Not Lowering This Flag
En Revanche quotes from an op-ed by William F. Buckley, who didn’t like the adventure in Iraq from the start, and doesn’t like it much now, either. Buckley says
We pronounced, in the Declaration of Independence, ideals we conceived of as universally appealing, but which no one had the least intention of exporting beyond the boundaries of the newly independent country.
All of that came much much later, becoming full-blown U.S. policy only in the reign of Woodrow Wilson, whose espousal of ideological diplomacy caused desperate problems for himself, his administration and the League of Nations. Missions for world reform came back in the late ’30s, provoked by the universalist aims of Soviet communism and, though more finite in its appetites, the far reaches of the Nazis’ Third Reich. The rhetoric of the Four Freedoms and of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was there to justify international activity on the part of the United States: the Marshall Plan, NATO, and the hundred meetings of native idealists who reasoned, with great appeal, that the liberties we would not ourselves do without were written in a universal idiom, leaving us as chief agents of evangelism.
…
Two challenges are posed. The first is relatively manageable: Lower the flag on American universalism — not to half-mast, but not as toplofty as it has been flying since the end of the Second World War. The second is tougher. Why is Islam burning bright? What on earth do they have that we don’t get from Christ our King? If what they want is a religious war, are we disposed to fight it?
I find fault with Buckley’s thinking in these respects:
- “No one had the least intention of exporting beyond the boundaries of the newly independent country”? Do attempts to take Canada, Manifest Destiny, the Monroe Doctrine, the adventurism of the 1890s, and so forth not count? How about misisonaries? Businessmen? Filibusterers (military adventurists trying to take over countries)? Back then it was a lot more likely that the acquired territory become a state; these days we’re less acquisitive in that manner. Buckley’s point may be contra Sharansky, but stated disingenuously.
- Buckley, the author of God and Man at Yale, seems to have forgotten what Yale is like these days, where God shows up in the form of guys like the Taliban public spokesman. Not that many people are “getting from Christ our King” these days, particularly in Western Europe and the blue states. Those who do certainly aren’t descending into the style of apocalyptic faith that cleanses the world through blood as the Christians had to deal with immediately following the Reformation and the Muslims are dealing with now (and globalized!). That combination of secularism on one hand and apocalypse and nihilism on the other is pretty characteristic of a good portion of the conflict. It took many decades for Wahab’s work to catch on; Qutb was tortured and killed in the seventies, the ayatollahs took over the Iranian embassy in the seventies. This situation has taken a long time to get here; it’ll take a long time to kill off.
- It’s not exporting American universalism that we really want. We want sic semper tyrannis faster; we know free people tend not to obsess over ways to blow up Americans, so we want the tyrannies to be freer. This doesn’t mean sham elections, or anarchy; it means moving towards more democratic institutions. The Republic of Korea had its first really free elections only a decade ago after a de facto sorta benevolent and gradually liberalizing military dictatorship; these things take time, and it’s not merely a ballot box with “Thug One” or “Thug Two” selected by the ruling thugs as in the Palestinian or Iranian elections.
Apparently George Will has the same hymnal as Buckley, because Will’s singing a similar tune with an “I Hate The Weekly Standard” twist.
Still, it is not perverse to wonder whether the spectacle of America, currently learning a lesson — one that conservatives should not have to learn on the job — about the limits of power to subdue an unruly world, has emboldened many enemies.
Speaking on ABC’s “This Week,” Rice called it “shortsighted” to judge the success of the administration’s transformational ambitions by a “snapshot” of progress “some couple of years” into the transformation. She seems to consider today’s turmoil preferable to the Middle East’s “false stability” of the past 60 years, during which U.S. policy “turned a blind eye to the absence of the democratic forces.”
There is, however, a sense in which that argument creates a blind eye: It makes instability, no matter how pandemic or lethal, necessarily a sign of progress. Violence is vindication: Hamas and Hezbollah have, Rice says, “determined that it is time now to try and arrest the move toward moderate democratic forces in the Middle East.”
Will sure sounds defeatist, and sounds like Scowcroft arguing for status quo ante. The administration has decided that status quo ante with nuclear weapons and the Internet is not desirable.
(Update: Phibian thinks Will’s spot on in considering Iran a bridge too far for the Americans. I would only point out that if we think so, then the Iranians and their clients will act unconstrained by our desires, and the result of that may well be worse. I’ve not done that analysis; I’m just saying.)
Hugh Hewitt (on a new site with cancerous advertising Javascript–thank goodness for Mike Skallas’ ad blocker!) has some comments about Will’s op-ed that identify a problem with making too close an analogy between the Soviets and the Islamists:
Perhaps in a future column, George Will can expand on the Kennan argument as applied to President Ahmadinejad, and of the consequences if he is wrong. Reread the Long Telegram. The Soviet Union Kennan considered appropriate for “containment” was radically different from the Islamist jihadis of today.
“The theory of the inevitability of the eventual fall of capitalism has the fortunate connotation that there is no hurry about it,” Kennan wrote. “The forces of progress can take their time in preparing the final coup de grâce.”
No 12th Imam there. No need to hurry his return. And in Iran today, as with al Qaeda, there is no leisurely pace, only fury and fervor.
Containment applied to such a force is surely appeasement. It is a recipe for a disaster far greater than 9/11.
A foreign policy based upon the reality of the Iranian regime does not mean a war with it or Syria, though neither would war be ruled out. But it certainly wouldn’t indulge in the fantasies that characterized Stanley Baldwin and his followers. The very first step is clarity about the nature of the enemy.
Hewitt also calls for debate on the situation in Congress, and that’s not a bad idea–although some debate other places would be good as well.
I think Hewitt’s got a point about the Long Telegram. That document was a part of what helped frame our response to Soviet aggression. Right now the closest thing I can think of would be the Bush Second Inaugural, informed as it is by Natan Sharansky’s The Case For Democracy, and codified into the National Security Strategy. From the inaugural address:
At this second gathering, our duties are defined not by the words I use, but by the history we have seen together. For a half century, America defended our own freedom by standing watch on distant borders. After the shipwreck of communism came years of relative quiet, years of repose, years of sabbatical – and then there came a day of fire.
We have seen our vulnerability – and we have seen its deepest source. For as long as whole regions of the world simmer in resentment and tyranny – prone to ideologies that feed hatred and excuse murder – violence will gather, and multiply in destructive power, and cross the most defended borders, and raise a mortal threat. There is only one force of history that can break the reign of hatred and resentment, and expose the pretensions of tyrants, and reward the hopes of the decent and tolerant, and that is the force of human freedom.
We are led, by events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world.
America’s vital interests and our deepest beliefs are now one. From the day of our Founding, we have proclaimed that every man and woman on this earth has rights, and dignity, and matchless value, because they bear the image of the Maker of Heaven and earth. Across the generations we have proclaimed the imperative of self-government, because no one is fit to be a master, and no one deserves to be a slave. Advancing these ideals is the mission that created our Nation. It is the honorable achievement of our fathers. Now it is the urgent requirement of our nation’s security, and the calling of our time.
So it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.
This is not primarily the task of arms, though we will defend ourselves and our friends by force of arms when necessary. Freedom, by its nature, must be chosen, and defended by citizens, and sustained by the rule of law and the protection of minorities. And when the soul of a nation finally speaks, the institutions that arise may reflect customs and traditions very different from our own. America will not impose our own style of government on the unwilling. Our goal instead is to help others find their own voice, attain their own freedom, and make their own way.
The great objective of ending tyranny is the concentrated work of generations. The difficulty of the task is no excuse for avoiding it. America’s influence is not unlimited, but fortunately for the oppressed, America’s influence is considerable, and we will use it confidently in freedom’s cause.
Buckley would like to lower his flag. I think others are going to keep theirs high, for better or worse, and for a long while.
11 Responses to “Not Lowering This Flag”
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July 19th, 2006 at 2:06 am
See, this is why you should take Option 4.
July 19th, 2006 at 11:47 am
Chap,
If you want a multi-war front, you need a multi-war Army and a public that will support it. We don’t have either. That is just a fact; the Iranians don’t need me to tell them that. Until formations like the German-Netherlands Corps has the Strat. Lift and political will to join us in the mountains around Tabriz – we are not going to take a country with a population of, what, 70+ million.
July 19th, 2006 at 12:42 pm
The President said:
“So it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.
This is not primarily the task of arms, though we will defend ourselves and our friends by force of arms when necessary. Freedom, by its nature, must be chosen, and defended by citizens, and sustained by the rule of law and the protection of minorities. And when the soul of a nation finally speaks, the institutions that arise may reflect customs and traditions very different from our own. America will not impose our own style of government on the unwilling. Our goal instead is to help others find their own voice, attain their own freedom, and make their own way.”
By his own goals and standards, did the current administration do enough (in terms of the realistically feasible) by way of support of the Lebanonese government after the Cedar Revolution?
The current neoconservative foreign policy which is encapsulated in the inaugural snip above was not followed through in Afghanistan, Lebanon, and by this blog’s own admission, in the case of the uprising of the secular Iranian street. Why? I would argue that these three successive dropped balls in the past three years demonstrate a broader truth — scratch a neocon and find a half-baked realist underneath who, in turn, half-asses his foreign policy.
The behavior over the longer term, of any state on the international stage, creates by default the platform from which any and all information warfare can be conducted. When there is consistent lack of alignment of the admirable ideals of neo-conservatism with behavior that from any non-domestic perspective appears to be cynically realist, that platform is fatally corrupted. No amount of FOX News or Derridean double talk can alter that reality. It becomes increasingly the case that the decision is not whether to lower the flag but whether to watch it descend into the quicksand or strike the colors and look to plant them on firmer, more aligned ground.
When the American electorate gets to choose between the half-assed Realist (or half-assed idealist – take your pick) or the uninspiring Realist who acts in accordance with his pragmatic ideals and tells the truth, the latter wins every time. And that’s all Will and Buckley are trying to get the Republican Party to come to grips with.
July 19th, 2006 at 10:18 pm
CDR,
Maybe. Like I said, I haven’t done the analysis. I would agree that conventional methods would be a little difficult, and also agree that changes in how we do business now might be necessary. But it’s a multi-front war whether we like it or not; the real question is which violent actions we take at our own choosing, not how to avoid action at all.
John,
I’ve made previous comments on realism versus idealism (main post 1, followed by 2 and 3) before. So perhaps I’ve said what I need to on that. I’d add anything I have mentioned here about economic, diplomatic and initiatives such as the Force More Powerful guys to the mix.
I would argue that not achieving perfection is not a cause to abandon a course set, and indeed coming short of perfection and dealing with the plan that changes after initiation is characteristic of the last long fight we had with someone trying to take us over. The folks pushing status quo got voted out before Clinton took office–they can’t drive the bus this month.
July 20th, 2006 at 5:59 am
Buckley is not necessarily wrong in my book. The attempts to take Canada were about expanding American hegemony-any progress came as an afterthought and as a result of a what used to be a fairly homogenous population committed to American values. American expansion was about economics first and foremost—that was where the gold and copper was. And if you recall the territorial governments were not so democratic and statehood came on average 40+years later.
Plus, if America really wants democracy in all these other countries, then it needs to be prepared to live in a multi polar world where it is just another power, NOT the strongest power. As wealth transfers and the competition for oil really begins, the US will find itself not getting what it wants. Your example of Korea is a good one in showing this affect. They are thumbing their nose at the US every chance they get, from ranges to base movements to continuing to appease the NORKS. It may be good for the Koreans, but where is the benefit for the US. Hamas won in a democratic election, and in Lebanon Hezbolah is allowed to run rampant.
The US has to keep its eye on what is good for the US. Plus to be blunt, we created this bed by not sticking up for the European colonial empires when we should have. Certainly Teddy Roosevelt was not about expanding democracy, it was about furthering American power. This about preserving the world the for the West, not some milquetoast view of making all nations equal.
There is a great line in the movie Syriana, where the head of Killen Oil says, “China’s econmomy is not growing as fast as it could because it can’t get enough oil. I’m damn proud I had a hand in that fact.” – Amen to that! Keeping China from growing is good for America.
Its not a game were all boats can float. Its a competition with winners and losers. I’m rooting for the America team, not the rights of others. Buckley is right from a historical standpoint and a pro-American one.
July 20th, 2006 at 1:06 pm
Skippy-san nails the pure, unadulterated, realist perspective. For me, this is where all honest discussion about American foreign policy has to start.
While I find the analysis and logic of the realistic perspective to be unassailable, I don’t know whether I have to or want to live in that world. In other words, I believe the realistist perspective puts liberalism on notice the way that it should be. Liberalism currently gets off the moral hook because all we have to do is point out the wanton, blatant hypocrisy of the present incantation of neoconservatism. And while I admit it feels good to feel morally superior to Donald Rumsfeld, it’s a pretty hollow victory.
Realism demands that liberalism answer this question or set of questions: “What are you prepared to live without in terms of material goods or in terms of incremental security?” “Are you prepared to see your standard of living possibly, perhaps quite likely, decline?” “How much?” “Are you prepared to forego the perks and privileges of living in the ultimate superpower?” Liberalism in turns demands of realism that it act in a maximally humane manner: “How much is enough?” As Ben & Jerry might ask it, “Can $13 billion of the $30 billion currently allocated to maintain a nuclear deterrence be cut and reallocated to alleviating child poverty and covering child health care?” And so on…
That debate is the one we have to have if we want to be as strong as our conscience and collective creativity will allow.
July 20th, 2006 at 6:39 pm
Like I said, I covered that before. I don’t agree and think your definitions aren’t the same as mine–see the previous posts. In the previous round, Skippy and I butted heads–he doesn’t see the same consequences as I do from the path he advocates, and adds a line from a silly movie that ignores stuff like China’s sixth largest trading partner (Wal-Mart) without explaining how it has a link to deciding on American paths vis-a-vis Iran.
I think Ben and Jerry made some good ice cream, and their question is simultaneously preposterous and irrelevant to the realism vs. idealism discussion mentioned in the previous posts.
July 21st, 2006 at 4:27 am
Chap,
First, its not a silly movie. Ebert and Roper said so. So do I. Even if it is, seeing China get screwed works for me (especially if its cute Chinese girls!) :-).
They are a trading partner, but they are also an enemy. What this really comes down to is, why does the United States have to force national evolution. Why can’t nations evolve at their own pace? In the interim the US should the best it can to tilt the tables in its favor, WHILE STILL RESPECTING the concept of national rights to exist. (e.g. you can’t impose demcrocracy by invasion).
Who made that our job? That’s what Buckley is saying. Not every nation is ready to accept democracy because democracy requires a reasonably educated electorate. Just look in Africa for proof of that. Or in the stans. It takes time to develop a critical mass where the people can actually make intelligent choices. That’s why the founding fathers created the electoral college and why Singapore has a one party state.
More importantly why do Americans have to die for people who will never appreciate it as long as they have the mantle of Islam around their heads.
I was meant for a different time me thinks. I would have thrived in the British Empire of the 20′s, I’m sure.
Not sure how I get the fact about Iran. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Ergo China sells to Iran, because we don’t. They are both enemies though. They don’t get a vote if we strike them. ( And if they do, I probably need to re-read Late Great Planet Earth because that will be the 200,000, 000 coming to invade Zion…….).
July 21st, 2006 at 10:35 pm
Skippy,
I keep bringing it back to “isolation brought us WWII, realist stability brought us Islamofascism on our shores”. I don’t think we have the choice to sit this one out.
July 22nd, 2006 at 10:48 pm
Skippy wrote: “As wealth transfers and the competition for oil really begins, the US will find itself not getting what it wants.”
That is wrong. That is not how it works. Wealth doesnt transfer. It is not a pie that gets divided up. The US didnt steal anyone else’s piece of pie. I agree this is the way many liberals look at global economics, but repeating an assertion does not make it true.
July 23rd, 2006 at 5:04 pm
Wealth does not transfer? Otherwise money itself becomes meaningless. Please explain further.