Sometimes You Feel Like a Nut
Well they say there is no such thing as bad publicity. Ms. Slaughter's post aims to Naderize me. Not the first one to try, when strong criticism of Democratic Party/U.S. foreign policy doctrine is saddled with an extremist political label, rather than addressed in its own terms.
I spoke of a "U.S. National Security State." Just for clarification, I'm referring to a record of policies -- not to "America," or even to the Federal government -- that have been deeply problematic, from the standpoint of the national interest.
The important subject is the record of U.S. foreign policy. It isn't good, and Democrats in general are deeply complicit. I vote for Democrats regardless. I hopefully look for signs of change. In the leading candidates, I don't see them. Awareness of this record promotes public intellectual health. Instead, from AMS we get beguiling fairy-tales about America as we imagine it has been, or as we wish it might become.
The political challenge, as a sympathetic reading of the quote highlighted by AMS would suggest, is how to dial up the pressure without causing the explosion. My approach is to try and knock down commonly accepted, "bipartisan" premises that logically lead to foreign policy disaster -- to war with Iran. In the current situation, a few of these premises are:
* We cannot let Iran obtain nuclear weapons.
* Iran's leadership is insane and apt to do anything.
* Iran is a threat to U.S. security.
* Iran is committed to the destruction of Israel.
* Iran is one of our enemies in Iraq. Any of these are potential hair-triggers to war.
All are commonly accepted among Democrats, never mind Republicans. The latters' trigger-happiness is not in question.
Quoth AMS:
"The Princeton Project on National Security recommended that we be prepared to offer negative security assurances to Iran in exchange for a nuclear deal -- e.g. a commitment that we would not attack Iran. (Max Sawicky seems to think this is some kind of weird cover for a plan to attack Iran, but that is so nuts I can't even figure out how to respond to it.)"
Well it's usually called the good cop half of the proverbial duo. Or the carrot that goes with the stick. And suppose they don't bite? What then? What's the stick?
I share AMS' nightmare about the Administration's interest in doubling down in the Mideast. In my nightmare, the White House contrives a provocation from Iran. The Democratic leadership rears up and . . . then I wake up.
AMS says Dems have gone no further than to advocate diplomatic pressure. But it's a long way to November, 2008. Last night we were sold some wolf tickets about attacking Al Queda in Pakistan. Some say we might do it, others say we might but shouldn't talk about it.
With the best of intentions, there are temptations to grasp at good reasons for doing good things with potentially disastrous consequences. If we gave decision-makers the benefit of the doubt, that is a fair description of the source of many blunders.
Bipartisanship and wisdom are not the same thing. In the context of U.S. foreign policy, they are often contradictory.
no assurances are going to assuage Iran, just as they didn't assuage Kim Jong Il. This is a governent that fears and mistrusts their own people more than the US. We would never fully trust their assurance of giving up nukes. The Princeton idea is a non-starter in this White House, and Bush isn't smart enough to use it as cover for anything else.
August 8, 2007 11:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
I lean toward Max in this debate, at least in so far that the National Security Establishment has done a terrible job confronting its shortcomings, addressing its mistakes, and just generally reflecting on the complete and profound disaster it has walked us into. This includes the "lefty" and "liberal" side of the Establishment, which was complicit with or silent in the face of the terrible policy choices made since 9/11.
So, I find voices even from that side of the Establishment spectrum *profoundly* lacking in credibility. And calls for anything other than a root-and-branch reform of the policies, personnel, and apparatus in Washington to be beside the point. The Establishment is broken and dangerous. Dean Slaughter's prescriptions will not fix it.
(Point of reference: I am a liberal hawk who opposed the Iraq War based on common sense.)
August 8, 2007 11:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
AMS is trying to paint you as unreasonable because of your metaphor -- better to sink the ship etc. However, if the usual Washington pundits -- neolibs & cons, Brooking & AEI "scholars", etc -- are your ship, then the statement is correct. These guys can not be reformed, they all must be sent out to pasture before they do any more harm.
You are right to stress that the disease of the NSS has deeply penetrated the democratic party and that battle against these guys will continue after the Dems regain the whitehouse. It would be justice, if just as AMS is about to be invited to join this corrupt club, we succeed in sinking that ship first. Ah wishful thinking.
August 8, 2007 1:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
You don't have to trust their assurances. You have negotiate a stringent verification regime as part of the deal.
August 8, 2007 2:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
A first step along these lines, at least on the Democratic side, would be to ask that Democratic presidential candidates disclose the people who are providing them with foreign policy advice, and press them to indicate who are their top candidates for the main FP and national security positions in their administration.
If someone doesn't like Michael O'Hanlon, for example, voters have a right to know if he is some candidate's current top choice for Under Secretary of Defense for Policy.
August 8, 2007 2:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
Now this is one of those throwaway lines that is worth looking into a bit further, as it is the underpinning of the whole argument. The argument seems to be that the bipartisan Washington consensus about the National Security State has led to foreign policy blunders that have endangered the United States's own security and led to a record of success that can only be called "not good".
Now there can be no doubt that the US has made serious foreign policy blunders, Vietnam and Iraq being only the most prominent. And the extend to which the logic of the national security state contributed to those blunders, then we can say that it was a malign influence. But are we really willing to say that the overall record of US foreign policy is not good? I find that a bit hard to swallow.
The first thing to realize is that the Bush Administration is an outlier in terms of its foreign policy record. The epic blundering and total indifference to failure of the last 7 years is unprecedented.
The second thing is that US foreign policy has had spectacular successes as well. They just haven't happened recently, so people tend to forget. Some examples:
Now of course this must be balanced against the failures, of which there have been quite a few. But it is precisely because the Bush Administration overturned so many foreign policy norms pretty much as soon as it got into office that its foreign policy record has been so skewed to failure. But it is just ridiculous to say that US foreign policy in general is nothing but failure and the reason for that failure is that some malignant national security obsession colors everything we do.
Much has been written about how the center of gravity of the Democratic Party has shifted left somewhat in recent years. But attitudes to national security are unlikely to make the same shift, the Iraq War aside. This post by Max Sawicky gives some good insight into why that's likely to remain the case for a while.
August 8, 2007 2:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Also, I would highly recommend Glenn Greenwald's piece today in Salon.
Here.
Powers is one of the reasons I lean toward Barack at the moment.
August 8, 2007 2:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
they have NO NUKES to give up
August 8, 2007 3:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
My first question is how you figure that US Military presence in east asia was the critical element in the economic growth of that region? Perhaps it played some part, but an essential role? I'm all ears.
Second, no one claims that American foreign policy has been nothing but failure, but it most certainly CAN be said that every significant foreign policy failure since the end of World War II has been a product of the mindset, viewpoint, philosophy of the national security state. Furthermore, it is quite clear that the obsession with maintaining the national security state apparatus has and continues to color everything our government does. Bush and his criminal gang of irresponsible idealogues haven't departed from the national security state's mindset at all. What they have done is to consistently side with the most extremely paranoid, imperialisitc and ill-advised wing of the national security state.
August 8, 2007 3:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Of course all of US foreign policy is not bad. We are focusing on our aggressive military posturing. It is true that not all of these acts result in fiasco like Viet Nam and Iraq. But what good came out of the following US military interventions going back say 25 years.
Helping Israel in Lebanon (1983)
support for Contra's against Nicauragua
support for military juntas against El Salvadoran people (50,000 dead)
support for military juntas against Guatamalan people (200,000 dead)
invasion of Grenada
invasion of Panama
humanitarian intervention in Somalia.
interventions in Haiti.
On top of this we have over 700 military outposts and bases in over 100 countries. Please tell us what good is coming from these. Okinawa? Uzbekistan?
Finally, you may think the war against Serbia was good, but you are simply wrong. National Security State Democrats hold that one up as "good" because we happened to win it (for now). It was no more justified than war against Iraq.
August 8, 2007 3:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't agree, but B the D's comment is well-taken.
Maybe I'll try a response tonite.
August 8, 2007 3:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
Many people do not feel comfortable being public about their political activities for fear of retribution, from work colleagues or elsewhere. That is why many prefer to remain relatively quiet. I fear that your idea may have unintended and detrimental consequences. Besides, many of the leading figures are already public so that ought to give you a fair sense of direction.
August 8, 2007 3:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not sure what you're saying Architect. My point is just that the question "Who are your leading candidates for Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense etc.?" is a perfectly fair question to ask a candidate, and we ought to expect answers. I don't see why we should have to vote blind.
August 8, 2007 4:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not too impressed with Power, to be honest. She might bungle us into a quagmire in Darfur.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
August 8, 2007 4:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not sure how fair or accurate the point is. Yes, he brought up some notable foreign policy successes but I don't think anybody who in Latin America and lived through our policies there would look at what we're doing in Iraq and call it an outlier.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
August 8, 2007 4:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Also, can the first gulf war really be counted as a success? What'd we do, restore oligarchy to Kuwait? Whoohoo.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
August 8, 2007 4:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
The idea of wanting bipartisanship in American foreign policy is incredibly destructive and I think that is what Mr. Sawicky is getting at. The idea of bipartisanship connects two (I would argue) two dubious ideas. The first is Arrow's impossibility theory. The idea (which Arrow worked out mathematically) is that in a democracy you cannot please everybody - so you have to find a way to make responsible decisions where some people will be unhappy. The second idea is representative democracy, the idea that we elect representatives who are elites who have a greater ability to survey a situation and then make the best possible decisions understanding the it is impossible to please everybody.
So bipartisanship suggests that it is important to elite representatives to get together (what has happened is that the idea of elite representative has become far more important than the idea that they were democratically elected. As long as the representative have even weak - sometimes very weak - ties to some type of democracy they can claim some level of authority) and determine what is the best possible decision where some individuals must be unhappy. The easiest argument to make as to why some people are unhappy is that they are the extremes. This actually makes the illogical argument that if those on the extremes are unhappy that means that the least important parts of the population are unhappy - and if it has to be somebody, it is best that it is the people on the extremes are unhappy (if you are thinking that this argument is circular - it is -bipartisanship is a circular argument - but it also explains why bipartisanship (which is essentially the merging of opinions of elites for the best possible solution) is so often equated with centrism (again, there is no logical reason to do this).
The reason Dr. Slaughter makes the bipartisan argument is because she is an elite and she really believes in this model I believe. What she doesn't understand is that that the development of the internet throws this all in to question - because the type of communication makes consensus possible.
August 8, 2007 5:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
I get the part about the good-cop/bad cop, and I follow right along when the metaphor gets mixed and all of a sudden I'm dealing with carrots and sticks. I'm old but the mind is at least that limber.
What I have a hard time considering is that the "carrot" is something called a "negative security assurance". How much of a carrot is it to say "I won't pound you to smithereens if you do what I tell you to do."? I would have thought the carrots might be a bit more like the assistance given to North Korea.
When Max wrote before I thought I enjoyed what he said because the heat and humidity was making me cranky. Now I think I'm enjoying it because he's right. Besides, anyone who uses "quoth" is alright in my book. <grin></grin>
aMike
August 8, 2007 6:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
My concern with AMS's position along with the rest of the Democratic elite is that when confronted with an actual choice they will quickly hide behind Bush's skirts. In other words, if Bush manufactured a Tonkin type incident with Iran, AMS and the rest of the democratic elite will be right there yelling " bomb'em, kill'em". After Iraq, I don't trust any of them and I won't until I see them on their knees begging for G-d's forgiveness for their complicity.
August 8, 2007 7:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
The defense of Western Europe during the Cold War- A cold war which we deserve most of the credit for starting, at least according to recent research.
The building of international institutions such as the UN and its associated agencies- A UN which is we support and undermine by turns.
The peaceful retreat of communism in Europe- Again there's an argument as to how much of a threat it was, in the post WWII era.
The fostering of the spectacular economic growth of East Asia (which couldn't have happened without US military presence)- It happened in India and China too. And of course the Kwangju massacre has a wider context.
The first Gulf War.- Not a good thing.
The Kosovo War- Arguable both ways.
The promotion of peace in Ireland- Not a US monopoly by far.
The promotion of international law- The undermining of International law.
The promotion of human rights-The Undermining of Human rights
The promotion of international economic cooperation and free trade- The forcible opening up of markets to US goods.
Not including the governments we actively engaged in overthrowing, what were the lasting effects of our manipulation? Or you one of those who thinks there would have been a gulag on Lake Como if it were not for our attention to "detail"?
Beyond the manipulations of power politics, how many deaths are we responsible for, either on our own or through our proxies: in South and Central America, South East Asia and the the middle east?
How many dead in Iraq? Or are you one of those who cal the last Lancet study a fraud?
You argue from the assumption that we are the necessary country.
There are many who disagree.
This is basic stuff.
August 8, 2007 8:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
The few liberal blog I read daily give me the uneasy recollection of the Bolsheviks fighting the Mensheviks. The liberal blogs hate the Democratic party more than they dislike the Republicans. It's alway the complicit Democrats, the spineless Democrats, etc.
It's not that there isn't some truth in the arguments these blogs make, but blogs don't have to live in a real world, they don't have to compromise, a constituency to placate. It's easier to solve problems in a imaginary world. The Democrats have voters to answer to, Republicans to be disgusted with; they make mistakes and they are not optimal.
Who the hell is?
August 8, 2007 8:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Re: Bipartisanship
The "partisans" that are "bi-ing" are politicians with a narrow range of opinion based on faulty premises and just plain lies--so what good is bipartisanship? As Max indicates, wisdom is a no-show in this game, truth is absent and reality is a stranger.
There are many people on this website with more wisdom than many of the partisan clowns in Congress. That's the truth. And we haven't been bought.
So we need not bipartisanship but multipartisanship, a full discussion of issues that involves the American people (of which we are representative). We have the technology and we can do it. We can use the blogs with their inherent BS-filter to get at the truth and reality. In fact, we're doing it! Let democracy ring! Bring on multipartisanship!
What do I mean? I mean a consensus of bloggers, think-tankers, academics and politicians concerning major questions of national and foreign policy.
We're not there yet, but we can be, and I think that some day we will be. In the meantime, speaking for myself, I'm mad as hell and if my blogging be "road rage" then so be it.
To the 'elite': Don't expect us to be impressed with some elite consensus arrived at by academics and politicians in complete disregard of facts and common sense, some special agenda that presupposes that I and my fellow bloggers don't know enough and aren't smart enough to figure this stuff out, some program engineered in the ivory halls of academia or in congressional cloakrooms. Marginalize us at your peril!
Don't talk down to us. Don't make us (and Max) "feel like a nut". Talk to us like we count, because we do. And when we tell you that your premises suck, your statements are self-contradictory, your processes are lousy, and your imperialistic impulses are stupid, as Max indicates, and we expect better, then take us seriously, because we are serious. It's not "road rage", it's citizens exercising their rights and you should have a decent respect for the opinions of mankind.
Thanks, Max. You be da man!
August 8, 2007 8:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've always thought that with a few more bipartisan politicians in the 1850s we could have avoided the Civil War.
A compromise could have been reached in which only Texas, Mississippi, and Georgia remained as slave states and the government paid slaveholders in the other slave states compensation for their loss of property.
August 8, 2007 8:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
aMike,
Don't give up being cranky, though. I think it lends gravity and I swear by it.
August 8, 2007 8:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's a fantastic observation and proof that the grounds for compromise between right and wrong are, at best, the grounds of "less wrong."
The slavery issue was the perfect one to bring up since any reasonable person recognizes that having less slave states is no less a travesty than having more of them. No slave states was the only just answer.
When Republicans try to make this point they tend to bring up Neville Chamberlain and Hitler.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
August 8, 2007 9:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Fair enough. I thought you meant that the candidates ought to release a list of all those advising them on foreign policy, not just the most likely senior appointees.
August 8, 2007 9:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
I am not against compromise - it's essential to getting anything political done. However, I am against totally caving in - that is what most democrats did on Iraq and they just did it again on wiretapping. They completely caved in to the White House bill. The democrats had a compromise bill on the table but then they wimped out because the WH and republicans would not compromise.
Given the polls the American people would seem to be behind the democrats on many of these measures, The problem is the political elite who advise the democrats have absolutely zero desire to rock the boat and as a result congressmen fall into line.
AMS is a "serious" person to use Greenwald's terminology and she will do anything to maintain that status. Morality and ethics be damned. Has she shed one tear for the innocent Iraqis who have died as a result of this fiasco? Would she shed a tear for any soldier? Any Iranian? When she writes, her commentary is devoid of any emotion or humanity. To her, geo-politics is nothing more than a video game where decisions are made and the victims of those decisions are no more real in her mind than animations on a screen.
August 8, 2007 9:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came . . . .
The Civil War was unavoidable.
August 8, 2007 10:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Neville Chamberlain and Hitler." But never Churchill and Stalin.And both about Poland.
August 8, 2007 11:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think you're being facetious Eric, but anyway ...
A book I am currently reading - "The Road to Disunion" by William W. Freehling makes it clear how wrong this is.
1. South Carolina was the hottest hotbed of slavery, and secessionism, not Texas, Mississippi, or Georgia.
2. The very existence of the "Black Republican" party was considered a mortal threat to the southern slavocracy and one of their biggest fears was the federal patronage a Republican president like Lincoln would have, jobs to fill with not necessarily abolitionists, but even with people who were simply willing to say publicly in the South that slavery was morally wrong - a contagion that they were unceasing in their efforts to prevent.
3. The South was EXTREMELY defensive about slavery and its morality and from the 1830's on (see gag rules in Congress, insistence on Fugitive Slave laws, etc.) was extremely aggressive and determined in promoting these interests, versus a North that didn't like slavery but didn't care nearly as much - sort of like the NRA today.
4. A free state bordering on a slave state was a continuing threat to slavery - this was the scenrario that bred fugitive slaves. Hence the Missouri-Kansas "border ruffians", etc.
An interesting, if long, read, in today's climate.
August 9, 2007 3:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
Gravity is one of the things that concern me. I'm thinking about spending 12 of very 24 hours hanging upside down so things can sag back into place. :-)
aMike
August 9, 2007 6:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
So the US is a singularly malignant force - wreaking havoc and destruction across the globe. And the things that the vast majority of historians, economists, politicians and ordinary people would consider US accomplishments - well "new research" says they're all wrong.
Amazing. It's a wonder the world doesn't just gang up against us and put us out of our (and their) misery.
I've met people like you before, back in my college days at Berkeley. You're as pathetically misguided now as they were back in the day. And I suppose you would bristle at being called "anti-American."
August 9, 2007 7:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
"And the vast majority of... economists, politicians and ordinary people..."
don't read history.
Before us there were others, and I spend a large part of my life studying and admiring the arts and baubles those cultures produced, as I produce arts and baubles for this one. But I don't make it a habit to defend countries or governments, mine or others'. You defend your country because it's what you know, but don't pretend there's such a thing as an objective nationalist. I suppose I should give you credit for lying to yourself before you do so to us, but that would be faint praise.
Read more, assume less.
A good rule of thumb.
You responded to lists and details with ad hominem attacks. See if you can do better next time.
August 9, 2007 8:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
First, mine was not an "ad hominem" attack i.e. an attack on character. I said you were misguided. I have no opinion of you as a person as I have no basis (or need) to judge you as a person.
Second, if you actually read what I wrote, I was trying to present a balanced viewpoint, acknowledging both the good and the bad of US foreign policy. I don't claim perfect objectivity, but so what? I am obviously not an American-can-do-no-wrong type.
You on the other hand, have even less claim on objectivity, given your proclivity to calling absolutely everything the US has ever done in the foreign policy realm as either (a) malignant or (b) irrelevant. Every single thing on the list of US successes I presented you dismissed. Even with the things you didn't actually deny, you tried to change the subject with the objective of avoiding admitting I'm right (what does Chinese and Indian economic growth have to do with the story of growth in Southeast Asia, which happened many years before?)
It's a comically biased, slanted perspective.
You attack your country because it is the only thing your ideology will let you do. You're a prisoner of a mindset that holds the US as a singularly destructive force and it prevents you from seeing any nuance, balance or complexity. To admit the US can also be a force for good would be to call into question that ideology and that is too scary to contemplate.
I'll say the same thing you said back to you: Read more, assume less.
August 9, 2007 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Speaking of this gravity thing, I don't believe it exists. I'm looking out the window right now at a leaf falling from a tree as God's hand pushes it down.
- Pat Robertson
August 9, 2007 1:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Representative democracy I defend; freedom of speech and assembly I'll defend, but not a country. Maybe I wouldn't have jumped so fast if you hadn't posted a list in which every example had such obvious counter-examples, which you ignored. Maybe I wouldn't have jumped if you'd argued that power is the problem no matter who has it; and no country should have as much power as the US does. It's simply not a good idea. Power in the hands of the few is not a force for good.
One of the other responders had a list of the dead resulting from a few of our escapades. New extimates of the deaths resulting from our"mistake" in Iraq are one million. And your flag waving generalities amount to no more than pointing out that between Sparta and las Vegas, most people would choose Vegas.
Hell, I'm going to Shanghai next month, the best of both worlds, right?
"Sorry, dude mistakes were made."
I don't hate this country, I hate people.
August 9, 2007 1:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
The best outcome is desirable if you can reach it.
However, any reasonable person would recognize that having fewer people dying of the plague is better than having more people dying of the plague.
Half a a loaf is better than none but one of the traps of bipartisanship is settling for an imaginary half a loaf and getting nothing when by holding out you have a good chance at a whole loaf a lot sooner.
August 12, 2007 5:15 PM | Reply | Permalink