Michael A. Cohen: Gettin' the Gipper Wrong
Michael A. Cohen is a regular columnist for Foreign Policy's Election 2012 Channel and a fellow at the Century Foundation. Follow him on Twitter @speechboy71.
...Romney's Iran confusion is in keeping with the GOP's larger misunderstanding about Reagan's foreign policy record. He was, in reality, the furthest thing from the resolute, unwavering, peace through "military strength" caricature they have created. Sure, there was the first-term Reagan: The strident anti-communist who ratcheted up the anti-Soviet rhetoric, increased defense spending, and supported authoritarian regimes and anti-communist rebels in Latin America, Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and Afghanistan -- during perhaps the single most dangerous period of the Cold War.
But that image of Reagan tells a very incomplete tale. He was also the sort of pragmatic commander-in-chief that seems anathema to the modern GOP. He sent troops to Lebanon -- and then "cut-and-run" after U.S. Marines were killed by terrorists. He allowed his U.N. ambassador, Jeane Kirkpatrick, to join in a Security Council condemnation of Israel for bombing the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq -- an event that if it were to happen today would probably lead to impeachment proceedings against Obama. On immigration, Reagan even allowed for amnesty of millions of illegal immigrants in the United States. Such a proposal today would get one laughed out of Republican presidential debates....
For all of his hawkish image and supposed ability to scare foreign leaders into submission, Reagan only ordered one "major" military intervention in his entire presidency -- the invasion of Grenada. In three years, Barack Obama has been a lot more inclined to order U.S. troops into harm's way than Ronald Reagan was in eight.
Beyond his lack of propensity for foreign military excursions, Reagan's most telling foreign policy legacy looks very different from the tough guy image that Reagan at times cultivated -- and Republicans today appear fixated on. If anything, Reagan was beginning near the end of his first term something of a quasi-peacenik -- at least when it came to U.S.-Soviet relations. Of course, Reagan had spent much of his career bashing communism (March 8 is ironically the 29th anniversary of his "Evil Empire" speech). But in 1985, when Mikhail Gorbachev ascended to the leadership of the Kremlin, Reagan took his measure of this reformist leader and decided this was someone with whom he could work with to end the Cold War....