In mid-December, after the White House put out a trial balloon indicating that Chuck Hagel, the former Republican Senator from Nebraska, is President Obama's top choice to lead the Department of Defense, Senator McCain was asked about Hagel's potential nomination as SOD. According to Politico:
McCain scoffed at claims that Hagel would be a Republican voice in a mostly Democratic Cabinet, saying to “allege that Hagel is somehow a Republican — that is a hard one to swallow.”
In 1996, Senator McCain campaigned for Hagel in his first Senate race. In 2000, Hagel co-chaired McCain's first presidential campaign. How things have changed in this country after September 11 and the Iraq war!
Connie Bruck of the New Yorker wrote a fascinating piece in 2008 on Hagel and his evolving friendship with McCain:
A photograph in Hagel’s office shows him newly elected, with the five other senators who were Vietnam veterans: McCain, Bob Kerrey, Chuck Robb, John Kerry, and Max Cleland, who lost both legs and an arm in the war. Cleland, seated in a wheelchair, has made a joke, which they all seem to be enjoying. But Hagel and McCain didn’t become close until, about a year and a half later, McCain read a story about Hagel and the Nebraska gubernatorial race in Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper. As the article recounted, Jon Christensen, the onetime front-runner in the 1998 Republican primary, had attacked his opponent with a harsh negative mailer in the final days before the election. Hagel and other Party officials in Nebraska, who had said that they would remain neutral, scolded Christensen and declared that his tactics “embarrassed Nebraska.” Christensen lost by a large margin. The story quoted Hagel as saying, “The most dangerous element of our political future in this country is candidates who debase and degrade the political process by straight-out lies and misleading spots on television. It’s a cancer to our system.” Hagel told me that McCain came to his office to talk to him about the article and said, “You know, I’m really proud of you for doing that. Not many people would have done it.”
McCain and Hagel were dear friends. Hagel endorsed him over George W. Bush and co-chaired McCain's presidential campaign in 2000:
McCain lost in the South Carolina primary after evangelicals led by Pat Robertson and Ralph Reed rallied the Christian right to George W. Bush. A smear campaign in the state suggested that McCain had fathered Bridget, the Bangladeshi orphan he and his wife, Cindy, adopted in 1993. Hagel declared that Bush had “sold his soul to the right wing” and called Bush’s campaign “the filthiest” he had ever seen.
McCain was defeated by Bush in the Republican primary. At the time, Hagel was a rising Republican star. He was even on the shortlist of Vice-President compiled by Dick Cheny on behalf of Bush. After Bush was elected President, Hagel continued to wear McCain For President campaign buttons. Although McCain and Hagel occasionally fought each other over legislation, they remained close friends. McCain said in a
statement on April 27, 2001:
I appreciate the hard work and sincere conviction that my friend – my dear friend and comrade – the Senator from Nebraska has invested in his amendment. I would, as always, prefer to be on the same side of the fight with him, as we have been so many times in the past, and as we will be again. He is a man of honor and a patriot. I admire him and consider his friendship to be a treasure of inestimable value to me.
September 11 changed that. McCain was a strong promoter of Bush's wars on terror, whereas Hagel was an early critic. According Bruck:
...... In early January, 2002, as warplanes took off for Afghanistan, McCain stood on the flight bridge of the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt, an aircraft carrier in the Arabian Sea, and yelled, “Next up, Baghdad!” Hagel, who was on the trip with the same congressional delegation, told a reporter, “I think it would be wrong, very shortsighted, and very dangerous for the United States to unilaterally move on Iraq.”
Despite misgivings about the Bush Administration’s buildup to war—misgivings that Hagel aired repeatedly in public—he voted for the October, 2002, war resolution. (He has since said that he regrets his vote.) On the Senate floor, he declared, “Actions in Iraq must come in the context of an American-led, multilateral approach to disarmament, not as the first case for a new American doctrine involving the preëmptive use of force.” ......
As the Iraq war was raging, Hagel and McCain parted ways. McCain and his new
best friend Democratic Senator Joe Lieberman were the prominent bipartisan voices supporting President Bush. Lieberman and Hagel often
dueled it out on Sunday talk shows. When Lieberman and the Bush administration questioned the patriotism of those who opposed the Iraq war, Hagel
fought back:
"To question your government is not unpatriotic -- to not question your government is unpatriotic."
In 2002, Georgia Senator Max Cleland ran for re-election against Republican Saxby Chambliss. The GOP ran an ad featured pictures of Cleland alongside Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. Chuck Hagel was
furious. He offered to do a TV ad for Cleland and demanded Chambliss withdraw the ad.
In 2008, Lieberman was a featured speaker at the Republican Convention. Hagel did not show up. Bruch wrote in the piece quoted above:
McCain no doubt understood how difficult it would be for Hagel to endorse him, yet their differences were what would make the endorsement so valuable. From 2004 on, McCain, in his desire to win the nomination, had embraced Bush’s policies ever more zealously, while Hagel had become the Administration’s most severe Republican critic. Although he has frequently voted with his party on domestic policy, his views on foreign policy represent a bold departure from those of the Administration, and his willingness to take Bush to task publicly has alienated many Republicans. In some ways, Hagel is far more of a maverick than McCain has ever been, and his endorsement would likely sway independents whose votes McCain probably needs in order to win.
Hagel said of their meeting in June, “It never was an interview kind of thing—‘John, let me get these things straight.’ ” Rather, he explained, “I wanted to understand, too, as we talked through these things, where he was going. . . . We talked about Iraq, and he and I disagree on this.” They also discussed McCain’s argument that Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic Presidential nominee, was wrong to pursue direct engagement with Iranian leaders. “And I said, ‘I don’t think he is. It’s what I’ve been saying, actually longer than Obama.’ I remember telling John—I said, ‘John, if you don’t engage Iran, where do you think this is going to go? We’re going to be in another war!’ ” (Hagel has been calling for direct, unconditional talks with Iran since 2001.)
In mid-July of 2008, Senator Obama, the Democratic Presidential nominee, brought Hagel and Senator Jack Reed from Rhode Island with him on a trip to Afghanistan and Iraq. They
forged bonds:
"He's a staunch Republican, but Chuck and I agree almost on every item of foreign policy," Obama said in August 2008, a month after taking Hagel with him on a tour of Iraq.
When the McCain campaign aired ads that implied that Obama was being disrespectful to troops during the trip, Hagel came to Obama's
defense, saying that McCain was "treading on some very thin ground". Hagel did not make a public endorsement in 2008. But his wife Lilibet publicly
endorsed Obama and was seen sitting next to Michelle Obama during the last presidential debate.
Back in 2002, Neocon Bill Kristol declared Hagel part of the "axis of appeasement". He is now leading a vicious smearing campaign against Hagel, labeling him an "anti-Semite" and running ads targeting him even before he was nominated. One of Hagel's crimes, according to Kristol, is:
9. When questioned about his pro-Israel record during a meeting in New York with supporters of Israel, Hagel is reported to have said, “Let me clear something up here if there’s any doubt in your mind. I’m a United States Senator. I’m not an Israeli senator. I’m a United States Senator. I support Israel. But my first interest is, I take an oath of office to the constitution of the United States. Not to a president, not to a party, not to Israel.”
No current Republican Senators have come to Hagel's defense. Mike Johanns was the the gubernatorial candidate who Hagel rised up to defend in 1998 when he faced unfair smear from Christensen. He
told a Republican gathering four years ago: "There was a day when I needed a friend very badly. And Chuck Hagel was there, and I'll never forget that." He is now the Senior Senator from Nebraska. He has been silent.
Meanwhile, Max Cleland, who lost to Chambliss in 2002, went to bat for Hagel:
“Look Chuck Hagel in the eye and vote up or down. Against a combat-wounded veteran, against a former member of the United States Senate, against a foreign relations committee member, against a sitting member of the military intelligence advisory committee to the Department of Defense,” he said. “Look him in the eye and vote against him for Secretary of Defense. Are you kidding me?”
Several Republican Senators, including Lindsey Graham who is close to McCain, have indicated that they will vote against Hagel. Senator McCain has not revealed how he will vote. The confirmation hearing will say a lot about the political climate of this country.