Monday, June 16, 2008
Gerald Ford on dangers then and now
A couple of weeks ago, the left and the mainstream media hammered on John McCain for suggesting (in a rather silly exchange with the Obama campaign) that the threat posed by Iran today is comparable to that of the Soviet Union back in the day. The dominant narrative was that McCain was grossly inflating the threat of Iran, or perhaps just losing his mind.
Against that backdrop, I was interested in reading some off-the-record, late-in-life comments of Gerald R. Ford on the broader threat of Islamist terrorism (of which Iran is almost certainly the leading state sponsor). From Thomas M. DeFrank's Write it When I'm Gone: Remarkable Off-the-Record Conversations with Gerald R. Ford
"I'm asked often, does the president have a tougher job in the current circumstsances than you had, or Reagan had, or Carter had? And my answer is yes. President [George W.] Bush has a much more difficult job. When Reagan and Carter and I and Johnson were in office, it was a challenge between the Soviet Union and the United States, their allies and our allies. When we negotiated, we understood what the problems were. We knew that they had so much in weapons, we knew they knew how much we had in weapons. And it was a much more responsible negotiation, even though the weapons were scary. President Bush has to deal with a worldwide, multifaceted problem, and that makes it much more complicated, and I say much more dangerous...."
Now, I have certainly argued the other side of this question, usually when goaded into it by people who claim that the invasion of Iraq was the "greatest foreign policy blunder in American history" or some such hyperbole, which then needs to be backed up by an inflated claim for the terrorism it unleashed. So I think that McCain was directionally wrong, much as I am a hawk on the confrontation with radical Islamism. It is interesting, though, that Gerald Ford, a strong proponent of Kissingerian detente with the Soviet Union, would argue (essentially) McCain's position. Perhaps it is because he understands that the radical Islamists, including the Shiite version in power in Tehran, are still in the revolutionary fervor stage and will not come to the table just because we invite them. They still want to bury us.
3 Comments:
By 
Steve M. Galbraith, at
Mon Jun 16, 11:10:00 PM:
The Soviet Union, despite its revolutionary beginnings and rhetoric, was - after Stalin's death and certainly post-Khrushchev - guided by national interest concerns. Whatever millenialism those leaders still held, after all, was about this earth.
The carrots and stick and other instruments and tools of foreign policy would work with these men.
Islamis radicalism seemingly cares not a bit about such measures since their millenial vision is of another world. In their worldview, even if they fail here, better things await them elsewhere.
Yes, Bush's task is immensely more difficult.
By 
, at
Tue Jun 17, 08:58:00 AM:
National interest is probably the biggest and most effective lever we have in this fight. The leaders in Tehran may not yet know it, but the Iranian people as a whole don't seem very keen on national--or for that matter, personal--annihilation.
Tehran's proxies are another matter entirely. Hezbollah appears more concerned with destroying nations than maintaining them.
I would argue indirectly Tehran is at risk too, and should be. We and any other nation concerned about terrorism should not only 'connect the dots' but hold all parties responsible. Israel makes a grave error in my estimation by not going after the state sponsors of the terrorism inflicted upon it.
Disproportionate retaliation on these states should be the primary, if not the only, response to terrorism, thus making it too expensive to sponsor. As regards responses to Hezbollah, Tehran and Damascus should be made very nervous and thus very careful.
Some will argue fanatical leaders won't be dissuaded by such considerations, and perhaps that is a correct reading. But even should the leaders be irrational the sure knowledge that the nation-sponsor will be held responsible may still serve as a deterrent and impetus to change, assuming the larger population is rational.
I think we have no choice but to hope and trust that to be the case, or work to undermine the irrational and thus make it so.
sirius_sir
By Assistant Village Idiot, at
Wed Jun 18, 11:39:00 PM:
The threats are apples and oranges, not to be measured by the same scale. As many others have noted, the USSR had much greater overall capacity for destruction, but was also more predictable, less volatile.
Stated in psychological terms, the Soviets were more paranoid, the Islamists more narcissistic. Both are dangerous.
