Given the vacuum from the libertarian wing, the hawks are driving the Iraq discussion. | AP Photos Return of the GOP hawks

The GOP hawks are back.

John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Marco Rubio are dominating the congressional debate on how to respond to the growing crisis in Iraq, calling for airstrikes on insurgents and blistering the president’s policies on the Senate floor and in the media.


Rubio is chastising President Barack Obama for rejecting the idea of putting boots on the ground while McCain is in such high demand among Senate Republicans that on Tuesday he briefed his colleagues — at their invitation — on his aggressive Iraq policy.

( Also on POLITICO: Wolfowitz: Not Iraq War ‘architect’)

As these Republican voices are rising in the Senate, there is less noise than usual from the party’s more libertarian wing, including possible 2016 presidential contenders Rand Paul and Ted Cruz. Paul has said little about Iraq, except that airstrikes should be considered and that Obama should seek congressional approval for whatever course he considers. Cruz has said even less.

Given the vacuum from the GOP’s libertarian wing, the hawks are driving the Iraq discussion.

“I don’t think it’s wise for the commander in chief to step forward and immediately begin to rule options out. Even if he never intends to send a single American soldier, he shouldn’t be signaling that to terrorists,” Rubio (R-Fla.) said in an interview. “You should not be going around announcing what you won’t do.”

( Also on POLITICO: Hill leaders, President Obama to meet on Iraq)

Rubio is no outlier in his interventionist stance. Many of his colleagues believe that Obama was wrong to withdraw all U.S. troops from Iraq in 2011 and is now paying the price, a notion rejected from Democrats who blame the Iraqi government for not negotiating a transitional security force.

And the scene in Iraq has Republicans looking toward the scheduled withdrawal in Afghanistan, where Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) thinks Obama should “reverse” course or the U.S. is “likely to see the same kind of meltdown in Afghanistan that we’ve seen in Iraq.”

Following the resurgence of sectarian violence in Iraq, Obama’s announcement that he is sending 275 U.S. troops to the country to guard U.S. interests has the GOP pushing a muscular policy that much of the party — including Rubio — seemed to reject when Obama asked for congressional approval to strike Syria.

( Also on POLITICO: Steny Hoyer: Iraq airstrikes should be considered)

Obama has ruled out sending American troops to Iraq but is continuing to mull over other options — including airstrikes. He huddled with his national security team on Monday night and on Wednesday will meet with party leaders in the House and Senate to discuss those options.

Meanwhile Republicans like Rubio and Senate Minority Whip John Cornyn of Texas are arguing that Obama shouldn’t be ruling a single option out, from boots on the ground to targeted airstrikes.

“This is just the beginning of what the United States will have to do just to defend our own people and the embassy,” Cornyn said. “We’re just fighting for the survival of the Americans and the embassy over there. So I wouldn’t be taking anything off the table.”

Of the GOP’s newest generation of senators, Rubio is most in line with McCain (R-Ariz.) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and the most comfortable discussing foreign affairs and making policy prescriptions. Two potential rivals for the 2016 GOP nomination, Cruz of Texas and Paul of Kentucky, have been significantly more quiet on Iraq than Rubio, who has also spoken about Iraq on the Senate floor.

Cruz referred a pair of reporters to his press office when asked about Iraq, as he did last week. A spokeswoman did not elaborate on Cruz’s Iraq positions.

With Republicans nervous over Paul’s isolationist foreign policy positions — a label he rejects — the Kentucky senator declined to rule out airstrikes over the weekend. But Paul has not said anything significant on Iraq since, and his political adviser Doug Stafford said that if Obama wants to re-engage in Iraq, he needs to bring that request to Capitol Hill for congressional approval.

With Cruz and Paul largely on the sidelines during this debate — so far anyway — the party is still turning to McCain and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on how to engage in Iraq and the argument that the U.S. should never have totally withdrawn.

“World events have proven Sen. McCain, myself, [Sen. Kelly] Ayotte, Rubio, other people who have been hawkish, to have been right,” Graham said. “To those who wanted to get to the left of Obama, I’m glad we didn’t take your advice.”

McCain said that Paul, Rubio and Cruz all come to him for foreign policy advice and that he’s not surprised that Republicans still lean on him for his views . McCain said his advice is still popular among Republicans because lawmakers are looking to be led by “who’s highly regarded” — and that means the two amigos.

“We have had long experience and haven’t been wrong,” McCain said.

Asked if he believed most Republicans largely agree with his suggestions on Iraq, which range from airstrikes to ditching the president’s entire national security team, the 2008 GOP presidential nominee replied: “Oh yeah. On most national security issues they do, I think they’d tell you that.”

Even McCain and Graham can’t agree on everything, and differ on whether to include Iran in the question with Iraq (“one out of 1,000 times we may disagree on something,” McCain quipped). But otherwise both lawmakers have been boasting of their prescience on Iraq — and largely drawing plaudits from their GOP colleagues.

But libertarian-leaning lawmakers like Paul, Cruz and Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) have made their mark on GOP foreign policy in recent years.

McConnell joined Paul in voting to cut aid for Egypt, many Republicans rejected a strike on Syria and even Graham and McCain’s blistering criticisms of Obama thus far don’t include the suggestion that American soldiers should be charging into Mosul.

For now, the GOP’s policy is primarily led by its old guard, though there’s still worry of an isolationist rebellion.

“Our tea party wing has a worrying isolationist strain in it,” said Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), one of the GOP’s point men on pushing sanctions on Iran. But Kirk admitted that for now, that strain is a small part of the conference.

New senators like Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) argue that the GOP has not strayed far from its foreign policy roots — it’s just that the hawks are louder and the Senate now has members like Paul and Cruz who embody a populist strain of GOP libertarianism that had long been absent from the Senate floor.

“The center of the party hasn’t shifted that much. There are voices that are louder than they have been on both sides,” said Scott, who wants American military deployment off the table but thinks airstrikes should be under consideration if the Obama administration can make an effective case for them.

Democrats are having a hard time dealing with the resurgence of the GOP’s hawkish wing. They see Republican statements that frequently begin with a call for political changes and end with a request for swift airstrikes on the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria as an unpleasant blast from the past that Democrats thought had been firmly defeated in the 2008 and 2012 elections.

“I’m very cautious about any moves on our part that suggest that somehow we’re going to be the solution to this,” said Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.). “There are a lot of tools. And [Republicans] seem to be comfortable with a very small number of tools.”

Even more painful for Democrats, particularly Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), is the relitigation of the 2011 decision to pull out of Iraq after bilateral talks with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki fell through. He was incredulous when asked about Iraq on Tuesday — in disbelief that Republicans are questioning the logic of returning American troops from eight years of war.

“Those who attack President Obama for bringing our troops home are flat wrong for criticizing him for that,” Reid told reporters. “They’re out of step not only with the president but with the American people. After a decade of war, we’ve all had enough.”

Manu Raju and Jeremy Herb contributed to this report.