Antiwar fallacies.
Richard Goldstein has an article, “Neohawks: Leftists Who Love the War Too Much,” in a recent issue of Village Voice that attempts to discipline the progressive Left back into obedience to the establishment Left on the issue of the the Iraq intervention, but ends up only providing examples of several common antiwar fallacies. (*) Goldstein says:
[I]t was a shock to find [Greil Marcus] dissing leftist intellectuals for their skepticism about the war on terror. Marcus is not the only member of the counterculturati to find the hawk within. . . . What we know about U. S. foreign policy is that it played a crucial part in the rise of Muslim militance.
Read the second part of this excerpt closely. That is only supportable if US foreign policy has been significantly more harmful to Muslims than to any other group. Yet, I am not aware of anyone in the American Left who outwardly voices such a view. On the other hand, Osama Bin Laden takes such a view in order to justify terrorist attacks.
You don’t have to condone the attacks of 9-11 to understand that suicide bombers are driven by a response to real conditions, and America had much to do with creating those conditions.
Goldstein is unclear here. By “conditions,” I assume he is talking about the lack of political freedom in the Middle East. If he supported political freedom, then why doesn’t Goldstein support the liberation of Iraq?
Now we find ourselves in the unenviable (but not unfamiliar) position of bolstering dictatorships in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt that suppress a democratic opposition—because it is Islamist.
Notably missing from this list is Iraq. US policy is to see that Iraqi is liberated from the dictatorship it has suffered under for over two decades now. It is too bad that Goldstein does not address Iraq, because its regime is the most tyrannical in the Middle East.
Does Goldstein expect the US to liberate the entire Middle East all at once?
Furthermore, I take exception with the idea that the “democratic opposition” to these dictatorships is Islamist. The Islamists are only the most vocal opposition. To be a democratic opposition you must want to preserve democracy once power is attained. This means peacefully stepping aside after losing a timely, free, and fair election. Islamist groups have not earned a reputation for being a democratic opposition.
The Bush doctrine comes veiled in an assurance that the societies we create in the countries we invade will be democratic and moderate.
I’m not aware that the “Bush doctrine” has as its goal the creation of any society.
Already there are rumblings about returning a king to Iraq. Shades of the Shah, whom we foisted on Iran after we helped overthrow its democratically elected leader in 1953.
Interesting rhetorical deception here. Note that Iraq does not have a democratically elected leader, as Iran did in 1953, making the current situation markedly different from 1953. Note also that returning a king to Iraq is at this point nothing more than a rumbling. Finally, in Afghanistan today, the returned king has few if any monarchical powers. If anything, he has been a stabilizing influence in a country desperate for peace.
How can anyone believe that the U. S., which gave chemical weapons to Saddam (in order to strengthen his position against Iran) and armed the fundamentalists in Afghanistan (in order to build a bulwark against the Soviets), is now able to manage a region embroiled in the consequences of its machinations?
More contradictions. It’s not clear whether Goldstein is accusing the US of “managing” the Middle East in a tyrannical, heavy-handed, dictatorial fashion or if he is accusing the US of attempting to do this, but unfortunately (?) is so incompetent to do so that the region will fall into horrifying instability. Apparently instability will be a bad thing, despite the prevalence of political repression there.
We know that Bush’s motivation in Iraq is at least partly economic. Regulating the flow of oil from the world’s second-largest petroleum producer would enable us to undercut OPEC and give us enormous leverage over Russia, which is dependent on oil prices for its recovery.
So the Left should support OPEC, the oil cartel?
Military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan would allow us to surround Iran and loosen our ties to the Saudis.
Earlier in the essay, Goldstein castigates Saudi Arabia as a dictatorship. Actually, it’s a monarchy. Nevertheless, Goldstein is saddened by the possibility that the US will be in a position to check the influence of the Saudis?
It’s not clear from the essay whether Goldstein approves or disapproves of the current Iranian regime. I wish he would have stated his position.
Zionists who welcome the protection of America should consider that Israel could become expendable if it is no longer deemed geopolitically necessary.
This is a good point. One important duty of the American Left is to defend the security of all people in the Middle East, and that includes defending the security of the State of Israel. I’m glad Goldstein made this point.
That’s just one of the cataclysmic changes that may ensue from U. S. ambitions, which are imperial in the most traditional sense.
Hold on. If this were true, then Goldstein has my vote. I don’t want George W. Bush to be crowned an emperor, the traditional leader of an empire. I support freedom and democracy. Could someone please keep me informed on this issue? I would like to know how to stop the US from becoming ruled by an emperor.
The Bush doctrine abrogates the major innovation of American foreign policy, which was to rely on our economic strength rather than our military power.
I’m not so sure that this change is a good thing. Goldstein evidently supports this change and thus the Bush doctrine, though, because, after all, it was US foreign policy that caused the rise of Muslim militance, as Goldstein so eloquently stated above. Now that we’re moving away from that bad old policy, Goldstein is apparently very pleased.
Now we are setting out to run the world by force of arms, a monumentally expensive—and offensive—proposition.
Oh. I guess he does not support the Bush doctrine. To me, anyway, the expense should be secondary in importance. We’re talking about peace here. It’s a matter of life and death.
Maybe Goldstein is saying that the reason why the Bush Doctrine is bad is because it relies on “offensive” techniques. The “Bush Doctrine” that I’m aware of says that states that support terrorists will be treated as if they were terrorists themselves. That’s not offensive. It’s defensive. Maybe Goldstein is talking about the National Security Strategy recently released by the White House. That is not offensive either, but instead allows for preemptive attacks on known enemies if they support terrorism and seek WMD. If Goldstein has a better way of dealing with states that support terrorism and also happen to seek nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons, then I would like to hear it.
I do wonder about the US getting set to “run the world.” That doesn’t sound like a good thing. It’s just reassuring that no one in the Bush Administration wants to run the world. So what is Goldstein talking about? Maybe he’s alluding to the fact that in the National Security Strategy, US policy is to retain its position as the world’s strongest power. Is Goldstein opposed to that? Can he suggest a country that he would prefer to have in this role?
What will America be like in a permanent state of combat?
It won’t be pretty. That’s why we need to marshal our forces to win the War on Terrorism as soon as possible.
The working assumption is that the economy will rebound, but even if it does, the cost of keeping the military locked and loaded against many enemies is bound to shrivel the already shrunken public sector.
It’s better than allowing another 9/11.
That means an even greater income gap and a further erosion of funding for education, environmental cleanup, health care, and the rest.
I doubt it. In any case, Goldstein says that we have entered a state of “permanent combat.” The nature of war eludes Goldstein. Wars are temporary. They end once they are won, lost, or stopped by treaty. The War on Terrorism is the same and will end eventually.
In many ways, this potential America corresponds to the conservative worldview, but for progressives it should be as ominous as the threat posed by terrorists. And we will still face the danger of strikes against our cities by a transnational movement that would like nothing better than to see the Ashcroft doctrine fully implemented here.
Progressivsm at its heart is the improvement of society, or, if appropriate, putting into motion a radical change in society. When our society is threatened to its core by terrorists, we must defend our society, or we will have nothing to improve.
Nevertheless, we will not be able to adequately fund the federal government if we exclusively tax the poor, as George W. Bush apparently wants.
Strange how this article started out as an attack on the hawkish Left, and then dragged in John Ashcroft, as if the hawkish Left were represented by him.
When Osama bin Laden predicted that America would become a hell for its people, he was speaking from a deep understanding of freedom’s fragility. Even a victorious war could produce the conditions that fulfill his dream.
Wrong. A victorious war will mean conditions return to normal. If we lose the war, we will all be living under sharia. I would prefer a victory.
Nevertheless, it’s clear that some of the civil liberties restrictions have gone overboard. As progressives, we should fight to reverse the tide and keep our society as free as possible.
The great strength of the left is its analysis of social dynamics.
I could not disagree more. Our great strength is obtained by people working together—cooperation. Our ideas are useful, as long as we allow for a free, politically incorrect discussion to keep our minds sharp.
To jettison this knowledge, along with the lessons of recent history, is to invite the worst possible future.
Perhaps, but if we jettison our society, we will have no future at all.
That said, I think it is high time for the Left to re-examine many of its theoretical assumptions about the way the world works. Clearly, the old “circle of violence” theory, among others, is unreliable, yet relied on heavily today by many Leftists, including Goldstein, who blames US foreign policy for causing 9/11. He might as well say that what goes around, comes around. That’s a sentiment usually associated with conservatism. The old way of saying it was, “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”
This is not a brief for pacifism. There are times when war is necessary, and, in the media at least, there is a real debate about whether this is such a moment. The discussion isn’t being led by chastened radicals but by mainstream liberals. The best arguments against invading Iraq can be found in The New York Times. Here you will discover an alternative to both Noam Chomsky and the Bush doctrine—a policy based on cooperative engagement and domestic defense.
Foreign policy as run by the New York Times? So, Goldstein doesn’t mind when the Times editorializes in favor of the anti-democratic coup d’etat in Venezuela? Or maybe Goldstein is talking about the Times’ spirit as expressed in their advocacy for fighting terrorism in one recent editorial. (†)
The real problem with this is that it is servile. The Times is a leading newspaper, but they still have their share of both good and bad ideas. We should not wed ourselves to anyone’s ideology.
9-11 did produce a new situation, but it makes a very old demand on us: to comprehend the world’s complexity. That’s something the neohawks have yet to demonstrate.
Well, we terrible “neohawks” were right about Afghanistan. We were right about Chomsky. We were right about the continued specter of terrorism in the past 13 months. Just where have we been wrong since September 11?
Originally posted to Democratic Left.