ON MARCH 2, 2005, Al Kamen, who writes the scoop-heavy "Inside the Loop" column in the Washington Post, addressed the "rumors" and "news reports" that Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz would soon be put forward by George W. Bush as president of the World Bank.
"No way that was going to happen," Kamen wrote. "(The notion was too much even for this column.)"
Two weeks later to the day, President Bush posed for pictures in the Oval Office with a smiling Wolfowitz, newly named to serve as president of the World Bank. Bush called Wolfowitz "a compassionate, decent man who will do a fine job at the World Bank. That's why I put him up."
And there it was. Nothing complicated.
European newspapers were filled with angry reaction to the choice. A headline in the Washington Post read: "Nomination Shocks, Worries Europeans." The article quoted one Michael Cox, a despairing professor of international relations at the London School of Economics: "We were led to believe that the neoconservatives were losing ground. But clearly the revolution is alive and well."
Revolution or not, the selection was seen as worrisome in Paris. An Agence France-Presse news story described European objections to Wolfowitz. "He is also held in suspicion as a central figure in the U.S. neoconservative movement, which would like to see the U.S. vision of liberal democracy and free-market economics take root around the world."
Much of the European caricature of Wolfowitz is tripe. They say he is a warmonger (he is not) and a unilateralist (he is not) and a tool of the Likud party in Israel (he is often quite skeptical of Ariel Sharon and advocated giving the Palestinians a state when that view was considered radical). But the AFP gets it right. Wolfowitz, like the president who appointed him, is an unapologetic proponent of "liberal democracy and free-market economics," and he would most certainly like to see both "take root around the world." (That so many Europeans apparently find this objectionable says far more about them than it does about Wolfowitz.)
Other critics suggest that Wolfowitz will have to curb his appetite for democratization in favor of an emphasis on economic liberalization--that his new job will be something of a departure for a man who for decades has been a strong proponent of democratization. It's a distinction Wolfowitz rejects. "I believe as a general tendency that economic development and political development support each other," he said in an interview Friday. "It's easier to support democratic institutions when economies are free, but I don't buy the Fareed Zakaria idea that poor people can't support democracies. The Indonesians are proving him wrong right now."
If Wolfowitz's views are unpopular in European liberal democracies, they have supporters in countries that aspire to become liberal democracies. Take Lebanon. Wolfowitz has spent much time lately visiting with Lebanese leaders and reformers in the United States. His week began with a memorial service to honor former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri at Georgetown University. (James Wolfensohn, the current World Bank president, was seated next to him during the service. They chatted briefly but did not discuss Wolfowitz's pending appointment, then still four days off.) According to several people at the service, a throng of Lebanese Christians (and some Muslims) gathered around Wolfowitz to thank him for pushing reform in the Middle East. The scene caused Farid Abboud, the Syrian-backed Lebanese ambassador to the United States, to mutter, "Who does he think he is, the patriarch?"
It was a reference to Nasrallah Sfeir, leader of the Maronite Catholic Church in Lebanon and a vocal opponent of the Syrian occupation there, who was in Washington for meetings with President Bush and other top administration officials, including Wolfowitz.
Wolfowitz attended a dinner for Sfeir at the Fairmont Hotel on Tuesday night, the day before the White House announced his candidacy for the World Bank job. Some 600 Lebanese Americans were in attendance, both Christians and Muslims. When Wolfowitz entered the ballroom, the crowd erupted in applause. He had not yet been introduced. "They hadn't even had a chance to say his name," says David Ramadan, a Lebanese Shiite Muslim who attended the dinner. "He literally got a standing ovation. The screams were louder even than the ones for the patriarch."
Ramadan believes the reception for Wolfowitz would have been the same among the pro-democracy protesters in Beirut. "The people in that room were representative of those 1.8 million people. It's the start of an Arab revolution, and a huge part of that is American foreign policy. And anyone who knows anything about American foreign policy appreciates the role of Paul Wolfowitz. And those who don't appreciate it--it's pure ignorance."
Shortly after the White House announcement, I called Senator Joe Biden, a leading voice for Democrats on foreign policy. The job does not require Senate confirmation, but Biden is often a barometer of liberal internationalist opinion. When I asked him what he thought of the pick, Biden answered with one word. "Solid." After a pause, he elaborated.
"Paul is a brilliant guy and a serious person. My differences with Paul relate to his assessment of what we would have to face in Iraq after the war." Despite the knee-jerk opposition to Wolfowitz from some European intellectuals and politicians, Biden thinks Wolfowitz will get a fair hearing. "I've had a lot of talks about Paul in European capitals. They know him as a serious intellectual and an engine of change."
I asked Biden if he understood the Wolfowitz nomination--and the nomination of John Bolton as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations the previous week--to be an attempt by the Bush administration to use the second term to repair and remake broken international institutions. He responded by contrasting the styles of the two men.
"No. I think John will break the U.N. John has convinced me that he has an absolute disdain for the U.N. If he has moved from that position, I'm not aware of it. If he now thinks the U.N. could be a strong, useful institution--that's an epiphany for him. Paul is a much more sober, realistic guy. He is much less ideologically driven about multilateral institutions--if that makes sense. Paul reminds me of the surgeon who says, 'You have cancer. I don't know whether we can cut it out, but we're going to try.' And then he focuses on just the area that has cancer."
Whatever their differences, the decision by Bush to elevate Wolfowitz and Bolton--taken together with the appointment of Karen Hughes last week as undersecretary of state for public diplomacy--clearly demonstrates the Bush administration's commitment to the ideals Bush laid out in his second inaugural address. It should confirm the "suspicions" of Europeans that not just neoconservatives but Bush himself "would like to see the U.S. vision of liberal democracy and free-market economics take root around the world."
Stephen F. Hayes is a staff writer at The Weekly Standard.