Posted on 07/22/2003 7:21:19 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
"Since the events of 9/11," observes Lee Harris, America's reigning philosopher of 9/11, "the policy debate in the United States has been primarily focused on a set of problems -- radical Islam and the War on Terrorism, the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, and weapons of mass destruction in the hands of Saddam Hussein in Iraq."
We sense that these three problems are related, Harris notes in an article at TechCentralStation.com, but we can't quite figure out how. He proposes a subtle link between these seemingly disparate issues -- and it's not specifically their common Muslim identity. Rather, it has to do with their unearned power.
"All previous threats in the history of mankind have had one element in common. They were posed by historical groups that had created the weapons -- both physical and cultural -- that they used to threaten their enemies." States achieved their military power through their own labor and sacrifice, developing their own economies, organizing their societies, training their own troops, and building their own arsenals.
But the same cannot be said of the threats emanating from the Muslim world. Al-Qaeda destroys airplanes and buildings that it itself could not possibly build. The Palestinian Authority has failed in every field of endeavor except killing Israelis. Saddam Hussein's Iraq grew dangerous thanks to money showered on it by the West to purchase petroleum Iraqis themselves had neither located nor extracted.
How, despite their general incompetence, has this trio managed to guide the course of events as if they were Powers in the traditional sense?
The cause of this anomaly, Harris replies, is that the West plays by a strict set of rules while permitting Al-Qaeda, the Palestinians, and Saddam Hussein to play without rules. We restrain ourselves according to the standards of civilized conduct as refined over the centuries; they engage in maximal ruthlessness.
Had the United States retaliated in kind for 9/11, Harris tells me, the Islamic holy places would have been destroyed. Had Israelis followed the Arafat model of murderousness, the West Bank and Gaza would now be devoid of Palestinians. Had the West done toward Iraq as Iraq did toward Kuwait, the Iraqi polity would long ago have been annexed and its oil resources confiscated.
While morally commendable, Harris argues, the West's not responding to Muslim ruthlessness with like ruthlessness carries a high and rising price. It allows Muslim political extremists of various stripes to fantasize that they earned their power, when in fact that power derives entirely from the West's arch-civilized restraint.
This confusion prompts Muslim extremists to indulge in the error that their successes betoken a superior virtue, or even God's support. Conversely, they perceive the West''s restraint as a sign of its decadence. Such fantasies, Harris contends, feed on themselves, leading to ever-more demented and dangerous behavior.
Westerners worry about the security of electricity grids, computer bugs, and water reservoirs; can a nuclear attack on a Western metropolis be that remote? Western restraint, in other words, insulates its enemies from the deserved consequences of their actions, and so unintentionally encourages their bad behavior.
For the West to reverse this process requires much rougher means than it prefers to use. Harris, author of a big-think book on this general subject coming out from the Free Press in early 2004, contends that Old Europe and most analysts have failed to fathom the imperative for a change. The Bush administration, however, has figured it out and in several ways (all of which surfaced during the Iraq campaign) has begun implementing an unapologetic and momentous break with past restraints:
- Preempt: Knock out fantasist leaders (the Taliban, Saddam Hussein, Yasir Arafat) before they can do more damage.
- Rehabilitate: Dismantle their polities, then reconstruct these along civilized lines.
- Impose a double standard: Act on the premise that the U.S. government alone "is permitted to use force against other agents who are not permitted to use force."
In brief, until those Harris calls "Islamic fantasists" play by the rules, Washington must be prepared to act like them, without rules.
This appeal for America to act less civilized will offend some; but it does offer a convincing explanation for the inner logic of America''s tough new foreign policy.
"the Islamic holy places would have been destroyed"; "the West Bank and Gaza would now be devoid of Palestinians"; "the Iraqi polity would long ago have been annexed and its oil resources confiscated." So you already said.
You only want to nuke Mecca. That will work like a charm, because ruthlessness always does. After all, this is our lives, right? So what's a little dealing with the devil, if that is where power is to be found?
But then, that isn't where power is to be found...
There is no devil. There is only us and them, and them wants to kill us. Us would prefer to kill them first because, I personally can live with us but not with them, and like any organism, I want to live as long as I can. Death is not necessarily better than life, but as Ambrose Bierce pointed out, it is longer.
I am endorsing it.
Here's a quick quiz for you to take to test your level of political morality:
Who was worse:
Batista or Castro?
The Shah or the Ayatollah?
Ngo Dinh Diem or Ho Chi Minh?
Lon Nol, or Pol pot?
Chiang Kai-Shek or Mao Tse-Tung?
The Czar or Lenin?
Who would you prefer to rule Arabia? The Saudi royal family, or Osama bin Laden?
You mean the Nazi-gold-loving Swiss?
He he he he
i have to hand it to you - at least you're consistent.
Who would you prefer to rule Arabia? The Saudi royal family, or Osama bin Laden?
it's odd that you present as two distinct options what are actually two sides of the same coin which we have choosen (sadly).
And what is this "we" bit? Are you assuming I'm on your side? That I still will be, regardless of what you choose as a course of action? "Personally", I can live with us minus those who want to nuke Mecca. And see precious little difference between those who want to nuke Mecca and those who nuked lower Manhattan. So, if you want to go to the head of my "prefer to kill them first" list, run around nuking cities.
Which is simply a single instance of the basic point, which I notice you managed to cut out of your selection from my previous. "But it isn't" - where power is to be found, that is. If you want to live as long as you can, avoid pissing off everyone who thinks as I do - we are a bit more numerous than Bin Laden's camp and decidedly stronger. Moral evil creates new enemies as fast as it dispatches the old ones. It is not a route to power, entirely pragmatically and even cynically, for that reason.
No, dear, I'm saying THEY consider you to be just another Westerner and will slaughter you even as you cringe before them, assuring them that you are one of the "nice" Westerners who isn't like those nasty ones willing to fight for their lives.
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sickofit
Since Aug 5, 2003
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James Bacque's 'Other Losses'
A Review by Stephen E. Ambrose
Ike and the Disappearing Atrocities
New York Times Book Review, February 24, 1991
Mr. Bacque, a Canadian novelist with no previous historical research or writing experience, says in his introduction: "Doubtless many scholars will find faults in this book, which are only mine. I welcome their criticism and their further research, which may help to restore to us the truth after a long night of lies." Last December, the Eisenhower Center at the University of New Orleans invited some leading experts on the period to examine the charges.
Our second conclusion was that when scholars do the necessary research, they will find Mr. Bacque's work to be worse than worthless. It is seriously - nay, spectacularly - flawed in its most fundamental aspects. Mr. Bacque misuses documents; he misreads documents; he ignores contrary evidence; his statistical methodology is hopelessly compromised; he makes no attempt to look at comparative contexts; he puts words into the mouth of his principal source; he ignores a readily available and absolutely critical source that decisively deals with his central accusation; and, as a consequence of these and and other shortcomings, he reaches conclusions and makes charges that are demonstrably absurd.
In short, Mr. Bacque is wrong on every major charge and nearly all his minor ones. Eisenhower was not a Hitler, he did not run death camps, German prisoners did not die by the hundreds of thousands, there was a severe food shortage in 1945, there was nothing sinister or secret about the "disarmed enemy forces" designation or about the column "other losses." Mr. Bacque's "missing million" were old men and young boys in the militia.
What Holocaust-denial site did you dumpster-dive for this scumbag James Bacque?
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