Secretary Gates’ Farewell Tour

In today’s Boston Herald, the editorial board rightly praises Secretary Gates’ for his candor in a valedictory address earlier this week at AEI. Writing that the outgoing defense secretary has “truly found his voice,” the board applauds Gates’ stance on the defense budget amid trendy calls for slashing Pentagon spending: that further cuts will not leave America’s role in the world unaffected.

If anyone is positioned to say “enough” to ever-more draconian defense cuts, suggests the Herald, it is Gates, who has been relentless in the pursuit of efficiencies. But, tellingly, even this secretary is circumspect about the potential for deeper cuts:

The ‘low-hanging fruit’ — those weapons and other programs considered most questionable — have not only been plucked, they have been stomped and crushed.

The editorial staff closes with a compelling critique of those unconcerned about the strategic effect of defense cuts:

There are those benighted souls who would leave this nation a fifth-rate power, believing there are no good wars, no battles worth fighting. Gates is surely not in that camp. But he is a realist who has posed the right question: Do we want this nation to continue to lead? We vote yes to that.

For more on the Secretary’s farewell tour, see my blog post after the AEI address and check out AEI coverage of Gates’ earlier Notre Dame speech by Gary Schmitt, Mike Mazza and me.

Learn about the strategic implication of defense cuts from Defending Defense, a joint project of AEI, the Heritage Foundation and the Foreign Policy Initiative, and don’t forget to read Gates’ AEI address in full and watch video highlights.