From Dafna Linzer’s piece in the Post on the rise of “Gen X” NSC staffers …
At the NSC, staffers said the gap is most noticeable when their boss, National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley, recounts his years as an arms control negotiator during the Cold War. “We’re like ‘Arms control, what’s that?’” said Michael Allen, Hadley’s special assistant for legislative affairs.
“I often hear about arms control from the old-timers, but it’s so different now. It’s about all the places we don’t have embassies now and it’s very rare, it seems, that [Congress] is lobbying the executive branch to engage. Most of the times it’s isolate, how can we isolate a country even more?” said Allen …
Sigh.
The article is loaded with Sesame Street and Brady Bunch references, which leads me to wonder (1) what would Big Bird think about our current foreign policy and (2) if one of these kids takes the tiki doll back to burial ground, will things go back to normal?
That article made me upset all day yesterday. So this is the bunch that’s doing the behind the scenes work for the NSC. These people think they have some special insight because of 9/11 and that nothing that happened before applies. What hubris. They are going to learn what Satayana said about repeating history. All these kids care about is padding resumes so they’ll be set after their little jaunt at the NSC. They will leave their mess behind for others to clean up long after they’re gone. Unfortunately, it’s gonna be people like me who lived through and remembered the Cold War to do that.
You mean “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”? Honestly, this article makes our generation look like a bunch of ahistorical, power-hungry imperialists. Oh, wait, the previous generation (at least those in power) is also looking like that at the moment.
I’d be interested to get an impression of what the corresponding State Dept. folks are saying these days.