Former Israeli Defense Forces Chief of Staff and Air Force Lieutenant General Dan Halutz extended his previous criticisms of hawkishness on Iran on Monday afternoon, worrying that setting “red lines” for Iranian progress that would trigger a military strike (as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prefers) would be counterproductive.

Halutz’s remarks came at a press event held by J Street. Halutz worried that setting specific conditions that would trigger military action might limit American and Israeli flexibility in addressing Iran’s nuclear program:

I don’t believe in red line policies, because when you’re stating something at time 1, it might not be the same at time 2…when you are saying red line, you’re claiming you can draw a line based on what the other side is doing…for each and every thing that’s part of the redline, when it comes to the decision, someone will come up with an excuse. You still need a coalition.

Halutz’s point was that setting lines now that are supposed to bind policymakers in the future can prevent them from adapting if conditions on the ground change. Moreover, so called red lines may not actually trigger international action against because the states who are supposed to be bound by them may disagree about whether or not Iran has actually made the level of progress in question.

The Lieutenant General also downplayed the risk that Israel would strike Iran unilaterally in the short term, saying that “I don’t think that anyone in Israel thinks we should attack immediately in spite of all the noises recently” but warning observers “not to underestimate” the IDF’s capability and willingness to attack. He also said he supports the Obama administration’s Iran policy, saying “diplomacy, sanctions, and stick on the table (military option) is the right approach” and that he believes President Obama “means what he’s saying” on his willingness to strike Iran. He added that sanctions “are working. There’s no doubt they are working. The question is how long it will take” to make Iran change its calculus.

When asked about the issue of red lines Monday morning, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States is not “setting deadlines” for any type of military action.

Halutz echoed the administration’s view that Iran’s nuclear program posed a serious threat, though it should also be noted that a strike would also carry with it significant downsides. Since informed analysts like Halutz and other American and Israeli analysts suggest there’s still time to resolve the crisis, the Obama administration believes diplomacy is the “best and most permanent” way to address the issue.

On the eve of the eleventh anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Danielle Pletka, vice-president for foreign and defense policy studies at the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute, writes, “It’s time to lay waste to a special calumny that has gained prominence and entered the main stream from the fringes where it once resided: The notion of American guilt.”

The notion that U.S. foreign policy shapes “invitations” for terrorists to attack on our soil — and the concomitant idea that if we had no foreign policy, there would be no attacks –is entirely mindless.

It’s time to put Ron Paul, truthers, blowbackers, and all the adherents of such ideas back where they belong… on the fringes of American life, wearing tin foil hats, writing irate letters to the White House, exchanging newsletters, and building shelters in their moms’ basements.

Understandably, Pletka trains most of her fire on Ron and Rand Paul. As my colleague Brian Katulis wrote in the New York Times last month, the conservative movement is more deeply divided over foreign policy than it has been in decades, with neoconservatives like Pletka struggling to hold ground against neo-isolationist Tea Partiers, for whom the Pauls are standard bearers.

But neocons have their own version of “blowback” theory, perhaps most clearly articulated by Sen. John McCain in a May 2008 foreign policy address, during his presidential run: “For decades in the greater Middle East, we had a strategy of relying on autocrats to provide order and stability“:

We relied on the Shah of Iran, the autocratic rulers of Egypt, the generals of Pakistan, the Saudi royal family, and even, for a time, on Saddam Hussein. In the late 1970s that strategy began to unravel. The Shah was overthrown by the radical Islamic revolution that now rules in Tehran. The ensuing ferment in the Muslim world produced increasing instability. The autocrats clamped down with ever greater repression, while also surreptitiously aiding Islamic radicalism abroad in the hopes that they would not become its victims. It was a toxic and explosive mixture. The oppression of the autocrats blended with the radical Islamists’ dogmatic theology to produce a perfect storm of intolerance and hatred.

And here’s neocon don Bill Kristol at a 2005 Tel Aviv University symposium (pdf), defending the Bush administration’s reaction to 9/11: “Bush decided that, for reasons both good and bad, we had made too many accommodations with dictators”:

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During an appearance on “Face the Nation” on Sunday, Paul Ryan denied voting for military spending cuts, telling host Norah O’Donnell that he only supported the sequestration measures included in the Budget Control Act. The 2011 law provides for across-the-board automatic cuts to the federal budget amounting to $1.2 trillion, including an estimated $492 billion from military spending. The reductions will go into effect on January 2 if Congress does not offset them.

On CBS, Ryan blamed the Obama administration for including $487 billion in cuts, but in August of 2011, while selling the law to conservatives, Ryan highlighted the very military savings he’s now trying to distance himself from:

SEAN HANNITY (FOX NEWS, HOST): Alright. How much are we getting the first year and how much are we getting the second year? How much is in defense? And how do we hold future congresses accountable to what you’re doing today?

RYAN: Right, right, that’s a good question. So, $21 billion right away for the first fiscal year. Then it’s about $46, I think, that’s off the top of my head, for the second fiscal year. How much out of defense in the first fiscal year will be $9 billion from what we call the security accounts. That’s not just defense. That’s all security. The Homeland Security, National Security. And then $2 billion to $4 billion the next year. So, the cuts on defense are — were minimized quite a bit by the most recent agreement John Boehner reached.

More than 200 House Republicans voted for the BCA and Ryan praised it profusely, saying that the law “represents a victory for those committed to controlling government spending and growing our economy.”

– Nate Niemann

Between calls from leading Republicans to get ready for war with Iran, remain in Afghanistan and Iraq, and intervening militarily in Syria, it’s no surprise that some on the left might label the GOP’s approach to foreign policy “bomb everyone tomorrow.” But when a Republican Senator says the same thing, it’s worth sitting up and taking notice. On Monday, Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) did exactly that.

When asked about Republican political failures on CBS This Morning, Paul argued that the dominant GOP approach to foreign policy was turning off voters that might otherwise be inclined to support the party. His choice of language in describing this phenomenon was unusually harsh:

We shouldn’t be everywhere all the time. We should have a more defensive foreign policy, a less aggressive foreign policy. I think that would go over much better in New England than the typical ‘we need to bomb everybody tomorrow’ policy you hear from some Republicans…there were many Republicans that said let’s stay [in Afghanistan] forever, there are still some in the Senate who want to for 100 years in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Watch it:

The party’s general tenor appears to be well reflected in its presidential nominee. Mitt Romney is surrounded by a coterie of hyper-hawkish advisers who have pushed the candidate’s positions in a more aggressive direction with respect to the use of military force. Two prominent scholars of international relations referred to Romney’s “core world view” as “a global assessment distorted by ideological excess, pledged to wield power in a way that will leave the nation weakened and isolated, and demonstrated a failure to appreciate the key linkages between strength at home and influence abroad.”