Friday, January 28, 2005 |
11:30 - Fundamental theorems
http://coldfury.com/index.php?p=5252
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Mike Hendrix has posted a deft summary of the position that a lot of us hold, which we all may as well just link back to as the starting point from which we can start having some new arguments. In the years since 9/11, our discourse has converged on these ideas, and while some might find parts with which to disagree (and even in a principled manner, in some cases), there's not much there to argue with. Sometimes getting it all into one big pile helps perspective. I don't think many people take the time to remember how much it felt like the world had changed on the evening of 9/11, for instance, and knew—instinctively knew—that the old rules of engagement and tolerance of global threats no longer applied, that the burden of proof and demonstration of necessity for preemptive war were things that would not survive in their familiar forms in the new, changed world.
One might still argue that our priorities could have been arranged differently, that having the Europeans on board with the long-term War on Terror (through whatever concessions to them might be necessary) outranked taking out the immediate perceived threat of Iraq, and that Iraq should have waited if it meant sacrificing that global consensus. That's at least a principled position—not one that I agree with, because I don't happen to believe that the Europeans would have gotten on board with us beyond Afghanistan under any circumstances, as we can see through their relaxed dealings with Iran and their lack of outrage or even surprise at the moral implosion of the UN. I happen to think that there really was no other good option than the one we undertook, as the War on Terror might have been easier won with the Europeans on board, but it can never be won without us calling the shots. Nobody else has the resources or the willpower, or the clarity of purpose. Nobody else could stomach the hard, ugly transformative steps that are necessary to make Islamic terrorism die, not through short-term symptom-treating palliatives, but through the march of generations. Nobody else seems to share that vision, probably because nobody else shares our experience.
I don't expect agreement from those who don't have the same vision of what the world needs to be. I don't like to have to say they'd just better get used to it, either. But I think we do know what we're doing here. The Europeans shouldn't make the all-too-common mistake of underestimating our understanding of human nature. We have figured a few things out. All on our own.
AFP and the BBC may judge us harshly, but I'm confident that the history books will be more charitable. They'll have to be, because they'll be written in a better world.
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