Americans like McCain, R-Ariz. The reason is simple. Americans enjoy celebrating politicians who take inflexible positions on defense and foreign policy issues.

For those who live under the spell of U.S. military and economic omnipotence, there is nothing more appealing than McCain's public resolve to attain total victory, his readiness to invoke World War II with its striking images of soldiers storming ashore at Normandy or Marines raising the flag over Iwo Jima.

Within the American political system, politicians of all parties regularly bow before anyone in uniform these days. No one understands this better than McCain.

Yet Obama, D-Ill., need not concern himself very much. In the years leading up to and following World War II, Americans were led by presidents stirred more by rationality and sober analysis than sentiment. Obama's stance on Iraq has more in common with them than McCain's policy stance does.

Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman and Dwight David Eisenhower were men whose judicious application of American blood and treasure flowed from an appreciation of America's political, economic and military potential, as well as its limitations. They reached the White House in different ways, but all shared an ability to distinguish reality from fiction in the conduct of war and the preservation of peace.

FDR served as assistant secretary of the Navy during World War I, a post that brought him into contact with the commander of American Expeditionary Forces in France, Gen. John Pershing -- an officer promoted in 1910, over the objections of the U.S. Army's leadership, from captain to brigadier general in one day.

With Pershing as his guide, FDR saw the devastation of World War I up close, a war that claimed more American battlefield casualties in six months of fighting than World War II did in three years.

FDR not only witnessed the carnage of World War I, he also remembered the bitterness and anger that filled the hearts of returning American veterans, most of whom were convinced President Woodrow Wilson's crusade for democracy was a betrayal. These veterans rejected the notion that their sacrifice had done anything more than rescue British and French imperialism from certain defeat, and they registered their indignation at the polls. Until America's economic depression brought FDR to the presidency in 1932, Wilson's principal achievement had been 12 years of Republican government. Consequently, when war in Europe threatened again in 1939, FDR was in no hurry to emulate Wilson. FDR moved cautiously.

-- (Part 2: Franklin Roosevelt's successful lessons for 21st century U.S. leaders.)

(Douglas Macgregor is a former Army colonel and a decorated Gulf War combat veteran. He has authored three books on modern warfare and military reform. His latest is "Transformation under Fire: Revolutionizing the Way America Fights." He writes here for the Straus Military Reform Project at the Center for Defense Information in Washington.)

-- (United Press International's "Outside View" commentaries are written by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of important issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of United Press International. In the interests of creating an open forum, original submissions are invited.)

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