In a speech designed to boost his hawkish credentials, Gov. Bobby Jindal touted a foreign policy vision in D.C. that aimed to balance increased military spending with fiscal conservatism.
The speech at the conservative American Enterprise Institute think tank focused on Jindal’s opposition to President Obama’s foreign policy in general and to the effects sequestration had on military spending cuts in particular.
Jindal gave a laundry list of overseas crises unfolding under the president’s watch, including the demise of the U.S.’s special relationship with Great Britain, the rise of ISIS and North Korean saber-rattling. Then his rhetoric veered apocalyptic.
“He has not reconsidered whether his approach to leadership is a part of the reason the world seems to be spinning off its axis,” Jindal said of the president.
Jindal also cited neoconservative favorites former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton to argue that America’s military is atrophying, provoking the country’s enemies. And he argued that defense should be the first thing budgeted, advocating for former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates’ 2011 defense budget proposal as a minimum.
He closed with a reference to 1 Corinthians 14:8: “For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle?”
The talk won immediate plaudits. Jim Talent, Heritage Foundation scholar and former Missouri senator, joined the governor for press questions afterward and coyly suggested he hopes Jindal runs for president.
“I think he’s great, and hope he seriously considers what he’s seriously considering,” Talent said.
Talent and Jindal have co-authored a paper on defense that they will present Oct. 7 at the Citadel in South Carolina.
