The Headlines of 2011 (Pete Hoekstra)

National Review ^ | January 25, 2011 | Pete Hoekstra

[nuconvert]

Iran Conducts Nuclear Test.”

Could we see such a headline in 2011? Yes, and America’s leaders must prepare for this and similar possibilities, however unlikely they now seem.

Too often, our leaders are caught by surprise because they refused to consider the unthinkable. This has led to some spectacular intelligence and policy failures. For example, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Washington cut its intelligence budget dramatically. Many Americans believed what Francis Fukuyama argued in The End of History and the Last Man: that the triumph of democracy and human rights was inevitable. Our leaders ignored the possibility that new threats could emerge, such as al-Qaeda, which launched attacks on the U.S. starting in the 1990s.

As former secretary of homeland security Michael Chertoff put it at a Foundation for Defense of Democracies event not long ago, America is bad at addressing threats that haven’t appeared on television. Sadly, like our intelligence community, our leadership is often reactive and risk-averse; it suffers from groupthink and refuses to contemplate alternative points of view. Our lack of foresight makes us an easy target. But one can predict with 100 percent certainty that America will face dangerous and unexpected foreign-policy challenges in 2011.

As a leader on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I had a unique perspective on the evolving security threats against the United States. They can be summed up in a few words: Iran, cyberwarfare, homegrown terrorism, and natural resources. In these areas, what threats should we be considering that we are not?

[The Great RJ]

I would rather see the headline: Obama Ruled Ineligible to be President.