Mr. Secretary: Lawrence Eagleburger, 1930-2011

I've always been interested in people with long government careers, particularly in foreign policy. I consider myself something of a student of history and am fascinated with anyone who took part in so much of it. One of the most impressive things about Richard Nixon is that he met every major geopolitical figure of the second half of the twentieth century, except Stalin. For those reasons, I plan on re-reading and write about Robert Gates' 1997 memoir From the Shadows: The Ultimate Insider's Story of Five Presidents and How They Won the Cold War soon.

Former Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger, who died this morning after a brief illness, was such a historical figure, although a little-known one. He held the office of secretary for a mere five months, after James Baker resigned to lead the first President Bush's unsuccessful re-election effort.

My feelings about the first Bush administration are hardly a secret. George H.W Bush was, in my opinion, the last adult in the White House, by which I mean that he dealt with the world as it was, as opposed to some visionary construct of what he wished that it was. In this, I also believe that he was the last real foreign policy conservative in the Republican party.

Everything subsequent to the Bush foreign policy is nothing less than unfettered Wilsonianism, which goes a long way in explaining why the United States has been constantly deployed in combat operations somewhere in the world for twenty years now, the fiscal effects of which are just now being felt.

If you want to know why Bush is my favorite of modern presidents, along with Truman, Eisenhower and Nixon, all you need do think is think of what didn't happen in 1989, but very easily could have with another president in office. A major world power, the Soviet Union, declined and fell without massive, unstoppable bloodshed, an almost unprecedented event in human history.

It's impossible to imagine Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush having the restraint to not engage in a break-dancing spectacle on the ruins of the Berlin Wall, which would have caused Gorbachev and the Moscow Politburo to become even more repressive in what remained of the Soviet empire. Moscow would probably have ultimately failed, but millions of people could have been killed in the process. A potential civil war in a nuclear country is something best avoided, a fact that escapes most modern "conservatives."  In granting Gorbachev his dignity, he created the conditions that allowed for a peaceful, virtually bloodless collapse.

The same is true of the American response to the Tienanmen Square crackdown of the same year. The emerging neoconservative movement joined liberal Democrats in calling for harsh response against Beijing, or, perhaps worse, to have supported the democracy activists before or after the massacre in the square. Of course, that ignores completely the natural isolationationism of the Chinese to foreign interference, and would have not only destroyed Sino-American relations, it would have lead to an even broader and more brutal level of repression, perhaps even civil war if it had gone far enough.  

I'm not sure that Bush and Baker could have accomplished any of that without the able hand of Larry Eagleburger. While the former were spending their formative years making their fortunes in the oil fields and law firms of Texas, the latter was in the service of the Eisenhower and Kennedy State departments. In the 1960s, Bush was engaged in domestic issues and Baker was earning his wings as a political hand, while Eagleburger was one of Henry Kissinger's key deputies on the National Security Council Staff. When Bush and Baker were in political exile during the Carter years, Eagleburger was ambassador to Yugoslavia, experience that couldn't have been more helpful during that country's disintegration in the latter years of the Bush administration.

Lawrence Eagleburger, along with Bush himself, was an adherent of the Kissinger - Brent Scowcroft school of foreign policy realism, without which the United States could have faced catastrophe. That the Republican party as a whole has repudiated that legacy  in order to embrace the failed ghost of Woodrow Wilson is one of the three major reasons that I'm now incapable of taking the Republican party seriously. The GOP has been far too preoccupied rewriting the history of the Reagan administration to make it fit with their categorical lack of a coherent worldview to even think of what they'd do in office, except continue the second Bush's mostly disastrous reign of error.

Indeed, the only person left in American politics to even acknowledge the Bush-Baker-Scowcroft-Eagleburger (and later, Colin Powell) legacy is President Obama. Though deeply flawed, as we're seeing in Libya, I can at least recognize the Obama foreign policy historically and see where it is supposed to lead. No rational person can say the same about any of the major Republican challengers for president propose. They spend their days and nights imagining what their fantasy vision of Reagan would do, but fail to recognize that their vision is just that, a fantasy with no basis in history. In fact, Reagan ranks with Eisenhower and Carter for the fewest military deployments in post-war history.

I'd like to close with some of the tributes to Larry Eagleburger from The New York Times.

Bush called Eagleburger "one of the most capable and respected diplomats our foreign service ever produced, and I will be ever grateful for his wise, no-nonsense counsel during those four years of historic change in our world."

In a statement, Bush said that "during one of the tensest moments of the Gulf War, when Saddam Hussein began attacking Israel with Scud missiles trying cynically and cruelly to bait them into the conflict, we sent Larry to Israel to preserve our coalition. It was an inordinately complex and sensitive task, and his performance was nothing short of heroic."

Baker said Eagleburger "was a legend in the U.S. Foreign Service, a consummate professional who served his country expertly and with great dignity as a selfless diplomat." He said his former colleague was "superb at divining trouble and heading it off. That's why he became the first Foreign Service officer in history to rise to deputy secretary of state and later to secretary of state. Simply stated, Larry Eagleburger was as good as they come — loyal, hard-working and intelligent, a trifecta for an American diplomat."

(...)

"Larry believed in the strength of America's values, and he fought for them around the world," (Hillary) Clinton said Saturday. "He was outspoken, but always the consummate diplomat. Even in retirement, Larry remained a staunch advocate for the causes he believed in. He never stopped caring, contributing, and speaking out."

Obama called Eagleburger a statesman who "devoted his life to the security of our nation and to strengthening our ties with allies and partners."

Although I doubt that any recognizes it, the death of Lawrence Sidney Eagleburger comes at the worst possible time for both the Republican party and the United States. He still had a great deal to offer both.

But today is not the day to ponder that. We should instead thank him for is good and great contributions and honor his memory. And we should hope that more men like him are on the horizon.