10 more
Posted by Michael Signer
CNN and MSNBC are both reporting that 10 Marines were killed today by a homemade bomb... DOD doesn't have it up on their site yet though.
So unbelievably painful -- and this one seems somehow worse -- such a large number, and they're Marines, and it all comes after the President's speech...
I've been accused recently of occasionally being snarky, and I suppose I concede the point. But all I really have to offer now is my recollection of audible dismay (something between a gasp and a sigh) when I checked CNN's page.
I hate where we're at, that all we have to choose between are equivalently poor options, and that our soldiers (and, man, do I admire Marines) are suffering for it all. For me, this isn't about party. It's about my wounded pride in our great nation, and a sense of rage at this death by a thousand (now over 2,100) gashes.
please excuse a personal obervation...I work at a major US airport...a few weeks ago a proud set of parents were seeing off their young marine son who had justbeen graduated from basic training...the young man - though I hesitate to say that because he was only a boy - was in uniform...also proud but profoundly self-conscious,and deeply embarassed at the attention he was getting...and I couldnt help but think God forgive us for sending innocents like this to die in our name...
Posted by: jl | December 02, 2005 at 01:11 PM
Why isn't the story that the last time we lost 10+ killed in one day was 3 months ago? Why isn't the story something like tonights Nightline (townhall style meeting in Iraq)? Why does anyone imagine 10 combat deaths, while a tragedy to 10 families and those close to the fallen, is "news"? It's certainly a fact but facts are not news yet they are presented as such.
If 10 soldiers died every day in Iraq for 3 years that would be around the same number of Americans who died in combat in one day a few generations ago. To focus on the death of ten honored marines as an apparent indication of everything that is wrong is to fundamentally misunderstand the nature of war and is void of all historical perspective.
The nation does indeed send you or I or our children off to war and we or they do not all come back. In order to spare future generations sometimes we bleed for them today. Sometimes we spare ourselves and kill our grandchildren as in the case of Europe being so fearfull of one war they allowed a far worse one within one generation.
Part of the reason young Americans are dying in Iraq today is because the leaders of this nation in some situations in recent history allowed many around the world the perception that we as a nation no longer have the stomach for war (Iran hostage crisis, Marine barracks Beirut, Somalia, etc.). Are we to lose more young men years from now because we cut our losses and left Iraq to it's own devices now? One can rage against that level of short-sighted selfishness too.
The world needs to see our nation debate Iraq as a matter of policy. When they see one side inspired by the death of ten marines they know with total certainty how easily they can influence our nation. My personal rage at that is boundless.
Lane Brody
Posted by: Lane Brody | December 03, 2005 at 01:52 AM
Lane, the trouble is that Bush's efforts to tell americans why we're there have failed. So it just seems like 2 more senseless deaths one day and 10 more senseless deaths the next day and 4 more the day after that.
A few generations ago we knew what we were fighting for. Today we don't.
The idea of democratising iraq is unfortunately directly parallel with the reason the russians gave for their war in afghanistan. They were going to civilise the place and the longer they fought without any signs of civilization popping up the less enthusiastic they got. We have the same problem.
So there's an easy solution. Get the sunnis to look for a political solution and give up violence. Get the electricity running reliably and the oil production up, bring back the university teachers and doctors, get such a low profile for US troops that iraqis mostly don't ever see them or see US warcraft. When iraqis show solid signs of a democratic government that runs its own country on its own budget and patrols its own borders etc, americans will gladly support the war.
Posted by: J Thomas | December 03, 2005 at 11:01 AM
Lane,
All US military casualties are reported dutifully by the press. Every day they report one or two soldiers killed here, or a couple killed there. As you suggest, in most cases these reports are not treated as major news, but just part of the daily public journal of events in Iraq.
Whether a report of troop losses recieves prominent play and discussion, or not, seems to depend in part on the level of the losses. By your own account, casualties in excess of ten on a single day are very rare. Hence it is not surprising this report should escape from the realm of the mundane, and rise to the level of news.
On the other hand, if fatalities in the area of ten a day become the norm, then I am sure reports of this kind will cease to be treated as news.
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 03, 2005 at 11:57 AM
There's no problem with a little snark as long as it is matched with substance. Obviously, there tends to be a decent amount of snark on our site as well.
Moving on to two substantive points:
First, with regard to 'jl', the first commenter above -- you seem to be suggesting that this young marine is making an ignnorant and misguided decision to enlist. But perhaps he is isn't ignorant. Perhaps he simply disagrees. He believes in our mission in Iraq, unpopular as it as. And I am sure he fully recognizes that he may very well be killed on behalf of that mission.
On a related note, one of the major problems liberals have relating to their military is their denigration of the decision to serve. Soldiers are very proud of making a choice that few others have made, yet liberals often insist on describing that choice as a product of ignorance. This is one important reason Democrats have hard time establishing their credibility on security issues.
Posted by: David Adesnik | December 03, 2005 at 01:09 PM
David,
You're projecting. I didn't detect any negative judgment at all in jl's comments about either the soldier leaving home, or his proud parents - at least not a negative judgment directed toward the soldier and his parents. The accusatory finger was pointed toward "us" - the viewers of this touching tableau. We are the ones jl asks God to forgive.
Some may consider it impolite or direspectful to view young enlistees as boys, but the older I get - I'm 46 now - the harder it is for me to view these guys as "young men". I gather I am not alone, since it is customary to refer to soldiers fighting abroad as "our boys". They may crave respect as men and equals - but unfortunately my attitude toward them remains a paternal one. And I am haunted by the realization that these soldiers don't just go to Iraq - they are sent by their country. Since our country is a somewhat democratic one, which its citizens rule, some of us feel a sense of collective guilt at having sent them.
Exercising paternal responsibility requires acceptance of some degree of hostility and condemnation. Parents are used to being seen as "lacking credibility" of various kinds by their children. They also recognize that the pride their children feel in various accomplishments is a double-edged sword - one which can just as often lead them into bad choices as good ones. If one can't stand up to these youthful accusations of lack of credibility, or the charge that "you don't understand me", then one can't skillfully discharge one's parental responsibilities.
The sense of guilt or sin many experience in sending our boys off to fight for our various interests is an old story. Indeed it is an ancient story - at least as old as the story of Abraham and Isaac. Just as that story makes one wonder what kind of God could demand the sacrifice of a son by a father, so the spectacle of the old sending the young off to die for them makes one wonder about some other idols of modern worship - such as the nation.
I recently encountered a young Navy Seaman in training during my trip home after a week on business. Our flights had been delayed, and then cancelled, and we were both on standby for a later flight. I, along with several other people, gave up my place on the list and let the sailor jump ahead of us. I was feeling proud of myself for a while, but eventually my skepticism set in. It felt to me like I was just buying an indulgence. The thought was that if we give up our seats enough times to service men and women, or buy them enough drinks, or clap loudly enough when they march past in veterans parades, that will somehow make up for the fact that we sent them into hell to secure our material resources, or to purchase some marginal bit of added security against terrorist attack - or even worse, to avenge some affront to our national pride.
But I do have my own kind of pride. I am proud of the anti-militarist skepticism which has been a prominent theme in the liberal tradition. I realize that this means that people like me lack credibility in the eyes of lots of eager young hawks. But that goes with the territory.
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 03, 2005 at 02:51 PM
Dan, the distinction between "anti-militarist" versus "anti-military" is the same difference as between "islamist" and "islam".
A subtlety that's worth careful attention.
But note that just as islamists want glory for islam, militarists want glory for our military. So in either case it's easy to imagine that opposing militarists means opposing glory (and weapon systems) for our military and is therefore a bad thing.
Posted by: J Thomas | December 03, 2005 at 04:55 PM
If one is against the war, for any reason, than more "senseless deaths" should not be needed to rienforce one's view of the war being wrong. The major problem is the implication that X amount of deaths equals loss of support for a given mission.
Around the world there are pamplets, handbooks, and websites that basically say engage the Americans in urban combat, ambush them when you can, and eventually when you kill enough of them they will go home- and you'll be very surprised how few of them you have to kill sometimes. As a nation it is not in our intersts to keep rienforcing this lesson. The lesson should be we will do what it takes to win. Recall "pay any price and bear any burden"? Where is the voice of JFK now?
The press should report combat deaths. The problem, however, is when these stories contain the implied conclusion that because 10 marines died we are losing when in fact that many hadn't died in 4 months in one day and the enemy in between now and then has on many occasions killed large number of civilians including the recent bombing of children at a hospital.
The point is the insurgents are not offering anything and have zero chance of victory. To repeat, zero chance of victory yet the press keeps saying we are losing and cites our losses as "proof". It's zero because 80% of Iraq is shia or kurd and not even most of the remaining 20% or so sunni population wishes to engage in a civil war. The entire notion of Iraq having a civil war is irrational. If anything we are preventing some of the 80% majority from slaughtering the sunnis.
This is exactly what most sunni's have figured out and why many will be voting in 10 days. How about we take a breath and wait and see if that election is seen as legimate, what percentage of sunnis vote, and what happens near and midterm after that?
Lane Brody
Posted by: Lane Brody | December 04, 2005 at 12:11 AM
Lane, we have to fight our wars with the citizens we have and not the citizens we wish we had. We don't want to get in long bloody expensive wars. Not unless we have to. If a president wants to lead us into a long expensive bloody war he'd damn well better persuade us it's necessary. The Bush administration didn't even try. They did a bait-and-switch.
The insurgents are very likely to win, if their goal is to get us to go away. We are very unlikely to win if our goal is to get a stable iraq run by our puppet government while our military is still in charge.
We aren't losing because we're taking casualties. We're losing because the enemy doesn't give up no matter how many casualties we inflict. And note -- if we somehow do beat down the sunnis, the shias won't need us any more. They'll tell us to go away and if we don't they'll fight us. See, we had it won in 2003, and we forgot what our victory conditions were and started making up new ones. So we're losing. Probably some of the insurgents also have chosen victory conditions they can't achieve. They're losing too. One time Kissinger said, "It's too bad they can't both lose." Well, they can. The example he was talking about (iran and iraq) they did. It's quite likely we lose and some insurgents lose both.
It isn't like "We're going to move in and tear things up and then mvoe out again" isn't a serious threat. Across the world people who think they can drive us out if they kill enough US soldiers don't want us to move in and tear things up. It's when we make stupid goals that we lose. And deciding that we're going to occupy a country until we can kill or detain all the terrorists is a stupid goal.
Posted by: J Thomas | December 04, 2005 at 04:38 AM
The point is the insurgents are not offering anything and have zero chance of victory. To repeat, zero chance of victory yet the press keeps saying we are losing and cites our losses as "proof". It's zero because 80% of Iraq is shia or kurd and not even most of the remaining 20% or so sunni population wishes to engage in a civil war. The entire notion of Iraq having a civil war is irrational. If anything we are preventing some of the 80% majority from slaughtering the sunnis.
I can't speak for others, Lane, but I don't often think of the challenges and options in Iraq in terms of "victory" and "losing". The US went into Iraq with various aims; indeed, various different kinds of Americans and US leaders had various different aims. Some of those aims have been achieved, and some have not. Of the various possible aims that different kinds of Americans still have, some might be achievable without great difficulty, some achievable with great difficulty, and some not achievable at all.
The same is true of the different parties in Iraq, including those making up the insurgency. Some of their aims have been achieved, some have not yet been achieved but can be achieved; and many cannot be achieved.
To the extent that some of the insurgency consists of Baathists or other Sunni parties whose aim it is to re-take all of Iraq, and establish a Sunni-dominated government to rule it, I agree that their chances are miniscule.
To the extent that some of the insurgents seek to prevent the present government from establishing effective rule over the Sunni heartland, I believe their chances are still reasonably good.
To the extent that the goal of some insurgents is simply to exact vengeance against American invaders, and to achieve honor by killing them whenever targets present themselves, they have already been quite successful in their goal, and many of them are likely to continue to be successful so for as long as Americans are in the vicinity.
To the extent that their goal is not to be killed themselves by Americans, some have been successful and some have not.
To the extent that their goal was to achieve martyrdom by being killed in battle by Americans, some have been successful and some have not.
To the extent that their goal is to prevent the Kurds from seizing total control of ethnically mixed cities in Northern Iraq - Tal Afar, Mosul and Kirkuk - their chances of success are, I would estimate, below one half, but still reasonbable.
To the extent that their goal is to force US troops to leave various cities in the Sunni heartland, their chances of victory are in a certain way excellent - since we know the US will likely leave those places eventually.
To the extent that some of the insurgents are jihadists of the Al Qaeda variety, who seek to establish a Salafist toehold state in Iraq, I think the chances are not at all good, but not negligible.
To the extent that the US aim was to establish a unified, liberal, democratic and non-theocratic state in Iraq, the chances are now close to zero.
To the extent that the aim was to establish a durable and unified Iraqi state of any kind, the chances of success are not zero, but less than one half. I believe Iraq is headed for dissoulution. The only questions are when that process will be completed, and how terrible the cost of getting there will be.
To the extent that the US aim was to remove Saddam from power, permanently, the chances of success are close to 1. Saddam has already been removed from power, and the likelihood of his return is vanishly close to zero.
To the extent that the US sought to liberate the Kurds from the grip of Saddam's government, they have been largely successfaul, although the Kurds are still fighting remnants of that government.
To the extent that the US aimed at establishing a government in Iraq that would allow the US to establish a large and permanent US military presence in different regions of the the country, the aim is not entirely achievable. My guess is that the Kurds will eventually form a state or autonomous region that permits such a presence, but the chances of maintaining such a presence in the rest of the country are very low.
To the extent that the US sought to replace Saddam's governnment with a unified government powerful enough to check Iranian power in the Gulf, the chances of success are very low. Whether a unified government emerges or not, the Iranian position has been improved as a result of the war.
To the extent that the US sought to establish a unified national government that would de-nationalize its oil business, and place it in the hands of private firms that would freeze out French and Russian competition, and work primarilly with American ones, the chances of success are very low.
To the extent that some Americans have aimed at preventing the Iraqi conflict from spilling beyond Iraq's borders and sparking a regional war, the chances of success are middling.
To the extent that some other Americans have had the opposite aim of spreading the Iraq conflict beyond the borders of Iraq, and sparking a transformative regional war, their chances of success are also middling.
To the extent that some in the US sought to establish a government that would have normal, and largely friendly relations with Israel, they are likely to be only partly successful at best. That may be the case with a future Kurdish state - but not likely in the rest of Iraq.
One could go on and on here, Lane. But you get the picture. Unless poeple manage to think about events in Iraq in something other than crude, bivalent terms of "victory" or "defeat", we are doomed to frustration and stupid decision-making.
Some argue that the US public is not capapble of anything beyond this level of stupidity. I disagree. The main problem right now is that the US President is a mental midget, and a thoroughly inept communicator. If we had a president who was capable of making realistic and multidimensional appraisals of the prevailing realities in Iraq, and then skillfully presenting these appraisals to the American people, in clear and easily intelligible terms, we could have a continuing national discussion about our options - with the focus on the best way foward rather than the mistakes of the past.
Instead we have a President who seems stuck in his dogmatic and ridiculously oversimplified grasp of events; who is stubbornly attached to a course of action suitable only for that fantasy world, and one who presents the public with only series of meaningless, staged Presidential pep rallies. The result is idiotically polarized and fantastical national debate that seems to comprehend only two options: "winning" or "cutting and running".
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 04, 2005 at 10:59 AM
Dan wrote, "One could go on and on here, Lane. But you get the picture. Unless poeple manage to think about events in Iraq in something other than crude, bivalent terms of "victory" or "defeat", we are doomed to frustration and stupid decision-making."
I completely disagree. I think that people develop idealistic and impractical notions by failing to think in terms of victory and defeat. While limited political aims allow a grey area of “perpetual peace” (really just continuous, low-intensity conflict), unlimited political goals provide only for win/lose thinking.
As I have pointed out before, the disagreements hinge on what the political goals ought to be, which in turn hinges on certain philosophical assumptions. These philosophical starting points hardly ever get discussed, and one thinks they are rarely even thought of, and the political goals are but rarely discussed.
Posted by: Jeff younger | December 04, 2005 at 06:09 PM
Jeff,
I think you would have to admit that the "unlimited goals" you articulated in an earlier comment are accepted by only a minority of the American people, and a minority of our national leadership.
My comments were directed mainly toward Lane Brody's comment that the insurgents have zero chance of victory. What do you personally think an insurgent victory would consist in? Aren't there many different kinds of insurgents with many different kinds of aims?
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 04, 2005 at 09:54 PM
Dan, on the contrary, I think that most American wholeheartedly support the unlimited political goals documented in The National Security Strategy of the United States of America
This is a clear statement of an unlimited political goal, and you can be very sure that the US State Department, intelligence services and military take it very seriously. Moreover, I feel very confident that most Americans enthusiastically favor it. I certainly do.
I must admit to bafflement at how little liberals seem to know about diplomacy and war. For example, you put the term unlimited goal in scare quotes, but it is standard diplomatic usage, especially as it pertains to war policy. Just to be clear, you do understand that, at least since the Treaty of Westphalia, threats to vital national interests are by definition unlimited threats, right?
Posted by: Jeff younger | December 04, 2005 at 11:07 PM
I must admit to bafflement at how little liberals seem to know about diplomacy and war. For example, you put the term unlimited goal in scare quotes, but it is standard diplomatic usage, especially as it pertains to war policy. Just to be clear, you do understand that, at least since the Treaty of Westphalia, threats to vital national interests are by definition unlimited threats, right?
You'll have to instuct me Jeff and help me with some citations. I have to admit that I am having trouble making logical sense out of these concepts.
An unlimited goal, I would assume, is a goal that is incapable of fulfillment. Any goal that is achievable within the finite bounds of human existence, on the other hand, is a limited goal. Are you suggesting that the United States should pose for itself unachievable goals? Then we are no longer even talking about the gap between victory and defeat, but between eternal transcendence and mortality.
Similarly, I don't understand how it is that a threat to a vital national interest is thereby an unlimited threat. No matter how grave the threat, there are only so many people in the world, and so many guns, bombs, etc. Thus even threats to vital interests are finite.
In any case, Iraq is not Armageddon. It's just a regular human war, and we should confine our discussions of options to what is the best achievable outcome in the temporal realm of - as you call it - continuous low intensity conflict.
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 05, 2005 at 12:06 AM
By the way Jeff, I think it is dispuatble that there is anybody in Iraq who is part of an organization with global reach, or at least that there are any significant number of such people. A small proportion of the insurgency appears to be made up some jihadists who call themselves "Al Qaeda in Iraq", and who are reputed to communicate from time to time with Al Qaeda leaders outside Iraq. But whether these folks in Iraq really do participate in any meaningful way in an "organization" with global reach is unclear. It also seems clear that the majority of Sunni Arabs in Iraq have no intention of being ruled by these suicidal nutjobs. If we were to cancel our futile project of fighting every Sunni who just wants us out of there, thereby helping a Shiite and Kurd-dominated government establish control over the Sunni Arab desmains, and were to allow the Sunnis to establish home rule over their own cities and towns, then I suspect they themselves would do much to take care of the jihadists for us.
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 05, 2005 at 12:20 AM
Sorry but I thought it was clear that by victory I meant the insurgents taking over the country.
For all the talk of the country splitting up one might offer two observations: There is a strong sense of national identity of being Iraqi, a very significant amount of intermarriage, etc. On a practical level Turkey is never going to put up with a real Kurdish nation. Certainly there will be strong regional automony but that works well in many countries.
On a broad level isn't it up to them? Don't they get a chance to have an election in ten days and determine for themselves whether they will have a decent future? We owe them the chance to explore this future. It's a debt both moral and legal after taking over their country and disbanding their security forces. Recall Powell stating you break it you own it. It's no less true now. When did so many of us forget the notion of duty?
Lane
Posted by: Lane Brody | December 05, 2005 at 01:49 AM
Dan, the DoD dictionary defines unlimited war (also called general war) as “Armed conflict between major powers in which the total resources of the belligerents are employed, and the national survival of a major belligerent is in jeopardy.”
A good example relating the concept of unlimited goal to unlimited war is this report from the Strategic Studies Institute.
Just to be clear:
There is a well-known typology of military strategies that relate the political goal to the military one. An unlimited aim can be achieved only by unlimited means --- by bringing to bear sufficient power to destroy the enemy. Limited aims can be achieved by unlimited or limited means.
Now on to the notion of national interests. A national interest is nothing more or less than something considered important to a nation-state. It could be anything from a world soccer match to a border dispute. Vital national interests are a definition of things tantamount to survival of the state. If a vital national interest is toppled, the state will likely cease to exist. Obviously, when a vital national interest is threatened a nation-state will go to war to protect it, otherwise it will likely cease to exist. Hence, diplomats spend considerable time broadcasting their nation’s vital national interests, hoping to prevent unintended war.
US vital interests include (from the NSS)
One important point: oil markets are a vital national interest. Without oil, no nation could possibly field an army to protect itself.
Again, I’m aghast that liberals can be so ignorant of basic definitions in their area of purported expertise. I’m beginning to think that the illogic of liberal policy analysis derives from a failure to do basic background research. Astounding.
Posted by: Jeff younger | December 05, 2005 at 12:21 PM
"On a practical level Turkey is never going to put up with a real Kurdish nation."
This gets used as an excuse a whole lot. But we don't actually know what the turks would do in any particular situation. It's just one of those things people think they know when they don't.
Suppose we wound up with a kurdish nation with a member in the UN etc. Would turkey invade that nation and annex the land to turkey? I have some doubts. The turks want to be in the EU, they'd have to give up on that first. They already have a lot of trouble with kurdish citizens, would they want more?
There are the oilfields, but if turkey tried to take over those oilfields which other nations would back them and which would oppose them? Do they have a friend in the Security Council who'd veto resolutions against them? We talk about turkey as our good friend and ally but would they still be our friend after we set up an independent kurdistan? Are they still our friends now? We've been mighty high-handed at presuming on the friendship in recent years.
What's the chance the turks would consider kurdistan more of a pressure valve? Maybe they coul send dissatisfied turkish citizens there. Kurdish nationalism is a long-term problem for turkey, but they might put the problem off. Look at all the long-term problems we've put off.
And then, say the turks are ready to invade. Would confederation into a weak iraqi state stop them? An iraq that didn't contribute shia troops and sunni troops and armor and such probably wouldn't have much effect. Why does it really matter to the turks whether the kurds have an iraqi diplomatic fig leaf?
It all looks murky. The turtks are peeved at us and they'll be peeved at us over any outcome that leaves the kurds unsuppressed. I think there's a strong chance turkey won't invade kurdistan almost no matter what happens there. And the chance they do invade doesn't much depend on what the kurds and iraqis do. It would probably be bad for everybody if turkey got involved, but it isn't the least bit clear what to do to avoid that.
Posted by: J Thomas | December 05, 2005 at 03:32 PM
Sorry but I thought it was clear that by victory I meant the insurgents taking over the country.
Then I agree with you Lane. I think the chances of some or all of the Sunni Arab insurgency taking over the country are negligible.
I also think the chances that the Sunni Arabs will submit to the rule of the Iraqi government, or eventually be subjected to that rule through force of arms, are quite small.
As for the issue of the elections, I don't think there are many people arguing for withdrawl ahead of elections.
Continuing with my current theme about the harmful effects of attachment to the winning/losing dichotomy, I think it is just as much a distortion to say "we are "losing" as "we are winning". There are too many distinguishable US interests and objectives involved to lead to such a clean distinction. There are certain US aims - for example, establishing a unified, liberal and democratic state with control of all of Iraq - that have not been achieved and that I believe are unlikely to be achieved by the continued application of US military force. But there are other options which, though not optimal, are still achievable and do not constitute a loss.
In certain sorts of decisions situations, there are only two possible outcomes, a good one and a bad one. Some situations like this are two-person games in which one party achieves the good outcome if and only if the other party experiences the bad outcome.
But most situations are much more complex. There may be many more than two parties involved. And for any one of the parties, there may be many more than two relevant outcomes.
The problem with much of the current debate is a powerful tendency to think of every situation to think of every situation as a symmetric two-person game with only two possible outcomes per player. But suppose we listed 100 of the possible outcomes of the current conflict in Iraq, and rank ordered them - with a different rank ordering for each player. Suppose the the eventual outcome is ranked 47th by the US; and suppose it is ranked 32nd by the KDP; and 81st by SCIRI; and 31sd by the Islamic Scholars Association; and 87th by Ahmed Chalabi; and 91st by Al Qaeda in Iraq; and 56th by the government of Saudi Arabia; and 70th by the government of Iran, etc. etc.
Did we win?
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 05, 2005 at 05:20 PM
Victory in Iraq will be determined by the attainment (or not) of strategic political goals. In particular, the geographical, political, economic, intelligence and military containment of the two most pro terrorist states in the world: Syria and Iran.
Posted by: Jeff younger | December 05, 2005 at 06:03 PM
Jeff,
Thanks for the clarification on the nature of limited vs. unlimited goals and limited vs. unlimited war. I don't know why you would describe these topics as areas of purported expertise for liberals. Personally, I have no expertise at all in politics, diplomacy, international relations or military affairs. I have never studied any of those areas formally, nor have I worked in any of them. I assume most liberals are the same.
I suppose you mean that because liberals tend to put more emphasis on diplomacy than military solutions, they ought to acquire expertise in diplomatic practice and terminology. Perhaps that's a good point. On the other hand, there are a lot of conservatives who, for example, advocate replacing social security with a system of forced private investiment. But these conservatives are not all experts on investment banking. Ars longa, vita brevis.
I understand something of your philosophical position, but I would like to see more of a discussion from you of concrete means and ends, about the various options available to us in Iraq, and about how choosing these options would or would not be conducive to certain ends. Specifically, I am not clear about your views on the nature of the various fighters who constitute the insurgency in Iraq, and about how our fights against these folks are related to achievable goals in Iraq, and the vital national interests you mention. I tend to believe that defending those interests, including those that I think most Americans would agree about, requires that we make a significant change of course. For example, you mention our strategic interest in checking Iranian power. It seems to me that our current course is enhancing it.
I agree with your general point that major issues about large political goals and philosophical presuppositions are barely touched on in our public discussions. This is particularly galling to me since I was a philosophy professor for 18 years. Of course, all political leaders have a tendency to keep things simple. But I think our current national leadership (including the Congress) is singularly inept in its ability to communicate with the American public about broad national goals, about the hard facts of life constituted by contemporary events and political realities, and about how those facts are related to the goals. Politics in America seems to me weighted down by an overabundance of taboos - and also by mediocre and ignorant leadership in both parties.
The President himself seems to be preternaturally stubborn about admitting any errors or miscalculations in the past. This is very self-defeating, since it prevents him from moving on, and changing the topic to those those things he might have been right about, or at least to our predicament now and what to do about it. He also seems unwilling, or unable, to come before the public with detailed assessments of the current facts on the ground - including names, places, maps, graphs, etc. Thus, while the country is in the thick of battle in Iraq, we are bogged down in a bitterly polarized debate about recent history, and about electoral politics-as-usual, rather than pressing current events.
I think the Bush administration also suffers from profoundly anti-democratic instincts, and seems to believe that except for the occasional "accountability moments" provided by elections, the public has no right to participate actively in the formation of national security policy and decision-making. The crude and misleading terms in which the administration describes events related to the Iraq War, which I believe includes a fair amount of outright lying, display great contempt for the intelligence and democratic prerogatives of the American public.
I just want to add a few words about my own philosophical orientation in the area of global affairs, since the customary liberal/conservative distinction doesn't seem very informative these days.
I have a strong disposition toward preserving the integrity of states, even where those states are not particularly enlightened. I tend to agree with Hume who once argued that there is nothing more terrible than the total dissolution of government. Unlike many on the left, I am not a big fan of national liberation movements where they are destructive of an existing state. I believe this tendency, found in writers such as Hume, Hobbes and Burke, is one that most would describe as "conservative".
Along the same lines, I am also not much of a romantic. I am skeptical about the conventions of heroic sagas and epics, and classical romances. I tend to distrust human passions and their tendency to produce mischief, and tend to see outbursts of raging passion as dangerous fires to be put out. I prefer calm, balance and reason. Conflict and anger, in particular, strike me as highly conducive to human stupidity.
I accept the fact that it is sometimes only possible to end some outburst of violence with the application of violence, but on the whole I am very skeptical about war. I tend to think almost all of them are avoidable, and that their human costs are rarely worth the results achieved. Again, this is a tendency that is present in Hobbes, whose preference for strong central governments and undivided sovereignty was motivated by his hatred of war.
On the other hand, I believe that one of the main reasons for so much carnage in human history is that those who make the decision to fight rarely are the same group as those who do most of the fighting. Therefore, while not big on national liberation, I am somewhat more sypathetic to movements to liberate the lower orders from the oppression of the higher. This is a critique usually associated with the left.
I personally crave the liberties offered by a free society, and believe that military mobilzation is always a danger to liberal government. The logic of military thinking and hierarchy are antithetical to the practices of tolerance, openness and personal liberty. There are certain people, it seems to me, who just seem to like or need war, and have a wish to be at war all the time. I always have my antennae up for such people, no matter what society they are in - another or my own. Permanent war means authoritarian, even totalitarian government. Militarists have no problems with every kind of ruthlessness, and they constantly convince themselves that our dire circumstances require the application of misinformation, disinformation, suppression of free discussion, and oppression of every kind of deviance at home as well as abroad. When I hear people defend our current wars because they see them as "defending our freedoms", I wince, because so many of these same people seem to hate freedom in their bones - John Ashcroft comes to mind as a recent example.
I also support more vigorous government action to achieve material equality and genuine democracy, since I think the latter requires a rough equivalence in power, and wealth. This definitely puts me with the left.
I believe in the usefulness of treaties, conventions, and widely accepted norms and standards. Human beings have a trendency to promulagate rules for their own behavior, and often manage to achieve a widespread, deep adherence to some of those rules. They also make solemn agreements and will stand buy them so long as the solemnity of the agreement is maintained. Violation of accepted standards of individual or state behavior, and transgression on ingrained inhibitions, tends to erode those standards and inhibitions, and is generally to be avoided. Again, I think of this as a mainly conservative disposition. But for some reason it is associated these days with the left.
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 05, 2005 at 09:46 PM
Jeff, I'm not sure I understood your last brief post.
What do you think our strategic goals are for iran and syria?
If iran gives up nuclear weapons, does that mean we've achieved victory in iran?
If iraq becomes such a smoking ruin tat iran can't plausibly attack saudi arabia across it, is that victory in iraq?
As each successive victory condition becomes obsolete (either when it's achieved, like the destruction of the iraqi army and the capture of Saddam, or when it becomes very unlikely, like the secular israel-supporting deomcracy) people propose new victory conditions. This is the newest which I've never heard before, so I naturally would like to get some details straight.
Posted by: J Thomas | December 07, 2005 at 11:15 AM
Since 2002, the US Executive has been implementing the National Security Strategy of the United States of America.
US political strategy against state sponsors of terrorism is clearly stated in the NSS document. Sanctuary states will be “convinced or compelled” to end support for terrorism. In 2002, I predicted that the US would adopt a political strategy of containment against terror states. I believed this for two reasons. First, a State Department full of Cold Warriors would naturally want to follow the well-trodden strategic routes. Second, the geo-political topology favors the strategy.
Even a cursory examination of current geography shows Iran surrounded by hostile states, with US power-projection sites within easy reach. Syria now has a large, hard-to-reconnoiter border with a US Marine division just the other side and hostile states on most of its other borders. The potential sanctuary states of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan are also within easy reach of US power-projection sites. The porous Pakistan border is contained. The US has radically weakened the geo-political buffer formerly enjoyed by terror states.
Reasoning backward, I make the assumption that this situation was planned from the NSS in 2002. In effect, we are pursuing a policy of containment and political isolation against terror states much like the Cold War policy of containment against the USSR.
I have elsewhere posed the fundamental military problem: How can the US achieve unlimited aims with limited means? We now have an answer: The US will neutralize the logistical bases of world terrorism, the state sponsors of terrorism. Since all out war is not politically feasible, “all the elements of national and international power” will be used to contain the terrorist threat. Geo-political containment is the first phase, economic debilitation is the second phase, political destabilization is the third phase, and neutralization is the last phase.
Liberals call for "more diplomacy", but they fail to realize that there is no more diplomacy. Diplomacy continues unabated at full speed, even while all the other instruments of national power are deployed. Their calls for "more diplomacy" are thus really calls for "less force," but it seems clear that force is needed to accomplish the goals in the NSS.
Posted by: Jeff younger | December 07, 2005 at 01:59 PM
Dan, thanks for the thoughtful response.
With regard to liberals and expertise, my point is limited to equivocation. Every discipline uses accepted terms of art. These terms develop from historical usage and can sometimes conceal unusual connotations. Before opining, much less opining vociferously, we ought to familiarize ourselves with the subject’s parlance.
I use the term ‘war of annihilation,’ and I get called an advocate of genocide. I use the term ‘unlimited goal,’ and I get accused of imperialist ambitions. I write of ‘vital national interests’ and liberals brush them aside as though they are politically inessential. I know that liberals must be unaware of these diplomatic and military terms of art, but often liberals seem impervious to accepting these terms. Some of which have been in use for four hundred years! In the interests of clarity and honesty, it seems that we ought to mold our usage to discipline, rather than the other way around.
Let me be explicit about my philosophical presuppositions: I am basically a neo-Aristotelian.
With regard to the Iraq Theater, I see three plausible courses of action: (1) tache d'oeil counter-insurgency operations (our actual approach); (2) conventional counter-attack on logistical bases outside Iraq; (3) development of insurgencies in neighboring states.
Liberal calls for withdrawal are not politically feasible for three reasons: (1) it would hand a political victory to our enemies; (2) it would weaken our ability to contain terror states; (3) it would impede our strategic goal of preventing state sponsors of terrorism acquiring WMD, specifically Iran.
While the insurgents in Iraq come in thousands of ideological variations, they all derive operational and logistical support from one of four sources: (1) Syria, (2) Iran, (3) Saudi Arabia, or (4) Iraq’s previous military forces.
You have my full agreement on the ineptitude of the current Administration’s public relations policies.
We fully disagree that wars are usually avoidable. I think this reduces to a more fundamental disagreement about equality. I find the liberal advocacy material equality illogical in the extreme. To say that two things are equal is to say they are alike with respect to some measure. Two driveways are of equal length if they are the same with respect to length. Likewise two people are said to be materially equal if they are the same with respect to material possessions.
Liberals are also great advocates of diversity. Diversity is the celebration of cultural differences. Cultural differences have a profound effect on the acquisition of material possessions. For example, cultures that disfavor intellectual achievement may not achieve the material wealth of cultures that highly prize intellectual achievement. Cultures that have a strong disposition for violence may not produce as much wealth as cultures that prize a rule of law. Cultures that disdain large-scale social organization in favor of smaller, tribal social units may not develop large-scale economies. And so on.
The simultaneous desire for material equality and cultural diversity is clearly illogical. In fact, if we examine the literature, the nightmare dystopias are egalitarian. Material equality as a political goal is properly seen as a horror.
With respect to war, history shows that war is the normal state, not peace. Accidents of geography, culture, religion, politics and history inevitably lead to clashes of vital national interests. The “logic of military thinking” is thus the same logic everyone else uses: the science of non-contradictory identification. Free societies exist only because of war. War is an instrument of national power; it can be used for bad purposes like the Progressive Imperialism of Teddy Roosevelt or for good purposes like ending Japanese Imperialism.
So, it isn’t the Left’s desire to use the tools of diplomacy --- treaties, conventions, norms and standards --- that distinguishes it from the conservative view. Conservatives want to use the same tools. Liberals and conservatives want to use those tools for different ends, and liberals disdain the use force.
I can never pin liberals down on what ends diplomacy should serve. ‘Peace’ is an aim, but diplomats must translate that goal into specific arrangements between states. Here the waters run deep and dark, where the essential clash of vital interests lurks. Liberals seemto think that all vital interests are negotiable. As a matter of practical history, this has never been the case.
Posted by: Jeff younger | December 07, 2005 at 03:08 PM
J Thomas wrote "Jeff, I'm not sure I understood your last brief post."
Big surprise.
Posted by: Jeff younger | December 07, 2005 at 04:41 PM
Jeff,
I have read your reply and thank you for it. I am going to forego a further reply only because this discussion has now moved very far down on the list of both posts and comments, and I suspect hardly anyone is still reading it. I'm sure we will soon have a chance to resume it. I'm looking forward to discussing issues like the nature of vital interests, the relationship between equality and liberty, and the prospects for global pacification when the context is appropriate.
Posted by: Dan Kervick | December 08, 2005 at 12:03 AM
J Thomas wrote "Jeff, I'm not sure I understood your last brief post."
Big surprise.
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