Washington stubbornly sticks to national security policies that don’t work, are devoid of moral considerations, sap the Treasury and rob future generations, says Andrew J. Bacevich. In a brief talk that leads to a candid and sometimes impassioned give and take with his audience, Bacevich describes a national security consensus that has over time “thrust us into a situation which is really akin to permanent war.” Since World War II, the nation has elected to pursue a singular mission to “lead, save, liberate and ultimately transform the world.” To fulfill what Bacevich calls the “American credo,” the U.S. alone must maintain a global military presence to establish peace and order, project this power by all means possible, and practice “global interventionism.” From Bacevich’s perspective, this national security consensus has not just outlived its usefulness but come to jeopardize the core values of the nation, “setting the U.S. on a course toward bankruptcy, both moral and fiscal.” Bacevich calls for a new credo that limits America’s use of force to self-defense, or when the nation’s “vital interests are threatened.” Forget acting as the world’s policeman. He admits there is little chance of such rules taking hold, given the deep investment in the status quo by politicians, the military-industrial complex, even the mainstream media. Worse, he worries that Americans are no longer capable of challenging the consensus, conditioned as they are “to believe any departure from Washington rules will lead directly and inevitably to catastrophe and isolationism.” Case in point: There has been no effective public debate about the reasons for waging a war first in Iraq, then in Afghanistan, or how to gauge realistically the threat we face in that region. Questioned about the “morality” of withdrawing from Afghanistan, Bacevich notes that our leaders “don’t sit around the coffee table asking what’s the right thing to do.” Indeed, it should be the job of all Americans to discu...