By David L. Bahnsen
 
Jewish intellectual, Norman Podhoretz, has left interested readers a rich legacy of material in the fields of foreign policy and international studies.  His perspectives have infuriated his critics, educated his readers, and challenged international agnostics to better understand the nature of the enemies with whom America has often been engaged, and to better consider the aggressive solutions needed to secure peace and prosperity, stability and safety.
 
With his latest release, World War IV, I expected a fine piece by a fine "neoconservative" writer, capably arguing the case for Democratic regimes in the Middle East.  However, I doubt that the historical significance of World War IV has been properly understood by even the most hawkish among us.

Podhoretz begins by rationalizing the characterization of present conflict as "World War IV" by arguing that World War III was in fact the long Cold War between the West and the Soviet Union. He also provides an objective criteria for using the term, "world war":  It is global, it involves a mixture of violent and nonviolent efforts, it requires mobilization of skill, expertise, and resources, it involves a vast number of soldiers,  it may go on for a long time, and it has ideological roots. Podhoretz argues that failure to use this terminology which could have provided both clarity and focus for the American people, has cost the Bush administration dearly in setting the stage for the task at hand.  The term, "World War IV", is not only accurate and eerie, but it also is the only description full enough to communicate the severity of the conflict in which we are engaged, and the patience that will be required to win it.

The patience and fortitude required to winning World War IV is the real subject of this book.  Podhoretz provides many historical anecdotes of left wing opposition to the resolve required to win past global conflicts.  He rebuffs in fantastic detail the ideological flaws of moral egalitarianism so prevalent in opponents of American foreign policy.  His book is a pleading for patience and determination, not only from American leaders, but from the American people, whose resolve will be the key factor to a successful preservation of American way of life.

Interestingly, World War IV is a non-partisan work, sharply (and rightly) critical of the détente approach of Nixon and Kissinger, and even occasionally critical of the Right's hero, Ronald Reagan, who Podhoretz believes was so focused on the Soviet threat, that he often gave Islamicists a pass.  The book provides praise and commendation to the legacy of Harry Truman, and yet provides a blistering critique of the foreign impotence found in the policies of Jimmy Carter.  The book does not aim to align Podhoretz with all shapes and sizes of the conservative movement, as he provides abundant defense against criticisms waged by such conservative stalwarts as William Buckley and George Will.  In short, this book is hard to categorize in terms of who will like it, and who will not like it. 
 
But the book is abundantly successful in defining the foremost challenge facing Western civilization--recognizing the violent threat from a radicalized and ideologically driven enemy in Islamic Fascism and taking responsibility as the world's leader to see it defeated.

As in the Cold War, "history 'plainly intended' for us to bear this responsibility", and Podhoretz argues with moral authority that we must "beat back the implacable challenge of Islamofascism as the greatest generation of World War II in taking on the Nazis...and as its children and grandchildren ultimately managed to do in confronting the Soviet Union".  World War IV clearly outlines the task ahead but is far less clear in predicting the outcome: "I persist in thinking that we do, and that we will [beat back the challenge of Islamofascism], but the jury is still out, and it will not return a verdict for some time to come".