McNamara was certain that he could figure out a way to make the policy work. The numbers said the mission was possible.
The confidence of McNamara and his colleagues caused them to downplay, or to simply ignore, strong warning signals they were hearing from military officials, certain administration officials and many legislators, and to instead push the nation into the war.
The second mistake was being trapped in the politics of the past. For Kennedy's generation of Democrats (and Republicans, like McNamara, who worked for him), one of the main problems was overcoming the political damage that had resulted from the "Who Lost China" debates.
In the elections of 1952 and 1956, Dwight Eisenhower had won the presidency (and Congress from 1952 to 1954) by charging that President Harry Truman had failed to support the Chinese Nationalists in 1949 against a communist revolution.
Kennedy's team was determined not to lose on that score again. They wanted to burnish their hawkish credentials and were leery about giving Republicans the opportunity to paint them as weak on defense. This led them to make poor decisions.
Obama's team faces a similar challenge. Democrats had been battered for many years by conservatives who charged they were unwilling to challenge communism and then terrorist networks.
Sometimes Obama's team has articulated a new national security agenda -- talking about multilateralism and diplomacy and "Smart Power" and new initiatives in the Middle East.
But at other times, his team has attempted to show that Democrats can be equally aggressive on defense -- appointing Bob Gates to secretary of defense and talking tough about a significant escalation of force in Afghanistan. Obama has remained largely silent on recent events in the Middle East.
The final trap was disdain for the legislative branch. Kennedy's generation of the best and brightest were believers in the "imperial presidency." They came from an era when liberals thought the executive branch was more sophisticated, efficient and capable. They didn't have much good to say about Congress.
In their mind, senior Democrats who had made their career in Congress, such as Johnson, represented a type of politician who was crass and ignorant, only concerned with getting as many votes as possible, who needed to be overcome. Even when working for Johnson after he became president when Kennedy was assassinated, they expressed the same feelings, including about their own boss.
This was unfortunate since there were many legislators, such as Georgia's Richard Russell on the right and Idaho's Frank Church on the left, who were early voices of opposition to escalating America's involvement in the war.
This mentality could be a trap for Obama's team as well....
Read entire article at CNN
... In many respects, the current White House is as impressive as the one that Kennedy and Johnson assembled. Obama has drawn on the nation's best universities, the most talented pool of campaign operatives and writers, and the top echelons of the national security and economics establishments.
While there is nothing inevitable about talent making mistakes, there are weaknesses that [David Halberstam in The Best and the Brightest] saw in Kennedy's generation that would be worth remembering today. The first is hubris.
Halberstam's account traces how Kennedy's team, which had extensive experience in the national security establishment and had built the institutions of the Cold War, were so confident in their vision and ability that they didn't have a sense of their own limitations.
Though he understood, early on, the enormous challenges that the U.S. confronted in defending South Vietnam, the "Whiz Kid" Robert McNamara was certain that he could figure out a way to make the policy work. The numbers said the mission was possible.
The confidence of McNamara and his colleagues caused them to downplay, or to simply ignore, strong warning signals they were hearing from military officials, certain administration officials and many legislators, and to instead push the nation into the war.
The second mistake was being trapped in the politics of the past. For Kennedy's generation of Democrats (and Republicans, like McNamara, who worked for him), one of the main problems was overcoming the political damage that had resulted from the "Who Lost China" debates.
In the elections of 1952 and 1956, Dwight Eisenhower had won the presidency (and Congress from 1952 to 1954) by charging that President Harry Truman had failed to support the Chinese Nationalists in 1949 against a communist revolution.
Kennedy's team was determined not to lose on that score again. They wanted to burnish their hawkish credentials and were leery about giving Republicans the opportunity to paint them as weak on defense. This led them to make poor decisions.
Obama's team faces a similar challenge. Democrats had been battered for many years by conservatives who charged they were unwilling to challenge communism and then terrorist networks.
Sometimes Obama's team has articulated a new national security agenda -- talking about multilateralism and diplomacy and "Smart Power" and new initiatives in the Middle East.
But at other times, his team has attempted to show that Democrats can be equally aggressive on defense -- appointing Bob Gates to secretary of defense and talking tough about a significant escalation of force in Afghanistan. Obama has remained largely silent on recent events in the Middle East.
The final trap was disdain for the legislative branch. Kennedy's generation of the best and brightest were believers in the "imperial presidency." They came from an era when liberals thought the executive branch was more sophisticated, efficient and capable. They didn't have much good to say about Congress.
In their mind, senior Democrats who had made their career in Congress, such as Johnson, represented a type of politician who was crass and ignorant, only concerned with getting as many votes as possible, who needed to be overcome. Even when working for Johnson after he became president when Kennedy was assassinated, they expressed the same feelings, including about their own boss.
This was unfortunate since there were many legislators, such as Georgia's Richard Russell on the right and Idaho's Frank Church on the left, who were early voices of opposition to escalating America's involvement in the war.
This mentality could be a trap for Obama's team as well....