Kamala Harris is a neocon in disguise Her progressive pedigree makes her all the more dangerous

Kamala Harris may have succeeded in convincing America that she’s a hip, “joyful” alternative to Sleepy Joe, but those outside the US shouldn’t be fooled. When it comes to foreign policy, all the signs suggest that Harris will follow the path set down by her former boss: one grounded in aggressively countering any challenges to America’s waning hegemony, by any means necessary.

But what, one might ask, about Harris the Progressive? For months, the American Right has gleefully painted the Democrat as a “woke” warrioress, a liberal campaigner who cares more about “kindness” than keeping America safe. Yet the truth couldn’t be more different. In fact, on the global stage, Harris’s progressive pedigree is precisely what makes her so dangerous.

One of the ways the US has traditionally justified its foreign interventions, especially after the Cold War, is through appeals to humanitarianism and morality. This represents in many respects the ideological foundation of liberal interventionism, which advocates for the use of military force, regime change or economic-diplomatic pressure to secure the “rules-based international order”. In reality, these lofty ideals have often served as the pretext for the advancement of US economic and geopolitical interests.

In 2022, the international relations scholar Christopher Mott coined the term “woke imperium” to describe the most recent iteration of this mode of government, which doesn’t just seek to overthrow foreign rivals, “but [to] engineer their very cultures according to the Western progressive model”. Its real aim, he explained, is to “advance the foreign policy objectives of the liberal Atlanticist Blob”.

Harris’s advocacy for progressive issues — from climate change to democratic governance in developing countries — perfectly fits this pattern. Like Biden, she has often framed the tensions resulting from the emerging multipolar order as a global struggle between democracy and authoritarianism, and championed human rights as a cornerstone of US foreign policy. As America’s first female president, and a multiracial one at that, she would be uniquely qualified to double down on this agenda.

To understand what this might entail, we need only look back at the past four years. From its role in provoking and escalating the war in Ukraine to its near-unconditional support for Israel and aggressive approach to China, it is no exaggeration to say that Biden’s Democratic Party has become the official heir to the neocon agenda. Read again the Wolfowitz Doctrine of 1992, which asserted that “America’s political and military mission in the post-Cold War era would be to ensure that no rival superpower is allowed to emerge in Western Europe, Asia, or the territory of the former Soviet Union”. The only difference now is that the US is no longer fighting to prevent the emergence of systemic challengers to its hegemony but, much more perilously, to contain and suppress new powers that have already emerged, first and foremost China and Russia. This was perhaps best captured by a classified report approved in March by the Biden Administration, and recently disclosed by The New York Times, advocating that the US must prepare for a simultaneous nuclear war against China, Russia and North Korea.

Harris played an important role in cementing this posture. In her speeches as Vice President, she repeatedly underscored the importance of maintaining American military superiority and reaffirming the US’s central role in Nato and other military alliances. She dealt extensively with Ukraine, for example, meeting Volodymyr Zelensky six times since the beginning of Russia’s invasion. On several occasions, she reiterated America’s unwavering commitment to Ukraine. Harris also made numerous trips to Asia, meeting with US allies in the region to bolster Washington’s various anti-China military-security alliances, as well as pushing important legislation targeting China for human rights violations.

Since assuming the role of Democratic presidential nominee, Harris has made it amply clear that her approach to foreign policy will remain rooted in Wolfowitzian principles. At the recent Democratic National Convention in Chicago, she promised to “ensure America always has the strongest, most lethal fighting force in the world”. She also vowed to “never waver in defence of America’s security and ideals, because in the enduring struggle between democracy and tyranny, I know where I stand and I know where the United States belongs”. This might sound relatively benign, but it betrays a deeply Manichean worldview — one which openly rejects the idea of civilisational distinctiveness as the foundation of an international order based on sovereign equality between nations, but rather divides the world in legitimate (“good”) and illegitimate (“evil”) states.

Harris also made it clear that she would maintain the status quo on Ukraine: continuing — and possibly escalating — Washington’s proxy war against Russia. Indeed, it’s hard to imagine that Harris hasn’t been involved in the White House’s recent discussions about allowing Kyiv to use American and British-made long-range missiles to strike deep into Russian territory, even as far as Moscow itself — something that Putin has warned would draw Nato into a direct conflict with Russia.

We can expect Harris to pursue a similar line of continuity over China and the Middle East. Her manifesto, for example, claims that “she will always stand up for American interests in the face of China’s threats” — whereby “threats” should be understood as America’s declining hegemonic status resulting from China’s rise, not as a direct military or security threat to the US. Meanwhile, as far as Israel is concerned, despite Harris placing more emphasis on the humanitarian suffering of the Palestinians in Gaza, she has done little to actually rein in Israel — nor has she provided any intention of doing so in the future. Indeed, in her campaign manifesto, she vows that she will “always stand up for Israel’s right to defend itself and she will always ensure Israel has the ability to defend itself”.

This follows reports from Harris’s current and former staff members that she will not only reject any cuts or conditions on military aid to Israel, but will also refuse to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal as a means of reducing tensions in the region. According to The Times of Israel, congressman Brad Schneider stated that Harris’s Jewish outreach liaison informed him that the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee would oppose re-entering the nuclear agreement — even though the unravelling of the deal allowed Iran to massively advance its nuclear programme, while incentivising it to strengthen its ties to its proxies in the region, including Russia.

On all major foreign policy issues, then, we can expect Harris to toe the Democratic Party’s imperial line. Especially when considering that her national security advisor, Philip Gordon, is a “dyed-in-the-wool transatlanticist” who played a key role in devising Obama’s disastrous attempt at toppling Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Nor is it surprising that, despite her progressive credentials, Harris has been collecting heavyweight endorsements from hardcore neocons and Republican foreign policy hawks. Indeed, none other than Dick Cheney — lifelong Republican über-hawk, mastermind of the post-9/11 “forever wars”, and notorious advocate of torture — recently announced that he will be voting for Harris, who said she was “honoured” to have Cheney’s endorsement. Cheney’s daughter, Liz, a former Republican congresswoman, has also given her backing to Harris. Referring to Harris’s keynote address at the Democratic National Convention, she said: “It is a speech Ronald Reagan could have given. It is a speech George Bush could have given. It’s very much an embrace and an understanding of the exceptional nature of this great nation… [If you care] about America’s leadership role in the world, a vote for Vice President Harris is the right vote to make this time around.”

As an intervention, it was as revealing as it was remarkable. The fact that ultra-conservatives are now endorsing Harris is reminder that the “culture wars” are, ultimately, little more than a sideshow: when it comes to the issues that truly matter — first and foremost foreign policy — elites will happily join forces with peers who share opposing views on “cultural” issues. Indeed, the Cheneys are merely part of a growing list of Republicans who have come out to endorse Harris, including Roberto Gonzales, attorney general in the Bush Jr Administration, where he was an architect of some of the early War on Terror’s worst legal offences; Larry R. Ellis, a retired general who also served under George W. Bush; and more than 200 former Republican staffers. The establishment media has been fawning over Harris for very much the same reason. Jennifer Rubin recently wrote a glowing analysis of Harris’s foreign policy in The Washington Post, approvingly describing it as “Reaganesque”.

Meanwhile, as the US establishment lines up to celebrate the prospect of a Harris presidency, the rest of the world could be forgiven for being more wary. After all, for the billions of people around the world who are deeply concerned about the prospect of global war, this kind of zero-sum Cold War mentality only spells bad news. Under Harris, the “woke imperium” will have found its emperor. And with a smile, she will deliver more of the same: intervention in the name of democracy, and war in the name of peace.

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Thomas Fazi is an UnHerd columnist and translator. His latest book is The Covid Consensus, co-authored with Toby Green.

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