<present realities>
The Hawks like to think that they are the only practical people, that they have the only methods that work in the real world, and that pacifists are Utopian arm-chair sissies, either dupes or just lazy.
But we have had a real-life lesson in the power of Gandhian non-violent resistance, just a few years ago. The Communist despots who ran the Soviet Empire, they weren't any nicer people than the Islamists who we face today. Those Communists were just as opposed to the Enlightenment ideals, and just as willing to use unlimited violence. They had spend 70 years perfecting the tools of oppression, Control, and systematic terror.
In Leipzig in 1989, the numbers of people who came out in the streets and said to their oppressors, "You can kill us. We have no guns. We are willing to die. But we will no longer obey.", was:
September 4 -- 1,200
September 15 -- 1,500
September 25 -- 8,000
October 2 -- 20,000
October 9 -- 70,000
October 16 -- 120,000
October 23 -- 250,000
October 30 -- 300,000
November 6 -- 400,000
It takes as much discipline, as much courage, to make that statement, to stand in the streets with empty hands and face the tanks, as any soldier has. But, once any group of people achieve that self-discipline, that Will To Freedom, they are unstoppable. No Stalin, no Mao, no Bin Laden, no Khomeini, can control them. And they proved it, in the streets of Leipzig and E. Berlin and Prague and Moscow and Warsaw. Non-violence fails, not because of the degree of evil of the Stalins and Khomeinis, but because of a lack of discipline and courage in those who want freedom. Non-violence works, in the real world. All it takes is a willingness to say, "Give me Liberty, or give me death."
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<legitimate self-defense and pre-emption>
A contradiction in terms. Pre-emption is not defense. There is nothing "defensive" about sending 300,000 soldiers to the other side of the world, and attacking a nation that has not attacked us. And not legitimate, as the world is telling us. Pre-emption is an act of aggression, it means going out into the world, seeking out anyone and everyone who might attack us, and doing violence to them before they have done violence to us. The new doctrine of Pre-emption, which has replaced the Cold War's Containment and Deterrence, has made us the Rogue State that everyone else is trying to Deter and Contain. There is an endless list of nations who might attack us, so the doctrine of Pre-emption means an unending series of wars of aggression.
The Hawks are trying to control the world through unilateral unlimited force. This is impractical, a refusal to see the world as it is. They are Hammers who see only Nails. The NeoCons are Utopians who see some glorious transformed perfect world, right after the U.S. Army does Regime Change #47. We are fighting the WarOnTerror, the way we fought and lost the WarOnDrugs. Same mindset, same tactics, same results.
Message 18631996
The Hawk's methods, leads the world to see us this way:
By Western civilization I mean the ideals which people in the West have embraced in modern times and the pursuits based on these ideals. The supremacy of brute force, worshipping money as God, spending most of one’s time in seeking worldly happiness, breathtaking risks in pursuit of worldly enjoyments of all kinds, the expenditure of limitless mental energy on efforts to multiply the power of machinery, the expenditure on the invention of means of destruction, the moral righteousness which looks down upon people outside Europe,—this civilization in my view, deserves to be altogether rejected.-Gandhi
die_meistersinger.tripod.com
If you read (as I have) the criticisms of the West made by the Islamists, they make a similar list of our faults. Capitalism defeated Socialism, in large part by (eventually) listening to the cogent criticisms of the socialists, co-opting them, reforming capitalist societies, institutionalizing most of the reforms the socialists championed. Republican Presidents like the Progressive Teddy Rooseveldt, were closet socialists, and they saved Capitalism. We need to do the same thing, in our response to Islamism. If we don't, we will lose the BattleForHeartsAndMinds. If we begin with the assumption that we have a monopoly on truth and virtue, we learn nothing and will be defeated in our War. And we begin that War far, far behind:
Message 18551463
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I don't have the discipline to totally renounce Force. As I said in
Message 18639444
I would use Force in a policy of Strict Reciprocity.
President Carter said it better, in
Message 18675712
I would have a foreign policy like that of Switzerland and Sweden writ large. I would use U.S. soldiers abroad, to defend the U.S. when it has been attacked. I would also extend our protection, via mutual defense treaties (strictly defense only, and alliances that act by consensus not U.S. fiat), to nations that are run according to the principles in the U.S. Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
unhchr.ch
I would achieve our national goals (embodied in those 3 documents), by 10% Force, and 90% diplomacy and economic levers, instead of the other way around.
I would have a Manhattan Project for Energy Independence, so we don't have to garrison the Middle East oil fields.
I would use our leverage to create a compromise peace in the Israeli-Arab war.
Message 18552556
I would invite any Democracy to shelter under our protection, even in the furthest most violent corners of the world.
Message 18662761
When there is no other choice, and we must make war, then we should fight to win. If any military victory is to last, we have to convince the civilian populations that support our enemy, to end that support. Purely military victories may win the war, but not the peace. Destroy an enemy army (guerrilla, conventional, WMD, it doesn't matter, the same principle applies), while leaving intact the reasons that created that army, and we will soon face another army. Or cause MAD (mutually assured destruction) in the attempt to impose a purely military solution. So, we must learn how to wage battles for HeartsAndMinds. Again, this means 10% military effort, and 90% Other effort.
Message 18548840
Message 18557993
Message 18582620
If the only choice is between cowardice and violence, I'll choose violence. But those are rarely the only choices. This is as true for relations between individuals, as between nations.
Mine is a much more practical real-world policy, a hard-headed policy that takes account of the real-world limits of our Reach, than the Hawk's policy of Pre-emption, propping up every anti-Ismalist despot (a continuation of the policy of propping up every anti-communist despot), and endless wars of aggression. |
