Many people have rightly remarked that former Assistant Secretary of
Defense Peter Rodman, who recently died, will be greatly missed. I was
once his fierce adversary, and I will miss him too. He was everything
that his friends and colleagues say: a man of rare of intellect,
passionate conviction, and extraordinary good manners.
I first came into conflict with Peter in 1981, after I published
"Sideshow: Kissinger, Nixon and the Destruction of Cambodia." I argued
that America was the world's most vital democracy, but I was very
critical of Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger's careless policies toward
Cambodia, the sideshow to Vietnam. I argued that these policies helped create the conditions in which the
genocidal Khmer Rouge communists came to power.
Peter was then working for Mr. Kissinger, and in the American Spectator
he published a scorching analysis of the way in which I had used
("misused," he said) the official U.S. documents I had obtained under
the Freedom of Information Act. I responded to his attacks, he replied,
so did I. The four-part exchange laid out deeply different views of the
nature of evidence, the war, and the U.S. role in the world. I thought
it interesting to readers and so published the whole exchange in
subsequent editions of "Sideshow."
Over the years to come I did not change my mind about "Sideshow," but I
did think a lot about America, a country I have loved since I first came
here in 1972. I also thought a good deal about one particular line of
Peter's. He said if in the early 1940s the U.S. had been hobbled as he
thought I wanted, I, a native of Britain, "would have grown up speaking
German." A fair point.
Then came 9/11. Peter, an assistant secretary in the Defense Department,
helped articulate Washington's response in first Afghanistan and then
Iraq. Having written about both the Taliban and Saddam, I believed those
policies were broadly correct. On the basis of the reports by United
Nations weapons inspectors from 1995-2001 I was certain-like almost
every intelligence agency-that Saddam was harboring WMD. And I thought
that after 9/11 that posed an intolerable risk for the U.S.
In 2004 Peter and I met in person at a policy forum meeting run in
London by Devon Cross. Peter was remarkably articulate, thoughtful and
persuasive-even to European critics of President Bush's policies.
Peter and I hit it off. I enjoyed and admired his wry and sharp, but
softly spoken, arguments. In June 2007 we collaborated on an op-ed for
the New York Times, "Defeat's Killing Fields," in which we said that,
despite our differences over U.S. policy in Indochina, we agreed that
the human and political costs of the communists' victories there were
appalling.
Remembering Indochina, we supported the surge led by Gen. David Petraeus
in Iraq and warned against premature withdrawal-as men like Sens. Barack
Obama and Joseph Biden were demanding.
Soon afterwards, our article was cited in a speech on Iraq by President
Bush: "Recently two men who were on the opposite sides of the debate
over the Vietnam war came together. . . Together they wrote that the
consequences of an American defeat in Iraq would be disastrous."
We did indeed. Defeat in Iraq, we said, would produce an "explosion of
euphoria" among the enemies of the West and demoralize all those who
trusted in American and Western values. Defeat would destabilize
moderate, friendly governments and accelerate the radicalization of
every conflict in the Middle East. We shared the view that America is an
absolutely vital force for good in the world and that America's
defeat-in Iraq or Afghanistan -would be catastrophic.
Earlier this year we decided to write more articles on U.S. policy
together. When I heard of Peter's sudden death from leukemia last month
I was more shocked and saddened than I would have expected. I had lost a
challenging former critic and a good new friend. Peter Rodman was a man
of great wisdom and great civility. The West has lost one of its most
articulate defenders.
