# Project for the New American Century The **Project for the New American Century (PNAC)** was a neoconservative foreign-policy think tank operating from 1997 to 2006. Founded by Bill Kristol and Robert Kagan, it became the **principal institutional advocacy vehicle for the [[Iraq War]]** and, more broadly, for the doctrine of American military primacy that defined the foreign policy of the [[George W. Bush]] administration's first term. PNAC is the **paradigmatic case** of a small, donor-funded think tank moving a major U.S. foreign policy decision. Its 1998 open letter to [[President Clinton]] calling for the removal of Saddam Hussein, its 2000 *Rebuilding America's Defenses* report, and its post-9/11 advocacy directly shaped the policy environment in which the March 2003 invasion of Iraq became possible. ## Founding and Mission PNAC was incorporated in 1997 as a project of the New Citizenship Project, a 501(c)(3) co-founded by Bill Kristol. Its mission statement called for "American global leadership" through "military strength and moral clarity" — explicit reference points being the 1980s Reagan-era defense buildup and the 1898 McKinley-Roosevelt imperial pivot (a national-greatness conservative lineage; see [[William McKinley]], [[Theodore Roosevelt]]). The founding statement was signed by 25 conservatives, including Kristol, Kagan, [[Dick Cheney]], [[Donald Rumsfeld]], [[Paul Wolfowitz]], [[Jeb Bush]], I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Dan Quayle, [[Steve Forbes]], [[Norman Podhoretz]], [[Elliott Abrams]], and Francis Fukuyama (who later publicly distanced himself). ## Iraq War Advocacy PNAC's signature policy intervention was a **January 1998 open letter to President Clinton** calling for the removal of Saddam Hussein as the necessary condition for U.S. security in the Middle East. Signatories included Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Perle, Abrams, [[John Bolton]], and Robert Zoellick — many of whom would hold senior national-security positions in the Bush 43 administration that ultimately ordered the 2003 invasion. After September 11, 2001, PNAC's pre-existing Iraq advocacy became the intellectual substrate for the war planning that began within days of the attacks. Multiple senior figures inside the Bush administration — Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith, Perle, Abrams, Khalilzad — were PNAC signatories or affiliates. The *Rebuilding America's Defenses* report (September 2000) had argued for dramatic defense-budget increases, forward basing, and regime change in Iraq, infamously noting that the process of transformation was "likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event — like a new Pearl Harbor." ## Funding PNAC was funded principally by the **Bradley Foundation, the John M. Olin Foundation, and the Sarah Scaife Foundation** — the same three conservative foundations that anchored the broader 1990s-2000s right-wing think tank infrastructure. See [[Sarah Scaife Foundation]] for the specific PNAC-Scaife connection. The combined funding was relatively modest ($600,000–$1M annually) — a striking ratio of dollars-to-policy-impact. ## Dissolution and Legacy PNAC quietly dissolved in 2006 as the Iraq War deteriorated and the neoconservative brand became politically toxic. Many of its key figures migrated to: - **[[Foundation for Defense of Democracies]]** — for the post-9/11 sanctions/counter-Iran specialty - **[[American Enterprise Institute]]** — as the broader institutional home of conservative foreign-policy hawkishness - **[[Hudson Institute]]** — for defense-tech and Indo-Pacific work - **[[The Weekly Standard]]** (Kristol's magazine, shuttered 2018) - **The Bulwark** and **The Dispatch** — Never Trump successor outlets The Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI), co-founded by Kristol and Robert Kagan in 2009 as a successor body, also dissolved in 2017. ## KB Significance PNAC is the **causal link** between the 1970s–1980s neoconservative intellectual project ([[Irving Kristol]], Norman Podhoretz, Commentary, [[The Public Interest]]) and the 2000s catastrophe of the Iraq War. Understanding PNAC explains how a small, dense, donor-funded think tank can drive consequential national-security policy when its signatories occupy the relevant administration positions. It is also the canonical cautionary tale invoked by the contemporary MAGA-restraint right ([[Tucker Carlson]], [[J.D. Vance]], parts of the contemporary America-first tradition) against the neoconservative-hawk pole that survives in [[Foundation for Defense of Democracies]], [[American Enterprise Institute]], and [[Hudson Institute]]. ## See Also - [[Foundation for Defense of Democracies]] — post-PNAC institutional successor - [[Neoconservatism]] — the ideological tradition - [[Sarah Scaife Foundation]] — major funder - [[American Enterprise Institute]] — where many PNAC alumni landed - Iraq War — the policy outcome - [[Think Tank Ecosystem]] — broader ecosystem hub