Senate Republicans finally got their chance today to put former Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel, President Obama’s nominee for defense secretary, through a gauntlet of hostile and confrontational questions on many of his controversial statements and positions taken over the last two decades of his career.
Hagel’s confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee was one of the more highly-anticipated political dramas of Obama’s early second term because Republicans have so many areas of disagreement with him. Some Republican are also disturbed by statements Hagel has made in the past, and Democrats have questions too.
Hagel stumbled and backtracked quite a bit during the hearing, appearing to demur on many of his previous stances. He made it clear that his approach on many of the controversial issues will be to support the Obama administration’s position.
Arizona Sen. John McCain, who was once a close friend of the former Nebraska senator, was one of the most hostile in his stance toward Hagel.
Both men are decorated Vietnam War veterans with many years of expertise on American military issues. But McCain has been outraged by his fellow veteran’s positions after he attacked former President George W. Bush for his decision to go to war with Iraq — a decision Hagel voted for, but soon after said he regretted supporting.
McCain repeatedly pushed Hagel on whether he had been right or wrong to say that the 2007 surge of troops in Iraq was “the most dangerous foreign policy blunder since Vietnam.”
At one point, McCain angrily said, “Will you please answer the question?”
Hagel responded, “I’m not going to give you a yes or no answer…. I’ll defer that judgment to history.”
When McCain shot back that Hagel had been wrong about the surge, Hagel said his comment had been “not just about the 2007 surge, but the overall war of choice going into Iraq” in 2003.
Some experts say that Obama has chosen Hagel to preside over a deep reduction in the nation’s defense budget. This reduction has already started, as the economic numbers released today from the fourth quarter of 2012 indicate. Defense spending was cut 22.2 percent—the largest reduction since 1972.
Hagel has expressed reluctance to send American troops into foreign conflicts unless absolutely necessary and all other options have been explored — a position that infuriates the more hawkish senators like McCain.
Republican senators have also been concerned by Hagel’s statements about Israel and Iran and they worry whether he will be quick enough to take action against Iran if it becomes necessary.
This led to one of Hagel’s more embarrassing moments, when he had to correct himself about the Obama administration’s policy toward Iran.
At one point, Hagel told Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, “I’ve just been handed a note that I misspoke and said I supported the president’s position on ‘containment.’ If I said that, I meant to say that obviously – his position on containment – we don’t have a position on containment.”
Hagel added, “I’ve had more attention paid to my words in the last eight weeks than I ever thought possible.”
This prompted Armed Services Committee Chairman Sen. Carl Levin, a Democrat from Michigan, to intervene, “Just to make sure your correction is clear, we do have a position on containment – which is we do not favor containment.” Hagel quickly agreed with Levin’s statement.
In his opening remarks, Hagel said that he is “fully committed to the president’s goal of preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon,” and that “all options must be on the table to achieve that goal. My policy is one of prevention, and not one of containment and the president has made clear that is the policy of our government.”
Hagel’s position on Israel was highlighted in a 2008 book by Aaron David Miller, where Hagel is quoted as saying of “the Jewish lobby” that “it intimidates a lot of people” in Congress. Hagel has apologized for the comments and said he ought not to have used the word “intimidates.”
Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina later returned to Israel, asking Hagel to “name one dumb thing we’ve been goaded into doing” by a pro-Israel lobby. Hagel could not name any member of Congress who had been intimidated by an Israeli lobby or any policy the U.S. government had been goaded into.
Despite the harshness of hearing, most observers expect the senate committee to confirm Hagel and let the president have his hand-picked defense secretary, as it would be dangerous precedent for the opposition party to tell the newly- elected president that he couldn’t pick his own Cabinet.
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