“With the Bush Administration about to recede into history, a widely asked question is whether the neoconservative philosophy that underpinned its major foreign policy decisions will likewise vanish from the scene.

…The safest bet… is that we can bid adieu to the neocons and leave their role to be adjudicated by history.

But the epitaph of neoconservatism has been written before – prematurely, as it turned out, in the 1980s.

…They themselves argue that they form part of the mainstream of American history. It seems more likely that they will come to be seen as an aberration.

Two things may change this. First, the flipside of neoconservatism is what might be called neo-humanitarianism. This is the idea that US military power should be used to intervene on the ground in crises like the Rwandan genocide or in Darfur.

Some Obama officials, for example Susan Rice at the UN, will be making this case. All indications are that the Obama administration will be cautious but, if not, US unilateral military deployment may be back on the global agenda.

Secondly, the Obama administration faces unsettled business on Iran.

The neocons are arguing that Iran is the defining issue for US foreign policy and that, short of an abandonment by Tehran of its apparent nuclear weapons program, the US must use force.

Once again, the early signs are that, for the Obama team, military force is well down the agenda and a new form of engagement is under consideration.

Should this change – possibly on the back of intransigence from Tehran – the neocons will be back in business and will crow that they have survived yet another premature obituary.”