Wednesday, December 21, 2005
What's Good For Us Is Good For Abdul...
I want to address a comment under TigerHawk's excellent post on Victory conditions in the wider war and the importance of ideology; not in the spirit of being adversarial, but simply to engage the idea because I think it fundamentally wrong:
...economic progress is what really benefits the US and that does not require democracy as the UAE and the rest of the Trucial states have proven. For that matter China proves that point every day. Also you are confusing what may be good for the average Arab on the street with what is good for the US. They are two different things and the only thing the US should care about is what is good for us. Screw the Arabs, for they will do the same for us, regardless of the government in place. Iraq will, like Weimar Germany vote its own dictator into place soon because in the end people will be willing to trade security for some of their freedoms. The only question is whether it will be a benign strongman like in Singapore or a harsh one. Actually Iraq would probably benefit from a strong monoarchy or a one party state like Singapore and allow itself to grow economically.
You would be better off thinking of this "war" as simply the fruits of our not encouraging the British and the French in 1956. Had we supported them in Suez we would probably not be here today.
In the end, two things will need to happen for real peace in the Middle East. The Palestinians need to give up the fantasy that they can have a functional state and get their lazy Arab asses elsewhere and allow Israel to exist. And B) they need to rid themselves of the albatross that is Islam. They will do neither, unfortunately so they will have to be dealt with. I do not care if they have democracy or not, so long as the governments that are there are aligned with US and sell us oil which is their only real purprose on earth to begin with.
This is not a war in any sense of the word, but a struggle to regain national sovereignty and security. That never has an end state but is an ongoing struggle.
To engage the first bolded portion above, in a global interconnected world there is nothing more important than what different countries choose to export.
The commenter asserts, rather startlingly, that we need only be concerned with what is good for the U.S., and that what is good for the average Arab on the street is immaterial. This would first-rate thinking...if we still lived in some Jeffersonian isolationist utopia. But we don't. We live in a world connected by the Internet, cell phones, data networks, and airliners that (as we learned to our cost on September 11th) transport both people and weapons around the world in the space of a few hours and fly them into skyscrapers.
In a world without borders, we can no longer afford to think only of what is good for us. It is all connected, now.
We export money, services, consumer goods, movies, music, and pop culture; and as a result of the GWOT, democratic values.
The Arab nations, right now, are exporting a number of violent and disaffected young men who refuse to assimilate themselves into Western culture.
They are little disposed to tolerate the practices, religious practices, or beliefs of others.
They do not believe Israel has the right to exist. They wish to wipe it off the face of the map. I remarked earlier that this was a war of ideas. The fighting may be happening in Iraq and Afghanistan but the world is watching. And if that message is lost on most Americans it most assuredly is not lost on al Qaeda. Perhaps the most critical two things TigerHawk said in his post were these:
The occupation of “Muslim lands” by Jews is particularly offensive to the jihad.
Al Qaeda believes that neither the apostate regimes nor Israel can defeat al Qaeda over the long-term without the support of the United States and its allies. Therefore, the United States must be induced to withdraw all support for Muslim apostate regimes and the “Zionist entity.”
...Al Qaeda is so embedded in the Muslim world that the West alone can neither destroy its organization nor discredit its ideology. We need help from Muslims, particularly Arabs, to separate the bad guys from the neutrals and the allies. Muslims must bear the brunt of this war, which is for the political heart of Islam.
Israel is that most hapless of creatures: a creation of the United Nations. And the U.N. has proven itself both unwilling and incapable of defending its baby against the rapacious Arab League. Always the first to appear to champion the global rights of women (so long as this doesn't require actually taking a stance), the UN appears to be trying to engage in some bizarre retroactive late-term abortion:
How one pines for a plain-spoken tell-it-like-it-is fellow like, say, former U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali? As he memorably said of Iran, "It's a totalitarian regime." Oh, no, wait. He said that about the United States. On Iran, he's as impeccably circumspect and discreet as the State Department.
Is ...the Iranian president ... "out of touch" with the "values" of the "international community?" The Hudson Institute's lively "Eye On The U.N." Web site had an interesting photograph of how the "international community" marked Nov. 29 -- the annual "International Day Of Solidarity With The Palestinian People." Kofi Annan and other bigwigs sat on a platform with a map flanked by the "Palestinian" and U.N. flags. The map showed Palestine but no Israel. The U.N., in other words, has done cartographically what Iran wants to do in more incendiary fashion: It's wiped Israel off the map.
So if there will never be peace in the Middle East until Palestine decides to let Israel exist in peace and/or gives up Islam (and it won't) and if the U.N. will never take action to defend Israel against the Arab nations who want to wipe Israel off the map (and they won't), and if the U.S. cannot afford to give up her defense of Israel nor withdraw from the region due to her oil interests, and if the Arab nations continue to export violent, disaffected young men to Western nations, thereby destabilizing Western society, then it seems that there is really only one solution to all of these problems.
Unilateral action by the United States to transform the region. This is an abstract, difficult task that, as TH remarked (and I have also done for two years now) may well take a generation. It is, as many of the anti-war crowd have remarked, a profoundly idealistic venture. A truly grand strategy. But that does not mean it is not worth doing. I have always loved this quote:
Realists judge policy by the ability to persevere in the pursuit of an objective in stages, each of which is imperfect by absolute standards but would not be attempted in the absence of absolute values.
American exceptionalism, viewing itself as a shining city on the hill, has always insisted on representing universal values beyond the traditional dictates of national interest.
In a world of jihad, terrorism and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, President Bush in his second inaugural address put forward a challenge at once going beyond the interests of any one country and that different societies could embrace without prejudice to their own interests.
He elaborated that the United States seeks progress toward freedom, not its ultimate achievement in a defined time, and that it recognizes the historical evolution that must be the foundation of any successful process. On this basis, realists and idealists should go forward together.
It does matter what is good for TH's "Average Abdul". We need more good neighbors, and the best neighbors of all are democratic republics. Yes, this is messy. But we are undoubtedly moving in the right direction, and the impetus of history is toward democracy. If I had to place a bet on which type of government would "win out" in the long term, I'd say George Bush had placed his money on the right horse.
If things are "good" in the lands of their birth economically, politically, and socially, there is less incentive for young disaffected Muslims to leave and migrate to the West. As the political and cultural gaps between us and them are lessened, there is less excuse for fanatical hatred and less opportunity to recruit the kind of people who strap bombs to their torsos and murder innocent civilians.
If we can successfully replace an ideology based on repression and fear with one that fosters tolerance and open inquiry, there is a chance that in 5, or 10, or even 25 years we will see another "Reagan" moment when the Berlin Wall of the Middle East will fall between Israel and Palestine.
Where there is no vision, the people perish.
8 Comments:
By 
Gordon Smith, at
Wed Dec 21, 11:22:00 PM:
So much to chew on over here today.
The grand strategy to remake the middle east requires a sustained military action and the invasion or toppling of several nations.
Quite a roll of the dice, eh? If your lucky seven comes up, then everything'll be peachy. But, as so often happens once the guns start firing, nothing happens according to plan.
If we're going to compose a grand strategy, why stop there? We can liberate the Chinese. Those Chinese sure look threatenin'. Have you seen the size of their nukes?!
One can argue that a remaking of the middle east driven by American militarism would be super.
One can also argue that it's a shortsighted way to change the world, and maybe not at all for the better.
In a war of ideas, let's use ideas first. Before we go smartbombing the Iranians, let's consider piping in internet and radio and television (all out in the open).
Al Qaeda and its offshoots can be addressed cooperatively by international law enforcement backed up by military in extreme situations. The jihadists ought never have been elevated to the status of warrior by our government. They're radicals, criminals, and murderers and they ought to be treated as such.
When we choose a militaristic path, we again reinforce the central belief of all violent movements - that might makes right. Choosing a cooperative path with the Rule of Law at its core reinforces the values that reflect our interconnected world. We need men ready to kill those who think they're warriors, so don't get me wrong - I'm not a pacifist. But it is plain that we are busily repeating an ages old drama with new players in the roles of hero and villain.
I would like to see the United States choose another visionary path - one of international cooperation and unity, one of seeking peace rather than preparing for eternal war.
Yeah, sounds crazy I know. But no crazier than bombing the middle east into democracy.
As usual - thanks for the forum
By Papa Ray, at
Thu Dec 22, 01:23:00 AM:
Nation building is something that takes more than one generation. But wiping out Islam is what it is going to take to stop the Muslim movement to change all governments to Islam.
If they (the Muslims) could somehow excise the Koran of the idea that it is the one and only true religion and that all others must be destroyed and other little tid-bits like that, maybe and I say just maybe Islam could be left to co-exist with the rest of the world.
But its never, ever going to happen.
Papa Ray
West Texas
USA
By Papa Ray, at
Thu Dec 22, 01:27:00 AM:
Oh, I forgot to mention something that all of you mostl likely already know.
Islam is not just a religion, it is the whole ball of wax. Politics, policy right down to which hand to wipe your ass with.
It's not just a religion,
It's a Cult, the most dangerous cult to ever to exist.
Papa Ray
By Gordon Smith, at
Thu Dec 22, 08:10:00 AM:
Yeah Papa Ray! Wipe out Islam! Fuck Yeah!
Lunatic.
Good thing those kindhearted Christians don't have an exclusivity clause in their holy book. And the Christians wouldn't dream of using religion and violence together...
Maybe we ought to wipe out christians too. We'll let the Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, and Rastafarians fight it out.
By Cassandra, at
Thu Dec 22, 08:29:00 AM:
Screwy, Screwy, Screwy...
First of all, you ignored the main thrust, as it were, of my argument.
Which, for a man is really unforgivable if not against biology *and* your moniker :)
China, last time I checked, is not exporting a minority cult of violent young men who refuse to assimilate themselves into Western society. The Chinese are smart, industrious, and a credit to whatever nation they choose to land in. One can argue China is waging economic war against us, but that is a different matter and the proper venue for that battle is the marketplace, not the battlefield.
As far as their nukes, again China is a rational actor, unlike Iraq (which attacked its own neighbors twice without provocation and used WMDs twice also, in addition to being a well-known and quite generous state sponsor of terrorism. I am also unaware that China ever tried to assassinate our President - did I miss that? All very good reasons for the US to take Iraq out but not China). So the threat assessment is entirely different - a fact you quite conveniently gloss over in your analysis.
*********
When we choose a militaristic path, we again reinforce the central belief of all violent movements - that might makes right.
*********
Screwy, they are not toddlers, and this is not some Skinnerian experiment. The reinforcement value of any response we might make is generally quite lost on suicide bombers -- they ain't around to have their 'beliefs' either reinforced or undermined.
What's left of them is being scraped off some block of pavement. This is why there aren't many little suicide bombers running around.
By Gordon Smith, at
Thu Dec 22, 04:16:00 PM:
Cultures of violence breed more violence. Surprise!
China is a very different threat, yes. That's why we busily spy on them and rattle our saber when they get upset about it. They are the future unless we reform our own economy and stop with the outsourcing already.
There are plenty of pro-war Bushies who might contend that they're a real threat to 'the American Way of Life'. And then there's the whole dictatorial regime that systematically quashes dissent, rapes the environment, denies basic human rights, and has more nukes than you can shake a nonprofliferation treaty at. Wait...am I taking about China or us? I digress...
There is a place for military action against those who act militarily (guerrilla or otherwise) against us or our allies. But for our central strategy to be military goes against common sense and against the wisdom of the great peacemakers of Western culture.
I won't go into all the Gandhi, King, Jeebus references, but feel free to insert them yourself. To deny their viewpoints is to deny much of the base of our morality.
Killing people to show them that killing people is wrong is a shortsighted strategy doomed to fail without an accompanying plan to create peace.
By 
, at
Thu Dec 22, 04:46:00 PM:
By Cassandra, at
Thu Dec 22, 07:03:00 PM:
But that was the point of the satire Screwy...they don't breed.
Actually Screwy, classic conservatives would maintain a free-trade stance that says we need to compete with China based on what we do best vs. what they do best. They have cheap labor. We are no longer a cheap labor market: we aren't willing (vice able: a CRITICAL distinction) to compete in the labor market: we have priced ourselves out of manufacturing goods competitively for that reason and it's a damned shame. Oh well.
I depart (somewhat) from the classic conservative model in that I believe there are certain core industries that ought to be protected because we have a national security interest in keeping them alive: steel, for instance, and a few other heavy industries. I think we were short-sighted in letting them die out.
