Is the West Too Civilized?

CNSNews.com ^ | July 22, 2003 | Daniel Pipes

[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.

[DoctorMichael]

.......respond to the Islamofascists as fascists?......

Is it Fascism to value ones life and to protect and defend it?

I suggest you check your original premises.

[SauronOfMordor]

The obvious long-term counter to US power, is to infiltrate and take over, as the Islamists are doing in Europe. Simply immigrate in, legally or illegally, and have ten or more kids per Muslim woman. Within one generation, Muslims could be a larger percentage of the electorate than Blacks, and far more militant. Imagine the response in the US if Bush sent in Marines to depose Mugabe in Zimbabwe, and re-install white government. It would be unthinkable -- the cities would be burning by evening. Action against any Muslim polity would be similarly unthinkable once Islamists were 10% or more of our population

The only counter to that would be for the non-Muslim US population to make Islamists feel unwelcome. Very Unwelcome. This is something that the web of civil-rights and hate-crime laws would tend to stifle

[JohnGalt]

As an American conservative, I believe in a decentralized government and a well-armed citizenry as the best defense. Pipes believes in blowing up temples and what not half-a-world-away.

I believe 'America' should revert to her conservative principals; Pipes is advocating we 'become more like them.'

You are right; he is not a fascist, he is an idiot.

[thinktwice]

the best defense

... is good offense.

[sheltonmac]

As an American conservative, I believe in a decentralized government and a well-armed citizenry as the best defense.

Amen! Unfortunately, breaking it down into such simplistic terms guarantees that Beltway conservatives won't understand it.

[moni kerr]

There are times when it is necessary to behave like a barbarian in order to preserve your civilization.

[LibTeeth]

Pipes isn't just an idiot, he's a dialectic idiot. The logic to his solution is that A becomes not-A. How very Hegellian. This should offend any thinking conservative. I wonder why this sort of policy and tactics failed the Russians in Afghanistan if it is such an obviously useful course of action? One doesn't fight immorality by matching it with immoral behavior. Self-defense is moral and unambiguous; pre-emption isn't. This is true in the individual case, as well as when our assigned servants organize collective defense. No doubt Potemkin-conservatives such as Pipes have no problem with centralized authority and disarming free-agents for the security of the state.

One who can diagnose the symptoms correctly but completely screw up the cure is known in other professions as a quack.

[moni kerr]

It's simply a hard though paradoxical truth. Violence, no matter how well refined or choreographed is far from civilized behavior. It is primal and instinctual. But it is often necessary to cultivate such behavior to preserve what you have.

[nopardons]

Daniel Pipes isn't " an idiot ";dialectic nor otherwise.

Not all Muslims are Islamacists, though all Islamacists are Muslims.

Every thinking Conservative should be OFFENDED by you and others of your ilk, who have no comprehension nor knowledge, yet feel it incumbent to spew irrational, ridiculuous, preposterous, and ill informed garbage on FR. The pre-emptive strike on Iraq was far from " immoral ".

Pipes is far from being anything similar to Potempkin and I seriously doubt that you even understand the implications of what you so emotionally and unthinkingly wrote.

The " ARAB STREET ", as well as the putative leaders of Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and even N. Korea see the USA quite differently than they did prior to the Afghanistan and Iraq " wars ". Even France, Germany, and little Belgum have backed off somewhat, with their stupid rhetoric.

Russia ? Why didn't you throw in England whilst you were at it, when talking about Afghanistan's history ? Both failed there; America hasn't.

[nopardons]

You haven't a clue; none at all. Neither do you even know what Pipes has advocated, apparently.

You and your islolationist friends, who also see America's past through distorted lenzes, should, instead, look at facts, rather than through unfactual smoke & mirrors of your own daydreams.

[JohnGalt]

Anyone who uses 'fantasist' in an alleged serious foreign policy article is both an idiot and a dialectical idiot at that.

[JohnGalt]

Protecting ones property, family and friends is instinctual but has nothing to do with troop tactics half a world away. In order to make that connection you would have to use the abstractions generally reserved for the left in order to draw a parallel.

Seems the moderator thought I was over the top in my response; apologies if you were offended.

[SJackson]

If you'd like to be on or off this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.

[Tolik]

Here is the article by Lee Harris referenced by Daniel Pipes: http://www.techcentralstation.com/1051/defensewrapper.jsp?PID=1051-350&CID=1051-031103A 

Read it, please.

If you have and still used the "idiot" reference in regards to Mr. Harris, there is nothing I can say that can convince you otherwise. For anybody who have not read the original article (btw, Mr. Pipes did a good job summarizing a part of this long multi-part article published back in March of 2003), I want to highlight again: Mr. Harris says that the current enemy is different from the traditional enemy. Instead of reality, the new enemy deals with fantasy. The reasonable enemy can be relied on to act within specific set of rules and can be, well, "reasoned" with. The new "fantasist" enemy, does not respond to reason. Traditional approach is counterproductive. If the West wants to win, it must change its approach and must bring the "fantasist" enemy back to reality.

The article was discussed three times here:

Our World-Historical Gamble
Posted by beckett
On 03/11/2003 11:31 PM EST with 106 comments

Tech Central Station ^ | March 11, 2003 | Lee Harris
1: THE PROBLEM Of the many words written for and against the coming war with Iraq, none has been more perceptive than Paul Johnson's observation in his essay "Leviathan to the Rescue" that such a war "has no precedent in history" and that "in terms of presidential power and national sovereignty, Mr. Bush is walking into unknown territory. By comparison, the Gulf War of the 1990's was a straightforward, conventional case of unprovoked aggression, like Germany's invasion of Belgium in 1914 and Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor." The implications of this remark - like the implications of the war with...
 

Our World-Historical Gamble
Posted by ganeshpuri89
On 03/12/2003 12:15 AM EST with 7 comments
 

Our World-Historical Gamble
Posted by Risa
On 03/17/2003 12:37 AM EST with 10 comments
 

[JohnGalt]

I took the time to read the esteemed Mssr. Harris's orignal article yesterday, and lets be clear, I was calling Pipes and idiot in the original sense of the word.

The Apaches, the Huns, Tojos, VC...were all said to be like no enemy in history. Only the truly lazy buy the latest clap trap about the nature of the current enemy of the moment. The sad part are the lazy are the very people who conceded so many of their liberties to the state, in times of crises, they are only capable of thinking the state can save them.

“Why, of course, the people don’t want war,” Goering said when it was all over, in his prison cell in Nuremberg in 1946:

"Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a communist dictatorship ... That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."

[Alouette]

The logical end of Herr Pipes recommendation, I guess, is to respond to the Islamofascists as fascists?

Did we defeat the nazis in World War II by responding as nazis?

[JohnGalt]

No, the Allies defeated Nazi Germany because the United State government could field an army with nearly unlimited machines of war and a capable, seasoned military leadership in the field.

[Tolik]

I just love that wonderful Goering quote. What does it prove? That any part of human existence and any human feeling can be manipulated? Of course it can. It was done since prehistoric times. Isn't why Shakespeare still current because he deals with the basic human feelings and tragedies? Does shameless manipulation renders everything false? I dare to disagree. If the fraise "I love you" was shamelessly used a couple of trillions times just to get laid, does it mean that it false every time? Think not. ... But I digress.

 I think that the threat to civilization from the current fanatical barbarism (called whatever: islamofasicm, militant islam, islamism, radical islam, pick one or none) is real regardless of how Goering and Co manipulated Germany in the last century. I think that this new enemy indeed has "unearned power" (as termed by Mr. Pipes) and is different kind of enemy that Nazi Germany, Militaristic Japan or Communist Soviet Union were or Communist China may be.

I also think that the West itself contributed to the rise of this enemy buy not holding it accountable for their actions and inadvertently supporting their fantasy that our goodness is a sign of weakness.

This enemy is also expansionist. So if we decide to fold and hide behind two oceans, it won't save us anyway. Did not Osama said in answer to the question: all right, so what America should do? - First convert to Islam.

[JohnGalt]

But isn't that dialectics? The onus is on the theorist to prove that the new enemy is different than all others, rather than begin with such an assumption.

"I also think that the West itself contributed to the rise of this enemy buy not holding it accountable for their actions and inadvertently supporting their fantasy that our goodness is a sign of weakness. "

Lets be clear the West contributed to the rise of the enemy in the sense that Western intelligence services employed radical Islam as a tool against Soviet expansion and failed to tie up loose ends after the war; they even tapped some the agents again to 'help' in Kosovo.

Its hard to take such abstract theorizing and world play seriously when American boys are in harms way, but I understand urbanites, like Mssr.Harris have little interest in those of us in fly-over country.