That leaves a slender political space in which Republicans can operate. They must craft a policy tougher than the president credited with killing bin Laden but not so far to his right that it scares a war-weary public.

“There was a point early on [in the 2012 cycle] when it seemed there might be evidence that even conservatives might be pulling back a bit from a really assertive foreign policy. That seems to have gone away,” said Pew Center associate director Carroll Doherty. “There’s a great deal of concern about Iran among the public.”

Text Size -

+

reset

“Our polls have repeatedly shown that, and certainly more sympathy for Israel than the Palestinians,” he added. “In terms of actual use of military force — after two wars, there’s a certain reluctance to use force, certainly.”

In some respects, the GOP national security message is unchanged from previous elections: uncompromising support for Israel, opposition to nuclear proliferation, robust defense spending and a willingness to use pre-emptive force. Iran looms large in the GOP message, and Rick Santorum declared last weekend that it’s naive to expect a jobs-only election debate when Iran might be “potentially about to explode a nuclear weapon.”

Given Obama’s relatively strong ratings on counterterrorism, Republicans say they’ll instead focus on the president’s inability so far to stop Iranian nuclear advances. They’ll target Obama’s turbulent relationship with the Israeli government and his refusal to block scheduled cuts to the Pentagon budget. The candidates have also vowed to tackle China’s economic and human-rights excesses, with Romney making an uncharacteristically heated pledge to label Beijing a currency manipulator.

“There is a lot of material to point to that demonstrates the failings of this administration on foreign policy. And to some extent we haven’t seen as much focus on it because the economy has been such an area that has gathered attention,” said Liz Cheney, who heads the national security group Keep America Safe and predicted Republicans would quickly coalesce around a traditional conservative foreign policy platform.

“There have certainly been some debates this primary season where candidates like Jon Huntsman and Ron Paul espoused a more isolationist foreign policy,” said Cheney, a veteran of the Bush State Department and daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney. “Now that it is clear our nominee will be Romney, Santorum or Gingrich, I am confident you will see our party stand for a strong national defense and American ascendancy in the world.”

The task for 2012, as one veteran Republican who has been involved in foreign policy put it, is getting beyond “talking points — ‘we can’t appease our enemies and Obama’s appeasing our enemies.’”

“The problem is post-9/11 gave a sort of free pass for a lot of Republicans to not be substantive on foreign policy,” the Republican said. “I think a lot of Republicans right now just aren’t comfortable speaking foreign policy.”

The burden of articulating a contrast with Obama will fall heavily on the Republican presidential nominee, party strategists said — partly because it’s hard to deliver a foreign policy message from Congress and partly because Republicans haven’t done much to try.

“Republicans on Capitol Hill have not mounted an effective political challenge to President Obama’s foreign policy of apologizing for America and embracing adversaries. For example, the number of GOP senators who voted for the giveaway to Russia known as the new START treaty was disappointing,” said Christian Whiton, a former Bush administration official and Gingrich campaign adviser.