The Top-Ten List of Reasons Why I Hate "World War IV"
thomaspmbarnett.com
I briefly dismissed the "World War" crowd in PNM, and frankly, I haven't given them much thought since. But this terrible idea simply won't die, and so it seems only right to kick off the newsletter with a fundamental reiteration of why this idea is not only misguided, but quite dangerous to both our goals and our spirit in the years ahead. It's right to attack this notion because, in doing so, I'm forced to re-examine everything that I hold dear, re-emphasize everything that animated PNM, and to remind myself as I edit Blueprint for Action: A Future Worth Creating, exactly what I mean by that subtitle. In short, if you need "World War IV" to help you sleep at night, stop reading now, open up your browser, and move along to some fear-mongering site that really "answers the male" in you.
This rant is to be blamed upon Jay Tolson's 14 March 2005 article in U.S. News & World Report ("The coming storms: Scholars and pundits trade dark prophecies--and high hopes," 14 March print edition). Tolson is a fine writer, with a big mind, and in this article he compared my hopeful vision with those of scary thinkers Eliot Cohen, Norman Podhoretz, Richard Clarke and Andrew Bacevich. As he writes, "It's a curious war indeed that makes people argue over whether they are really fighting one." It sure is, and it's telling that I'm the only writer among the six who's described as offering "a more nuanced--and certainly more hopeful—perspective." Tolson cut everyone some slack in the piece, because—hey—he's letting the reader be the judge. I will afford no such niceties here. I think they are all kind of irresponsible in pushing this sort of nonsense, and yes, I include the venerable Thomas L. Friedman in this condemnation for his strange insistence on his own, equally useless variant, "World War III." This very bad concept of World War IV makes the Global War on Terrorism seem like it's all about us. It's also very isolating, self-serving, myopic, unduly pessimistic, and non-strategic in its outlook. It militarizes our future tasks, as well as "governmentizes" and Americanizes them—all to the negative as we seek allies in this long-term effort.
Finally, it just plain ignores the Gap, taking a pass—if you will—on the only legitimate finishing line worth pursuing: shrinking the Gap. Let me now elaborate on each criticism in turn, borrowing David Letterman's trick of a countdown list:
10. This struggle isn't about us The WWIV crowd wants to use this notion to rally the nation, to make it the defining cause of the next "greatest generation." In reality, the struggle has little to do with America, which may have started the current iteration of globalization following WWII, but certainly can no longer be described as encompassing this grand historical process—not with the twin rise of both India and China (not to mention the European Union and Japan). None of these fellow great powers sees a "world war" at work—not one. And you can't declare a world war all by yourself; it only exists if the world says it does. This struggle is currently about how Islam adapts itself to globalization. America is a distant "devil" in this fundamentally intra-civilizational process, a convenient scapegoat for past failures and current deficiencies, but nothing more. Trying to make this all about us is the height of historical arrogance, and a fundamental misreading of history. Globalization comes with rules, not a ruler. America plays globalization's bodyguard, but hardly its sole defender. Yes, 9/11 was the prompt for us to step up and assume our rightful strategic role, but let's argue this role rationally, without invoking any war clause that the unscrupulous will inevitably use to shout down opponents and their criticisms of current policy. There is no with-us-or-against-us dynamic at work here, but rather a with-globalization-or-against-it choice that America makes for no nation, no culture, no individual.
9. The term isolates America, yielding a rule-set population of 1 The Bush administration has promulgated a raft of bold new rule sets for dealing with the twin dangers of failed states/rogue states and the transnational terrorists they enable. These are inevitably quite controversial changes, the biggest one being preemptive war. By running WWIV up the flag pole and demanding all salute it, we run the risk of losing the global debate from the get-go concerning these new rules, and if we can't get anyone to recognize them as legitimate, then we enjoy a rule-set population of one (or maybe one-and-a-half if you include Israel's Likud party). That's not only not just good enough, it's self-defeating. We'll shoot ourselves in the foot with this approach, alienating for no good reason the very same nations whose support defines our real success in this struggle: not the defeat of our enemies but the creation of a Core-wide security order that recognizes the Global War on Terrorism as the means to a worthy end: making globalization truly global and ending the disconnectedness that spawns transnational terrorism. The Bush administration's new rules on security are—by and large—the right ones.
Enunciated in the first term, as well as demonstrated in firm action, the goal of the second term must be to garner their widespread acceptance, otherwise they will wither and die with Bush's departure. "WWIV" is thus a legacy-killer for Bush, not a legacy-definer, as most of its proponents unwisely believe. He is a smart leader never to have embraced this term.
8. It's a self-serving concept that encourages us to rationalize failure All's fair in love and war, or so we are told. But nothing could be further from the truth, especially in this struggle, which will involve elements of warfare but hardly be dominated by them. Since warfare will be but a means and never the sole determinant our achievement of ends, how we wage war will be incredibly important.
It has to be contextualized within the larger framework of rule-set extension, meaning we fight and kill and die not just by example but for example. Demonstration of values means everything in this conflict, and so the rationale that some failure can be excused simply because "we're at war—damnit!" is wrong—very wrong. We don't wage warfare simply to deny our enemies their desired future (although that is an outcome we seek), but rather to invite Gap societies to join our inevitable, shared future. Globalization will win out in the end, because connectivity trumps disconnectedness, and if we have confidence in that outcome, then we must temper our desire for short-term successes with a sense of playing out history's clock and understanding that if we cannot look our opponents in the eye upon any conflict's resolution, our victories will seem hollow indeed.
There will be no globalization at the barrel of a gun, but rather at the acceptance of legitimate rule sets to which we likewise must submit in both wartime and peace. Abu Ghraib was wrong, as is Guantanamo, as is rendering terrorist suspects to Gap states which use torture. "WWIV" is easily distorted to excuse all these failures of judgment and action, and for that reason alone it does us far more harm than good.
7. It's war within the context of war—to the n-th degree The WWIV types would have us believe this phrase tells us all we need to know about the difficult choices and the difficult days that lay ahead—that if we keep our noses to this narrowly-defined grindstone we'll stay focused on what really counts. But this definition is more mill stone around our necks than cornerstone for some new world order. It'll be used to ignore strategic counsel from those whose expertise lies outside of war, as though their insights are "nice to have" but hardly compelling, when exactly the opposite is true.
For example, wartime security considerations will see us tighten up our borders beyond all utility, and by doing so we'll damage our economy directly while putting our long-term development at risk in two ways: by curtailing our access to immigrants who've fueled our growth in the past and should logically continue to do so in the future; and by none-too-subtly encouraging great powers the world over to create their own economic rule sets that exclude America—especially in Asia. Fortress America will be isolated America, forced into its own, peculiar Gap-like existence—disconnected from the rest of the Core's vision of an expanding globalization process yielding an expanding community of like-minded states. In the end, by displaying such a lack of understanding of war within the context of everything else, it is possible that we'll infect the rest of the Core with similarly zero-sum mentalities, perhaps triggering globalization's very demise in much the same way that economic nationalism destroyed the first modern variant of globalization in the 1930s. And wouldn't that be ironic? America destroying globalization by pursuing a form of security nationalism in response to globalization's growing quotient of economic interdependency? Think history won't judge us as far more stupid than our failed
predecessors in this regard? Are we to define the "irrational actor" at this point in history? Have we so little faith in capitalism? In democracy? In the justness of our cause? 6. The Big Bang is working, for crying out loud! This one hurts the most. By doing unto Osama what he sought to do unto us on 9/11 (i.e., throw rule sets into flux), we've triggered a System Perturbation that will inevitably remake the Middle East, not in our image but according to Islam's needs as it adapts itself to deep connectivity with the global economy and integration into the Core's stable security rule set. Now that we've got them moving in exactly the direction we desire, it's not time to demonize Islam, but to encourage its continued reformation. Ultimately, this "war" will be Islam's to win, not ours. By casting the conflict as a war of worlds, our victory can seemingly only come with Islam's defeat.
We seek Islam's retreat from authoritarian politics, but not its disassociation from politics altogether, any more than America could easily forget its Judeo-Christian roots. Islam needs to find its rightful place in a connected, vibrant, free Middle East, just as that Middle East needs to find its rightful place in a connected, vibrant, and expanding Core. The region gives every indication that such progress is finally within reach, as elections in Iraq, Palestine, Saudi Arabia and—soon, we hope—Egypt demonstrate. Will this process move with the sort of speed demanded by a "world war"? Hardly, and therein lies the danger: our strategic impatience for "victories" may well be the Big Bang's undoing. Advocates of WWIV imagery believe their terminology honors those who've already sacrificed their lives in this struggle, but they're wrong. By putting our strategic goals at risk through impatience and bellicose sloganeering, they actually disrespect the sacrifices offered to date. Our soldiers' deaths can be both proud and non-zero sum, but only if we choose to make them so. 5. It's the death of grand strategy, not its enunciation The myopic visioneering of WWIV is its strategic undoing, for it puts at great risk the very peace dividend of the Cold War: the expansion of the Core from its roots in the West to its newest members in the East. By making this a West-versus-Islam war of civilizations, we subsidize a zero-sum mentality in the New Core, forcing them to hedge against either side's demise by plotting relationships with both. This balancing act will inevitably be considered treasonous by the "realists" of the WWIV camp, when in reality it will represent nothing more than the New Core's consistent expression of its desire to capitalize further on its growing economic development. We might be taking "time out" from economic rationality to wage this "world war," but China, India, and others cannot afford such a strategic pause. In the end, we cannot connect the Middle East to the global economy and—by doing so—truly win this conflict without the New Core's active participation. However, armed with a Manichean, with-us-or-against-us mentality in any "world war," we may well force New Core powers to choose their access to crucial raw materials and energy over access to our markets, fracturing the Core in the process by encouraging mercantilist mindsets at exactly the point in history when they can do the most harm. To the extent we force a zero-sum mentality in security, the New Core will retreat to a zero-sum mentality in economics to hedge against our awesome military power. WWIV sloganeering only accelerates that natural, knee-jerk turn toward self-preservation among New Core pillars, thus sowing the seeds of globalization's possible destruction.
4. Militarizing grand strategy is what gets you Vietnams WWIV advocates believe their terminology is more honest and direct than "relativistic" attempts to contextualize the Global War on Terrorism within such broader paradigms as globalization's unfolding, but in the end it's far more confusing. It's confusing because it demands unrealistically narrow definitions of progress and victory. You cannot bomb your way to connectivity, but it is connectivity that will define where our victories unfold and the lack of it that will determine where they die stillborn. Killing bad guys does not create connectivity, nor does drive-by regime change. Markets create connectivity, and military security is needed for markets to take root and flourish. Saddam's removal was not a victory in any "world war," or even the Global War on Terrorism. No, our first victories came with the national elections in both Afghanistan and Iraq, when we connected the masses of those states to a political future worth creating. The invasions and captures and assassinations have all been tactical victories at best—necessary but never sufficient. The militarization of the Cold War strategy of containment was almost its downfall in Vietnam (destroying the village to save the village), and we could easily engage in similar myopia in the Global War on Terrorism if we were ever to pursue it as a true "world war." One of the worst notions in this approach is that we must always be right to achieve victory while the terrorists only need to be right every once in a while. Nothing could be further from the truth, or reflect more sadly our tendency to militarize our complete approach to this struggle. Terrorism is but a tactic, not an enemy. Its complete eradication is a chimera. Our goal is to marginalize it as a weapon by delegitimizing its use, and we do that best not by preventing its occurrence completely, but by routinizing its effect to the point of rendering all such acts obviously futile. In Core states, terrorism disrupts connectivity but does not call it into question, because the density of our current level of connectivity is simply too great to overcome through sheer physical destruction. It is our expectation of continued connectivity—indeed our demand for it—that ultimately makes us invulnerable to the tactics of terrorism: no amount of terrorism can turn back history's clock in the United States. But in Gap countries, such terrorism can have a far more disheartening effect by reemphasizing the fragility and uncertainty of connectivity in cultures long-accustomed to its denial by elites determined to rule through disconnectedness from the outside world. When we militarize this conflict, we lose track of what we should really be doing to extinguish terrorism's root causes, because in our rush to hunt and kill bad guys we'll forget that hearts and minds are not won inside the Gap by military means, but by the everything else that security can bring.
3. Governmentizing grand strategy is unrealistic in the extreme By declaring it a "world war," WWIV advocates claim the greatest and most important roles for the state, when in reality the private sector will win far more victories in this war on terrorism than either the state or the military can ever hope to achieve. By governmentizing this conflict, we discourage the private sector from doing all that it can to create the economic connectivity that will ultimately diminish terrorism's influence and ability to steer history inside the Gap. We tell business to sit on the sidelines, waiting for victory to be declared, when their pro-active approach is far more important than that of the government, because rising economic transaction rates get fledging Gap government up to speed faster than any nation-building program or any official developmental aid flow. Good markets demand good governments, says Martin Wolf, not the other way around. Governments can only protect connectivity, they cannot grow it, and connectivity is what defeats terrorism by raising expectations that tomorrow will be better for those who choose to play by the rules. We don't need business to "get behind the war," but to get out in front of it. We need business to lead, not follow, but since "war" terminology is used to subordinate economics to security, its use tends to disincentivize our most important allies in this struggle from assuming their front-line roles.
2. Americanizing this conflict is the real imperial hubris America will never be victorious in this struggle because we're only marginally involved in its ultimate resolution. By casting this as a "world war," we encourage the worst sort of bilateral, zero-sum scorekeeping. We can own none of the real victories, but we will surely be tagged with all of the most stinging defeats, and in that uneven exchange we'll appear to assume imperial ambitions where none are present. We'll see America's "will" being tested on all fronts, and while we'll be driven to distraction, others will be driven to disregard—of our motivations. By placing America's security at the center of this "world war" and everyone else's at the margins, we'll confirm the world's worst assumptions about our nation's "self-centeredness" and "greed."
1. Ignoring the Gap is the surest way to fail The mindset of the WWIV advocates is surprisingly non-global in vision. In many ways, it seeks the least complete victory possible: the eradication of a tactic. It's like killing cancer with no consideration of long-term survival rates, much less the resulting quality of life. In sum, it lets us off the hook on the toughest tasks, claiming for itself a multi-generational game clock. Instead of finally meeting the demands of the Gap to be let into the global economy, we tell these states—yet again—that we'll have to forego the pleasure of their company in globalization because overriding security concerns prevent us from such connectivity at this time. And the Gap will be left wondering—yet again—how it is that America always prefers wars over peace. In those diminished expectations, we will sow the seeds of more terrorism inside the Gap than we ever could have managed through our complete inaction. But as we unwittingly generate these new enemies by our insistence upon "world war," we are certain to view such self-fulfilling prophecies as real evidence that our fears are not unjustified. After all, if you're fighting everyone, isn't everyone out to get you? And so we'll turn ever more to the "wise men" of "world wars" for guidance on how to escape this frightening future. And each time we do so, their unreasoned words will strike us as more reasonable. * * * Notice how the goal of global peace is typically derided as naive, whereas "world war" is so easily cast as the ultimate in sober realism? Ask yourself: Who really rules by fear in this dialogue? Is it our enemies or ourselves? Then ask yourself if you have a choice in the matter. Ask yourself, Is World War IV really a future worth creating? |
