Twilight of the neocons: Richard Perle has begun to panic.

• Author: Halper, Stefan
• Position: On Political Books

Since 9/11 a cascade of books purveying instant analysis on the ramifications has hit the bookstores. A deep fault line runs between them. Those with "evil" or "jihad" in the title lie on one side of the divide; those with "empire" or "lies" are found on the other. Their mutually antagonistic readerships snarl at each other across the chasm. So it is with David Frum and Richard Perle's new book An End to Evil: What's Next in the War on Terrorism, in which they reinforce the thesis--now usually described as neoconservative--that American interests and values are best pursued with a maximum of military stick and minimum of negotiating carrot. It makes little difference whether the issue is Libya, Iran, or North Korea. The authors believe market-democracy is best delivered on the back of a Tomahawk missile.

The book's argument is easy to follow, consisting of three main propositions: America is an immense force for good in the world (who would disagree?); American military might is preeminent (again, universal agreement); therefore, the way to project American values is through American force of arms. Ah, there's the rub. And underlying these propositions is the authors' absolute certitude about the correctness of their solutions and the unreliability of what are darkly called the "accommodationists in the foreign-policy establishment."

Ideology informs the book like an iron spine. The authors seem less interested in imparting new information than in reminding the faithful about what they should be thinking. This may be the book's most interesting aspect, in as much as the authors betray a mild note of panic. They write that "the will to win is ebbing in "Washington" and warn against "a reversion to the bad old habits of complacency and denial." It is as though they fear that, given the so-far fragile progress in both Afghanistan and Iraq and in their misconceived recommendations for North Korea, their 15 minutes of fame may be coming to an end. They are right to worry. The twilight of neoconservatism has arrived.

Tally the faithful

This book is essentially an attempt to plug leaks in what the authors feel may be a sinking ship. As such it has the shrill tone of a political manifesto. In the case of Frum, a former White House speechwriter who is more a political jingle-writer with an ear for a polemical catch phrase than a foreign-policy expert, the book's bludgeoning tone is unsurprising. Perle, however, a member of the administration's...