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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (75409)	2/19/2003 12:03:41 PM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Well, we apparently have different conceptions as to what mass public demonstrations are capable of doing. I don't see them as able to engage in policy nuances. Rather, it seems to me you can only organize great masses of humans with straightforward messages such as stop this or start that. The minute you start saying, well, start this, only if a or b applies; or stop that, only if a or b applies; it's simply no longer viable. The problem with the demonstrations is not that they are not nuanced. Rather that the Bush administration has simply failed to convince them of its cause. And, in fact, has managed to move from a world wide favorable consensus after 9-11 to astonishing levels of public opinion opposition. I think it's clear that this kind of public opinion accepted containment. It's also clear that it won't accept invasion, at least on the terms now articulated by the Bush administration. Who knows what will happen should an invasion go as some have hoped: short invasion, red carpet laid in Iraq, little or no street fighting, little or no guerilla opposition, easy transition to a transition government clearly on its way to a democratic future. My own take on that scenario is that it carries far too many hopes. One or two might work, six or seven just strain credulity. I expect to see an increase in public demonstrations in Europe and in the US should the Bush administration go ahead. The course of conflict will determine whether they continue to increase after invasion or decline. But whichever occurs, the Bush administration will leave a great load of anti-Americanism around the globe. The demonstrators are supporting a non-serious policy. This guts the chances of their having any political influence. Saying 'it's not their job' to get a coherent policy is like saying that an opposition party has no responsibility to come up with a coherent platform. Well, it's hard to talk then. Well organized, large demonstrations, in my experience, are not capable of nuance. They work best and have their maximal effect, when the message is short, not nuanced. And that's because, done well, they require organizing a great variety of disparate points of view. You have to find the point of common agenda, articulate it firmly, and strike out. Serious policy alternatives, on the other hand, are, of necessity, nuanced. No, I meant to type 'the Taliban' since they ran Afghanistan, the country we were about to invade. If you will recall, the far left was totally opposed to that attack also, and made very free with predictions of quagmires, humanitarian disasters (remember Chomsky's "silent genocide of three or four millions"?), the brutal Afghan winter, and "Afghanistan, death of empires". But in the direct aftermath of 9/11, these opponents did not have the time or chance to gather supporters to demand that we Leave Mullah Omar Alone. This confuses at least two levels of discussion. The first is a distinction between what you've termed the "far left" and other folk to your left. Chomsky's political influence, whether one likes it or not, is less than minimal. Hardly worth discussing except for the right to use to caricature the left. So, let's skip Chomsky. The second is to confuse Afghanistan policy with Iraqi policy. One can argue as to whether the US pursued the right tactics in Afghanistan. But you won't get much traction with the US public by arguing that the Bush administration made a mistake to go in full force. They definitely made some mistakes along the way and one can enunciate those loudly and those criticisms will have some resonance. But to take those to a level in which one argues we should not have gone is a mistake. Your audience is gone. Iraq is a completely different matter. The Bush administration has simply assumed it could carry good will from its Afghanistan work right through to an attack on Iraq. So they've done little if any of the work of public persuasion. That means, in my view, all will have to proceed perfectly for them to escape serious criticisms. And, obviously, they've lost large chunks of world opinion; in critical countries, they are not even in the game.