There are either growing number of conservatives who've become opponents of the US policy in Iraq, or those that always were opposed are becoming less sanguine. Fred Reed, who I generally find interesting and amusing, just penned a venomous anti-Bush screed that suggests a rather stark decision tree:
Either Georgie Bush is the minor, depressing, witless ferret I think he is, or I am. It has to be one or the other. If things don’t start looking up pretty soon internationally, I’m going to be pretty sure which.
His contention is that Bush doesn't take human nature into account. That makes sense because, as the product of the elitist prep school system, he presumably didn't interact much with normal human beings. But then so is Fred Reed, and so am I. Gulp.
But though I feel some affinity with Fred, who might be our own generation's elder Tom Sawyer, if not Sam Clemens, I just don't believe he's thinking this through:
Think about it. When he went braying into Iraq like a learning-disabled jackass, he thought people would roll over, throw flowers, and have a democratic revolution. This would start a domino effect that would make all the other Moslem countries want to be democracies too. They would climb over each other to be democracies. They would love us because democracies love each other. He just knew it.This makes perfect sense if you have no freaking idea how human beings work.
Of course, if you have read any history, which Bush hasn’t, you will have noticed that people do not like being occupied by force. They don’t like having their cities bombed. It galls them. It can, under certain circumstances (such as any circumstances) make them hostile.
If you think in terms of abstractions too simple for Reader’s Digest, you might reflect as follows: “Democracy good. Iraqi people, love’m democracy, so love’m us. Urrrg.” Then you might be real surprised when their gratitude was exiguous after you remorselessly wrecked their cities, killed their army (which consisted of other people’s husbands, brothers, and sons: ever think of that?), groped their women when you didn’t have time to rape them, and left them without water and electricity.
I’m not saying the Iraqis ought to dislike these things, only that pretty reliably they will dislike them. The Afghans too, or either. It’s how people are. Ungrateful.
Bush has no idea how people are.
First of all there were a lot of folks in that administration who weren't making the assumption that we'd be greeted with flowers... at least in the long run. But I did have a Latvian friend who told me that his father and uncles spent 12 winters in the Latvian forests waiting for a liberating US invasion, until they finally realized that it wasn't coming. And these folks weren't educated at Phillips or Andover, either. So human nature's a complicated thing.
And I'm not all that sure I see why we should care whether they like us, frankly. History may tell us that people hate occupiers, but it's also replete with examples where the values of occupiers have been successfully adopted by the occupied, especially if those values and institutions are the least bit worthy. The highest correlate with Democracy in the modern era is whether a nation was ever a British colony, suggesting that occupiers sometimes get the job done.
I mean, the British occupied America, and we pretty much despised them for it. Didn't turn out too bad. Most of the colonies never even had a genuine rebellion. Canada and Australia turned out OK, more or less. And India's occupation coupled with a successful anti-British revolution led to a phenomenon as inexplicable to sociologists as a bumblebee's flight was to aeronautical engineers: a democracy with extremely high levels of class and wealth disparity.
So, it wasn't necessarily a bad idea to invade Iraq in order to sew the seeds of a different kind of society. But it's probably a little naive to think that being liked is essential to getting the job done. Nor is it especially enlightened to think that the kind of dislike that a benevolently occupied people bear for the occupier naturally translates into murderous terrorism... which in this case is aimed mostly against non-occupiers. People are stupid and violent, and while it's important to acknowledge that reality, those are not exactly traits I'm willing to grant much deference.
And ultimately the only reason we're not perpetually in a Hobbesian war of all against all is that we're all "occupied", in a sense. The Stockholm Syndrome is an example of a larger phenomenon suggesting that people come to identify with those in power. The trait doesn't just apply to kidnap victims.
But the real problem might be that we place so much emphasis on being liked, because we think that has some transcendent value. The truth is, people don't identify with folks who are questioning and second-guessing their own power. They fight them.
The critical variable that ought to determine our actions isn't whether they like us, it's whether they're at a point that they can quell the wave of nihilism that threatens to sweep the Ummah and that targets us, not because we're occupiers, but because nihilism is an aspect of human nature that civilization, and sane women, don't like. When they're ready for that, by sentiment, conviction, and capability, we should leave. And when that time comes there might even be some utility in being disliked. More on that later...
But the real problem might be that we place so much emphasis on being liked,
We don't. The media does. They deal in celebrity and fame, not reality and celebrity and fame consist in being known and liked.
I'd prefer to be liked. I'd prefer to be respected. Absent those, I'll settle for inspiring soul-searing terror at the mere thought of trifling with me.
I find quite infuriating the kind of fundamentally unserious oped piece that accuses George W. Bush of being unserious.
Here Reed just clearly does not know how George W. Bush works, so he just invents motivations from whole cloth.
Most folks haven't figured out what the alternative to occupation would be.
We're not going to tolerate madmen with significant resources. We're learning in Iraq how we want to deal with madment with resources.
One way to get to that goal is to keep madmen from having power. That's where "create a civil society" is going. However, the folks involved do have a veto - they can decide that they don't want civil society. (And, we know that civil societies can spawn madmen.)
Another way to get to that goal is to take the resources.
While the US has been accused of the second method, the actual spending doesn't reflect it.
It would be a shame if the end result in Iraq was the US occupying the oil fields, protecting the pipelines, and pretty much ignoring the populace, where "ignore" includes "not giving them the relevant revenues", but that's easily achievable. And, if we grease the right palms, no one with the ability to block that move would object.
To recap, there are three possibilities.
(1) Live with madmen with resources.
(2) Impose civil society.
(3) Take resources.
I realize that some folks value "defeat Bush", but is that enough to sway their choice on that question?
Does Mr. Reed really mean to say that American soldiers are groping Iraqi women "when they didn´t have time to rape them"? Once again, we are learning very little about the subject matter and more about the writer than we needed to know. That he maintains the Iraqi army was killed tells me he is either uninformed or careless. Who is this guy and why should I waste time on someone who has nothing to say?
By the way, Mr Markham: The British occupied America? I thought the colonists were never anything but British before the revolution.
Repubosophist writes:
"First of all there were a lot of folks in that administration who weren't making the assumption that we'd be greeted with flowers..."
I guess these were the far-seeing responsible guys who made sure that guards were posted around all of Saddam's weapon caches. Probably the same crew who suggested that the Ferret-in-chief bomb Zarquawi's training camp up in Kurdistan, even though it might lessen Feretface's contention that Iraq was harboring Al-Qaeda. I bet these were also the guys who twisted Bush's arm that we continue to search for Osama at all costs.
Seriously, the only voice of reason in Ferretface's administration was Colin Powell, and he was pretty much dismissed as a whiner.
Groupthink and ass-kissing will sabotage the noblest causes, let alone foolish boondoggles like Iraq!
First, I think Reed has not read his history. All wars have their morale component (positive for our side; negative for the other), including ideological framing. Lincoln dedicated the lives of our slain soldiers to the proposition that all men are created equal. Wilson said we were fighting the war to make the world safe for democracy. Any cosmopolitan snob can (and could at the time) make fun of these sentiments.
Mr. Lincoln, you told us that we were fighting for Union, not slavery. How can you expect to reconcile with the South once you've destroyed their cities, starved their people and imposed upon them a policy of abolition? You're clearly an untraveled, country bumpkin that has no clue how to resolve this crisis and is simply content to use this war to further your radical views on race and your unpopular Whiggisms!
Andy Freeman makes big sense to me. The Middle East is obviously not ready for democracy and probably never will be. Exhibit A: Gaza, Exhibit B: Iraq, Exhibit C: Hezbollah in Lebanon. Savages are like children, they need a strongman kicking ass or nothing gets done. Our best bet is to leave the barbarians to their unspeakable foklways and use our power to protect our interests. Andy's #3 seems to me the best way to do that. Occupy the oil fields, buy off the people we can and kill the people we can't.
Oh yeah, I had a second comment . . .
To the extent we're looking at British imperialsm for a model, it was about being brutal at times, but also about using the power of finance.
If people resent occupation and lack of political control as much as Reed believes, why didn't India rebel at the outbreak of World War II? Or World War I? While some Indians used these wars to engage in insurection, the bulk of India, including the Indian National Congress alligned with British idealogically and economically with blood and treasure. The core of the Congress were educated, upper-middle class Indians and like the American revolutionaries were willing to return to business once the political issues were resolved.
The British didn't find much in the Middle East to attract them economically, until the discovery of oil in the fading sunset of Empire. But oil appears uniquely incapable of making the type of economic change that creates an educated, upper middle class.
I'm not familiar with Fred Reed, but if he's supposed to be funny he's no P.J. O'Rourke, and if he's supposed to be a piercing curmudgeon he's no Florence King. If he's supposed to be smart, my mother's poodle has him beat.
He's not the first Bush-hater to remind me of Homer Simpson, taking on Ned Flanders:
"Hmm. If I want to find Flanders, I have to think like Flanders! [Thinks] I'm a big four-eyed lame-o and I wear the same stupid sweater every day ..."
Well some of those poor slobs thought they were Americans, but you know...
I suppose you're saying..., well actually I'm not too sure what you're saying. A "prior allegiance" in this case would refer to ethnicity, I imagine. I don't know what other allegiances existed, since the US was the first nation founded on something other than ethnicity. But the fact is that we had evolved a culture that was quite distinct from that of the mother country, although derived from it. And at a certain point lots of people just decided that we were "occupied", even if some of the details defining an occuptation were a little loosey goosey. The enemy wore red coats, for instance, which made their offending presence rather noticable... even if some of the founders had worns such coats in the past.
To say we were just a different flavor of British is sort of to deny colonialism. But you know, I basically think colonialism was a good thing. Or at least not nearly as bad as it was made out to be. And, of course, our culture is derived from the British. (A frenchman, though, noticed some marked differences as early as the 1830s.)
"But you know, I basically think colonialism was a good thing."
You may have noticed that this sentiment is quite common among colonizers, but suprisingly less common among the colonized.
The views expressed in this thread would have been commonplace in the 1800s, but by 2006 the world has left colonialism behind, except for a few diehard neo-cons, dreaming of a world that never was.
After all, what have the Romans ever done for us?
Uh, the aquaduct?
Tom,
I suppose it would be completely useless to explain to you that in fact, the comments about colonialism above have virtually nothing to do with neoconservatives?
"After all, what have the Romans ever done for us?
"
Aside from schools,roads,sewers,law, etc.etc, I know my Monty Python too.
But, there is no will in the US to become a New Rome, despite the quite-detached from reality dreams of the neo-cons, nor is there the financial resources required, when even the day-to-day operations of government are financed by borrowing from our children.
There is certainly will to protect the US from real threats, but only a minority is interested in searching out and/or fabricating potential threats.
Re the suggestions upthread of bombing Al-Jazeera, because they show the bloody bodies which the US corporate media censors. If to win a war you must destroy freedom of speech in a non-combatant nation, violating international law by unprovoked attack (or provoked only by expressing ideas with which you disagree), then in the court of world public opinion you have already lost that war. Even the Romans ruled only with the consent of the governed (at least those that were still alive), any New Rome founded on attacking media outlets in peaceful countries would lose all legitimacy. Meanwhile with Al-Jazeera shut down, the Middle East would be getting its' information from jihadi websites instead. Good Luck on bombing those websites!
SPQR,
You can explain away, but in my opinion the mindset of oblivious imperialism where the US is expected to rampage around the world, invading countries, emulating empire and blowing up TV stations, is exactly the worldview promulgated by the neo-cons.
Maybe the posters would not consider themselves neo-cons, but they express the neo-con worldview, with all its' blindspots and shortcomings.
As the original post acknowledged, even the mainstream of conservative thought is moving away from the neo-cons' ambitious and unrealistic dreams of conquest.
Tom #17 -- I don't know if you are talking about me or not, but tor the record, for what it is worth, I never suggested that we should bomb any TV station. When the poster mentioned it I merely suggested there was a calculus to consider when considering such an operation.
> But oil appears uniquely incapable of making the type of economic change that creates an educated, upper middle class.
That might be because oil wealth involves very little labor, or at least very little "dumb" labor.
Okay, time to play Reality Check. Everybody flush out your headgear.
Categories are:
1. DEFINE IMPERIALISM
2. DEFINE NEOCONSERVATISM
3. DEFINE COLONIALISM
4. GIVE AN EXAMPLE OF A SINGLE NEOCONSERVATIVE WHO "PROMULGATES" A WORLDVIEW REMOTELY SIMILAR TO THE ONE DESCRIBED ABOVE
5. GIVE AN EXAMPLE OF A COUNTRY THAT THE US IS COLONIZING
6. GIVE A LIST OF COUNTRIES THAT BELONG TO THE US EMPIRE
7. WHICH OF THE FOLLOWING INVASIONS CONSTITUTE IMPERIALISM, AND WHICH DO NOT (GIVE REASONS): GWI, GWII, HAITI, THE FORMER YUGOSLAVIA, GRENADA, THE BAY OF PIGS
Tome, you have the buzzer. Pick any one you like.
It's got nothing to do with "how human beings are". It's got everything to do with a lack of single source of power. As long as there are competing powers, people do not matter and democracy cannot function.
So we end up with the chicken-and-egg problem: what comes first, democracy or social stability? Ideally, the latter is a precondition of the former. Realistically, we'll have to muddle through.
I don't know who Fred Reed is, but he's being at best silly, and probably -- worse -- dishonest, feigning a misunderstanding of the situation. "How human beings work" will matter when these human beings are not afraid of this or that thug shooting them in broad daylight for doing what they would naturally prefer. If there is one thing the occupation of Iraq is so far failing at it is the inability to secure the country and give the central government a real and total jurisdiction over the whole territory. Once people there can vote w/o fear for their lives, we'll see "how human beings are", and I suspect, it'll be as expected, rather than as Fred Reed implies.
Tom,
You seem to believe that you have discovered a species of never-before described ideologue, but unfortunately it only seems to appear in your imagination. The convenience of inventing this ideologue and ascribing to him all of the purported bad thoughts you can invent is no doubt enticing.
But the term "neocon" was already in use to refer to a specific political/economic body of thought and its adherents and you really can't use it for your strawman creation.
beowulf888,
Uhh, right. We knew exactly where all of them were, didn't we? That's why there was such universal agreement before the war that Sadaam had no WMD, isn't is--he had come clean an shown everyone where all that stuff was, then went the second mile and gave the West a complete guided tour of all his military facilities and depots. Right down to the last MIG buried in the sand.
Yeah, right.
BTW, I'm not Daniel Markham. Though perhaps that'd be a good thing.
Yes, Demosophist, that is a good thing. One of each of us is enough.
Glen,
1.From dictionary.com,
imperialism /–noun 1. the policy of extending the rule or authority of an empire or nation over foreign countries, or of acquiring and holding colonies and dependencies.
So a commonsense interpretation of US invasion/occupation of Iraq would qualify, especially with the current construction of what the Iraqis call "George Bush's Palace" while the rest of Iraq falls into chaos.
2. Wikipedia has a great entry on neoconservatism, way too detailed to reproduce here, but some excerpts...
"Neoconservatism is a political current and ideology, mainly in the United States, which is generally held to have emerged in the 1960s, coalesced in the 1970s, and has had a significant presence in the administrations of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. It is today most closely identified with a set of foreign policy positions and goals: a hawkish stance during the Cold War and, more recently, in various conflicts in the Middle East."...
"Neoconservatives won a landmark victory with the Bush Doctrine after September 11th. Thomas Donnelly, a resident fellow at the influential conservative thinktank, American Enterprise Institute (AEI), which has been under neoconservative influence since the Reagan Administration, argued in "The Underpinnings of the Bush doctrine" that
"the fundamental premise of the Bush Doctrine is true: The United States possesses the means—economic, military, diplomatic—to realize its expansive geopolitical purposes. Further, and especially in light of the domestic political reaction to the attacks of September 11, the victory in Afghanistan and the remarkable skill demonstrated by President Bush in focusing national attention, it is equally true that Americans possess the requisite political willpower to pursue an expansive strategy."
In his well-publicized piece "The Case for American Empire" in the conservative Weekly Standard, Max Boot argued that "The most realistic response to terrorism is for America to embrace its imperial role." He countered sentiments that the "United States must become a kinder, gentler nation, must eschew quixotic missions abroad, must become, in Pat Buchanan's phrase, 'a republic, not an empire'," arguing that "In fact this analysis is exactly backward: The September 11 attack was a result of insufficient American involvement and ambition; the solution is to be more expansive in our goals and more assertive in their implementation."
President Bush has expressed praise for Natan Sharansky's book, The Case For Democracy, which promotes a foreign policy philosophy nearly identical to neoconservatives'. President Bush has effusively praised this book, calling it a "glimpse of how I think".8
As of 2005, the most prominent supporters of the neoconservative stance inside the Administration are Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld."...
Since I am at work I don't have time to fo through your whole list, but my general practice is to used words as defined in dictionaries and other references. The "words mean what I want them to mean" style or arguement quickly degenerates into babble.
What bothers me and (apparently) most of the US public is the unquestioned assumption that the US has the right, responsibility, and capability of restructuring governments around the world to our preferred configuration, with or without the consent of the people in those countries (Who cares if the Iraqis like us,etc.,etc,).
History indicates that the results of invasion/occupation/bombing are not as rosy as the neocons claimed in the heady days of 2003. Holding ideas which are not modified and adapted to fit reality is the characteristic of an idealogue.
My definition of neo-cons is quite consistent with wikipedia's and is certainly not my invention.
Was the invasion of Japan, imperialism? Was setting up a Constitution for Japan imperialism? Is builing military bases in Romania, imperialism? Is imperialism just another word to be thrown around for a war someone doesn't agree with?
Only a racist would ask those questions. Or is it fascist?
Not even close. Imperialism is an attempt to impose a common culture and a common rule of law on another territory or nation.
Again, I throw out the example of Haiti. Was Clinton's invasion and occupation of Haiti "imperialism"? Was Clinton a neo-con? But then, the left was in a coma during Wild Bill's military adventures. I'll never forget the Hollywood creeps defending his indiscriminate use of Tomahawk missiles - instant push-a-button "military victories".
I guess you also blanked out all those Gore lectures about "nation-building". I don't blame you, I never listen to that clown either.
> We're not going to tolerate madmen with significant resources.
This kind of assertion is kind of silly, as it is so patently false as to be ludicrous.
Who funded Saddam when he was using chemical weapons on the Kurds? The US, of course, which is why the US has to do an embarassing song and dance at his trial now.
Who funded dictators in Iran through most of the 20th century? The US, of course, which is why their leaders have to denounce US imperialism constantly, to have any moral credibility at home.
"Who funded Saddam when he was using chemical weapons on the Kurds?"
France, Russia, and China. And it turns out the chemical weapons were made in Germany.
"Who funded dictators in Iran through most of the 20th century?"
How many dictators were there in Iran? The US had to do with exactly one, the Shah put into power during WW2 to guarantee that Iran would allow arms and goods transports into the Soviet Union.
Quoth Tom Volckhausen:
Well, as Lincoln riddled,