In 2013, Jim Mattis was removed from the helm of US Central Command by Barack Obama. Too bellicose by half, was said to be the president’s view of the general, especially on the subject of Iran. The cashiering of Mr Mattis passed without tremendous lamentations from Democrats.
Five years later, a man with the same name and solemn bearing has achieved martyr status among them. “Turn out the lights when Mattis leaves”, tweeted Democratic congressman Adam Schiff, upon the defence secretary’s resignation last week. Senator Chris Murphy pronounced a “national security crisis” at the loss of this one-man check on President Donald Trump.
This is not hypocrisy or opportunism at work. Democrats mean what they say: about the sanctity of alliances that Mr Trump has injured, about gains in Syria and Afghanistan that a drawdown of US troops would risk, about Mr Mattis’s stalwart efforts to avert these various follies. It is just that they mean it now. It took the trauma of Mr Trump’s presidency to focus Democratic minds. The result is a party on a more interventionist foreign policy course than it was following before.