“Those who are leaning on America to end Libya’s pariah status seem to have forgotten one of the most important ideas that came out of Mr. Bush’s speech before the National Endowment for Democracy last month. ‘As long as the Middle East remains a place where freedom does not flourish, it will remain a place of stagnation, resentment, and violence ready for export.’ Mr. Bush did not say in his speech that the elimination of nuclear weapons would make the world a safer place. Rather, he explained that the key to a more peaceful world is the elimination of dictators, those who are standing in the way of the spread of democracy and human rights.”

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Those lines, from a New York Sun editorial issued the day before Christmas of 2003, come to mind as the bloodied corpse of Colonel Gadhafi is finally being dragged through the sands of Libya. It would be too much to say that Gadhafi now represents another notch in the gunstock of the Bush Doctrine. The big risks in the war to defeat Gadhafi were always those taken by the Libyans themselves. But it is a moment to reflect on the irony of the fact that the doctrine being pursued by President Obama was laid down by his predecessor.

We, for one, don’t begrudge Mr. Obama his laurels in the downfall of Gadhafi. He certainly put his administration out on a limb in respect of the no fly zone, into the enforcement of which he put American forces without so much as a how-do-you-do to the Congress of the United States. It would have been wiser to have gone to the Congress; the Congress would have been wiser formally to have backed him. But no risk, no reward, we say. The question we find ourselves thinking of at this moment is whether the Bush Doctrine that Mr. Obama has embraced will also be embraced by the Republican campaign that is gathering for the 2012 election.

The question is out there because, for all the debates the Republican primary candidates have put themselves through, they have yet to have one focused on foreign policy, per se — at least not a satisfying one. The views of the candidates range from the libertarian near-isolationist, Ron Paul, to, say, the generally hawkish Newt Gingrich. Save for Dr. Paul, the pro-Israel sentiments appear solid in the GOP. But we haven’t yet heard a coherent foreign policy debate, and the party is at the moment a long way from the kind of clear and visionary doctrine for which the 43^rd president stood. The Battle of Libya — meaning, one struggle in a long war — is a reminder of how important it is to have such a keel on the ship of state.