All nations have interests, and some have values, and their respective interests and values frequently conflict. Some, like Woodrow Wilson and his followers (Barack Obama comes to mind) see essentially all conflicts as resolvable through diplomatic means, essentially advocating humility as a way of international life, especially for the most powerful, like their own country [bold mine-DL]. Others, notably Theodore Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan, see conflict as a more inherent human quality, to be avoided when possible but accepted when the costs to core values and interests would be too high [bold mine-DL]. ~John Bolton

Via Scoblete

Most Republican foreign policy arguments over the last year have been tedious and wrong, but one thing that has been mildly amusing is the rediscovery of the perfidy of Woodrow Wilson. After two terms of possibly the most ridiculously Wilsonian President we have had in over forty years, we are now treated to a slew of articles outlining the misguided Wilsonianism of Obama from many of the same people who advanced or defended the embarrassingly Wilsonian foreign policy of the previous administration.

Bolton’s formulation is the most ridiculous yet, since he would have us believe that Woodrow Wilson of all people did not believe in the necessity of armed conflict! There was scarcely a time during Wilson’s tenure when he was not ordering the armed forces to invade or occupy another country or join in a military campaign overseas. By the end of his Presidency, he had deployed American soldiers to more foreign countries and entered into more foreign wars than all of his predecessors combined. It is unlikely that he sent an expeditionary force to Kamchatka because he believed in the absolute efficacy of resolving conflict without the use of force.

Naturally, Wilson must have sided with the three largest European empires of his day and enabled them to impose a harshly punitive treaty on the defeated powers because he believed in “humility as a way of international life”! That makes sense. If Wilson had had his way, American soldiers would have been occupying Constantinople and Armenia, which were supposed to be made into Mandate territories after WWI. Turkish opinion was never supposed to enter into it. How’s that for humility? Of course, the Treaty was not ratified here at home and Ataturk had different ideas in any case, but no one remotely aware of Wilson’s record could claim that he saw “all conflicts as resolvable through diplomatic means.”

For that matter, one cannot seriously claim this about Obama, either. After reviewing his speeches and decisions over the last five years, it is obvious that it is much more accurate to say that Obama believes conflict is something “to be avoided when possible but accepted when the costs to core values and interests would be too high.” He said as much at Oslo. He has said something very much like this in connection with our own war in Afghanistan. Obama did not seem to think that the recent Israeli conflicts with Hizbullah and Hamas could be resolved through diplomatic means. How could he? He doesn’t even accept that there should be negotiations with Hamas. So Bolton’s criticism along these lines is simply laughable.

Looking at the aftermath of Wilson’s interventions, we can say that the promiscuous, frequent recourse to using military force and military deployments did not contribute to international stability, but usually had the opposite effect. The reality is that Wilson practiced the sort of reckless foreign policy that Bush did, and it did great damage to “international peace and security.” It is not surprising Bolton, the would-be defender of “cold-blooded realism,” has nothing to say about the record of the previous administration, which combined hubris, unrealistic goals and the wrecking of U.S. interests all at the same time.