Mike Huckabee, who has joked about his lack of foreign policy experience, is criticizing the Bush administration’s efforts, denouncing a go-it-alone “arrogant bunker mentality” and questioning decisions on Iraq.
Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor now running for the Republican presidential nomination, lays out a policy plan that is long on optimism but short on details in the January-February issue of the journal Foreign Affairs, which is published by the Council on Foreign Relations. A copy of his article was released Friday.
“American foreign policy needs to change its tone and attitude, open up, and reach out,” Huckabee said. “The Bush administration’s arrogant bunker mentality has been counterproductive at home and abroad. My administration will recognize that the United States’ main fight today does not pit us against the world but pits the world against the terrorists.”
In one specific criticism, Huckabee said Bush did not send enough troops to invade Iraq. And he accused the president of marginalizing Gen. Eric Shinseki, the Army chief of staff, who said at the outset of the war that it might take several hundred thousand U.S. troops to control Iraq after the invasion. “I would have met with Shinseki privately and carefully weighed his advice,” Huckabee said.
I heard a radio analysis of Huckabee yesterday which seems spot on, in which Huckabee was compared to Howard Dean at the same point in the cycle in 2004. When one reads “he accused the president of marginalizing Gen. Eric Shinseki”, one has to wonder if this former governor of a minor state is ready for the big leagues. Presidents don’t supervise four star generals; the Secretaries of Defense and the Army do. Anybody could blame Bush on supporting Rumsfeld, but the link to Shinseki is very indirect. If Huckabee doesn’t know that now, he’s not going to learn it in time for inaugeration.
“”Arrogant bunker mentality” —Huckabee
Sound about right.