Seven weeks ago, President Obama fired Chuck Hagel, his secretary of defense. In a gesture of defiance, Hagel has chosen to remain in office until the Senate approves his successor. He’s used what little time he has left to attend his own wake, touring bases for an extended goodbye. The Marine Corps Times reported Wednesday on the latest stop in this farewell tour, a visit to the Marine Corps Air Station in Miramar, Calif., where Hagel spoke at length on his view of America’s role in world affairs:

You can’t force the United States’ value system and our values and our standards and our structures and our institutions down anybody’s throat. . . . .And we make huge mistakes when we think we can go around and make many USAs all over the world. It just won’t work, never has worked. . . . The United States in a lot of our foreign policy over many years, the mistakes we’ve made is because we have tried to force things.

Hagel’s disdain for American foreign policy is selective. He ignores our performance in World War II, the rise of democracies in Germany, Japan, and South Korea, the creation of the United Nations, the law of the sea undergirded by the U.S. Navy, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and countless other indisputable successes. While of course he is entitled to his dissenting views, he should keep them private while he is a cabinet member. Today we are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan under the direction of the Obama administration. Hagel bears responsibility for the very policies against which he is lashing out in retaliation for his dismissal. He should rein in his solipsism.

Seventy percent of our military—roughly 700,000 young men and women—leave after four years of service, with a modest educational stipend and no pension benefits. They re-enter civilian life and start all over again. If you are the secretary of defense, you do not send them on their way by lecturing about “huge mistakes.”

A few years ago, I accompanied a Marine patrol in the violent Afghan district of Sangin. After a firefight, Sergeant Joe “Mad Dog” Myers said to me, “This war is stupid. Well, so what? Our country’s in it.” Like Hagel, Mad Dog acknowledged policy mistakes. We did overstep in our attempt at nation-building. Unlike Hagel, Mad Dog understood that we must fight to protect American values, regardless of our past policy errors.

While I was in Sangin, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates paid the Marines there a visit. He congratulated them for having “killed, captured or driven away most of the Taliban. . . . I relish your victories, take pride in your achievements, and take satisfaction as you strike fear into the heart of the Taliban.” In other settings, Mr. Gates had criticized the policy of nation-building. But he had the wisdom to distinguish between making policy and fighting a war.

In a similar vein, after Saigon fell in 1975, Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger composed a letter to our 2 million troops. “Your cause was noble,” Schlesinger wrote. “Your dedication was determined. You answered your country’s call.”

Secretary Hagel would be well advised to follow the examples of Secretaries Gates and Schlesinger in his own farewell addresses.

— Bing West is the former Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs.