Posted on 03/18/2004 1:48:35 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
WASHINGTON – Ever since George W. Bush's first reaction to Sept. 11 was that this is "war," debate has simmered over whether fighting terrorism is best handled as a military operation or as law-enforcement, using intelligence cooperation, police work, and the courts. Now that controversy is flaring again, both in the US in the context of the presidential election and among America's allies in the aftermath of the Madrid bombings.
With President Bush set to emphasize in a speech Friday that the war in Iraq is a cornerstone of his war on terrorism, the White House is leaving no doubt about its view that the battle against terror, as practiced in this century, is indeed a war. But that view has not caught on with America's European allies - and has only met with more vehement rejection as the Bush administration has equated the terror war with the Iraq war.
After decades of battling terrorism on their own soil, Europeans continue to believe that the best counterterrorism work is done through police intelligence and cooperation. And they believe that characterizing the fight as a "war" only antagonizes the populations that have produced terrorist groups and makes it harder to address the root causes of terrorism.
What may have changed now is the arrival of the same kind of terrorism in the heart of Europe that prompted America's sense of urgency, some experts say. But they add that transatlantic cooperation will be enhanced only if the US dictates less what Europe's response should be, and instead sits down to more fully understand Europe's sense of facing a new threat.
"There is now on the other side of the Atlantic a better sense of the urgency of the threat, and our convergence of views should mean a better opportunity to work together against the threat," says Simon Serfaty, a global security specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington. Noting the differences that linger, he adds, "It doesn't mean we must do everything together, but that together we can do everything."
Meeting Friday
In response to the Madrid bombings that took more than 200 lives a week ago - bombings that increasingly look to be the work of an Al Qaeda-affiliated terror cell - German Interior Minister Otto Schily has called for a meeting Friday of the European Union's interior and justice ministers. But Mr. Schily did not summon defense ministers. While the meeting is expected to produce measures for more cooperation and intelligence-sharing among Europe's law-enforcement agencies, few observers expect the Madrid bombings to draw Europe closer to the idea that this is "war."
"We have always had a different definition of terrorism, in that we never call it a 'war' on terrorism. We call it the fight or battle against terrorism, and we do think the distinction makes a difference," says one European official in Washington.
"Madrid will certainly lead to a more dynamic look at counterterrorism operations and cooperation, but terrorism in Europe is not a new phenomenon, so this will not suddenly be seen as a war," adds the official, who asked not to be named. "This is not Europe's 9/11."
More troubling, the official says, is the "sense" among some experts that by reminding the two sides of the Atlantic of their differences, the Madrid bombings might mean more troubled relations between the two. Noting that many European governments are determined that any cooperation with the US won't appear to be agreement on the terror war-Iraq war equation, the official says, "There is a feeling we are drifting further apart."
At the same time, the Madrid bombings could yet act as a catalyst for greater cooperation, some experts say. In their scenario, last week's events could serve as a wake-up call to both sides that what unites the two is greater than the differences.
"There's just as much chance that this [Madrid] could act as a glue as it could a wedge, but it will really depend on how the US responds," says Thomas Sanderson, deputy director of the transnational-threats initiative at CSIS.
After Madrid
Spain may indeed pull its troops out of the coalition in Iraq, but Mr. Sanderson says the US should not assume that means Spain is "turning tail" on the fight against terror. "Spain is not leaving the war on terror. They are leaving a war of choice in Iraq," he says.
In response, the US should work to redirect Spain's efforts - to join other Europeans in stabilizing Afghanistan, for example, where there is virtually no controversy about US intentions, says Sanderson.
He also notes that the US is worried other countries will join Spain in pulling out of Iraq - which is likely to figure in Bush's speech Friday to the ambassadors of countries that the US deems partners in the terror war.
Mr. Serfaty says the election of a Socialist government in Spain does mean a strengthening of what the Bush administration refers to as "old Europe": the Europe that is most opposed to US policy in Iraq and to the US characterization of a "war" on terror. "Italy and Poland are going to find this trend difficult to resist," he says, "because they cannot afford politically not to do so." But he says the US can still develop international cooperation by focusing less on differences and more on "complementarity of actions."
Still, with the White House trumpeting the president's leadership since Sept. 11, no one expects the Bush campaign to back off from the emphasis on the "war" on terror.
At a campaign event earlier this month in New York State, Bush made that point clear. "Some are skeptical that the war on terror is really a war at all," Bush said, referring to Sen. John Kerry's preference for calling the fight more of a law-enforcement and intelligence operation.
John Kerry would make a good president of Europe.
Kerry’s views seem to mirror his father’s. ----------- Kerry's World: Father Knows Best***By the time John Kerry's father, Richard, published his only book, The Star-Spangled Mirror, in 1990, he should have been a mellow man. Nearly 30 years had passed since his retirement from the Foreign Service, where he'd filled mid-level posts in Washington, Berlin, and Oslo. His central issue, the cold war, had followed him into retirement with the crumbling of the Berlin Wall and rise of glasnost in Russia. When the 75-year-old Kerry wasn't working on his book, he could be found building model ships and sailing off Cape Cod. If he had any reasons for professional bitterness, they should have long since faded.
None of these facts, however, becalmed him. His book has a young man's brash, polemical tone. The Star-Spangled Mirror is a critique of moralism in America's foreign policy -- and, more than that, it is a critique of America's national character.
"Americans," he writes, "are inclined to see the world and foreign affairs in black and white." They celebrate their own form of government and denigrate all others, making them guilty of what he calls "ethnocentric accommodation -- everyone ought to be like us." As a result, America has committed the "fatal error" of "propagating democracy" and fallen prey to "the siren's song of promoting human rights," falsely assuming that our values and institutions are a good fit in the Third World. And, just as Americans exaggerate their own goodness, they exaggerate their enemies' badness. The Soviet Union wasn't nearly as imperialistic as American politicians warned, Kerry argues. "Seeing the Soviet Union as the aggressor in every instance, and the U.S. as only reacting defensively, relieves an American observer from the need to see any parallel between our use of military power in distant parts of the world, and the Soviet use of military power outside the Soviet Union," he writes. He further claims that "Third world Marxist movements were autonomous national movements" -- outside Moscow's orbit. The book culminates in a plea for a hardheaded, realist foreign policy that removes any pretense of U.S. moral superiority.
Despite its blunt arguments, The Star-Spangled Mirror received little attention. Foreign Affairs greeted it with a 90-word summation in its review section. But the work of Richard Kerry, who passed away in 2000, will soon experience posthumous reconsideration. It won't be because of the renewed relevance of his arguments (although his book does read like a contemporary brief against neoconservatism). It will be because his son is a leading candidate to run U.S. foreign policy. ***
What debate? It's been all the above since 9/12/01 for the Bush administration. The hardcore wanker-left seems to be in denial that we're at war.
"He speaks as if only those who openly oppose America's objectives have a chance of earning his respect," Cheney said.
By contrast, Cheney said earlier in his speech that "the United States will never seek a permission slip to defend the security of our country." ***
as in free?
.
Maybe America is a better country to live in than many if not most,it doesn't necesarily mean Americans consider themselves morally superior.
"...falsely assuming that our values and institutions are a good fit in the Third World."
Maybe it's because of those "values and institutions" that America is not a third world country.
A typical leftist rant...values,institutions,morals have nothing to do with a country's level of prosperity and freedom.
Sounds just like the Labor party here in Oz.
Deep Down,I think it's the core beliefs and values that make or break countries...leftists give me the impression they live in a better country because they are just smarter than others,talk about feelings of "superiority"
God bless
Author LaFranchi reports: " 'We have always had a different definition of terrorism, in that we never call it a 'war' on terrorism. We call it the fight or battle against terrorism, and we do think the distinction makes a difference,' says one European official in Washington."
Proof positive that author LaFranchi is dumber than a box of rocks.
--Boot Hill
They suffer from LIBERAL guilt born of cultural decay and moral collapse. They listen to distractors who tell them they have caused the problems instead of holding the line and speaking truth against tyranny.
Appeasement,at least in regards to terrorism,is fear driven.
I think Bush scares a lot of folks because he refuses to appease terrorists.
We are on a long journey downhill,as fear increases so will attempts at appeasement.What will all this ultimately cost?
The west is so busy trashing it's christian heretige it seems to have forgotten that that's where its' strength came from in the first place.
In the end,who can stand?
God bless and keep you
That's not how I remember it. Wasn't that war about 'oil', too?
The President from 2005-2009, together with the Senates of 2005-7 and 2007-9, will probably appoint five Associate Justices and a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
I don't know if that's ever happened before-but I do know that if it's John Kerry doing the appointing, America will be unrecognizable after he's done.
Please don't hurt us.
"and makes it harder to address the root causes"
We will pay you whatever you want.
"as law-enforcement"
We won't lift a finger, will give you lawyers, will release you on technicalities. Just please don't hurt us.
Mew. Mew mew mew. m...e...w...?
Some are still arguing whether communism is superior to capitalism, despite the fact that we've got more than a hundred years of hard, cruel reality to settle the dispute.
In the 1930s, Nazis used "The Third Way" to characterize their own brand of national socialism as a equidistant between the "internationalist" socialism of the Soviet Union and the capitalism of the West. Trotskyists used "The Third Way" as a term to distinguish their own Marxism from Stalinism and capitalism. In the 1960s, New Leftists used "The Third Way" to define their politics as an independent socialism between the Soviet gulag and America's democracy.
But as the history of Nazism, Trotskyism and the New Left have shown, there is no "Third Way." There is the capitalist, democratic way based on private property and individual rights-a way that leads to liberty and universal opportunity. And there is the socialist way of group identities, group rights, a relentless expansion of the political state, restricted liberty and diminished opportunity. The Third Way is not a path to the future. It is just the suspension between these two destinations. It is a bad faith attempt on the part of people who are incapable of giving up their socialist schemes to escape the taint of their discredited past. ***
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