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In the early 1990s, Robert Divine, a historian, playfully wondered if Americans would one day look back at the U.S.-Soviet rivalry and miss the stability it provided to the international system. I think Professor Kagan's essay shows that Divine's musing was much more foresighted than I thought.
From a historiographical perspective, I think that Professor Kagan is underestimating the power of ideas as well as the power of mass popular culture to transmit and to amplify those ideas. I think Kagan discounts the ability of those on the margins to drive historical change at the center. (That is history happens from the bottom up at least as often as from the top down.) Moreover, I think Kagan's depiction of the middle ages as "the dark ages" is anachronistic--an irony considering his nuanced thumbnail sketch of modern European history.*
From a geopolitical perspective, Kagan's call for naval supremacy as part of a grand strategy that ensures the preponderance of American power appeals to my intellectual vanity as a navalist. (See? Mahan was right all along. What's good for the navy is good for the United States.) However, I think America's interests will be ill-served by the hegemonic approach to global affairs that Kagan suggests.
Now, the primary test of American power is not the ability to harness the RMA "to put ordinance on target." Instead, the test before us is to find sustainable ways to deter war and to root out terrorism while our diplomats and certain professional groups within the armed services enable others to catch their own fish--while we at home rebuild the economy, repair our political system, and regenerate civil society.
My $0.02.
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* As an example, some historians focusing on gender have argued that women overall had more power and freedom in medieval and early modern Europe than they would in modern Europe.
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