Posted on 11/11/2005 7:48:49 AM PST by Tolik
Recently George Bush met hostile crowds and a critical press during a 34-nation Summit of the Americas. Leftists and elite commentators criticized his recent proposals to liberalize American markets from Canada to Chile even though such an enlightened policy would be deeply resented by many American unions and small businesses here at home, but of inestimable value to South American exporters with their much cheaper costs of production.
Perhaps this automatic anti-Americanism that clouds Latin American self-interest is a result of the present hysteria over Iraq or the foul fumes from American corporations of the 1950s.
Maybe countries like Argentina, in the manner of post-Soviet Russia, allowed corruption and cronyism to subvert overdue market-driven reforms and now need a convenient scapegoat for their own self-induced miseries.
Or is the furor due to the influence of Hugo Chavez's billions of petrodollars? He has promiscuously spread money throughout Latin America and tends to prop up socialist policies that otherwise would probably fail.
Still, one wonders what would have been the reaction of the various anti-American protesters had the president agreed with much of their clamoring to be free of influence of the United States. Maybe George Bush could have offered something more palatable such as the following:
Unfortunately at a time of trade imbalances, budget deficits, and security concerns, the United States regrets that it must consider first the interests of its own small businesses and workers. So sadly it must maintain or increase its protection of the domestic American market, restrict the remittances of illegal aliens back to Latin America, and close our borders to the entry of all illegal aliens from the south.Recently the Spanish High Court Judge Santiago Pedraz issued international arrest warrants for three American soldiers, charging them with murder in the accidental death of a Spanish cameraman at the Baghdad's Palestine Hotel on April 8, 2003. The idea of Pedraz and many of his associates is that Spain is now the world's custodian of universal justice and can indict those it feels commit crimes against humanity — or at least sort of.
In the world of the utopian European, Pinochet is logically indicted for killing thousands, but strangely not Castro for tens of thousands. American soldiers in the heat of battle are deemed criminals for accidents in the way that former Eastern European and Soviet intelligence officers truly responsible for thousands killed not to mention top al Qaeda officials. If the French police or military gets a little too heavy-handed against Muslim rioters, none will be indicted by Judge Pedraz.
More curiously, Judge Pedraz seems oblivious that there are thousands of American personnel not far away from his courtroom stationed on Spanish soil. So rather than charging Americans for supposed wartime crimes in distant Iraq, cannot the Spanish, to ensure a more sensitive military landscape, instead simply ask us to leave their country entirely — and allow the defense of Spain to become strictly a Spanish matter? Most Americans and Spanish alike would welcome the idea — perhaps the former far more than the latter.
It is now common knowledge that Iran is hell bent on acquiring nuclear weapons. It has three or four probable aims in doing so. Blackmail worked in the case of North Korea, giving an otherwise failed state cash, food, "peaceful" nuclear expertise, and, most importantly, global attention. Iran might win the same from the EU.
Or it could gain the type of deterrence that Pakistan has obtained with both the United States and India, allowing it even greater exemption to fund and host terrorists.
Or, as its so-called president suggested, it might wish to wipe out Israel — either on the frightening premise it could survive such an Armageddon and Israel would not, or on the lunatic assumption that it was willing to go to a collective paradise, martyring itself to end once and for all the Zionist plague.
Or, perhaps Iran wishes to supply stealthy nuclear devices to groups like Hezbollah that could terrorize the West while allowing Iran deniability of culpability and thus avoidance of massive retaliation.
In any case, it is clearly not in the interest of the United Nations nor the European Union nor the Arab League that Iran goes nuclear. It is even more evident that no one apparently can stop it — despite all the remonstrations of the three EU nations talking to Iran, a Peace Prize to Mr. El-Baradei, and grandstanding slurs against a supposedly trigger-happy United States from Germany and France.
In response, perhaps the United States should declare something like the following:
Iran's nuclear ambitions are both an internal and regional matter that properly fall under the auspices of the U.N., EU, and Arab League. Our own strategies — missile defense and massive nuclear response to any attack — are designed to protect the United States and its allies; but we certainly would not wish to prejudice alternative avenues of national or global approaches undertaken by others, and most definitely do not wish to interfere in the internal affairs of Iran.
All these examples — and far more could be adduced — reveal a radical disconnect between rhetoric and reality. South Americans want unfettered access into America's markets, assume thousands will illegally cross into the United States, and welcome in return billions in cash remittances. Similarly, Spain assumes perpetual NATO protection. In reality that means that the U.S. nuclear deterrent and its vast conventional forces will keep the Mediterranean and Western Europe free from outside threats at little cost to Spain, with a relatively low American profile, and in consultation with Spanish officials. The bad cop United States is not unwelcome to anyone dealing with Iran, because all accept that the scary scenario — America is the only power with the capability and will to stop Iran's nuclear roguery — is not as bad as the worse alternative of the theocracy becoming a major nuclear power.
Why then all the dissimilation? The most obvious answer is pride, envy, jealousy, and all the other primordial emotions that the weak and the vulnerable harbor against the strong and autonomous.
Second, for all our pride, we are not like the once-powerful — and scary — Soviet Union, so Latin Americans and Europeans know that there is rarely any price to be paid for attacking the United States. Slandering us is a win-win situation — cowardly and expedient to be sure, but hardly like indicting bin Laden or embargoing Iranian oil. No Argentinean is furious over Chinese unfair trade; no Spaniard protests Russian oilmen for spoiling the arctic. And worse still, we know why.
Third, so far anti-Americanism is tactically smart. The heated rhetoric of the extremists makes others seem moderate. So Latin American leaders can grudgingly "take political risks" to "permit" America to accept their cheap products into the United States. The leftwing Spanish government can pose as responsible in opposing its own court's theatrics. The Europeans and U.N. can apologize to Iran that it is forced into such unpleasant dialogue by the alternative specter of American preemption and unilateralism.
Fourth, the world since the Cold War has become a much wealthier and safer place with the demise of nuclear and intercontinental Communism, and the onset of globalization. Latin Americans are furious not that they are starving in 1950s fashion, but that their glimpse of parity with the affluent United States is slipping away. Spaniards are safe and secure, but in typical human fashion of ever rising expectations, even more apprehensive that things are not as heaven on earth. And Europeans and internationalists are frustrated with Iran. It has oil and money and has been left alone, so why would it wish to ruin a good thing and call the bluff of their new enlightened order?
Are there any dangers to this game of rhetoric masking reality? Plenty. It is now old, tiring, and predictable. The American people are on to the fraud, and probably don't much care for another free trade agreement with ingrates who slander what benefits them. They are tired of NATO and want it to nobly die on the vine and allow utopians to get a taste of the real world they so disdain. And wisely or not, they are not too fond of the Middle East and pretty much want those whom Iran immediately threatens to deal with it on their own and count us out. Our critics forget that American foreign policy is ultimately simply a representation of collective will. Nations are simply people, and thus subject to emotional urges that often trump reason.
So by castigating the U.S., critics forget that their long-term welfare is not the same as the short-term interests of America. Open markets, military alliances between liberal democracies, and sober joint actions now to prevent worse threats later on are to everyone's advantage. But for right now, the United States might benefit by not welcoming any additional free and unfair trade with South America, or spending billions on European defense, or taking on any more burdens in the Middle East.
In contrast, an India, Japan, and Australia are proud and confident nations. They don't indict our citizens and often appreciate an American global role, whether outsourcing jobs or patrolling regional waters. Unlike the U.N., the EU, and South America, they spare us the sanctimonious lectures and look forward rather than nurse wounds of the past.
The world is changing as we speak. The great untold story of our age is that others need to get a life and the United States needs to move on.
— Victor Davis Hanson is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. His latest book is A War Like No Other. How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War.
Let me know if you want in or out.
Links: FR Index of his articles: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=victordavishanson
His website: http://victorhanson.com/ NRO archive: http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson-archive.asp
V.D. Hanson says it all and so well. How could anyone argue with him? He's organized, logical, and makes sense. Thanks for posting this, especially today, and in the midst of the relentless Bush bashing and republican weak-kneed gloom and doom.
The only ones who argue with Hanson are liberals whose arguments are: disorganized, illogical, and make no sense.
"The great untold story of our age is that others need to get a life and the United States needs to move on."
_______
Classic!
bttt
But liberals, like Mapes, "believe" such and such, and because they believe so strongly it must be so and they will fabricate the "truth" to make it so. Who cares if thousands upon thousands of elderly died during a heatwave in France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands and Belgium? Who cares if France cannot contain rioting WITHOUT banning the right to assemble? Who cares if the EU cannot defend itself against a nuclear Iran? As long as the Sheehans. the Mapes, the Kennedies and the Durbins of the world believe otherwise it must be so.
Viva Victor!
Oh, there are things where I disagree with him.
The biggest is his take on our war with Serbs. He totally supports it, and I was and still am against it. I think we were held by perfect disinformation campaign conducted by Yugoslavian Muslims. There were bloody years there, all right, and some thousands of killed is nothing to laugh about, but no hundreds of thousands massacred ever where found - contrary to all claims.
He also once was in disagreement with Lee Harris' philosophy that Islamists/Jihadists are devote of rationality and act as they live in their own fantasy world. Hanson was more in the line of thinking that their actions are quite rational. Without finding an exact quote now, I have a perception that he is more agreeable with at least of some irrationality thesis lately. (Jordanian bombing this week have no logical explanation for me at all).
It does not stop me to admire him greatly - as you could have guessed :^)
bttt
Jordan is like other "corrupt" regimes that Al Qaeda denounced already, and the Sunni Triangle may not be so hospitable anymore. Al-Qaida in Iraq, local insurgents battle over tactics, money
The bad cop United States is not unwelcome to anyone dealing with Iran, because all accept that the scary scenario — America is the only power with the capability and will to stop Iran's nuclear roguery — is not as bad as the worse alternative of the theocracy becoming a major nuclear power.
===
I love VDH, and along with Steyn, he continues to make the case that the current administration should've been making all along. I disagree with the above scenario though, as I think Israel has the capability, and the will, to stop Iran, and it is at the point that the all out war that may result (I cannot bring myself to believe we wouldn't side with Israel) would be the greatest favor we could ask for, despite the inevitable carnage. Eerily, history has shown that Bubba America just might need such a jolt in his Fruit of the Looms in order to get on board with this World War.
I am sorry to sound like Chicken Little, but now spend the majority of days frightened for our children, ashamed of the seditious left that call themselves Americans, and scandalized by the "big R" guys that I vote for that turn out to be gutless slime that spend the fruit of my labor. VDH has a couple of brillant "what ifs" in his article, but we all know that it ain't going to happen. I am grateful that there is a God-fearing man in office and immensely respect GWB, who has surprised me on many occassions by being two steps ahead of us all. However, nobody I've seen since Ronaldus Magnus has what it takes to knock the $hit out of the press, the fellow travellers, and the DC apparatchiks (the first front), the Islamofascists (the second front), and return us to government "of the people, for the people and by the people."
So, with all due respect to rhetoric and VDH, I sure would like to hear (perhaps beginning with some of the great minds here in this forum) solutions. I will continue to enjoy punditing the pundits, but each day my laughter gets a little bit more nervous in tone.
Flame away, zig, zagging me all over the net if you like... I'll keep searching.
"The only ones who argue with Hanson are liberals whose arguments are: disorganized, illogical, and make no sense."
Hahaha. I have exactly the same experiences with my liberal friends.
I e-mail them VDH's column every Friday afternoon, and we meet for drinks at Joyce's Tavern every Friday night. Each week I hope to be engaged in some sort of cogent debate, but all I ever get is Kool-Aid nonsense. No logic; no facts. In the end, though, a lot of Johnny Walker Black.
"Or, as its so-called president suggested, it might wish to wipe out Israel ..."
I have to wonder if there would really be any major consequences if Iran were to nuke Israel. Initially there would be plenty of noise, but people have short memories.
Yes, I agree with you here. Bombing the Serbs was a huge mistake by the Clinton administration. But didn't his Secretary of State, Madelaine Albright, recommend this? She grew up in Yugoslovia as a child. Was she prejudiced against the Serbs?
<< The great untold story of our age is that others need to get a life and the United States needs to move on. >>
Please, Dear Lord, FRom Doctor Hanson's lips to George Walker Bush's ear!
That we should ferociously deal with America's enemies at home and abroad and tell the rest of the world to E, S and D!
Flame away?
Rather that I remind you of the company you keep:
"If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace."
-— Thomas Paine
And that your tagline says it all.
God bless you and yours -- B A
#8 - Hear! Hear!
You have my take on Doctor Hanson down to a "T."
The following quote provides just about the best explanation I've seen:
"Power is not a means; it is an end, One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power."
George Orwell [Eric Blair] (1903-1950) "1984"
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