The Obama Administration is conducting a major peace offensive directed at Islamic countries. The UN Ambassador Susan Rice promised "direct" diplomacy with the Mullahocracy in Tehran. SecState Clinton magnified and focused the Rice position averring that it was up to Iran to choose whether or not to "unclench" its fist.
The President took to Arab TV seeking to reassure Muslims that "Americans are not your enemy." Obama also invoked the presumably good relations based on "mutual respect" which he alleged constituted the basis of US-Muslim relations "twenty or thirty years ago."
While the Geek is somewhat of a charm offensive mavin, having enjoyed the recurrent waves of Give-Peace-A-Chance rolling out of the Kremlin during the Cold War, he has to blow the historical whistle on the current Obama and Company effort.
You see, it just isn't enough to invoke the good-ole-days of peace, love and flower power as the President tried to do. The necessity is asking what has changed over the past generation which served to end the presumed Golden Years of US-Muslim relations.
Really only one slight factor has changed between then and now. That small matter is--ta! da!--religion.
Perhaps the simplest way to unpack this change is to ask a question: What event(s) transpiring in the transformative year 1979 powered the transmogrification of relations between the US and Muslim countries?
(Sound of patiently drumming fingers.)
That's right, kids. The Iranian Revolution.
The overthrow of the Shah and the installation of a rigorously Islamist regime was an event of world-historical importance. The impact of the revolution was potentiated by the intentional and prolonged humiliation of the United States during the hostage crisis. The overall effect of the Revolution was to thrust Islam of the most militant and uncompromising sort onto the global stage.
Prior to the success of the Ayatollah and his comrades, the mutterings of Islamic Revivalists such as those who founded the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt were confined to radical screeds and plots of little consequence. The assorted proponents of what we now know as Islamism/jihadism were like the Arab armies--failures with an attitude.
The Iranian Revolution changed all that. The Iranian Revolution proved that True Believers in the True Faith of Islam could triumph over apostates such as the Shah and infidels including the Great Satan, the United States.
Prior to the miracle year of 1979, the US could practice diplomacy with Muslim states in a manner akin to the way in which it engaged in diplomacy with all other countries. The rules and mechanisms of the game of nations were both well understood and adhered to by all players. Even the Soviets and the Communist Chinese played the game fairly (if ruthlessly.) All hands understood that the goal of diplomacy was the protection and advancement of defined national and strategic interests at the lowest risk and the greatest benefit.
Even the most ideologically besotted regimes recognised that compromise was necessary if inordinate risks were to be avoided. Nations behaved like sailboats heading upwind--tacking right and left in order to make incremental progress toward the goal. With very few and quite unimportant exceptions, countries during the period between 1945 and 1979 eschewed the "hey diddle-diddle, right up the middle" approach to international relations.
The victory of the mullahs in Iran changed that. At least with respect to the emerging Islamist entities. In the Islamist view of the world, there is no room for compromise. There is no room for incremental achievement of goals except in the most narrowly defined tactical way. In the eyes of Islamists, there is no making deals with the devil. In their playbook, there is no tolerance for any achievement less than total victory.
Apostates--perverting backsliders from the rigid demands of Islam--may make deals. These unworthy leaders may compromise. These blots upon the purity of Islam may look to the narrowly defined requirements of national and strategic interest.
True Muslims, the Islamists contend, do not stoop to dishonor their beliefs, their deity, the Prophet. True Muslims, the Islamists hold, go for the gold of complete and total victory over the infidel and the apostate regardless of risks and costs. It is what their warrior faith demands, their militant deity demands. It is the Message. It is the Will of the Prophet and the deity who speaks through the Prophet.
Unless and until the Obama Administration from the President on down the line get a firm grip on these realities, hopes for "direct" diplomacy and calls for the Iranians to "unclench" their fists will be bootless. Appeals for Muslims to change their view of Americans-as-enemies will have no useful result.
While Osama bin Ladin and other jihadists make recurrent reference to the success of the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan, the war against the occupier in that country was of far less importance in rise of Islamism than was the Iranian Revolution. This does not imply that the efforts of the jihadists were unimportant.
To the contrary the legends which have emerged in the Arab street regarding the efficacy of the Muslim fighters in Afghanistan have been an important reinforcement to the Iranian paradigm. The presumed success of the jihadists against the Red Army has been an important agent in developing a theory of war based on a unique concept.
Consider the oft-repeated assertion that Islamist jihadist "love death more than infidels love life." This conclusion is based in large measure on the Islamist/jihadist interpretation of how the Soviets lost in Afghanistan. True, this explanation simplifies to the point of absurdity the multiple factors which forced the eventual Soviet retreat.
However the we-love-death-they-love-life hypothesis was powerfully underscored by the US reaction to eighteen deaths in Somalia and the quite unrobust American responses to attacks on the Marine barracks in Lebanon, US embassies in Africa and even on a US warship. The reaction of the US to these events contrasted sharply and unfavorably with the evident willingness of Iranians to die in defense of the Revolution and Iranian soil during the long, bloody Iran-Iraq War.
The final conclusion of the Islamists and jihadists was simple, brutal and not easily countered. It is a conclusion well founded in the Quran, the Hadith and the history of expansionist Islam of centuries past.
The conclusion?
The True Muslim, the authentic follower of the Faith and the Prophet eagerly embraces death. By so doing he will defeat both the infidel and the apostate.
There is a necessary corollary. The True Muslim, the authentic follower of the Faith and the Prophet rejects compromise. Indeed, the idea of compromise is not to be found in the Islamic scripture. There can only be victory or death. There is no middle ground possible except for narrow, purely tactical reasons.
Apostates may bargain like merchants in the bazaar. Infidels may wheel and deal with compromise as the goal.
But, not the True Muslim. Not the authentic follower of the One True Faith and the Final Prophet. By loving death and rejecting accommodation, by seeking martyrdom and eschewing coexistence, by keeping the eyes on Paradise and overlooking the world, Islam not only can triumph. It will triumph.
The Obama Administration can and will engage in diplomacy with rulers of various Muslim states. It will play the game of nations with such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the other so-called "conservative" Muslim countries.
We will deal and bargain with the men seen by Islamists as apostates. But, these men are not the problem, they are probably not even part of the solution. Still, we will wine, dine, wheedle and cozen them. We will search for--and find--coinciding interests.
And, it won't matter. Neither will attempts to convince Muslims generally that "Americans are not your enemies."
Islamism and its armed, deadly twin, jihadism, are not to be countered by diplomacy or honeyed words. As the Iranian Revolution and its thirty year aftermath have shown the world, True Belief is not easily defeated. It is not subject to the rules of the game of nation.
Unpleasant reality to say the least. It is, however, the reality on which we and the new administration had best get a grip.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Mexico, The Burro That Might Kick Back
The Joint Forces Command recently concluded an assessment holding that Pakistan and Mexico were both "failing"states. Other, supposedly well informed, observers have joined the chorus warning of Mexico's potential collapse under the pressures of narco-trafficking violence and economic contraction.
There is no doubt about it: Mexico is in a bad way. The Geek has written a number of posts on the subject over the past year. There is a possibility that Mexico will collapse in a welter of blood and guts not unlike that which happened roughly a century ago following the deposing of Diaz. Should this happen the cause will not be the violence of the drug smuggling gangs. It will not be the result of gun-running from the Estados Unidos.
It will not even be the result of tightened enforcement of the various immigration laws.
Should Mexico come apart it will be due to a loss of faith on the part of the long suffering Mexican majority. A collapse of the Mexican state will be caused by the final collapse of the majority's belief in the capacity of the state, the political system, the paternalism of the indigenous elite, to assure that life is moderately safe, the future at least no worse than the present and the possibility for improvement of the quality of one's life not beyond the reach of realistic hope.
If the preponderance of Mexico's 105 million people, the peasants, the laborers, the wretched searching the reeking and smoking trash heaps in the Valley of Mexico finally lose hope, forsake faith, and turn their backs on the elite and the government which has so long and so well served its own interests at the expense of the majority, then and only then will the state fail.
When the passions of a long misused people finally boil over in that uniquely Mexican combination of fatalism and bloodshed which marked the long decades of the internal wars of the early 20th Century, the state of Mexico will collapse with a seismic sound which will echo throughout the United States. A seismic shock which may well cause aftershocks throughout Central America.
At that point it will be too late to ascribe responsibility. There will only be time enough to collect the casualties and contain the damage. The time to assign responsibility for the (possible but not inevitable) collapse of Mexico is now. Now, while there is still time and ideas enough to prevent any chance of Mexico becoming a failed state.
Quite unsurprisingly, members of the Mexican elite--both politicians and members of the intelligentsia--are laying the blame at the door of the US. From their point of view it the Yanqis who are responsible not only for the blood and gore along the border (more than eighty KIA in Juarez so far this month) but the economic catastrophe looming over the country as well.
From the perspective of Mexico City all that is needed to insure peace, tranquility and prosperity in Mexico is for the US to end all internal demand for illegal drugs, halt all smuggling of guns south across the border and lower all barriers to "internal migration." If the US can't do all three then, at the very least, it must admit all those Mexicans who wish to work here.
The Mexican elite has always been cushioned from the effects of its own misrule, its own exploitative practices, its own corruption, its own misguided economic nationalism by the presence of the US. The northern border of Mexico for decades has served the function of the old western frontier in American history. The border has been the safety valve. Crossing the line into the US has always been the refuge of the ambitious, the excess, those in economic need.
The money sent home by illegal workers in the US has assured that the Mexican elite has not had to reach into its own collective pocket to meet either the social and educational needs of the majority or engage in the necessary internal investments which would give more Mexicans more of a chance to have a better future living and working in the land of their birth.
In short, the safety valve represented by the United States has allowed the Mexican elite to be selfish, short-sighted, and contemptuous of those Mexicans born to less fortunate families. It has allowed the elite to kick and exploit without risk to its power.
If and only if the Mexican elite can bring its self to get a grip on the reality of its conduct over the long sweep of Mexican history and quit trying to foist responsibility onto the US can Mexican social, political and economic stability be assured in the long run. If and only if the Mexican elite can do the nearly impossible--recognise what it has been doing and change course, can there be utter certainty that Mexico will not collapse.
Absent that, the best that can be hoped for is that the ever-so-patient and long enduring Mexican peasant and his urban cousin will keep on bearing the burden of death, fear, poverty and general nastiness without (armed) complaint. The Geek has heard members of the Mexican elite (military and police officers of higher rank) compare the Mexican majority with burros.
One day the Geek watched as a man beat a burro. The burro was staggering under a pile of firewood so its head and rump could barely be seen (or beaten.) The burro driver cursed and whacked. Finally the burro kicked.
The man lived. Barely. His face will never be presentable.
There is no doubt about it: Mexico is in a bad way. The Geek has written a number of posts on the subject over the past year. There is a possibility that Mexico will collapse in a welter of blood and guts not unlike that which happened roughly a century ago following the deposing of Diaz. Should this happen the cause will not be the violence of the drug smuggling gangs. It will not be the result of gun-running from the Estados Unidos.
It will not even be the result of tightened enforcement of the various immigration laws.
Should Mexico come apart it will be due to a loss of faith on the part of the long suffering Mexican majority. A collapse of the Mexican state will be caused by the final collapse of the majority's belief in the capacity of the state, the political system, the paternalism of the indigenous elite, to assure that life is moderately safe, the future at least no worse than the present and the possibility for improvement of the quality of one's life not beyond the reach of realistic hope.
If the preponderance of Mexico's 105 million people, the peasants, the laborers, the wretched searching the reeking and smoking trash heaps in the Valley of Mexico finally lose hope, forsake faith, and turn their backs on the elite and the government which has so long and so well served its own interests at the expense of the majority, then and only then will the state fail.
When the passions of a long misused people finally boil over in that uniquely Mexican combination of fatalism and bloodshed which marked the long decades of the internal wars of the early 20th Century, the state of Mexico will collapse with a seismic sound which will echo throughout the United States. A seismic shock which may well cause aftershocks throughout Central America.
At that point it will be too late to ascribe responsibility. There will only be time enough to collect the casualties and contain the damage. The time to assign responsibility for the (possible but not inevitable) collapse of Mexico is now. Now, while there is still time and ideas enough to prevent any chance of Mexico becoming a failed state.
Quite unsurprisingly, members of the Mexican elite--both politicians and members of the intelligentsia--are laying the blame at the door of the US. From their point of view it the Yanqis who are responsible not only for the blood and gore along the border (more than eighty KIA in Juarez so far this month) but the economic catastrophe looming over the country as well.
From the perspective of Mexico City all that is needed to insure peace, tranquility and prosperity in Mexico is for the US to end all internal demand for illegal drugs, halt all smuggling of guns south across the border and lower all barriers to "internal migration." If the US can't do all three then, at the very least, it must admit all those Mexicans who wish to work here.
The Mexican elite has always been cushioned from the effects of its own misrule, its own exploitative practices, its own corruption, its own misguided economic nationalism by the presence of the US. The northern border of Mexico for decades has served the function of the old western frontier in American history. The border has been the safety valve. Crossing the line into the US has always been the refuge of the ambitious, the excess, those in economic need.
The money sent home by illegal workers in the US has assured that the Mexican elite has not had to reach into its own collective pocket to meet either the social and educational needs of the majority or engage in the necessary internal investments which would give more Mexicans more of a chance to have a better future living and working in the land of their birth.
In short, the safety valve represented by the United States has allowed the Mexican elite to be selfish, short-sighted, and contemptuous of those Mexicans born to less fortunate families. It has allowed the elite to kick and exploit without risk to its power.
If and only if the Mexican elite can bring its self to get a grip on the reality of its conduct over the long sweep of Mexican history and quit trying to foist responsibility onto the US can Mexican social, political and economic stability be assured in the long run. If and only if the Mexican elite can do the nearly impossible--recognise what it has been doing and change course, can there be utter certainty that Mexico will not collapse.
Absent that, the best that can be hoped for is that the ever-so-patient and long enduring Mexican peasant and his urban cousin will keep on bearing the burden of death, fear, poverty and general nastiness without (armed) complaint. The Geek has heard members of the Mexican elite (military and police officers of higher rank) compare the Mexican majority with burros.
One day the Geek watched as a man beat a burro. The burro was staggering under a pile of firewood so its head and rump could barely be seen (or beaten.) The burro driver cursed and whacked. Finally the burro kicked.
The man lived. Barely. His face will never be presentable.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
One Nation? Under God
Back when the Geek was a professor he put what he thought was a properly high emphasis on the role of religion, specifically Protestant Christianity, in American history. His co-workers in the history department were scandalized by this effrontery. In the unforgettable (to the Geek at least) words of one, "Of course you're right, but do you really have to make a point of it?"
The Geek realised long before that memorable encounter at the department mail boxes that he was out of step with the elite of his generation. They had almost without exception replaced the long standing American zeal for religious belief with one which celebrated secularism and the absolute separation of the communities of faith from the dialogue(s) in the public square. While being one with the famed aphorism of Laplace two hundred years ago and being a strong advocate of the "liberty of conscience" enshrined in the "no establishment" and "free exercise" clauses, the Geek was (and is) unwilling to distort history, least of all the history of his own country.
America was founded on religious passion. It must be recalled that the Puritans came to the wilderness of New England not in search of religious tolerance but in order to freely practice religious intolerance. As the legal history of the Massachusetts Colony shows clearly the theocrats of the Bay cheerfully instituted a regime based on religious precepts which was so narrow minded, intolerant, coercive and rigid that the most intense Taliban adherent could not improve upon it in the slightest.
Throughout the colonies religion was the kingdom and Christ was King. Laws looked both to the English common law and the bible for their justification. Community solidarity depended upon conformity of behaviour based on conformity of belief. The dissenters were neither welcomed or tolerated. Even Pennsylvania and Rhode Island, the (semi-mythic) icons of religious tolerance and inclusion were actually thin-skinned, insecure strongholds of fanatics.
The need for a "liberty of conscience"clause in the basic laws of the several colonies was recognised even before the first shots of the War of Independence were fired. The Virginia Statute on Religious Liberties authored by Thomas Jefferson was a firm sign pointing in the required direction.
Unless carefully constrained the religious enthusiasm and zeal of competing sects would rip the political and social fabric of the new republic apart. Unless citizens felt themselves both protected in their individual rights of conscience, the tyranny of a religious majority would crack a sharp whip on the backs of nonconformists. Thus the "no establishment" and "free exercise" clauses were at the top of the post-Constitution "must do" list along with liberty of speech and the press.
Religion was not bared from the public square. That was not the intent of those who wrote and approved the clauses in question. The purpose was one of civilizing and controlling the passions so easily stirred by matters of faith. A republic, the founding generation correctly saw, demanded restraint, control and civility in the public square, and they realized that these were readily destroyed by the passions of religious belief. They also correctly saw that the minorities, the dissenters, the nonconformists, were at risk in their individual holdings and persons once the genie of belief driven zeal was released from the bottle.
Religion stayed alive, well, potent and pervasive throughout the Nineteenth Century. It, or to err on the side of accuracy, one Protestant sect, became the virtual "state religion" in the states of the Confederacy both before and after the War Between the States. Ironically, this "state religion" was a sub-set of the Baptists. The irony springs from the fact that the Baptists of the late Seventeenth Century had been the strongest proponents of a wall of separation between state and church.
Religion featured heavily not simply in the internal crisis of the War Between the States, in the fight between abolitionist and slaveowner, it was just as important in the American identity crisis which developed with increasing speed between the late 1840s and the end of the century.
Identity crisis?
You bettcha! The American people have undergone several bouts of intense anxiety over just who-are-we? and how-do-we-know-we're-us? over the past two hundred years. This is completely understandable. The US is an artificial nation. It grew around a set of ideas. These ideals coupled with the very real possibility of material betterment in a vast and underdeveloped country served as a people magnet without equal.
People from different lands, cultures, languages and--ta-da! religions came in ever increasing numbers to the US. The most critical problem through much of the Nineteenth Century was the arrival of Roman Catholics. To put it bluntly, Catholics, particularly those from Ireland and later southern Europe, were not easily or warmly accepted by the Protestant majority.
Absent the "no establishment" and "free exercise" clauses, the conflicts between native Protestant and new arrival Catholic would have been more violent and extensive then they were. At the national level the "civilizing" effect of the twin clauses showed itself by repeated Congressional rejection of anti-Catholic measures. Ultimately the clauses provided the breathing space and time necessary for the multiple American nations to sign a series of separate peaces over differences of religious belief and agree that we could all be Americans--what ever that might mean.
It is true that the public square seems to have become ever more secular during the first three quarters of the Twentieth Century, but that is more a matter of appearance than reality. It is more that obvious passions faded along with the identity crisis during the opening years of the century. Sure, there were moments of conflict such as the Biblical Literalists opening shots in the anti-Darwin campaign eighty and more years ago.
But, in the main, Americans were content to put the fires of belief on hold and concentrate on matters at hand. Matters like the Great Depression, World War II and ultimately the Cold War. Indeed, the American people reinforced their sense of national self by reducing the apparent differences between religions. It was Americans who invented the unhistorical notion of the "Judeo-Christian tradition," and sought to meld the differing--even conflicting--theologies of Protestantism, Catholicism and Judaism into a sort of bland, one-size-fits-all civic religion which defined America and its ideals vis a vis Communism.
It was the need for a Cold War appropriate way to differentiate the US from the Soviet Union which gave rise to the sudden insertion of the words, "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance where it sits to this day as an indigestible lump to those of us who first learned the Pledge in grade school in the dark days before God was invoked. This brings up another delicious piece of irony.
Ironically, in view of the past few years, the US was the only non-Islamic country which differentiated itself from the Soviets on the basis of the latter being "godless" and the former "godly." The notion of godliness took such firm root in the US during the Cold War period that for a while at least it was open season on any person who was not a full, seemingly eager participant in one or another of the several flavors resident within the "Judeo-Christian tradition."
During the last decades of the past century, faith driven political ideologies re-emerged from the shadows. With the same sort of Wahhibist dedication and zeal that had typified the Puritans, the resurgent Christian "Conservatives" sought to enlist the political process in their particular (and often peculiar) view of biblically based morality. The flames of True Belief flared high, bright and hot, particularly among those who drew their nourishment from the the "state religion" of the Old Confederacy--the Southern Baptist Convention--and others from the same theological (not to say theocratic) model.
Not surprisingly the opposition reacted by elevating the "no establishment" and "free exercise" clauses to a level never before seen. The intelligentsia, particularly those born in the Forties, Fifties and Sixties, demanded a total removal of religion not only from the public square but from American history as well.
The result has been that the elite, the opinion molders, the academics, the journalists and even many of the political class, are dedicated True Believers in the secular agenda.
The other result has been that many, even most, of the rest of the American public remains faithful to the several communities of faith which co-exist in more or less harmony throughout the US.
The purpose and intent of the twin clauses barring establishment and assuring free exercise was to civilize and restrain passions. Without this moderating influence the fires of belief--whether religious or secularist--would imperil the still very delicate balance of the republic.
Get a grip on it. The American republic has charted a narrow and twisting course through the rocks, shoals and reefs of religious zeal. We still are. Even with more than two centuries experience we don't have it right yet.
But, we do have a tradition of separating the political sphere to a substantial extent from that of religious practice and belief. This is all that separates us from the countries of Islam.
The challenge is for us to understand not only how intertwined religion and state are in the Islamic countries and what that implies. We must also understand just how delicately we are balanced on the razor's edge of too much religion and too little. Both the Christian "Conservatives" and the secular intelligentsia must curb their passions.
Both must recognise that the Founders were right--passion destroys and civility creates. Otherwise God (or something) help us all.
The Geek realised long before that memorable encounter at the department mail boxes that he was out of step with the elite of his generation. They had almost without exception replaced the long standing American zeal for religious belief with one which celebrated secularism and the absolute separation of the communities of faith from the dialogue(s) in the public square. While being one with the famed aphorism of Laplace two hundred years ago and being a strong advocate of the "liberty of conscience" enshrined in the "no establishment" and "free exercise" clauses, the Geek was (and is) unwilling to distort history, least of all the history of his own country.
America was founded on religious passion. It must be recalled that the Puritans came to the wilderness of New England not in search of religious tolerance but in order to freely practice religious intolerance. As the legal history of the Massachusetts Colony shows clearly the theocrats of the Bay cheerfully instituted a regime based on religious precepts which was so narrow minded, intolerant, coercive and rigid that the most intense Taliban adherent could not improve upon it in the slightest.
Throughout the colonies religion was the kingdom and Christ was King. Laws looked both to the English common law and the bible for their justification. Community solidarity depended upon conformity of behaviour based on conformity of belief. The dissenters were neither welcomed or tolerated. Even Pennsylvania and Rhode Island, the (semi-mythic) icons of religious tolerance and inclusion were actually thin-skinned, insecure strongholds of fanatics.
The need for a "liberty of conscience"clause in the basic laws of the several colonies was recognised even before the first shots of the War of Independence were fired. The Virginia Statute on Religious Liberties authored by Thomas Jefferson was a firm sign pointing in the required direction.
Unless carefully constrained the religious enthusiasm and zeal of competing sects would rip the political and social fabric of the new republic apart. Unless citizens felt themselves both protected in their individual rights of conscience, the tyranny of a religious majority would crack a sharp whip on the backs of nonconformists. Thus the "no establishment" and "free exercise" clauses were at the top of the post-Constitution "must do" list along with liberty of speech and the press.
Religion was not bared from the public square. That was not the intent of those who wrote and approved the clauses in question. The purpose was one of civilizing and controlling the passions so easily stirred by matters of faith. A republic, the founding generation correctly saw, demanded restraint, control and civility in the public square, and they realized that these were readily destroyed by the passions of religious belief. They also correctly saw that the minorities, the dissenters, the nonconformists, were at risk in their individual holdings and persons once the genie of belief driven zeal was released from the bottle.
Religion stayed alive, well, potent and pervasive throughout the Nineteenth Century. It, or to err on the side of accuracy, one Protestant sect, became the virtual "state religion" in the states of the Confederacy both before and after the War Between the States. Ironically, this "state religion" was a sub-set of the Baptists. The irony springs from the fact that the Baptists of the late Seventeenth Century had been the strongest proponents of a wall of separation between state and church.
Religion featured heavily not simply in the internal crisis of the War Between the States, in the fight between abolitionist and slaveowner, it was just as important in the American identity crisis which developed with increasing speed between the late 1840s and the end of the century.
Identity crisis?
You bettcha! The American people have undergone several bouts of intense anxiety over just who-are-we? and how-do-we-know-we're-us? over the past two hundred years. This is completely understandable. The US is an artificial nation. It grew around a set of ideas. These ideals coupled with the very real possibility of material betterment in a vast and underdeveloped country served as a people magnet without equal.
People from different lands, cultures, languages and--ta-da! religions came in ever increasing numbers to the US. The most critical problem through much of the Nineteenth Century was the arrival of Roman Catholics. To put it bluntly, Catholics, particularly those from Ireland and later southern Europe, were not easily or warmly accepted by the Protestant majority.
Absent the "no establishment" and "free exercise" clauses, the conflicts between native Protestant and new arrival Catholic would have been more violent and extensive then they were. At the national level the "civilizing" effect of the twin clauses showed itself by repeated Congressional rejection of anti-Catholic measures. Ultimately the clauses provided the breathing space and time necessary for the multiple American nations to sign a series of separate peaces over differences of religious belief and agree that we could all be Americans--what ever that might mean.
It is true that the public square seems to have become ever more secular during the first three quarters of the Twentieth Century, but that is more a matter of appearance than reality. It is more that obvious passions faded along with the identity crisis during the opening years of the century. Sure, there were moments of conflict such as the Biblical Literalists opening shots in the anti-Darwin campaign eighty and more years ago.
But, in the main, Americans were content to put the fires of belief on hold and concentrate on matters at hand. Matters like the Great Depression, World War II and ultimately the Cold War. Indeed, the American people reinforced their sense of national self by reducing the apparent differences between religions. It was Americans who invented the unhistorical notion of the "Judeo-Christian tradition," and sought to meld the differing--even conflicting--theologies of Protestantism, Catholicism and Judaism into a sort of bland, one-size-fits-all civic religion which defined America and its ideals vis a vis Communism.
It was the need for a Cold War appropriate way to differentiate the US from the Soviet Union which gave rise to the sudden insertion of the words, "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance where it sits to this day as an indigestible lump to those of us who first learned the Pledge in grade school in the dark days before God was invoked. This brings up another delicious piece of irony.
Ironically, in view of the past few years, the US was the only non-Islamic country which differentiated itself from the Soviets on the basis of the latter being "godless" and the former "godly." The notion of godliness took such firm root in the US during the Cold War period that for a while at least it was open season on any person who was not a full, seemingly eager participant in one or another of the several flavors resident within the "Judeo-Christian tradition."
During the last decades of the past century, faith driven political ideologies re-emerged from the shadows. With the same sort of Wahhibist dedication and zeal that had typified the Puritans, the resurgent Christian "Conservatives" sought to enlist the political process in their particular (and often peculiar) view of biblically based morality. The flames of True Belief flared high, bright and hot, particularly among those who drew their nourishment from the the "state religion" of the Old Confederacy--the Southern Baptist Convention--and others from the same theological (not to say theocratic) model.
Not surprisingly the opposition reacted by elevating the "no establishment" and "free exercise" clauses to a level never before seen. The intelligentsia, particularly those born in the Forties, Fifties and Sixties, demanded a total removal of religion not only from the public square but from American history as well.
The result has been that the elite, the opinion molders, the academics, the journalists and even many of the political class, are dedicated True Believers in the secular agenda.
The other result has been that many, even most, of the rest of the American public remains faithful to the several communities of faith which co-exist in more or less harmony throughout the US.
The purpose and intent of the twin clauses barring establishment and assuring free exercise was to civilize and restrain passions. Without this moderating influence the fires of belief--whether religious or secularist--would imperil the still very delicate balance of the republic.
Get a grip on it. The American republic has charted a narrow and twisting course through the rocks, shoals and reefs of religious zeal. We still are. Even with more than two centuries experience we don't have it right yet.
But, we do have a tradition of separating the political sphere to a substantial extent from that of religious practice and belief. This is all that separates us from the countries of Islam.
The challenge is for us to understand not only how intertwined religion and state are in the Islamic countries and what that implies. We must also understand just how delicately we are balanced on the razor's edge of too much religion and too little. Both the Christian "Conservatives" and the secular intelligentsia must curb their passions.
Both must recognise that the Founders were right--passion destroys and civility creates. Otherwise God (or something) help us all.
Friday, January 16, 2009
We Know We're Fighting--
But, do we know what we are fighting for? Or, even, what we are fighting against?
Americans have been in combat, fighting and dying for the best part of seven years now. The outgoing president committed the blunder of declaring that the US and other countries were waging a global war on terrorism. Anyone with so much as a glimmer of intelligence knew back then that the notion of a "Global War on Terrorism" was not merely a malapropism but an affront against reality.
Now, seven years and over five thousand American lives later, the war against an unnamed enemy for an undefined goal continues. It is long past time for a change. It is long past time that the US government and We the People take a firm grip on just who or what the enemy is and for what better state of peace the war is being fought.
It is long past time for us to return to the basics. In order for a war to be waged to a successful outcome two minimal requirements must be met.
The first is seemingly self-evident (although it appears to have eluded not only the Deep Thinkers of the outgoing administration but the denizens of the chattering classes generally.) There has to be an enemy.
That means a real enemy. Not a tactic of war which is what terrorism constitutes. A war cannot be waged against a tactic as many have observed. Imagine how silly it would have been had FDR demanded on 8 December 1941 that the US declare war on "unexpected sea-launched air attacks not preceded by a declaration of war or ultimatum" rather than on the Japanese Empire.
Had the outgoing administration possessed even the rudiments of realpolitik it would have announced that the US would wage retaliatory war on al-Qaeda and the Taliban regime of Afghanistan which harbored it. That would have been a legitimate and realistic appraisal of the nature of the enemy.
The neocon ninnies of the Bush Administration failed to properly define the enemy.
This initial failure assured that a second would quickly follow. Keep in mind that wars are waged in the expectation that a better state of peace will follow. Had the enemy been narrowly and properly defined seven years ago, then the task of characterising a better state of peace would have been simple and straightforward.
A better state of peace (from our perspective at least) would come about as soon as al-Qaeda and Taliban were removed as potential threats to American national security. Period. The simple removal of these two entities--including by implication at least their leadership cadres-would make the world a better and safer place.
There would have been no need nor impetus for the disastrous mission lurch in Afghanistan which has resulted in the progressive destabilizing of that country but of Pakistan as well. There would have been neither need for nor impetus to the brainless High Minded cant concerning the building of a secular, pluralistic democracy in Afghanistan.
The failure (or unwillingness) of the outgoing administration to realistically and narrowly define the enemy and the desired better state of peace before launching the attacks on Afghanistan left the door wide open for the single most disastrous blunder in US foreign policy--the invasion of Iraq.
Our participation in Iraq may be winding down and the outgoing president may have admitted that possibly democracy as we Americans know it will not take firm root in Iraq, but there has been no redefinition of the enemy, no reassessment as to the nature of the better state of peace hoped to ensue when (and if) the guns and bombs are silenced.
To this day neither the government nor the military services of the United States are willing to say just who or what the enemy in the current "long war" might be. Worse, there is ample evidence that both the civilian and military command echelons have been totally resistant to appreciating let alone studying the sources of our enemy's conduct and identity.
Not to put too fine a point on the dagger of reality, the enemy over the past seven years has been Islam. To err on the side of total accuracy, the enemy is those Muslims who seize upon and exploit features of Islam which have served for centuries to make that religion the faith of warriors, the belief system of conquerors.
Make no mistake about it. Islam and nothing but Islam in the mouths of charismatic leaders propelled a scruffy amphyctony from the sands of Arabia to the South of France and later transformed another bunch of scurvy nomads into the Great Turkish Threat whose waves lapped at the walls of Vienna before finally receding to the harems of Istanbul.
Not even the Christianity of the First Crusade could begin to match Islam as the most sublime Warrior Faith. As several noted Egyptian clerics have commented lately on TV as they sought to encourage martyrs for Gaza, the Muslims of the past loved death more than the crusaders and others loved life.
Not even the distorted Shintoism of the Japanese Empire before and during World War II could make that statement.
At an ever accelerating rate over the past fifty years, the sleeping Warrior Faith has been awakened by politically ambitious and ever-more-potent clerics and others to motivate Muslims to die (and kill) in pursuit Islamic Revival. That means revival not as a religion per se but as a political force on the global stage.
There is the enemy. Not terrorism. Not "asymmetrical warfare." Not even one specific group such as al-Qaeda. Not even a specific country such as Iran.
The enemy is the Warrior Faith of Islam enlisted in pursuit of power on the world historical stage.
This enemy is implacable. This enemy is not one with which compromise is possible--even thinkable. This enemy is potentially far more threatening, far more potent than were the secular enemies of Nazism or Communism. This enemy may have been quiescent for centuries, caught in the backwater eddies of human experience, but it is alive, active and growing stronger by the day.
To defeat this enemy, this combination of a warrior faith without peer and expansionist ideology, we must study it, dispassionately and closely. We do not serve ourselves or our future well by pretending that political Islam is either a "misunderstanding"of the Quran and Hadith or that it is some sort of passing perversion caused by economic grievance or political marginalization.
We must read and parse both the sacred literature and the history of Islam as once we did the history of Russia and the writings of Marx, Lenin and Mao. We must know the sources of our enemy's conduct and goals.
But, understanding our enemy is not enough. On its own, the understanding of the enemy will not allow us to bring about a better state of peace no matter how long the war continues.
We must understand what we are fighting for. This task is, if anything, harder than identifying and knowing the enemy.
The fact that knowing ourselves, understanding what we are fighting for, what would constitute a better state of peace, is ironic.
Why? You ask.
The irony comes from our own history. It comes from the internal divisions which mark the landscape of the United States today. Not simply the division between elite and hoi polloi. More it depends upon the split, the deep fissure of more than one hundred and fifty years standing, which caused the surface split between those who think of themselves as members of the elite and those who don't.
More of that in the next post.
Americans have been in combat, fighting and dying for the best part of seven years now. The outgoing president committed the blunder of declaring that the US and other countries were waging a global war on terrorism. Anyone with so much as a glimmer of intelligence knew back then that the notion of a "Global War on Terrorism" was not merely a malapropism but an affront against reality.
Now, seven years and over five thousand American lives later, the war against an unnamed enemy for an undefined goal continues. It is long past time for a change. It is long past time that the US government and We the People take a firm grip on just who or what the enemy is and for what better state of peace the war is being fought.
It is long past time for us to return to the basics. In order for a war to be waged to a successful outcome two minimal requirements must be met.
The first is seemingly self-evident (although it appears to have eluded not only the Deep Thinkers of the outgoing administration but the denizens of the chattering classes generally.) There has to be an enemy.
That means a real enemy. Not a tactic of war which is what terrorism constitutes. A war cannot be waged against a tactic as many have observed. Imagine how silly it would have been had FDR demanded on 8 December 1941 that the US declare war on "unexpected sea-launched air attacks not preceded by a declaration of war or ultimatum" rather than on the Japanese Empire.
Had the outgoing administration possessed even the rudiments of realpolitik it would have announced that the US would wage retaliatory war on al-Qaeda and the Taliban regime of Afghanistan which harbored it. That would have been a legitimate and realistic appraisal of the nature of the enemy.
The neocon ninnies of the Bush Administration failed to properly define the enemy.
This initial failure assured that a second would quickly follow. Keep in mind that wars are waged in the expectation that a better state of peace will follow. Had the enemy been narrowly and properly defined seven years ago, then the task of characterising a better state of peace would have been simple and straightforward.
A better state of peace (from our perspective at least) would come about as soon as al-Qaeda and Taliban were removed as potential threats to American national security. Period. The simple removal of these two entities--including by implication at least their leadership cadres-would make the world a better and safer place.
There would have been no need nor impetus for the disastrous mission lurch in Afghanistan which has resulted in the progressive destabilizing of that country but of Pakistan as well. There would have been neither need for nor impetus to the brainless High Minded cant concerning the building of a secular, pluralistic democracy in Afghanistan.
The failure (or unwillingness) of the outgoing administration to realistically and narrowly define the enemy and the desired better state of peace before launching the attacks on Afghanistan left the door wide open for the single most disastrous blunder in US foreign policy--the invasion of Iraq.
Our participation in Iraq may be winding down and the outgoing president may have admitted that possibly democracy as we Americans know it will not take firm root in Iraq, but there has been no redefinition of the enemy, no reassessment as to the nature of the better state of peace hoped to ensue when (and if) the guns and bombs are silenced.
To this day neither the government nor the military services of the United States are willing to say just who or what the enemy in the current "long war" might be. Worse, there is ample evidence that both the civilian and military command echelons have been totally resistant to appreciating let alone studying the sources of our enemy's conduct and identity.
Not to put too fine a point on the dagger of reality, the enemy over the past seven years has been Islam. To err on the side of total accuracy, the enemy is those Muslims who seize upon and exploit features of Islam which have served for centuries to make that religion the faith of warriors, the belief system of conquerors.
Make no mistake about it. Islam and nothing but Islam in the mouths of charismatic leaders propelled a scruffy amphyctony from the sands of Arabia to the South of France and later transformed another bunch of scurvy nomads into the Great Turkish Threat whose waves lapped at the walls of Vienna before finally receding to the harems of Istanbul.
Not even the Christianity of the First Crusade could begin to match Islam as the most sublime Warrior Faith. As several noted Egyptian clerics have commented lately on TV as they sought to encourage martyrs for Gaza, the Muslims of the past loved death more than the crusaders and others loved life.
Not even the distorted Shintoism of the Japanese Empire before and during World War II could make that statement.
At an ever accelerating rate over the past fifty years, the sleeping Warrior Faith has been awakened by politically ambitious and ever-more-potent clerics and others to motivate Muslims to die (and kill) in pursuit Islamic Revival. That means revival not as a religion per se but as a political force on the global stage.
There is the enemy. Not terrorism. Not "asymmetrical warfare." Not even one specific group such as al-Qaeda. Not even a specific country such as Iran.
The enemy is the Warrior Faith of Islam enlisted in pursuit of power on the world historical stage.
This enemy is implacable. This enemy is not one with which compromise is possible--even thinkable. This enemy is potentially far more threatening, far more potent than were the secular enemies of Nazism or Communism. This enemy may have been quiescent for centuries, caught in the backwater eddies of human experience, but it is alive, active and growing stronger by the day.
To defeat this enemy, this combination of a warrior faith without peer and expansionist ideology, we must study it, dispassionately and closely. We do not serve ourselves or our future well by pretending that political Islam is either a "misunderstanding"of the Quran and Hadith or that it is some sort of passing perversion caused by economic grievance or political marginalization.
We must read and parse both the sacred literature and the history of Islam as once we did the history of Russia and the writings of Marx, Lenin and Mao. We must know the sources of our enemy's conduct and goals.
But, understanding our enemy is not enough. On its own, the understanding of the enemy will not allow us to bring about a better state of peace no matter how long the war continues.
We must understand what we are fighting for. This task is, if anything, harder than identifying and knowing the enemy.
The fact that knowing ourselves, understanding what we are fighting for, what would constitute a better state of peace, is ironic.
Why? You ask.
The irony comes from our own history. It comes from the internal divisions which mark the landscape of the United States today. Not simply the division between elite and hoi polloi. More it depends upon the split, the deep fissure of more than one hundred and fifty years standing, which caused the surface split between those who think of themselves as members of the elite and those who don't.
More of that in the next post.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Hanging On To The Tiger's Tail
As tanks and infantry move into the Gaza Strip, Israel has well and truly grabbed the tiger by his tail. The problem now is hanging on long enough to achieve a useful (from the Israeli perspective) outcome.
While there is no doubt that the IDF and the Government of Israel (GOI) have both repented of and learned from the debacle of the 2006 invasion of Lebanon, the operation into the Gaza Strip will be a dans du merde for the guys at the sharp end. It won't be a walk in the sun for the million or so Israeli civilians living within range of Hamas launched artillery rockets. The Geek doesn't envy what will come for any of them in the next few days or weeks.
In addition to the risks of combat in urban terrain against a very defiant, very, very well motivated and literally suicidal opponent, GOI and the people of Israel alike face the real potential of terror at home. Over and beyond those self-evident hazards, GOI must contend with the near universal reprobation of governments and well-meaning folks throughout the world, particularly in the West.
As the Geek has reviewed the tenor of protest against GOI for its air campaign, he has been struck by how much of it exonerates Hamas from all responsibility for the lives and well-being of the citizens under its domination and control. The utter lack of consideration for Hamas having chosen to launch and continue a slow motion war against Israel is nothing short of astonishing. Almost as mind boggling is the continued harping by Ban ki Moon and others of High Mind about the "humanitarian crisis" for the 1.5 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip.
There is no argument with the contention that the civilians of the Strip are in the midst of a genuine humanitarian crisis. There is also no arguing against the fact that the crisis is not of Israeli manufacture.
The crisis is of domestic origin. The crisis today as in the past has been the result of deliberate decision, carefully crafted policy by the local government.
In the old days, Gazans suffered because of Fatah's willingness to use civilian misery and death as a weapon against Israel. Now, it the result of Hamas' even more truculent approach. Hamas is a government of gunsels. It shot its way to power. Then it shot its own people as well as seeking to kill Israelis with rockets, mortars, IEDs, and suicide bombers. Now it hopes to "win" by assuring that so many die in the Strip that the High Minded, Lofty Thinking people in the West will apply sufficient pressure on GOI that the IDF is forced to let go of the tiger's tail.
As numerous previous posts demonstrate, the Geek is not an automatic supporter of GOI policies and practices. Neither is he in favor of the seemingly reflexive support offered to Israel by successive American administrations and Congresses.
This in no way obviates the necessity of acknowledging the onus of responsibility which must be placed on the Arab Muslim population of the Palestine region. The leadership of Fatah, like that of Hamas, acted without regard to the long term best interests of the people who propose to live in an independent country called "Palestine." The leaders of the Arab Muslim population of the disputed region missed the bus on too many occasions to list here--they habitually turned their backs as the bus passed by.
Hamas and other groups and governments have pursued assorted agendas with only one feature in common--the destruction of Israel. In the process, they have callously, cruelly used the hopes and fears, the bodies and lives, of the Arab-Muslim population. They have acted so as to pile the corpses of their own people, their own co-religionists, in heaps almost beyond measure. They have acted in concert with clerics of similar mind to warp Islam, to accentuate the most loathsome features of that religion into a psyops weapon to further the patterns of violent intolerance, absence of forgiveness, ruthless authoritarianism, and endless fear what the world now knows all too well as Islamism and jihadism.
The actions of these self-serving agenda riders have not only caused the local people but the rest of the world pain and misery, war and death, which could and would have been avoided absent these power-lusting pursuers of an impossible dream. Further, their actions, their words, have shredded any legitimate claims Islam may make to being the "religion of peace and tolerance."
Hamas and others from the same mold have committed war crimes, crimes against humanity and a far worse crime for which they cannot be indicted before any human court--a crime against the spirits and faith of one and a half billion Muslims.
Even now Hamas will avoid a fair fight with the IDF. The gun thugs of Hamas whose training videos have been posted proudly will do whatever they can to hide and shoot from behind the cover of women and children. Hamas will stoop undoubtedly to the level of using women and children as suicide "volunteers."
All of this will be done in the hope and belief that the resulting carnage will compel the High Minded Lofty thinkers of the UN, the EU and the US to force GOI to call IDF off, to force the IDF to drop the tiger's tail.
When--not if--when that happens, Hamas will be more legitimate. It will be more in power. It's voice will ring louder in the halls of power throughout the Mideast.
This necessarily means that other entities such as Hezbollah and the sponsor of both Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran, will gain authority in a region and a culture where strength is prized above other characteristics. Iran will gain vis a vis the "conservative" states such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
At the same time Israel will be weakened. Its people will be at greater risk. Far afield GOI and the IDF will be seen as bluffers as well as bullies.
Worse, the human race will be the loser. Terror and violence will be emboldened. Islamists and jihadists will be encouraged. The war on terror will continue. The bodies will stretch beyond Mumbai, New York City, London, Madrid. Only the dead will be unafraid.
One can only hope (and pray if so inclined) that the High Minded, Lofty Thinking will not be as potent an ally as Hamas calculates. The Geek is a historian. Cynicism, the occupational disease of the historian, prevents him from being optimistic.
He hopes he is wrong. But, he won't bet the ranch on it.
While there is no doubt that the IDF and the Government of Israel (GOI) have both repented of and learned from the debacle of the 2006 invasion of Lebanon, the operation into the Gaza Strip will be a dans du merde for the guys at the sharp end. It won't be a walk in the sun for the million or so Israeli civilians living within range of Hamas launched artillery rockets. The Geek doesn't envy what will come for any of them in the next few days or weeks.
In addition to the risks of combat in urban terrain against a very defiant, very, very well motivated and literally suicidal opponent, GOI and the people of Israel alike face the real potential of terror at home. Over and beyond those self-evident hazards, GOI must contend with the near universal reprobation of governments and well-meaning folks throughout the world, particularly in the West.
As the Geek has reviewed the tenor of protest against GOI for its air campaign, he has been struck by how much of it exonerates Hamas from all responsibility for the lives and well-being of the citizens under its domination and control. The utter lack of consideration for Hamas having chosen to launch and continue a slow motion war against Israel is nothing short of astonishing. Almost as mind boggling is the continued harping by Ban ki Moon and others of High Mind about the "humanitarian crisis" for the 1.5 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip.
There is no argument with the contention that the civilians of the Strip are in the midst of a genuine humanitarian crisis. There is also no arguing against the fact that the crisis is not of Israeli manufacture.
The crisis is of domestic origin. The crisis today as in the past has been the result of deliberate decision, carefully crafted policy by the local government.
In the old days, Gazans suffered because of Fatah's willingness to use civilian misery and death as a weapon against Israel. Now, it the result of Hamas' even more truculent approach. Hamas is a government of gunsels. It shot its way to power. Then it shot its own people as well as seeking to kill Israelis with rockets, mortars, IEDs, and suicide bombers. Now it hopes to "win" by assuring that so many die in the Strip that the High Minded, Lofty Thinking people in the West will apply sufficient pressure on GOI that the IDF is forced to let go of the tiger's tail.
As numerous previous posts demonstrate, the Geek is not an automatic supporter of GOI policies and practices. Neither is he in favor of the seemingly reflexive support offered to Israel by successive American administrations and Congresses.
This in no way obviates the necessity of acknowledging the onus of responsibility which must be placed on the Arab Muslim population of the Palestine region. The leadership of Fatah, like that of Hamas, acted without regard to the long term best interests of the people who propose to live in an independent country called "Palestine." The leaders of the Arab Muslim population of the disputed region missed the bus on too many occasions to list here--they habitually turned their backs as the bus passed by.
Hamas and other groups and governments have pursued assorted agendas with only one feature in common--the destruction of Israel. In the process, they have callously, cruelly used the hopes and fears, the bodies and lives, of the Arab-Muslim population. They have acted so as to pile the corpses of their own people, their own co-religionists, in heaps almost beyond measure. They have acted in concert with clerics of similar mind to warp Islam, to accentuate the most loathsome features of that religion into a psyops weapon to further the patterns of violent intolerance, absence of forgiveness, ruthless authoritarianism, and endless fear what the world now knows all too well as Islamism and jihadism.
The actions of these self-serving agenda riders have not only caused the local people but the rest of the world pain and misery, war and death, which could and would have been avoided absent these power-lusting pursuers of an impossible dream. Further, their actions, their words, have shredded any legitimate claims Islam may make to being the "religion of peace and tolerance."
Hamas and others from the same mold have committed war crimes, crimes against humanity and a far worse crime for which they cannot be indicted before any human court--a crime against the spirits and faith of one and a half billion Muslims.
Even now Hamas will avoid a fair fight with the IDF. The gun thugs of Hamas whose training videos have been posted proudly will do whatever they can to hide and shoot from behind the cover of women and children. Hamas will stoop undoubtedly to the level of using women and children as suicide "volunteers."
All of this will be done in the hope and belief that the resulting carnage will compel the High Minded Lofty thinkers of the UN, the EU and the US to force GOI to call IDF off, to force the IDF to drop the tiger's tail.
When--not if--when that happens, Hamas will be more legitimate. It will be more in power. It's voice will ring louder in the halls of power throughout the Mideast.
This necessarily means that other entities such as Hezbollah and the sponsor of both Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran, will gain authority in a region and a culture where strength is prized above other characteristics. Iran will gain vis a vis the "conservative" states such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
At the same time Israel will be weakened. Its people will be at greater risk. Far afield GOI and the IDF will be seen as bluffers as well as bullies.
Worse, the human race will be the loser. Terror and violence will be emboldened. Islamists and jihadists will be encouraged. The war on terror will continue. The bodies will stretch beyond Mumbai, New York City, London, Madrid. Only the dead will be unafraid.
One can only hope (and pray if so inclined) that the High Minded, Lofty Thinking will not be as potent an ally as Hamas calculates. The Geek is a historian. Cynicism, the occupational disease of the historian, prevents him from being optimistic.
He hopes he is wrong. But, he won't bet the ranch on it.
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Don't Go Postal Anymore--Go Muslim!
It used to be that when someone went a little funny and shot up a passel of coworkers or even total strangers, he was said to have "gone postal." Moving along with the times the Geek suggests with his normal absence of modesty that the term du jour must be "(to) go Muslim" v.tr, meaning to employ lethal force against the unarmed and unsuspecting for irrational or totally abstract and subjective reasons.
Tripping around the various Islamist/jihadist websites as well as sites maintained by governmental or quasi-governmental entities in assorted Muslim countries, the Geek has received the clear impression that there is a huge number of young and not-so-young Muslims who desire very much to become residents of the Land of the Dead. There is only one obvious proviso. Each and every one of these candidates for corpsedom insists upon the opportunity to kill people, preferably but not necessarily infidels and apostates.
In short, these Legions of Wannabe Cadavers want to "go Muslim" on the world--starting with Israel and (surprise! surprise!) the United States.
Say it ain't so, Joe. Say it ain't so! (The Geek is addicted to the use of ancient slang and cliches. It's his particular historian's disease.) Tell us that "going Muslim" isn't compatible with the doctrine and sacred writings of the "religion of peace and tolerance."
Sadly, no one who has read the Koran or the Hadith can make that claim with a straight face. Unless, of course, he is practicing the Approved by Islam behavior of lying in order to protect the religion and its believers.
Beyond even the slightest shadow of even the most hallucinatory doubt, Islam is the most death oriented, violently intolerant religion ever conceived by the warped mind of man. (Or delivered by an angel agent of the Most High, if you prefer that approach.)
The Quran and the other authoritative writings which form the base of Islam surpass by orders of magnitude any other similar materials ever encountered by the Geek when it comes to celebrating and commanding the shedding of blood. The same is true with respect to the virtually pornographically vivid depictions of the torments of hell.
It's almost as if a slasher flick had become a major religion.
Beyond that, Islam, in sharp distinction with all other major religions, has no brief with the word or concept "forgiveness." Arguably, the notion of forgiveness, forgiveness of one's self as well as others, is an absolutely fundamental requirement of the human condition.
Unarguably, without an emphasis upon forgiveness no religion can claim to foster either peace or tolerance. Without forgiveness there can be no escape from hatred, bitterness, fear and the need for the false power of revenge.
It isn't pushing the point to assert that without drinking deeply of forgiveness a person cannot be truly alive. Without forgiveness as a central tenet of belief, the believer is already living in the Land of the Dead.
Looking over the sweep of Islamic history one cannot help but notice that the Muslim peak of accomplishment in all fields of human creativity and progress ended almost a thousand years ago. Since then Islamic societies have been in what can be termed charitably a stasis.
The stasis has been caused by the nature of the religion itself. It does not celebrate life. No. It tolerates existence. It warns non-stop of the perils of hell and the delights of paradise. It is a faith of rules and authority which pays only passing lip service to the capacity of the individual to be other than the object of authority, the plaything of the deity.
Only in Islam is the will of the deity constantly and sincerely invoked to allow or forbid any human action. Islamists and jihadists always and repeatedly add the qualifier, "if Allah wills" whenever they make a pronouncement or undertake an activity.
Of course, to be a Muslim means to be a slave of Allah. Being a Muslim implies a willingness to submit not only to Allah but to any cleric who claims to understand and speak the true understanding of the true will of Allah. This absolves the individual of all personal responsibility for his actions while assuring him that by doing his (deadly) duty to the will of Allah as filtered through the mind and mouth of the cleric he will avoid hell and gain paradise.
Not only is Islam lacking in forgiveness, filled to overflowing with hatred and a will to kill, rigidly authoritarian, it has another central feature which condemns it to being the religion of the Land of the Dead. That feature is fear.
Every candidate for the MOS of interrogator who passes through one or another of the American military schools teaching the arts and science of getting prisoners to talk learns several techniques. One of those is called in short-hand form, "fear-up." Islam is the religion of chronic, persistent "fear-up." While other religions including Protestantism have passed through phases of "fear-up" as a centrality of their dogma, only Islam has it front, center, and continuous.
Fear of hell. Fear of not doing the will of Allah. Fear of being seen or characterised as an apostate. Fear of not being a full, proper, and complete slave.
What a burden this must be. How much better to seek a way out of the fog of perpetual fear and gain the rewards of eternity through one glorious, split second act. How much better to "go Muslim" on approved enemies of the One True Faith.
Even if one does not sign the martyrdom seekers pledge card, a Muslim can still vicariously "go Muslim" by joining in that favorite outdoor sport of the massive demonstration where chants of "death to" and "to hell with" are the order of the day. Even if an individual lacks that certain something necessary to strap on the suicide vest or shoot an AK at some school kids or throw acid in the face of an unveiled woman, a believer can still join in with shouts of damnation to the infidels, death to the apostates and, by so doing, gain a moment's respite from fear.
Fear, authoritarianism beyond the wildest dreams of Soviet Commissars, violent intolerance and a total lack of forgiveness, these are the features of the religion of the Land of the Dead. These are the sources, the motivations of "going Muslim."
The sad reality is the rest of us, the residents of the Land of the Living, have to inhabit the same world as these violent spiritual and emotional cripples. Worse, there are among us so many of the High Minded and Lofty Thinking that do not yet realise that sad and bitter fact.
But, neither did those in a post office years ago a second or two before a former co-worker opened up with his weapons.
Tripping around the various Islamist/jihadist websites as well as sites maintained by governmental or quasi-governmental entities in assorted Muslim countries, the Geek has received the clear impression that there is a huge number of young and not-so-young Muslims who desire very much to become residents of the Land of the Dead. There is only one obvious proviso. Each and every one of these candidates for corpsedom insists upon the opportunity to kill people, preferably but not necessarily infidels and apostates.
In short, these Legions of Wannabe Cadavers want to "go Muslim" on the world--starting with Israel and (surprise! surprise!) the United States.
Say it ain't so, Joe. Say it ain't so! (The Geek is addicted to the use of ancient slang and cliches. It's his particular historian's disease.) Tell us that "going Muslim" isn't compatible with the doctrine and sacred writings of the "religion of peace and tolerance."
Sadly, no one who has read the Koran or the Hadith can make that claim with a straight face. Unless, of course, he is practicing the Approved by Islam behavior of lying in order to protect the religion and its believers.
Beyond even the slightest shadow of even the most hallucinatory doubt, Islam is the most death oriented, violently intolerant religion ever conceived by the warped mind of man. (Or delivered by an angel agent of the Most High, if you prefer that approach.)
The Quran and the other authoritative writings which form the base of Islam surpass by orders of magnitude any other similar materials ever encountered by the Geek when it comes to celebrating and commanding the shedding of blood. The same is true with respect to the virtually pornographically vivid depictions of the torments of hell.
It's almost as if a slasher flick had become a major religion.
Beyond that, Islam, in sharp distinction with all other major religions, has no brief with the word or concept "forgiveness." Arguably, the notion of forgiveness, forgiveness of one's self as well as others, is an absolutely fundamental requirement of the human condition.
Unarguably, without an emphasis upon forgiveness no religion can claim to foster either peace or tolerance. Without forgiveness there can be no escape from hatred, bitterness, fear and the need for the false power of revenge.
It isn't pushing the point to assert that without drinking deeply of forgiveness a person cannot be truly alive. Without forgiveness as a central tenet of belief, the believer is already living in the Land of the Dead.
Looking over the sweep of Islamic history one cannot help but notice that the Muslim peak of accomplishment in all fields of human creativity and progress ended almost a thousand years ago. Since then Islamic societies have been in what can be termed charitably a stasis.
The stasis has been caused by the nature of the religion itself. It does not celebrate life. No. It tolerates existence. It warns non-stop of the perils of hell and the delights of paradise. It is a faith of rules and authority which pays only passing lip service to the capacity of the individual to be other than the object of authority, the plaything of the deity.
Only in Islam is the will of the deity constantly and sincerely invoked to allow or forbid any human action. Islamists and jihadists always and repeatedly add the qualifier, "if Allah wills" whenever they make a pronouncement or undertake an activity.
Of course, to be a Muslim means to be a slave of Allah. Being a Muslim implies a willingness to submit not only to Allah but to any cleric who claims to understand and speak the true understanding of the true will of Allah. This absolves the individual of all personal responsibility for his actions while assuring him that by doing his (deadly) duty to the will of Allah as filtered through the mind and mouth of the cleric he will avoid hell and gain paradise.
Not only is Islam lacking in forgiveness, filled to overflowing with hatred and a will to kill, rigidly authoritarian, it has another central feature which condemns it to being the religion of the Land of the Dead. That feature is fear.
Every candidate for the MOS of interrogator who passes through one or another of the American military schools teaching the arts and science of getting prisoners to talk learns several techniques. One of those is called in short-hand form, "fear-up." Islam is the religion of chronic, persistent "fear-up." While other religions including Protestantism have passed through phases of "fear-up" as a centrality of their dogma, only Islam has it front, center, and continuous.
Fear of hell. Fear of not doing the will of Allah. Fear of being seen or characterised as an apostate. Fear of not being a full, proper, and complete slave.
What a burden this must be. How much better to seek a way out of the fog of perpetual fear and gain the rewards of eternity through one glorious, split second act. How much better to "go Muslim" on approved enemies of the One True Faith.
Even if one does not sign the martyrdom seekers pledge card, a Muslim can still vicariously "go Muslim" by joining in that favorite outdoor sport of the massive demonstration where chants of "death to" and "to hell with" are the order of the day. Even if an individual lacks that certain something necessary to strap on the suicide vest or shoot an AK at some school kids or throw acid in the face of an unveiled woman, a believer can still join in with shouts of damnation to the infidels, death to the apostates and, by so doing, gain a moment's respite from fear.
Fear, authoritarianism beyond the wildest dreams of Soviet Commissars, violent intolerance and a total lack of forgiveness, these are the features of the religion of the Land of the Dead. These are the sources, the motivations of "going Muslim."
The sad reality is the rest of us, the residents of the Land of the Living, have to inhabit the same world as these violent spiritual and emotional cripples. Worse, there are among us so many of the High Minded and Lofty Thinking that do not yet realise that sad and bitter fact.
But, neither did those in a post office years ago a second or two before a former co-worker opened up with his weapons.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Yes, The Dead Really Do Vote
There is a ground truth in war which is both universal and, lamentably, rarely recognised by either historians or policy makers. In war, in all wars of whatsoever nature, there comes a time when the dead propel policy.
In a real way the dead vote. They vote through the living. The dead exercise a profound and often highly unpredictable pressure upon the political will of combatant populations and on the choices made by governments.
During World War I the peace initiative offered by Woodrow Wilson could not but fail even though neither the Entente Powers nor the Central Powers had any realistic hope of victory. The reason for that conclusion is both simple and stark. Had the French, the English, the German or even the Austrian government sought to make a "peace without victors" as the American president proposed, it would have been overthrown in a matter of days.
There was a single sentiment upon which the civilian populations of all the major belligerents could agree. Our dead shall not have died in vain. The populations of France, England, Germany, Austria, Belgium and even Italy were unwilling to see an end to the war without a benefit more than equivalent to the level of sacrifice.
During World War II the British and then the Americans sought to kill enough civilians through the "round the clock bombing campaign" that German civilian political will would collapse with fatal effects to the Nazi government and military. The "death from above" campaign was highly successful in breaking things and killing people, but it was totally counterproductive with regard to its goal of shattering morale. As the bombs fell and the civilian body count grew so also did German military production levels and overall popular commitment to the war.
Both World Wars were total wars of national survival for the primary combatants. They were existential in nature from the perspective of the Germans, the French, the British and the Russians. (Keep that in mind, we'll be coming back to the concept later.)
When a war is not existential for one of the belligerents, the impact of the "Dead Vote" is quite different. Take, for example, the American War in Vietnam. While the conflict was existential for the three Vietnamese belligerents, the Viet Cong, the North Vietnamese and South Vietnam, it was not such for the United States. For the US and We the People, the war was a limited one in support of policy. It was not a matter of national life and death.
Through the long years of escalating fighting, the political will of the North Vietnamese grew substantially under the pressure of American bombs. The Viet Cong also experienced a growth of commitment even as their butcher's bill grew. Even the tenacity and will to fight among the supporters of the varied South Vietnamese governments increased--substantially in the closing years of the war following the American withdrawal.
In the United States the "dead vote" was cast differently by the living. Here the lengthening list of the dead resulted in a progressive decline of support for and commitment to the war. Here, We the Living concluded that we must not allow any more to die without useful purpose and in absence of a real, compelling goal.
In short, there are two antipodal "votes of the dead." One is expressed in the context of existential conflict. The other comes about in the lesser, limited wars: the police actions, the foreign interventions, the humanitarian assistance and peacekeeping missions.
The first demands a victory complete, comprehensive and beneficial enough to justify the lives lost. The second demands that no more lives be sacrificed for some hazy and debatable purpose.
In a real way the dead vote. They vote through the living. The dead exercise a profound and often highly unpredictable pressure upon the political will of combatant populations and on the choices made by governments.
During World War I the peace initiative offered by Woodrow Wilson could not but fail even though neither the Entente Powers nor the Central Powers had any realistic hope of victory. The reason for that conclusion is both simple and stark. Had the French, the English, the German or even the Austrian government sought to make a "peace without victors" as the American president proposed, it would have been overthrown in a matter of days.
There was a single sentiment upon which the civilian populations of all the major belligerents could agree. Our dead shall not have died in vain. The populations of France, England, Germany, Austria, Belgium and even Italy were unwilling to see an end to the war without a benefit more than equivalent to the level of sacrifice.
During World War II the British and then the Americans sought to kill enough civilians through the "round the clock bombing campaign" that German civilian political will would collapse with fatal effects to the Nazi government and military. The "death from above" campaign was highly successful in breaking things and killing people, but it was totally counterproductive with regard to its goal of shattering morale. As the bombs fell and the civilian body count grew so also did German military production levels and overall popular commitment to the war.
Both World Wars were total wars of national survival for the primary combatants. They were existential in nature from the perspective of the Germans, the French, the British and the Russians. (Keep that in mind, we'll be coming back to the concept later.)
When a war is not existential for one of the belligerents, the impact of the "Dead Vote" is quite different. Take, for example, the American War in Vietnam. While the conflict was existential for the three Vietnamese belligerents, the Viet Cong, the North Vietnamese and South Vietnam, it was not such for the United States. For the US and We the People, the war was a limited one in support of policy. It was not a matter of national life and death.
Through the long years of escalating fighting, the political will of the North Vietnamese grew substantially under the pressure of American bombs. The Viet Cong also experienced a growth of commitment even as their butcher's bill grew. Even the tenacity and will to fight among the supporters of the varied South Vietnamese governments increased--substantially in the closing years of the war following the American withdrawal.
In the United States the "dead vote" was cast differently by the living. Here the lengthening list of the dead resulted in a progressive decline of support for and commitment to the war. Here, We the Living concluded that we must not allow any more to die without useful purpose and in absence of a real, compelling goal.
In short, there are two antipodal "votes of the dead." One is expressed in the context of existential conflict. The other comes about in the lesser, limited wars: the police actions, the foreign interventions, the humanitarian assistance and peacekeeping missions.
The first demands a victory complete, comprehensive and beneficial enough to justify the lives lost. The second demands that no more lives be sacrificed for some hazy and debatable purpose.
Let's pull it down to slogan level. "Our sacred dead shall not have died in vain." Or. "No more wasted lives!"
Interpreting or forecasting the "dead vote" requires considering cultural and religious factors. The Japanese religious and cultural context assured the continuation of commitment regardless of the number of lives lost or the degree of physical destruction and deprivation experienced.
The seven and a half year War of Algerian Independence is a perfect case study of the dichotomy of effect between those whose dead have died in an existential cause and those whose dead have perished in pursuit of a policy goal. It is also a perfect example of the impact of religious and cultural factors on the way in which the living cast the votes of the dead.
In some ways the Algerian War was complex. It involved several distinct communities. It involved vastly different cultures and religions. Yet it can be simplified without doing harm to reality.,
There were two belligerent communities living in Algeria. One was the pieds noirs, the European minority population which had lived in the country for as many as five generations when the war commenced in 1954. The other was the mixed Arab and Berber Muslim majority whose ancestors had been present in some cases from the time of Carthage.
For both of these communities the war was existential. If the Europeans came out on top, then the Muslims would remain strangers in their own land. If the Arab-Berber majority won, then the Europeans would be refugees in the making.
Of course each of these two groups viewed the other through the prism of prejudice and hatred.
The outsider in the war was France. Despite the legalities which proclaimed Algeria to be part of Metropolitan France and ignoring the complications of the French national ego and delusions of continued imperial glory, the war in Algeria was one which was not existential but rather an exercise in support of often ill-defined policy. France could live as well or, as events proved, even better without Algeria as it could carrying the colonial burden.
The dead started voting from the first day of the war. Pied noir dead voted consistently to continue and intensify the war by all means. As the death toll among the Muslim population mounted to its final total of some three hundred thousand, Arab and Berber political will both strengthened in support of total independence and reduced the potential of a moderate "third force" emerging. (It must be mentioned that the nationalist insurgents, the NLF, engaged in ruthless killings to preclude a moderate force from raising its collective head.)
For the outsider, the French, the dead finally voted in the opposite way. War weariness, or what French commentators called "boredom" with the war, was the basis for the DeGaulle government's peace agreement with the NLF. DeGaulle wanted to liquidate the war before it destroyed both the French Army and economy. But, in so doing, he read the mood of the French public perfectly. The war was ended not so much with joy as with an massive sigh of resigned relief.
As some observers mentioned at the time, the Algerian insurgents had a potent advantage. That advantage was defined as the nature of Islam with its emphasis upon martyrdom and a concomitant focus on death--particularly a kind of death which would avoid the perils of hell.
It was also noted at the time that Islam sanctioned, even required, the ghastly ways in which the insurgents butchered their opponents as well as those co-religionists who were suspected of supporting or even not resolutely opposing the French. The throat slittings, the decapitations, the genital mutilations, the torturing of captives, the burnings alive which were features of the war were not incorrectly identified by the French and other observers as being features of Islamic religion and not simply mindless barbarisms.
These features as well as the use of indiscriminate techniques of terror such as bombs planted in cafeterias, lamp posts, beachside dancehalls gave rise to the French and pied noir employment of terror and torture in return. The dead died more savagely. And, their votes counted for more in the minds of all three belligerents.
Islam being death oriented, violently intolerant and afflicted with a propensity for rigid authoritarianism is a powerful force multiplier. The dead of Islam always vote for more war, more death in order that the (literally) sacred Muslim dead will not have died in vain.
This combination of religion and the Vote of the Dead limits fatally the potential for the moderate third force so often sought without success not only in Algeria but over the past decades in the Mideast. Likewise, it limits the potential for any sort of meaningful long-term success for American policy in Afghanistan.
Even if the Son of Surge concept works to assure that the US and its allies achieve the minimum goal of "not losing" in Afghanistan, there is no real potential of a "free democratic, secular" nation-state emerging from the corpses and rubble. The corpses will assure that.
In the Mideast, in the Gaza Strip, the dead vote for more death and the living respond accordingly. This is a very good reason to agree with former Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger.
Eagleburger, who is a realpoliker to the core, recently opined that the Israeli-Palestinian contretemps is "virtually insoluble." His reasoning focused on the inevitability of any proponent of a moderate settlement ending up dead--sooner rather than later.
If Eagleburger is right, and history is on his side, then there is perhaps only one viable option open for the Israelis (and the world.) That option is unpalatable on the surface, but so also is the endless continuation of the blow-counter blow way of war which has typified recent years.
The unmentionable option might be termed the "Sherman Doctrine." To paraphrase a comment by old William T.: The hand of war must rest so heavily upon those who started and continue the fighting that their descendants will both fear and renounce war forevermore.
After enough dying, even those whose religion sanctifies the fine art of dying, will grow tired of the fear, grow tired of asking themselves and each other, "Where will the next bomb, the next missile, the next shell land?"
Even those who purport to love death, to seek the cold embrace of the grave, will shudder with the endless thought, "Will I be next?"
After enough death, those still alive may well decide that they hear the voices from the grave whispering, "Vote for life. Vote for peace."
Well, one can hope. Sometimes even the dead can come to their senses.
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