“It’s pretty obvious that the — political knives were out for — Chuck Hagel.”

— Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, in an interview on Meet the Press, about the Senate confirmation hearings for his successor.

Sen. Mike Johanns (R-NE) told the Lincoln Journal-Star that he will vote to confirm former Sen. Chuck Hagel’s (R-NE) for secretary of defense.

“In the wake of Hagel’s contentious confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday, the green light from Nebraska’s senior Republican senator could be timely and pivotal in helping pave the way for additional Republican support in the Senate.”

“Democrats — from both the White House and Capitol Hill — tell First
Read that they’re still confident Hagel will win confirmation. You’re
unlikely to see a Senate Democrat vote against him or even peel off
today; in fact, the hostile GOP questioning might have made Democrats
even more united, or so the White House hopes and believes. And if
that’s the case, Hagel will have support from a majority of senators. So
the question becomes: Do Republicans decide to mount a filibuster
against Hagel? That could make things more problematic for his
nomination, because he would need 60 votes instead of 51. But it also
would create a problematic storyline for Republicans: Do they really
filibuster one of their former colleagues who fought and bled in
Vietnam?”

Chris Cillizza: “Chuck Hagel was … just plain bad during his confirmation
hearing to be the next Secretary of Defense. And it almost certainly
won’t keep him from becoming the next man to lead the Pentagon.”

National Journal says Chuck Hagel “fumbled badly” at his Senate confirmation hearing today.

“The strong, silent-type approach worked for the Nebraska Republican when
he was on the other side of the firing line, just one of a gauntlet of
senators asking questions, but it wasn’t working on Thursday, with him
in the hot seat before the Senate’s Armed Services Committee and getting
it from all sides–from some Democrats and a battery of hostile
Republicans–who began by praising his service to the nation and then
proceeded to eviscerate him. During the daylong hearings, Hagel appeared
to lose Republican after Republican, and even a couple of Democrats,
including New York’s Kirsten Gillibrand, looked a little doubtful.
Hagel’s manner and responses did little to reassure anyone, it seemed,
about his toughness on Iran and firmness on Israel.”

Jonathan Bernstein: “Fortunately for Hagel, it almost certainly doesn’t matter. Spending a
few hours on the defensive isn’t likely to sink his nomination — unless
it was already doomed.”

Politico reports that Hagel’s answers prompted Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) to announce he would oppose Hagel’s
nomination.

Sen. McCain (R-Ariz.) “grew irate” when former Sen. Chuck Hagel at his confirmation hearing to be defense secretary “wouldn’t say whether he believed the 2007 troop surge in Iraq helped stabilize that country,” Politico reports.

McCain: “Are you going to answer the question? Let the record show that you refused to answer the question.”

Hagel: “I’m not going to give you a yes or no. I’ll defer that judgment to history.”

McCain: “History has already made a judgment on the surge, and you’re on the wrong side of it.”

McCain said later he might oppose Hagel’s nomination because of his refusal to give him a direct response.

“You’re on your own. Good luck.”

— Former Sen. John Warner (R-VA), quoted by the Washington Post, concluding his testimony in support of Chuck Hagel’s nomination as defense secretary.

First Read looks at Chuck Hagel’s chances of being confirmed as Secretary of Defense and notes that as of right now, “there’s at least one Republican (Thad Cochran) who’s planning to vote for his former GOP colleague. That’s 56 votes, which is enough for majority passage but not enough to prevent a filibuster. But do Republicans really pursue a filibuster against their former colleague? Talk about some story if they do.”

“All that said, Hagel also has little margin for error. A bad performance today could undo all the positive momentum his nomination has had over the past couple of weeks. Bottom line: As long as there are no surprises, Hagel is likely to make it. But it also isn’t going to be easy. The most contentious questioning today is likely to come from GOP Sens. Jim Inhofe, John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Ted Cruz.”

Josh Rogin takes a whip count.

Former Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE) “has gone on a charm offensive in the lead-up to his confirmation hearing on Thursday, attempting to beat back a well-funded, aggressive campaign that has sought to depict him as an anti-Israel, homophobic politician eager to gut the Pentagon’s budget,” the Washington Post reports.

“Hagel’s pushback during meetings with more than 50 senators and leaders of special interest groups this month appears to have been effective, said an official helping him prepare for the hearing.”

Nonetheless, NPR
says it’s “shaping up to be one of the more contentious nomination
hearings or one of President Obama’s cabinet choices.”

Reuters:
“John Brennan, President Obama’s nominee to head the CIA, had
detailed, contemporaneous knowledge of the use of ‘enhanced
interrogation techniques’ on captured terrorism suspects during an
earlier stint as a top spy agency official… Those records, the sources said,
show that Brennan was a regular recipient of CIA message traffic about
controversial aspects of the agency’s counter-terrorism program after
September 2001, including the use of waterboarding. How deeply
involved Brennan was in the program, and whether he vigorously objected
to it at the time, as he has said he did, are likely to be central
questions lawmakers raise at his Senate Intelligence Committee
confirmation hearing, scheduled for February 7.”

A new Pew Research survey finds 66% of Americans support allowing women in the military to serve in
ground units that engage in close combat, while just 26% are opposed.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced he would life the ban on women in combat last week.

Marc Ambinder: 5 silliest reactions to women in combat.

Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) tells Roll Call “that so far, he has not counted a single Democratic ‘no’ vote on the question of whether former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel should be confirmed as Defense secretary.”

The Week: Hagel defined by Vietnam.

Bob Woodward: “The two share similar views and philosophies as the Obama administration attempts to define the role of the United States in the transition to a post-superpower world. This worldview is part hawk and part dove. It amounts, in part, to a challenge to the wars of President George W. Bush. It holds that the Afghanistan war has been mismanaged and the Iraq war unnecessary. War is an option, but very much a last resort.”

“So, this thinking goes, the U.S. role in the world must be carefully scaled back — this is not a matter of choice but of facing reality; the military needs to be treated with deep skepticism; lots of strategic military and foreign policy thinking is out of date; and quagmires like Afghanistan should be avoided.”

“A brand new conservative group calling itself Americans for a Strong Defense and financed by anonymous donors is running advertisements urging Democratic senators in five states to vote against Chuck Hagel, President Obama’s nominee to be secretary of defense,” the New York Times reports.

“Another freshly minted and anonymously backed organization, Use Your Mandate, which presents itself as a liberal gay rights group but purchases its television time through a prominent Republican firm, is attacking Mr. Hagel as ‘anti-Gay,’ ‘anti-woman’ and ‘anti-Israel’ in ads and mailers.”

“Those groups are joining at least five others that are organizing to stop Mr. Hagel’s confirmation, a goal even they acknowledge appears to be increasingly challenging. But the effort comes with a built-in consolation prize should it fail: depleting some of Mr. Obama’s political capital as he embarks on a new term with fresh momentum.”

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta “is removing the military’s ban on women serving in combat, opening hundreds of thousands of front-line positions and potentially elite commando jobs after more than a decade at war,” the AP reports.

The New York Times reports President Obama will get the first test of his second term when former Sen. Chuck Hagel’s (R-NE) confirmation hearing to be the next secretary of defense gets underway this week.

Hagel “has begun the uphill task of winning over hostile Republicans… Privately, administration officials figure that Mr. Hagel could get as
many as 60 votes, a threshold that would allow him to overcome a
filibuster. Even with a few votes shy of 60, Congressional aides said,
it is not clear Republicans will try to block his confirmation.”

Aaron David Miller points out that the bumpy nomination and confirmation process for Chuck Hagel to be the next defense secretary isn’t really about Hagel himself.

“This is really a fight about Barack Obama. It is being driven by three somewhat overlapping constituencies — a pro-Israel community that doesn’t trust the president, a Republican party and a neoconservative elite struggling unsuccessfully to define its own foreign policy identity, and finally, a party in opposition that is determined to remind Obama that, reelected or not, he doesn’t have a free hand.”

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who is seen as a key to Chuck Hagel’s becoming Defense secretary, is backing the former Nebraska Republican senator — despite past controversial statements on Israel, Iran, and the “Jewish lobby,” NBC News reports.

Said Schumer: “Based on several key assurances provided by Senator Hagel, I am currently prepared to vote for his confirmation. I encourage my Senate colleagues who have shared my previous concerns to also support him.”

“Suicides in the U.S. military surged to a record 349 last year, far exceeding American combat deaths in Afghanistan, and some private experts are predicting the dark trend will worsen this year,” the AP reports.

“The problem reflects severe strains on military personnel burdened with more than a decade of combat in Afghanistan and Iraq, complicated by anxiety over the prospect of being forced out of a shrinking force.”