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Exclusive: As a U.S. senatorandSecretary of State, Hillary Clinton often followed a neocon-style foreign policy, backing the Iraq War, teaming up withDefense Secretary Robert Gates on an Afghan War surge,and staking out an even more hawkish stance than Gates on Libya, Robert Parry reports.

By Robert Parry

Most Democratic power-brokers appearsettled on Hillary Clinton as their choice for President in 2016 and she holds lopsided leads over potential party rivals in early opinion polls but there are some warning flags flying, paradoxically, hoisted by former Defense Secretary Robert Gates in his praise for the former First Lady, U.S. senator and Secretary of State.

On the surface, one might think that Gatess glowing commendations of Clinton would further burnish her standing as the odds-on next President of the United States, but strip away the fawning endorsements and Gatessportrait of Clinton in his new memoir, Duty, is of a pedestrian foreign policy thinker who is easily duped and leans toward military solutions.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on May 1, 2011, watching developments in the Special Forces raid that killed Osama bin Laden. Neither played a particularly prominent role in the operation. (White House photo by Pete Souza)

Indeed, for thoughtful and/or progressive Democrats, the prospect of a President Hillary Clinton could represent astep back from some of President Barack Obamas more innovative foreign policy strategies, particularly his readiness to cooperate with the Russians and Iranians to defuse Middle East crises and his willingness to face down the Israel Lobby when it is pushing for heightened confrontations and war.

Based on her public record and Gatess insider account, Clinton could be expected to favor a more neoconservative approach to the Mideast, one more in line with the traditional thinking of Official Washington and the belligerent dictates of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

As a U.S. senator and as Secretary of State, Clinton rarely challenged the conventional wisdom or resisted the use of military force to solve problems. She famously voted for the Iraq War in 2002 falling for President George W. Bushs bogus WMD case and remained a war supporter until her position became politically untenable during Campaign 2008.

Representing New York, Clinton rarely if ever criticized Israeli actions. In summer 2006, as Israeli warplanes pounded southern Lebanon, killing more than 1,000 Lebanese, Sen. Clinton shared a stage with Israels Ambassador to the United Nations Dan Gillerman who had said, While it may be true and probably is that not all Muslims are terrorists, it also happens to be true that nearly all terrorists are Muslim.

At a pro-Israel rally with Clinton in New York on July 17, 2006, Gillerman proudly defended Israels massiveviolence against targets in Lebanon. Let us finish the job, Gillerman told the crowd. We will excise the cancer in Lebanon and cut off the fingers of Hezbollah. Responding to international concerns that Israel was using disproportionate force in bombing Lebanon and killing hundreds of civilians, Gillerman said, Youre damn right we are. [NYT, July 18, 2006]

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Is Hillary Clinton a Neocon-Lite?

'HRC,' by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes, tells the story of Clinton's defeat in 2008 to her place in Washington today.

In the 2008 Democratic presidential primary, a junior senator from Illinois, a young nobody with minimal experience and a name no one had heard of, crushed Hillary Clinton, the known quantity, the experienced candidate, the better half of the nations most famous political power couple.

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That resounding defeat was supposed to have finished her career.

But it didnt. Clinton became one of the presidents most high-ranking cabinet officials; a steel-willed stateswoman; an admired, influential, and authoritative figure. And she just might be our president in 2016.

It is, arguably, one of the greatest political comebacks in recent history and its recounted in HRC: State Secrets and the Rebirth of Hillary Clinton, the hot new political book by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes.

HRC, which Crown Press released Tuesday, draws on more than two hundred interviews Allen, formerly of Politico, and Parnes, of The Hill, conduct with Clintons colleagues, backers, and enemies. The result, according to reviews, is a thoroughly reported and well-written chronicle of Clintons comeback and her tenure at the State Department, albeit one that discloses few real revelations or raw personality.

The book opens with a classic scene of Washington vengeance, in Clintons empty campaign headquarters after her demoralizing primary loss to Obama in 2008. A pair of campaign staffers compile an Excel spreadsheet of Clintons supporters and betrayers, assigning them gradations of loyalty and disloyalty on a scale of one for ultimate loyalty to seven for unforgivable treachery.

Then-Senator John Kerry and late Senator Ted Kennedy earn sevens. Claire McCaskill well, lets just say that there is a special seat by hells fire reserved for the Missouri senator, who broke down in penitential weeping after she commented, on national television, that she would not want her daughter near Bill Clinton, the Washington Post writes in its review of HRC. But her greater sin was being the first female senator to endorse Obama.

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'HRC': What does the new Hillary Clinton bio reveal? (+video)

Politico offers advice for Hillary Clinton today thats practically a greatest-hits list of How Not to Run for President. About the only useful takeaway is that if she does follow Politicos advice, Democrats should probably start wondering if they might want another candidate.

In terms of practical suggestions, the idea that she should begin distancing herself from President Barack Obama has to be about as bad is it gets, although the idea that she should be worrying now about fair-minded non-partisans or mild partisans -- a group that wont start paying attention to the 2016 presidential election until after the conventions are over -- is pretty silly, too.

And Im not even sure which part of Dont turn into Mitt Romney is worse: the idea that because the loser of the last election had particular presentation problems that Clinton should be worried about those particular problems or the idea that Romney might have been president if he could have narrowed the gap between himself and people who thought he was awkward, elitist, insular, and just a bit odd. Get those authors a copy of Sides and Vavreck!

The main point? All presidential candidates should be thinking about just one thing right now: the nomination. Sure, they should be careful not to do something at this stage that would make them entirely unelectable in November 2016, but mostly general elections are about big structural factors, not candidates (and certainly not about candidate presentation; its impossible to win a major-party presidential nomination without having the personal electioneering skills needed to win in the fall). Sure, candidates and their campaigns can matter on the margins, but there's not a lot that they do right now that will make any difference that far down the line. If, that is, they even get there.

Because the priority right now is nomination, the last thing Clinton should be doing is distancing herself from Barack Obama, who the Gallup Organization tells us, remained around 80 percent approval among Democrats at last check. Now, its certainly possible that Obama may be the kiss of death in November 2016, although its far too early to know that, and hes hardly at that point yet with an approval number that has been in the low 40s. But if so, absolutely nothing Clinton or any other Democrat could do to distance themselves will work.

John Harris and Maggie Haberman do have a couple of worthwhile, if obvious, suggestions. Clintons campaign certainly should be doing (or actually have already done) a first-rate job of self-research. And, yes, she should be ready with some sort of platform to run on. Good advice for any candidate down to the city council level; Im fairly sure Clintons campaign had thought of those tasks already.

As I said last week, at some point Clinton is going to have a bad week, and the news media is going to be eager to pile on. Im not sure if a bit of gossip about the 1990s really counts as a bad week, but Politicos efforts to turn it into publicity storms that can hijack her public image and swamp her plans to carefully manage her re-entry into public life which Clinton is acutely vulnerable to is fair notice of the pile-on. What matters for Clintons campaign is to avoid overreacting to every little one of these, and just keep plowing ahead.

To contact the writer of this article: Jonathan Bernstein at Jbernstein62@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this article: Francis Wilkinson at fwilkinson1@bloomberg.net.

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