U.S. Secretary of Defense—“Second Hardest Job” in U.S. Government

http://www.europeaninstitute.org/index.php/244-european-affairs/ea-november-2014/1960-u-s-secretary-of-defense-second-hardest-job-in-u-s-government

The European Institute

U.S. Secretary of Defense—“Second Hardest Job” in U.S. Government     

By John Barry, former Security Correspondent for Newsweek

So Chuck Hagel is leaving the Defense Department. That’s a wise decision on his and President Obama’s part. Hagel was chosen as Secretary of Defense when the task ahead was to shrink the Pentagon’s budget and withdraw American forces from conflicts bequeathed to Obama in Iraq and Afghanistan. A leader, in other words, for a period of American withdrawal from the world in response to twenty weary years of war since 9/11. But the world has proved it won’t wait. The United States confronts new challenges; and the mid-term election results suggest, like the opinion polls, that voters realize, however incoherently, that America has little choice but to meet them. Relish it or not, the United States remains “the indispensable power” --- a phrase given currency by Madeleine Albright, President Carter’s Secretary of State, but echoing the view of her predecessors back to Dean Acheson after World War Two.http://www.europeaninstitute.org/index.php/244-european-affairs/ea-november-2014/1960-u-s-secretary-of-defense-second-hardest-job-in-u-s-government