Great piece. Wonderfully expressed. I concur.

The "fight" metaphor works really well at rallying the American populace, but I think it sets us back from our goal.

Remember, we live in a globalized world, so Arab media will take any juicy bits from our rhetoric and use it to stir up a hornets' next that makes reform impossible. If people are jumping up and down screaming in the streets obsessed in fear that foreign devils will invade and subjugate them (exactly as we would be in their situation), then there is no hope of bringing them to our side. The noise and heat level is just too high.

We must remember that our greatest "weapon" is our ability to convince people that freedom and openness will bring more prosperity and dignity to everyone. But if everyone's mindset--liberal, conservative, foreign--is in war-mode, us-against-them, that strikes me as impossible.

We need a leader who will level with the American people--convincing the world that Freedom is a Good Thing is job number one. Dropping bombs and shooting bullets is merely an instrument to that end--and by no means is it the most important instrument.

The American people aren't stupid. They can see everyday that the reason we are losing in Iraq is because we've failed to convince them that they can trust us. The opportunity to completely transform the domestic politics of foreign relations has never been more real.

. . . liberalism always has the same, or a functionally equivalent, enemy. The enemy is totalitarianism. Gitlin

Give me a break!

America may have enemies; Americans may have enemies; abstract political theories don't have enemies.

Another Wilsonian readying the nation to fight the Kaiser and make the world safe for democracy.

This is my final thought, for now: many nice hearts-and-minds intentions will run aground in the Muslim world as long as the U. S. colludes in the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories. Liberals, we’ve ducked this one way too long. I don’t see a solution if the U. S. and Europe do not impose it.

There was much in Prof. Gitlin's post that I agreed with until I came upon this little nugget of inanity.  While it is certainly true that there are many in the Muslim world that will never forgive us for being an ally of Israel no matter what we do on other issues, it is certainly ludicrous to think that it is desirable or even possible to "impose a solution". 

The idea that it is possible for outsiders to impose a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict has been a liberal myth for a long time.  It is all the more remarkable because it ignores some of the very arguments that liberals make against the Iraq War, namely that outsiders can't impose solutions to ancient enmities by force.  Is Prof. Gitlin suggesting that NATO soldiers should go in there and physically remove Jewish settlers from their homes?  Does he think Israel will just stand by and let this happen?  Is he proposing the West go in and physically disarm the various Arab terrorist groups?  What makes him think that any Western intervening force won't suffer the fate of the Americans in Iraq, who have become an object of resentment and are being attacked by everyone?

Furthermore, like almost all liberals, he seems to be implying that ending the "occupation" is all that's needed to solve the conflict.  Just give the Palestinians the land and there will be peace.  Haven't we learned by now that it's just a tad more complicated than that?  Are the Palestinians totally blameless in perpetuating the conflict? Is the radicalization of Palestinian society, made apparent by the Hamas election, going to disappear if the soldiers leave?  Where has he been all these years?

Finally, far from "ducking" this issue, liberals have pretty often been obsessed with it, as any discussion thread about this topic on this blog will attest.  The problem is not that liberals have ignored this issue.  The problem is that the liberal orthodoxy - that the intensity of the conflict is merely a function of how many concessions Israel makes - is dead wrong.

Excellent comment. Do you think that Kerry could have made a pragmatic argument to voters in 2004? To get elected do we Democrats redefine the terms of the "War on Terror" or do we need a new, but not demagogic, slogan?

Dan-

Nice posting. However, I think you entirely miss the boat with one point: "As for preventing other people from being turned into other Mohammed Attas, I suggest that we try to neutralize the appeal that we know carries the most recruiting force with them – that is, we actually do figure out some way of getting out of their countries, and let somebody else be the "far enemy".

That's just too simple. There is no one cause for people becoming Mohammed Attas, or even one greatest cause. The studies I'm familiar with cite the foreign boots on the ground cause as correlating with suicide attacks, but as a capstone, not as an initial cause. There's a whole infrastructure that effectively funnels people into becoming Mohammed Attas--and that's what we need to attack with the same effectives that we have to arrest or kill the hard core guys. You can perjoratively label it a Marshall Plan NGO, but calling a dog a tree doesn't make it a tree.

I'd argue that such soft power warfare plays to all our strengths.

For me it's both and. I absolutely agree with you when you say that "If Democrats really want to win back the national security vote, then they are going to have to persuade Americans that they have the most hard-headed, level-headed, economically efficient and clear-eyed approach to doing what Americans most care about: protecting Americans." But just killing or arresting jihadis by itself doesn't accomplish that goal. You've also got to have the counter-madrassas, the pressure on Egypt to democratize, the infrastructure building in Afghanistan, the scholarships to American universities, the Peace Corps, and all the rest. Otherwise you're trying to empty out the bathtub with the faucet running full-blast.

Ellen-

The madrassas--and the absence of non-sectarian alternatives--is part of the infrastructure. The effective dynastization of Egypt is part of the infrastructure. The difficulty for foreign graduate students from the Middle East in getting student visas is part of the infrastructure.

I hope that makes it clearer.

So, where exactly did you get "attack, attack, always, attack!" from. Because it sure feels like you're attacking me. Sure you're not projecting a bit, here?

Good stuff, Dan, as usual.

I want to probe a little.

You wrote: "When either party overreaches, and takes on costly projects that are only tangentially related to the security of Americans, the country tends to turn against them."

Hmmm. How would this apply to Bosnia and Kosovo? Were those interventions essentially tolerated, even though they were clearly tangentially related to the security of Americans, because they were not costly, in US lives and dollars?

How would it apply to Gulf War I? Would you say the public perceived that intervention as tangentially related to US security? Would you say that project was "costly"?

Suppose Japan had not bombed Pearl Harbor. Do you think the US would have entered in WWII anyway, eventually? Do you think that absent some sort of action by the Germans or Japanese that could have been cast as a provocation, the public would have been sufficiently persuaded that having Europe and Britain under Hitler's thumb constituted a non-tangential threat to US security? If the answer to that is more likely "no" than "yes", would the US public have been wrong on that one?

I think Beinart would argue that the non-military actions he calls for are very much in the interests of US security, properly understood. Therein is the issue.
What is in the interests of US security, properly understood? We are not an island. Neither can we intervene anywhere and everywhere to overthrow every horrible despot in the world. Where do we draw the lines? How aggressive ought we to be in seeking to create, with others, a world order which conforms to our ideas of what is best for us and others over the long haul?

You wrote: "But liberals are tragically deluded if they think that translates into an abiding public commitment to use the military to spread liberal values abroad."

But the new incarnation of Beinart is not saying this. He no longer seems to believe in using the *miltary* to spread liberal values abroad (perhaps the lesson he has learned from Iraq?).

But he clearly does believe that promoting economic opportunity for ordinary Muslims living in Islamic nations is important for US security.

I'm not sure if he believes the latter because a) he thinks lack of economic opportunity is a direct cause of militant Islamist terrorism b) he thinks that lack of hope for a better future, one part of which is lack of economic opportunity, leaves many ordinary, and especially young, Muslim people more receptive to a radical anti-US message, and therefore constitutes a crucial loss of political support in the Islamic world for efforts to crush militant Islamist terrorists (hindering the US's ability to win the battle for public sentiment, for hearts and minds if you will, to recall the unfortunate Nixon-era language) c) both of these or d) something else.

It seems to me that we are most likely to have success in winning the battle for public opinion with ordinary Muslims, over the long haul, if we can: a) find a way to offer a narrative of what the US is about that can compete with the dominant narrative that the US is the devil, propagated by anti-US media and in the Madrassas, and at the same time b) find ways of enhancing quality of life for ordinary of Muslims and be seen, widely, as doing so.

We will lose that battle for public sentiment if we continue to use the military to attempt to spread liberal values abroad. The military cannot do that; it can depose evil despots, but that is not even close to the same thing as instituting liberal values once that is done. Many who supported the Iraq war engaged in wishful thinking in failing to grasp the distinction by assuming the one leads to the other, or by making mushy, softheaded assessments that have no place in the running of a competent foreign policy.

We will also lose the battle for public sentiment if we are all propaganda without concrete, visible actions seen by ordinary Muslims as benefiting ordinary Muslims to back that up.

I want to know, specifically, whether Beinart is for or against keeping US bases in Iraq indefinitely, and why? Anyone know the answer to that question?

Your willingness to do away with liberty is getting increasingly hard to understand. Wisonianism has won the day. It is victory against totalitarism and the expansion of global capitalism that has set up the opposition by the one large group largely left out of it, Arab Muslims.

Daniel A. Greenbaum

Don't give it a thought.  Daniel has a tendency to pick and choose his conveniences.  Tomorrow, the "opposition" will be Muslims in the Stans, peasants in Latin America, black Africans, Philippinos -- the list of potential beneficiaries of wily Wilsonianism is unending.

I think the problem has been that the dominant post 9/11 "narrative" was still firmly established in 2004, that it was still hard in for a genuine pragmatist to get a hearing. Americans in 2004 were still terrified about terrorists under the bed. They seem just slightly calmer and more skeptical now.

Follwowing 9/11, government bureaucrats everywhere quickly learned that the best way to get money out of they federal government was to cry "terrorist". If you want more money for border protection, you say there are terrorists swarming over the border. If you want more money for flood prevention, you say your local dams are vulnerable to terrorist attack. If you want more military hardware to take care of your regional responsibilities, you say you're worried about state sponsorship of terror, or terrorist infiltration or vulnerability to terrorist attack. If you want a new firetruck or cruiser or ambulance, you say that you need these things because are a first responder in the war on terror. This is an equal opportunity game - Democratic as well as Republican officials can play. But the antiterror pork industry that was spawned served to heighten public hysteria. Maybe Democrats can figure out some way of framing the issue as how to pay for the "real war on terror" rather than the "phony war on terror" or the "war on terror pyramid scheme".

I think the toughest "war on terror" issue for Democrats politically is the public attitude about extraordinary renditions, Guantanamo, domestic spying, etc. Americans are now convinced that Iraq was a big mistake which cost us money and lives while making us less secure, and that rolling every crazy neoconnish military scheme for the Middle East into the War on Terror is a mistake. But they believe there is a real war on terror that consists in busting up terror networks, hunting down their members, and then shipping them off to Guantanamo or some brutal foreign prison hellhole to be roughed up, locked up, turned into informers and prevented from doing us harm.

The standard liberal criticism of the current policy is that in the long run the damage to our international reputation caused by these actions is such as to offset the gains made by playing very rough with the bad guys and their associates. And that criticism has increasing traction. But it is still a tough sell.

I am, as another blog puts it, "Against the War on Terror."

If the WOT could be redefined as an intelligence and policing problem, perhaps, the American people would be more open to the arguments of civil libertarians. After all, Americans have, grudgingly(?), accepted restrictions on the police in prosecuting the War on Crime.

Good questions Libertine.

Hmmm. How would this apply to Bosnia and Kosovo? Were those interventions essentially tolerated, even though they were clearly tangentially related to the security of Americans, because they were not costly, in US lives and dollars?

I think part of the issue here is that many Americans became convinced that the Balkans conflict was spreading, and that we could not afford to let a larger war break out in Eastern and Central Europe. And of course, the promise that this was a job that could be done with air power, with few casualties, played a uge role. But perhaps somebody who remembers the debates more vividly will be able to present a clearer picture.

How would it apply to Gulf War I? Would you say the public perceived that intervention as tangentially related to US security? Would you say that project was "costly"?

The Gulf War was a very tough sell as I recall - much tougher than the Iraq war. A bare majority of Americans were ultimately persuaded by the need to turn back naked aggression, the most fundamental international crime that the post-WWII security order was meant to prevent and deter. Many Americans in 1990 still seem to have believed in international law and the global order, and believed that our security depended in part on maintaing the system of global security. Sadly, the Iraq War was fought on diametrically opposed principles, and we lost most of the world in the process.

Costs in the Gulf War were very broadly shared, and there was widespread global support for the effort. Casualties were relatively light, and victory was swift. Had the war dragged on for years with thousands of casualties, we might have seen the same public turnaround we see today.

I personally support the effort to build a new global security order, with a Security Council controlled global policing force with real teeth, a secure budget, and its own recruited professional soldiers - not soldiers tasked on special assignemnt from their nation's militaries. I'm not talking about a sort of NATO-style Democracy League, in the manner proposed by John Ikenberry, committed to spreading truth, justice and the American way, but a plain old pacification force, with real military tools, and broad-based support for ending conflicts in regions where they don't do anybody any good. The broader base of support is needed to make sure the troops are not engaged in quixotic and futile quests, or in ways that advance the national interests of a select few countries.

Suppose Japan had not bombed Pearl Harbor. Do you think the US would have entered in WWII anyway, eventually? Do you think that absent some sort of action by the Germans or Japanese that could have been cast as a provocation, the public would have been sufficiently persuaded that having Europe and Britain under Hitler's thumb constituted a non-tangential threat to US security? If the answer to that is more likely "no" than "yes", would the US public have been wrong on that one?

I think a majority of the public would have been persuaded eventually even in the absence of a naked attack like Pearl Harbor, but the country would have been more divided without a clear provocation. However, I think its a bit of an academic question, because my sense is that hot conflict between the US, Germany and Japan was more or less inevitable by December 1941, and if it wasn't Pearl Harbor, something else would have caused it.

... but please remember most of the people of the world were not "taken in".

Tom

Both Gitlin and Beinart offer some version of the American Myth. That we stand for fair play, equal rights for all, and that we have a level playing field. In point of fact our history has been much darker than that. Starting with annihilation of the Indians and the adoption of slavery right up today with the demonization of Muslims and immigrants.

If the US is ever going to have a realistic foreign policy it needs to be based upon our real nature, not some imagined goodness emanating from the US and shining on the world.

When push comes to shove our actions are motivated by self interest, not the promotion of democracy and "freedom". If these goals suit our purposes then they get supported, if they don't then we ignore them. Over the past 60 years we have supported many more dictators than democrats.

A good historical review of our myth narrative is in this book:

Myths America Lives By

Americans are not willing to lower their standard of living so that the US consumes a fair portion of the world's resources. Therefore we continue to support an agressive military which can enforce trade policies which favor us at the expense of the rest of the world. That fact that people don't want to acknowledge this doesn't prevent it from being so. We live in "I don't want to know how the sausage is made" denial.

--- Policies not Politics
Daily Landscape

LOL...no problem Dan. I was a bit confused for a second until I saw your 2nd post. I thought I was just engaging in my usual pontificating. I enjoy reading your posts anywho...

Kerry was ridiculed for doing just that in 2004.

At this point I would say too many people have too much invested in "GWOT" for us to get rid of it.

I would turn the argument on its head. Let's start talking about Saudi plutocrats donating to Al Qaeda as an insurance policy in case of regime change. Let's start talking about our own post-WWII Faustian propaganda in the name of cheap oil.

Bring it on.

Thank you for writing a cogent, cordial rebuttal to Beinart. And for sketching a clear picture of the kinds of distinctions that liberals need to make to wage a coherent and determined "war on error."

I disagree with you on the subject of Israel vis. the Palestinians and your framework for a solution, but I acknowledge the intractible situation and the need to continually think along the lines of equity and justice for ways to proceed.

Thank you for an excellent post.

the delusion that noble intentions are a foreign policy

Yes.  *Sigh*

You can't make this stuff up, folks.

First, Greenbaum paints Ellen as a "totalitarian" by saying she wants to "do away with liberty."

Secondly, he ascribes the US outspending the Soviet Union in armaments as a "victory against totalitarianism". Technically, it might be. But if it substitutes an "American Empire" for the "Communist Empire", I don't see the "victory." And certainly most of the rest of the people of the world don't see it, either.

Finally, as others have pointed out, he paints the entire Muslim world as in opposition to "liberalism." This is obviously false, as numerous Arab countries are dealing in "capitalism", buying US music, dressing like US citizens, and so forth. A comparatively small group of Islamic fanatics denounce this as "culturally subversive" (which it is, so what?). Their primary complaint is that their countries are controlled by corrupt monarchies - or corrupt secular governments in some cases - supported by the US greed for oil. They have a point.

The real issue is whether these fanatics would have any constituency if the US stopped doing what they accuse the US of doing.

Beinart doesn't address that issue at all, as far as I can tell. Greenbaum actively opposes the issue in the specific case of the Palestinian question.

Instead Beinart and, by apparent agreement, Greenbaum, want to tar and feather the entire Arab world with the brush of "Islam-fascism" and make it the central issue of "liberalism" by conflating it with a "Global War on Totalitarianism" (the same GWOT used by the "Global War on Terror.")

This is just intellectually dishonest and another attempt to justify the "American Empire" the neocons want, and even using much the same rhetoric.

Actually, I had a tough time separating the Berman-Gitlin-Beinart spaghetti at their level of abstraction.  It sounds to me that all three are wedded to the gun -- and Todd's trying to decide whether to use 5.56mm or 7.62mm ammo.

The standard liberal criticism of the current policy is that in the long run the damage to our international reputation

Not just the reputation. More importantly, shipping people off to Gitmo for beatings doesn't turn anyone into an "informer."  

Have questions about the Cafe? Try here.

I can't answer for Todd as to what his "imposed solution" might be.

But one thing the US COULD do would be to demand in the UN that Israel unilaterally disarm its entire nuclear arsenal under pain of economic sanctions if it does not comply.

What's good for Iran is good for Israel.

By raising the issue of a "Middle East nuclear free zone" - including Israel - the US would seriously enhance its credibility in the ME.

And by going further and firmly removing "regime change" of Iran and Syria from the table in US foreign policy, the US would further enhance its credibility.

Finally, stopping all economic and military aid to Israel AND the other US ME allies such as Saudi Arabia would also enhance US credibility. (Obviously, Saudi Arabia would not be happy, but so what?)

Those three actions alone would shift the balance of power in the Palestinian situation. The ME nations might then be able to pressure a nuclear disarmed Israel into settling the Palestinian issue on terms more favorable to the Palestinians.

It would not be easy. It might take a couple more decades. But eventually the power shift would likely resolve the issue - even peacefully.

And this would remove one major issue that the Islamic radicals are using to recruit against the US.

Oh, puhleez. Just where in the US Constitution does it commit us to the "expansion of global capitalism". Watch the Chinese show us how to do capitalism and totalitarianism at the same time. What we should be fighting for is the rule of law, not the rule of the biggest pile of armaments the world has ever known.

Please get thee a sense of indirect quotation.  I was paraphrasing Beinart, not stating my own position, which is obviously different.
Todd Gitlin

I'm totally in favor of the War on Terror. For starters, no remakes of The Omen or Posdeiden Adventure. But seriously, while I'm in total sympathy to the Beinert/Berman bashing and would have joined it if so many hadn't covered so much already (if perhaps not as brilliantly), I think we're too hard on Todd G. He is basically opposing the Cold War as a model for today, and that's the most important point in opposing Beinart.

That model is wrong even politically, since it concedes the GOP narrative that the Dems had it until they became peaceniks and backed down on Vietnam, not to mention the rest of the imaginary history. It's wrong for the reasons Todd and others articulate as well.

John

http://www.haberarts.com/

As usual you make commnents without knowing anything. My profess at the Grad Center wasw on Macarthur's staff in Korea. He saw the plans. The Chinese would have redoubled their efforts against nuclear weapons. How ridiculous can you get.

I also take it you do not know anything about the Middle East eaither. The Middle East except for selling oil is largely cut off from the rest of the global system. There is not a great deal of effort to include them in the system.

Daniel A. Greenbaum

You painted Ellen as a totalitarian not me. I am surprise by here acceptance of such regimes.

As is so often the case with your responses you either can't read or you are just a liar. The are very few totalitarians in the world today. Even the Chinese cannot quite run a totalitarian regime as is evidence by Hong Kong and the need to allow Shanghai some level of independence.

The Arab has a big problem. I am sorry that you cannot accept that. The Al Qaeda groups however big or small they are in membership get money and support from other Arabs. Islamists who are not affiated with Al Qaeda represent the biggest opposition groups tot he current Arab regimes. The Arab World is lacking a fully functioning civil society. Such groups are threats to both the existing ruling structure and the Islamist opposition.

For way too long the West did not care as long as oil was forthcoming. Sadddem's invasion of Kuwait raised the issue of the security of the flow of oil.

Bin Laden, who says he wants to drive the West out of the Middle East is a greater threat to botht he flow of oil and the safety of Westerners. Bin Laden wants to create what? He can be against everything he wants what does he want to build?

These fantics are opposed to the U.S. as supporters of the current regimes so lets pulll the rug out from under the House of Saud? Isn't this what we did to the Shah? Also given that U.S. and European companies do much of the drilling for oil, virtually the only commodity the Middle East has, how will you avoid Westerners, including Western women from mixing with Muslims?

Daniel A. Greenbaum

The ME is cut off. Really.

So all that oil money is sitting in a bank in where?

This article indicates otherwise. While the amount of investment in the US seems to be small compared with the European countries or Japan, the ME is clearly trying to integrate with not only the US but the rest of the world's financial and investment markets as well.

And as far as the Chinese, while Japan was not in a position to redouble its efforts after the nuclear strikes on it, let alone the US's conventional military pressures on it, China would have been in a different position. Like I said, numbers count.

Sure, we could have nuked the entire country and killed several million or tens of millions and probably won that war - but the cost would have been Chinese hatred of the West for the next century - similar to the North Korean attitude. That would have been a geopolitical disaster for the US in Asia.

As it was, the US did not win in Korea, and neither did China. China got a buffer zone against the West and the West got a trading partner in South Korea. That's not a win for either side, or a defeat.

My apologies.  You're not fighting "totalitarianism."  That's Beinart's thing. You, on the other hand, are fighting "jihadism." Have I got it right, now?

Remember, we live in a globalized world, so Arab media will take any juicy bits from our rhetoric and use it to stir up a hornets' next that makes reform impossible. If people are jumping up and down screaming in the streets obsessed in fear that foreign devils will invade and subjugate them (exactly as we would be in their situation), then there is no hope of bringing them to our side. The noise and heat level is just too high."

This is one of the problems with the left. To think that being obsesively carefull about how you carry on dialog will somehow make it impossible, or very difficult, for the Jihadists and their sympathizers to use our rhetoric to stoke the flames of vengence among their target audience is to forget that you're dealing with people that will forever read a victory for themselves in everything we do. I'm not saying to be hatefull or stupid in how we discuss things. But this whole idea that how you say things having any substantive impact on what demagogues around the world do is as silly as an anorexic thinking that every ounce of weight she loses, despite her already skeletal appearance, will do some good. Rhetoric's value is taken to such a disproportionate estimation of worth as to actualy have many thinking that using the word "crusade" in public discorse will automaticaly create so many Islamo-fanatics. Those who get pushed over the edge to fanatacism would have found the catalyst to a great degree regardless what caution we or our policy makers use in addressing them.

But I do think that by changing our policy toward Israel in some very significant ways, we could promt our ally to a serious re-evaluation of its self-interest, and to pursue a long term agenda which would be much more favorable to our own interests, and improve our realtionship with the Arab world quite dramatically.

This is so naive on so many levels that it simply boggles the mind.  In the first place, it parrots the liberal orthodoxy that the US has the power to compel Israel to act against its perceived interests.  But worse, it still can't get out of the mindset that I was talking about before: that resolution of the conflict is simply a matter of Israeli concessions and that once they happen, our relations with the Arabs will change for the better.  They won't. 

"You painted Ellen as a totalitarian not me. I am surprise by here acceptance of such regimes."

Wow! Read that sentence again, folks!

First he says he never painted Ellen as a totalitarian, then he says she accepts totalitarian regimes.

In his first statement, he said Ellen wanted to "do away with liberty."

Now he denies he ever said that.

You've got to wonder whether this guy is dyslexic or what. He literally can't remember anything he said five minutes ago, and denies he said it, or that it meant what he said.

Now he says the Chinese aren't "totalitarian" - apparently because they aren't "Big Brother", which appears to be the only "totalitarian" regime he thinks qualifies. In other words, he's now hiding behind the word "total" in "totalitarian."

And all this at the same time he's accusing Ellen of accepting "totalitarian regimes" that he says are very few anyway.

Sorry, I'm confused - what is the actual point here?

Then he goes into an assertive rant about conditions in the ME which he can't support with any evidence at all. Nothing he has said addressed any of the points I raised.

Then he raises the non-sequiter about how, since Western companies run the oil fields, can we avoid mixing Western women with Muslims?

What this has to do with US foreign policy is beyond me.

If he could express his points in some sort of coherent logical argument, I might be able to respond. As it is, it's a rant, nothing more.

Slow down, Greenbaum, decide what you're going to say, type it into your post, then use the edit button to correct your grammatical errors, please.

Are you trying to say that since bin Laden wants the West out of the ME, that he will then drive out the oil companies and we won't get any oil? Is that your point?

If so, that is entirely speculative on all counts. Dictators - even fanatical Iranian mullahs - deal with foreigners all the time. There is nothing that I know of in bin Laden's statements that says he will kick out the oil companies - even in the unlikely event that he or someone of his movement should seize sufficient power in the Middle East to do so.

His interest and that of other Islamic radicals appears to be to kick out the US military presence in the ME and to some degree the US cultural influence over the younger population. Fine. So what? None of that says anything about the oil companies.

For all we know, even if they kick out the oil companies, they will immediately hire them back on as consultants to teach their own people to pump and deliver the oil.

But let's assume they REALLY want to return to the Sixth Century or something and dispose of ALL the technology and economic progress they've achieved over the last century.

So what? Why do we care? That's THEIR problem.

The rhetoric of the Islamic radicals may be completely believed by them. But when push comes to shove in the real world, their policies cannot be implemented.

And of course, if the US were to reduce its dependence on oil - and stop trying to assault every country that produces it, such as Venezuela - we might have some alternatives to ME oil even if things did go badly there.

None of this speculation justifies going to war or considering Islamic radicalism a major threat to the US.

If in fact a bunch of Islamic states get created, and they raise an army, and they build nukes, and they then threaten to attack the US or Europe, THEN we nuke the crap out of them and their mistakes come home to roost.

Does anybody here really believe that, even with "liberal Democrats" in charge for the next twenty or thirty years, that somehow the Islamists are going to take over the ME, build a nuclear arsenal and a ten million man jihad army, and then take over the world without even the liberal Dems doing something about it WAY before it gets out of hand?

Get serious.

When the US already spends as much on defense as the rest of the world combined AND it still can't conquer Iraq, must we conclude that our defense budget should be doubled, tripled?

Or should we conclude that our defense (or is it offense?) capabilities have got precious little to do with our current problems in the world?

The whole "spend as much...as the rest of the world combined" is a factoid that's disengeneous in what it's aimed to convey. It sounds cool to those who are keen to massive downscaling of military readiness in favor of "education" and other socialistic programs but when one considers the fact that dollar to dollar comparisons are deceptive unless adjusted to the relative purchasing power of those same dollars were they to be used by African warlords. The armament industry, like the pharmacutical industry, is wise to the economics of such a diverse world, the african warlords litteraly get much more bang for their buck, and the fact that they have no real motivation to value life other than their own their efficacy in fighting doesn't demand exhaustive resources that are, in our military efforts, pumped into minimizing life lost on both sides whenever and wherever technology (generaly expensive cutting edge technology) permits such. So please, from here on out, rethink those glib statments and their overly simplistic intended conveyances if you at all value intellectual honesty and integrity.

As to our military capabilities and the problems of the world it's true that they can solve only small portions and side effects of the overall problems, that's all gauze can do for massive injuries and infection, yet without something to stop the hemoraging it would mean little what drugs or medical procedures one tried. Likewise our capacity to even try to correct problems is tied to our maintainment of solvency and power. I'm as scared as the next man at the military industrial complex but I'd take the one we currently have, and err on the side of too much than to find ourselves to have erred on the side of too little and be under the thumb of some other oportunistic nation and it's military industrial complex.

What's nation building got to do with fighting terrorism? Remember Casablanca, remember London, remember Ontario? All homegrown. Atta lived in Germany.

The country of origin has little to do with the fact that they commited terrorist attacks. The nation building is part of the process of undermining the source of their resources and support.

As long as fools like Beinart advocate rebuilding nations of the Muslim world in our image with the help of the 82nd Airborne, expect more terrorism. As long as the US taxpayer allows myopic Israeli governments to keep Palestinians in cage, expect still more terrorism.

Israel is the strawman. Israel is not why the fanatical Muslims are going crazy any more than the Jews were what prompted the Axis power's attempt at world conquest. It's an excuse for the idiotic and evil release of frustration by a lot of individuals looking for nobility in the squalor they, and their predecesors, have largely heeped upon them. If we conceeded to all the demands currently held by the Arabs, if we forced Israel into the sea for the sake of placating the arab masses they would be back on our door step in just a few years once they realized that the reason their life sucks has far more to do with deeply entrenched cultural and ideological heritages passed on to them from their parents.

Islamofascism is a strawman. Most dictatorships in the Muslim world are (1) secular and (2) US-supported.
Meanwhile, Bin Laden lives in a cave.

That's also disengenuous in it's intended rhetorical effect. Most nations on this planet are US supported in some way or another. You don't consume a fourth of the worlds energy, and be one of the major producers of goods for the global market without "supporting" most nations on earth. The Sudan is supported, along with many other African dicatorships, by the Chinese government. Your argument is akin to saying that the main supporter of an individual's AIDS infection is the individual themself. The fact that the whole world economy would be only a shadow of it's current self were we to colapse as a nation renders us the default supporters of much of the world. To think that we should encourage revolt at the drop of a hat in places like Saudi Arabia while we all stay home and instantly stop consuming while the worlds energy supply is reduced dramaticaly is inane.

What Islamofascist nation right now is a threat to the US? None.

You can stay in never never land if you like. Just don't come crying when hunger pangs pull you out of your fanciful world after a nuke or two shut down the whole of the US energy grid. A single missle with a nuclear war head, fired even from just a measly cargo ship a couple hundred miles off the coast of the US could potentialy send us back to a technological point where the Amish would be the most advanced and richest group in our nation. So stay in your little la la land while we try and figure out how to keep you fed so you can stay in your silly stupor.

But thanks to them, REAL terrorists are being manufactured just as we speak in Ramadi, Fallujah, Baghdad, Mosul... and Haditha.

That's a funny thing. You kill someone's mom, sister, and daughter, and that person gets mad, really mad. And that's got nothing to do with Islamofascism.

And it's less a 'funny thing' to think that we just cut aid to Israel, turn tale and run from Iraq and Afganistan and the world then sequentialy begins it's assent to utopia while all the radical Muslims turn their bomb belts into civic demolition devices to build roads and bridges all over the world? They can fashion a propeganda to incite all the fanatics they want regardless the fact that we're trying to help them fight their own demons in Iraq. Your playing the fool to posit the idea that our military action will incite more violence against us than the propegandists that have been trying for years on end to establish their position in their own military industrial complexes. One's built around convincing those other than themselves to strap up and sacrifice for the illusions of glory and multitudes of virgins regardless their sins and misdeeds. Their taught that they can indulge in all the evil trappings of the Great Satan provided they end their gluttony by blowing themselves up in an act of violence against some icon of the "Great Satan" even if that icon is nothing more than a bunch of Iraqi school children. The problem is not the unfortunate loss of mothers and brothers and sisters and fathers, it's the moral depravity encouraged by ideologies that will use whatever they can to turn souls into biologicaly based "smart bombs."

The simple answer is 'Yes; I do not believe the US should be fighting "jihadism."'

Abstract ideas such as "anti-communism" or "anti-jihadism" quickly turn into ideologies and operate as covers for whatever selfish and self-interested private goals their proponents have.

Show me a person or organization bent on harming me and mine (and that includes all Americans) and I'm all for wiping them out. But I'm not signing on to a never ending "war" against an idea expressed in the form of a shape-shifting choose-your-own-content "ism."

That's funny. Given that there's no group of any means or power that exists independent the existance of a coercive entity I'd think the onus would be on the one advocating the philosophy that has had so little staying power that it's hard to say it's ever really existed in any meaningful way for any real amount of time.

Don't talk about onus when the world has been filled with coercive organizing principles since time immemorial. Even the most chaotic environments in memory show harsh coercive states existing, we call them gang leaders, warlords etc. The fact that youj dogmaticaly hold all coersion to be eternaly inherently bad simply demonstrates how limited your social fitness would be if you lived up to the true dictates of your principles. All of this assumes of course that you are, as you claim to be, an anarchist. It's just as likely that you're an aspiring totalitarian simply employing machevelian tactics to accellerate a movement to a condition that seems more likely to lend you a chance at your possible totalitarian dreams.

As a lonely conservative on this liberal site I must say you seem to have the best grasp on reality of the overall situation of most I've seen on any end or part of the political spectrum. Very well stated.

"Yeah, right. The Chinese would have redoubled their efforts and probably wiped out most of the US military in Korea."

Umm, which part of Command, Control, Communication is hard to understand? With no political leadership, and no military leadership, how would the teaming hordes have been coordinated to even arrive anywhere, much less be trained and armed?

I was unfair -- my extreme distaste for the idea of converting Bush's "War on Terror" into our own "War on Jihadism" ran away with my manners -- and herewith apologize.

As to your ideas of deploying "soft power" (does that include Karen Hughes-type PR?), I'm interested in hearing more particulars -- although I don't have much hope that we can affect other societies even at the margins.

Brad, if you read the comment again you will see that I accept the fact that the United States cannot compel Israel to act against it's own perceived interests. But, since the US is a very powerful country, it does have the power to change those interests, and hence the perception of those interests, by changing the strategic environment in which Israel acts.

Israel's long term security calculations depend on a complicated assortment of economic, political and geopolitical facts and predictions related to future contingencies. If you change some of those facts and predictions, you change the calculations. Some of those background facts right now include the reliability of US military and economic support for Israel in a wide variety of adverse circumstances. Since that support appears so secure and comprehensive and uncompromising, Israel doesn't fear those circumstances to the same degree that they would fear them if they believed they would be forced to go it alone in those same circumstances. Changes in US policy toward Israel, if significant enough, would compel the Israelis, who are rational actors, to re-evaluate the wisdom of some of their current policies and induce them to pursue a different direction. Israel is not an impregnable superpower that can afford to maintain its current policies, come what may, since the continuing rationality of those policies depends on US security and economic guarantees. There are many things the US and other countries could do that would alter Israel's strategic environment in such a way as to weaken its hand drastically.

Similarly, Taiwan pursues its interests, as its government sees them. But its calculations of self-interest, particularly in its relation with the Chinese mainland, include its estimates of the depth and reliability of US support for various actions. If the US were to alter its Taiwan policy in a significant way, those calculations would change.

As far as ending the conflcit goes, I am not sure that Israeli concessions would hasten an end to the conflict. I personally believe it would help, but maybe I'm wrong. What I am more interested in, assuming the conflict goes on indefinitely, is how the US is oriented toward that conflict. I believe a reorientation would be very much in the interest of the United States - particularly with regard to its relations with the Arab and Muslim world, but also much of the rest of the world - regardless of its ultimate impact of the Palestinians and the Israelis.

"The purpose would not be to combat terrorists but to address Sharon's plausible argument that the country is so small it could be overrun in one assault."

That's complete nonsense on Sharon's part and you need to ignore that idea.

Israel is the most powerful military state in the Middle East. They even have their own satellite up now. They have submarines with nuclear-tipped cruise missiles for a retaliatory second-strike nuclear capability.

Does anybody think Israel doesn't have enough military intelligence that they couldn't see an attack coming a month before?

This isn't the 1960's or the 1970's. There is no way Israel could be overrun by anybody today.

The fact of the matter is that Israel's existence is NOT in doubt and hasn't been for at least the last thirty years.

The only thing the Zionists care about is whether their STATE'S existence is in doubt.

My solution is very simple - integrate the Palestinians with the Jews. Bingo. We have an Arab state with a high enough population of Jews (and armed Jews, at that) that the odds of there ever being a Holocaust there is nil. And since the Palestinians are represented as full citizens, there is no occupation, no ethnic cleansing, no problems with neighboring states who have to look after Palestinian refugees.

The Jews have security, the Palestinians have security, everybody is tense but happy - except the Zionist politicians who don't get to try to control the ME oil for their own benefit and the Zionist religious freaks who don't get to hold themselves up to their God as having reclaimed the land for the "Chosen People." Tough tit for them.

By the way, the Sufi story is that the horse would fly, not talk.

I tend to agree with Transhuman's analysis but want to concentrate on Greenbaum's implied oil angle. If we get out of the Middle East and let them do what they want, it is most likely that one of the things they invariably will want to do is sell us their oil. So far so good. However we are facing peak oil. Iran has recently reminded us that if we continue to threaten them militarily, they will cut off supply, and the markets took that seriously, as apparently did Condaleezza Rice. Oil is a powerful weapon. So some say: take away their capacity to threaten us with the oil weapon, and that can only be done by some form of occupation or real imminent threat of occupation. The alternative view--which I think should be the liberal position--is to reassure the regional powers that we will not threaten them militarily IF they enter into binding agreements on guaranteed supply of oil and gas. This is not Bolton's preferred position since--as he says--he is not into the giving "carrots" game. A complicating factor is nuclear weapons. If Middle Eastern powers (like Iran) aquire nuclear weapons our implied threat of military action is pretty much nullified, at which point these powers could break these binding agreements with impunity. That's where we find ourselves. This whole discussion of spreading freedom is really secondary. In principle, if Iran was the most democratic nation on earth, it would not automatically imply that it would not use the oil weapon for its strategic/political advantage. In my calculation, in a realist view of things, democratic powers play the global game as all others, neither more nor less. So really this hyping of "Islamofacism" is besides the point. It is really for domestic consumption to get the American people to support our military efforts. "they hate our freedom" etc. is really rather lame and tiresome.

While I accept that the tone of that first paragraph may have been unnecessarily harsh, American Dreamer, I am still happy with the general content.

While Gitlin has problems with lots of particular US policies, he still seems willing to sign on to Beinart's basic idea that what our foreign policy should be about is a crusade to rid the world of evil totalitarians. He just seems more cautious than Beinart in terms of tactics, and more aware of the counterproductive blowback that has followed from various bold and violent moves in the past.

But vague ideological labels like "liberal" and "totalitarian" provide a very shaky foundation for security policy. And in any case, I don't think waging ideological warfare - whether intelligently and cautiously, or stupidly and boldly - is what most Americans want their national security leaders to do.

To take one example of what I regard as a needless ideological edge, I don't understand the supposed need for a "narrative of national greatness". Gitlin and Beinart both apparently agree on this need. Now if I went to a local town meeting devoted to establishing police policies, doing some long-term civil defense planning, and voting on budgets to allocate to the various tasks, and then stood up and said "what we are missing here is a narrative of town greatness!" people would look at me like I was a loon. Why should it be any different when the matter is national security? Why must we romaticize the matter?

"National greatness conservatism" and "national greatness liberalism" both seem misguided to me. They appear to me to be attempts by frustrated intellectuals to escape from their boring lives at the keyboard or in front of the blackboard by attaching themselves vicariously to some sort of romantic hero's quest. It's Indiana Jones fantasy fare made into foreign policy. But we all recognize that the Indiana jones movies are for kids.

Agree with most of your analysis, except this one:

"If Middle Eastern powers (like Iran) aquire nuclear weapons our implied threat of military action is pretty much nullified, at which point these powers could break these binding agreements with impunity."

Actually US military power could not be nullified by Iran's possession of nukes, because the probability of their having any significant number of nukes in less than, say, twenty years, is nil. Israel alone has anywhere from 100-400 nukes, so Iran's possession of one or two or even more doesn't mean they can threaten unilateral action, as I've discussed in other threads.

So if Iran were to nullify a security agreement and then threaten its neighbors, it would lose.

If it nullified an oil agreement, well, it's their oil - attacking them because they agreed to give it to us at a losing price in the future isn't legit.

What ME nukes CAN do is nullify the "regime change" program of the US and Israel. This is because, while Israel has a second-strike retaliatory capability, they cannot absorb a first strike. And if the mullahs think they're going to be taken out ANYWAY, they might as well do a first strike. Therefore, once Iran has nukes, the regime change program has to be taken off the table.

Thus Iranian nukes actually improve the chances of stability in the ME by removing wars of aggression from the scene - no attack by the US, none by Israel, and no ability to unilaterally attack by Iran.

The stage then shifts to conventional military parity and geopolitical maneuvering.

"The alternative view--which I think should be the liberal position--is to reassure the regional powers that we will not threaten them militarily IF they enter into binding agreements on guaranteed supply of oil and gas."

The problem with this position, again, is that it's THEIR OIL, NOT OURS. We cannot legitimately attack a country that refuses to supply us a vital commodity, especially when there are other countries who will sell it to us - like Venezuela, if we'd stop attacking them politically via CIA-supported coups and the like.

Furthermore, Iran has stated repeatedly that they will not use the oil weapon as long as they are not attacked militarily. Since it is in their interest to keep up their revenue by selling oil, and it is in our interest to let them, there is no need to use agreements to keep getting the oil.

What is needed is to remove regime change from the table and recognize Iran as a regional power.

The problem is that this is opposed by Israel and the Israel Lobby in the US and the neocons who seek "Empire" in the ME based on controlling the countries with the oil through regime change.

Thanks for the Sufi version. Speaking of horses it's time for me to stop beating this dead one so I'm outta here.

Brad, I am a long-time defender of a two-state solution. I continue to believe that the only form of that solution which is politically viable in the long-term, taking the attitudes of both sides into account, and has half a chance of ending the conflict, is one based on the most straightforward reading of UN242 and the primacy of the 1967 border.

Israel's settlement policy has been, and continues to be a major obstacle to peace, and I don't believe the US should be offering Israelis any security guaranties that implicitly recognize the annexation of territories in the West Bank. The Palestinians also have done very many things that are obstacles to peace. But the US relationship with the two sides is not symmetrical, and its means for influencing the two sides are different.

If Israel were to dismantle its settlements, and establish a border along 1967 lines, rather than continuing with its policy of grabbing land and dismembering the West Bank to destroy its political viability, I would support a nearly unconditional US guarantee of Israel's security, and an unequivocal statement to Palestinian and other Middle East leaders that we consider the border matter settled, that what lies within the old border is the State of Israel, and that violations of that border will not be tolerated. There are certainly some rejectionists in the Arab world who would not accept this resolution. But I believe that a US shift (or return) to this policy would earn the US enough credit in the region with the majority of neighboring states and peoples to serve as a viable foundation for a permanent resolution.

I think the Israel lobby does have a huge impact on US policy toward the Middle East. I don't know how "nefarious" that makes them. They are doing what lobbies do. Their members have certain goals, and they are fighting like hell with the means at their disposal to advance those goals by influencing US policy. But some of us have different goals, which do not align smoothly with the goals of the Israel lobby, based on a different estimate of US security interests, and we are entitled to fight politically for our goals as well.

You see Israel was founded by people who believed that Jews must be responsible for their own security. Throughout history, the Jewish people were pawns with no power of their own. Finally, after 2,000 years of exile, the establishment of the state of Israel gave the Jews the power to make their own decisions on what they consider their own security interests. Thus the idea that Israel would fundamentally alter their security posture because of some prodding by the US is totally ludicrous.

Yes, all states aspire to a situation in which their security lies entirely in their own hands - one in which they don't need anybody, and their security doesn't require trusting or depending on anybody, or compromising with anybody. Israel is particularly fervant in that regard. But neither Israel, nor the US, nor any other modern state exists in that fanatsy world. We all depend on our relationships with others for our security.

In the end, Israel is a very small country, and its people recognize that fact. While there might be a certain proportion of zealots who would rather commit national suicide than bend to the will of the international community, I don't believe most of Israel's people are like that. Israel, like any other minimally rational state, will indeed alter its security policies if its people perceive that a changing global situation requires those alterations. Isralies will do whatever seems to give them the best overall chance of longterm survival and prosperity. And the US has some power to influence which course of action gives them the best overall chances.

I'm sure Israeli leaders would prefer a situation in which the US pursued policies that are 100% oriented toward the security of Israel, as viewed by Israel's own government. But the US has a lot of complex security interests in tension, and its relationship with Israel is only one of them. If certain kinds of US support for Israel put the US's own security in jeopardy, the Israelis surely understand that the US is likely to make a change eventually.

I don't regard the changes I have suggested as a "sell-out", since they are a reaffirmation of a policy to which the US was once committed. It could only be perceived as a sell-out by people who have grown spoiled, and become accustomed to an outlandish outlay of US good will and unquestioning support toward Israeli intransigence. It is certainly important for a country like the US to maintain its commitments, since the value of its word is its main stock in trade in building cooperative relationships. But the US commitment to Israel has evolved incoherently and recklessly, and become so open-ended and that it is no longer defensible on the basis of the need to stand by one's commitments. And the continuing extension of that open-ended commitment means that the US has been violating dozens of other commitments it has made to other countries.

Ellen-

Thank you for your gracious apologies.

To my regret, I don't have the time right now to go into details about soft power. Here are a couple of links that get to the core. I would plug for an expanded version that would include more funding/resources for education, health care, democratization and infra-structure building in selected countries in the Middle and Far East, as well as Africa, prioritizing activities in accordance with US strategic priorities. I would specifically prioritize wahabist/jihadist activities. For instance, in many areas of Pakistan, the only education many students can afford is provided by fundamentalist madrassas funded by Wahabists and others of that ilk. Offering alternatives would be a high priority for.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_power

http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/news/opeds/2003/nye_soft_power_iht_011003.htm

http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/news/opeds/2004/nye_softpower_chitrib_051604.htm

http://www.cceia.org/viewMedia.php/prmTemplateID/8/prmID/4466

Check 'em out, and please let me know what you think.

Thanks. But damm it, now you've made me feel guilty for calling your ideas "gooey ideological slop".

Curse you, Todd Gitlin!

No, I wouldn't, because discussing anarchist theory with people with no clue about its history or depth of theory is a waste of time.

Besides, as I noted above in my latest post, I am more a Transhumanist than an anarchist. The former subsumes the latter, because no form of political organization can work with humans. So radical Transhumanists ignore politics.

Naturally, you will now wonder what I'm doing posting here if I "ignore politics." You may be right - I am wasting a lot of valuable time here - especially commenting on characters like Beinart who are clueless about everything.

Mine, of course - I'm far too selfish to give a damn about anybody else's.

Besides if they're reading my stuff while disagreeing with me, they're wasting their time, too. So why should I care?

Actually this sort of discussion does me some small good - I get to refine views I didn't know I had. :-)

Plus it might lead me to a new concept. That ties in with my being an "information junkie" - never know when something you read might solve ALL your problems.

Never has in my 57 years, but you never know, do you?

DanK, you wrote: "While Gitlin has problems with lots of particular US policies, he still seems willing to sign on to Beinart's basic idea that what our foreign policy should be about is a crusade to rid the world of evil totalitarians."

I didn't read Gitlin as saying that, but, rather, as paraphrasing what he thinks Beinart is saying. But you may be right about his meaning. And Todd can certainly speak for himself and clarify if he wishes to.

You write: "To take one example of what I regard as a needless ideological edge, I don't understand the supposed need for a 'narrative of national greatness'."

I find this a very provocative point. It is suggesting a foreign policy rhetoric shorn of all flowery rhetoric. At the level of presidential rhetoric this seems rarely to have even been tried. One could make the case that Clinton's foreign policy rhetoric was lighter than most on big picture rhetoric and frames, and indeed he was criticized heavily by Beinart for just such an ostensible failing. After all, this leaves the Beinarts of the world with less fun work to do. They can't stop at philosophy but instead have to do boring detailed policy investigation and analysis and there's no fame and glory in that, is there?

Like you, I am interested, at bottom, in presidents making good calls on as many as possible of the specific fp situations they confront. And, yes, that means I don't give a damn whether pundits like Beinart feel those decisions taken together can be jammed into enough of a pattern to suit their taste for a "big picture", coherent, over-arching grand narrative. It's Beinart's bias--and an incorrect one, I agree--that if all the decisions don't fit into a pattern he is able to identify and name, then the President has no "coherent" foreign policy doctrine.

If it were only Beinart who writes about foreign policy in this way, it wouldn't matter much. Unfortunately a lot of the MSM in covering presidential campaigns seems to have a similar bias, when they do actually write about foreign policy. If, from the reporter's point of view, it doesn't fit into a nice, neat conceptual frame then it must be that the candidate *doesn't have* a foreign policy. And, my heavens, we can't have someone in the Oval Office who *doesn't have* a foreign policy doctrine now, can we?

It seems as though most of our Presidents, and virtually all of them who have led the country during a war, have, however, sought public support by talking about what they want to do in the form of a narrative, with us, of course, cast as The Good Guys.

I'm interested in why you think that is the case. I think it is because there is a perception that in order to obtain support for policies which could entail costs, the public needs to think the policy is good and necessary. For some folks, a pared down concept such as simple self defense does not suffice because it offers no broader narrative that inspires passion. There has to be some larger meaning and justification for it.

You're saying that doesn't matter to most ordinary citizens, just to politicians and people who write about them.

The more a President wants to use the military the greater is the need for such a grander narrative. There is a connection between the type of rhetoric used and the substance of the desired policies. If there really were no demon around which to organize US foreign policy I fully believe Beinart would identify one anyway--because you can't write grand narrative without one.