Posted on 03/10/2003 7:12:37 AM PST by Valin
IT EXPLAINS WHY WE’RE GOING TO WAR, AND WHY WE’LL KEEP GOING TO WAR.
Since the end of the cold war, the United States has been trying to come up with an operating theory of the world—and a military strategy to accompany it. Now there’s a leading contender. It involves identifying the problem parts of the world and aggressively shrinking them. Since September 11, 2001, the author, a professor of warfare analysis, has been advising the Office of the Secretary of Defense and giving this briefing continually at the Pentagon and in the intelligence community. Now he gives it to you.
LET ME TELL YOU why military engagement with Saddam Hussein’s regime in Baghdad is not only necessary and inevitable, but good.
When the United States finally goes to war again in the Persian Gulf, it will not constitute a settling of old scores, or just an enforced disarmament of illegal weapons, or a distraction in the war on terror. Our next war in the Gulf will mark a historical tipping point—the moment when Washington takes real ownership of strategic security in the age of globalization.
That is why the public debate about this war has been so important: It forces Americans to come to terms with I believe is the new security paradigm that shapes this age, namely, Disconnectedness defines danger. Saddam Hussein’s outlaw regime is dangerously disconnected from the globalizing world, from its rule sets, its norms, and all the ties that bind countries together in mutually assured dependence.
The problem with most discussion of globalization is that too many experts treat it as a binary outcome: Either it is great and sweeping the planet, or it is horrid and failing humanity everywhere. Neither view really works, because globalization as a historical process is simply too big and too complex for such summary judgments. Instead, this new world must be defined by where globalization has truly taken root and where it has not.
Show me where globalization is thick with network connectivity, financial transactions, liberal media flows, and collective security, and I will show you regions featuring stable governments, rising standards of living, and more deaths by suicide than murder. These parts of the world I call the Functioning Core, or Core. But show me where globalization is thinning or just plain absent, and I will show you regions plagued by politically repressive regimes, widespread poverty and disease, routine mass murder, and—most important—the chronic conflicts that incubate the next generation of global terrorists. These parts of the world I call the Non-Integrating Gap, or Gap.
Globalization’s “ozone hole” may have been out of sight and out of mind prior to September 11, 2001, but it has been hard to miss ever since. And measuring the reach of globalization is not an academic exercise to an eighteen-year-old marine sinking tent poles on its far side. So where do we schedule the U.S. military’s next round of away games? The pattern that has emerged since the end of the cold war suggests a simple answer: in the Gap.
The reason I support going to war in Iraq is not simply that Saddam is a cutthroat Stalinist willing to kill anyone to stay in power, nor because that regime has clearly supported terrorist networks over the years. The real reason I support a war like this is that the resulting long-term military commitment will finally force America to deal with the entire Gap as a strategic threat environment.
(Excerpt) Read more at nwc.navy.mil ...
What can we notice about his "gap?" It is overwhelmingly (again, Central Am. excepted) non-Christian. For years, Pat Robertson and others have called this the "10/40 window," which is full of (from a Christian perspective) idolatry, heathenism, voodoo, witch doctors, Hinduism and Islam. The issue is not whether they are "disconnected" but rather connected to what? Connected to Whom?
One reason for the poverty is the absence of Christianity, especially the "Protestant ethic" of hard work, saving for the future, secure contracts, combined with the Western (mostly Christian) emphasis on respecting legal/state authority because it is "given by God."
Please, this is not meant to start a big battle over Protestant/Christian theology, but rather to point out that "disconnectedness" has its roots in something OTHER than money and mammon.
From that perspective, then, the authors are still dealing with symptoms, which is all any secular government can deal with. Given that, what is the best response? Protect American interests, narrowly defined and Constitutionally limited. I don't think that involves massive foreign aid (but am not opposed to STRATEGIC foreign aid needed to "buy" temporary loyalty); nor do I think it involves permanent U.S. troops in places like Korea or Germany. But unlike the radical Libertarians and the Brigadiers, I DO think it involves an aggressive commitment of U.S. forces WHEN the "Reagan doctrine" questions can be answered (i.e., 1) is force the last resort? 2) is there a reasonable expectation of success? 3) are we willing to support our action completely, both militarily and financially? and 4) what is the exit strategy?)
Thus, we can cut right through all this "disconnectedness" and say, "Some countries are bad/evil because of their policies or even their religions; we don't have to kill them; but we do have to realize that they won't change just because they "come into the 21st century."
Ask Randy weaver or David koresh! Sure hope you aren't one of those evil home-schoolers or a gunowner. (teasing)
I prefer "liberation theology Catholics" or "liberation theology" "Catholics"
Just kidding. Good article. People have too much of a knee-jerk reaction when they hear the word "globalization." Their buchananess bubbles up to the surface.
In this context, globalization just refers to nations that are dealing in and with the community of nations. The terms of those agreements can be argued endlessly, but at least we're all working towards the same thing - wealth and security for our citizens.
Those nations that are outside that sphere are generally where the trouble is found.
I recommend as a "MUST READ" for all interested in the global status of freedom vs tyranny, good vs. evil, however one wishes to characterize the polarization of two forces.
Once I began reading, I was hooked, and read the entire article. ( It IS a long read, but eminently worth the effort. )
Thank You.
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