Walter Lippmann (1889 -1974) was perhaps the most influential American journalist of the 20th century. He was also among its wisest strategists. Among the many things that the Ukraine war has exposed is the conspicuous lack of media voices like Lippmann’s, as well as the paucity of strategic thinking at the highest levels of the U.S. government.
The core ideas underlying both neoconservatism and liberal internationalism remain deeply embedded in the rhetoric, practice, and failures of American foreign policy over the last two decades. They have led in part to the fractured U.S.-Russia relationship, and in many ways the conflict roiling Eastern Europe today.
In order to successfully challenge and eventually break the stranglehold these ideas have on policymakers and the Fourth Estate, we might benefit by a re-appreciation of Lippmann’s work. It might even help us to move beyond the prevailing wisdom of the bipartisan Washington war party, while at the same time reorienting the foreign policy of restraint back to first principles. Läs artikel