October 5, 2007 2:07 PM EST | Link

To Spain! Help?

This evening I'm leaving NYC for a couple of weeks in Spain. It's mainly a vacation with my daughter Lorna, but when I originally planned it I thought I could also do a little interviewing about the whole process Spaniards have gone through of choosing whether and how to memorialize the victims of Civil War and Franco-era violence.

However, I've been running around so fast in the past few weeks that I really haven't done anything to set up interviews, excursions, etc in Madrid in pursuit of this project. So if any of you fine JWN readers has some suggestions about people I could talk to, or places I could go, please post them on the Comments board here pronto!!

We'll only be in Madrid for a few days. After that we'll head south to Andalucia, which has a whole set of different concerns about memorialization, on a very different time-scale.

Anyway, I'd much appreciate any help any of you can give. H'mmm, now I need to think about packing.

October 3, 2007 7:44 AM EST | Link

Piece in CSM today on Bush and global warming

I have a non-column in the CSM today on climate-change. The title is "Bush's good idea on global warming." Don't let that put anyone off reading it!

I start the piece by recalling that, when he was still governor of Texas, Bush signed into law a fairly good pro-green law that imposed fixed mandates on energy retailers to us a certain proportion of renewable energy, with penalties for those who did not do so. But then I note that since becoming president he's been firmly opposed to any form of government-imposed mandates.

Then I talk about Kyoto some, and argue that it's very important for the US to be fully in the post-Kyoto negotiations.

Here's how I end:

All nations need to work together to bring emission rates radically downward. It has to be a cooperative venture. America's past and present emissions have (unintentionally) inflicted harm on others around the world, and now, foreign emissions are increasingly hurting America, too.

Yes, we will need innovation – at many levels. Conventional definitions of economic growth will have to be reconsidered. But the degree of innovation we can achieve will be strongly affected by laws, regulations, and mandates that structure the incentives of all players in a pro-innovation, pro-green direction. Bush can still play a useful role on this – if only he would follow his own earlier example.

October 1, 2007 10:57 AM EST | Link

T. Friedman calls for end to "GWOT"; admits own fallibility!

Juan Cole had a generally good commentary on the column that T-Fed wrote yesterday calling for an end to the GWOT. Juan zeroed in on the "bad for business" aspects of the GWOT that Tom had focused on.

Juan did not, however, mention an intriguing little two-word insertion in Tom's text that imho we should seek much more clarification of.

Tom was writing of (I think) Americans in general-- though speaking for myself and for everyone else who agitated strongly against the post-9/11 warmaking, I say, "Count me out!". He wrote this:

our reaction to 9/11 — mine included — has knocked America completely out of balance, and it is time to get things right again.

I don't know. Tom doesn't give any further clarification of his views on Iraq. We can note, though, that if the US's reaction to 9/11 "knocked America completely out of balance", then it had an impact on the 26 million people of Iraq that was far, far worse than that.

So I think we do need to have clarity from Tom regarding how he feels now about the pro-invasion position he energetically espoused prior to March 2003. (It would be good to have that conversation with Juan, too, at some point, though I think the support he gave to the invasion was somewhat less energetic than that of T-Fed, Jim-Boy Hoagland, and numerous other wellpaid heavyweights in the so-called "liberal" wing of the commentatoriat. And it goes without saying the neo-con wing was, in general, far worse.)

What Tom did write about, to illustrate the ways he thought the US had been "knocked completely out of balance", was mainly Guantanamo-- or perhaps I should say, those perceptions of Guantanamo that non-Americans have, that make them less happy to do business with the US as a result. He wrote, too, about those intrusive aspects of US border-control ops that dissuade non-US business execs and tourists from visiting our lovely country.

I should note that his column does raise one interesting possibility regarding how this thing called the "GWOT" might be expected to end. Many people have worried about this. In the traditional history of war, a war is first declared, by the competent arm of any given government, against one or more other named governments. It is then waged, using army-versus-army force, until either (a) one side is completely obliterated, in which case the victor becomes the "occupying power" in the other guy's country and assumed the responsibilities associated with that status, or (b) a surrender is negotiated between the governments concerned; and then the two sides implement the terms of that surrender, which may or may not include a limited-term occupation by the stronger side of the terrain of the weaker side.

But at least, in traditional warfare, everyone understood their rights and responsibilities-- and most importantly of all, there were clear criteria that marked off the situation of "at war" from the situation of "at peace." (In WW2, the victory over Germany took form "a" above, while that over Japan took form "b".)

But with this amorphous thing that Bush announced in late 2001, called the "Global War on Terror", there were no clear limits at all-- either spatially or temporally. One had no idea when the GWOT could be declared "over", since there was no clearly identified opponent whose vanquishing would constitute victory. Indeed, we were never given a definition of victory. We were just asked for hundreds of billions of dollars to carry on waging this thing.

So now, T-Fed has done us the service of suggesting some actual criteria for when the GWOT can be declared over. In his argument, it could be considered over when Microsoft, the US Chamber of Commerce, and the Association of US Travel Agents tell us it is "time to move on."

Under international law, you will note, this all looks most unusual and irregular.

Well, the whole GWOT has looked quite irregular under international law, all along.

It is time, indeed, for a new paradigm. (Amazing! That's what my new book will be about! Hint: It's called "Global Inclusion" and involves returning to and strengthening the long-established structures of international law...)

But as we all-- US citizens and the other 95% of the world's people-- work together to build and work for this new paradigm, I think we still need to hold to transparent account all those, both inside and outside the US government, who bear some responsibility (including the responsibility of public incitement) for having taken the US into its illegal and extremely harmful invasion of Iraq. Please, let's not simply sweep that historical record under the carpet.

This is not a question of schadenfreude or personal vindication. It is important that we learn from this whole experience... about the nature of war; about the need for caution and conservatism in the use of force; about the possibility of fatal mismatches between intentions and effects; about the need to listen carefully to others inside and outside the country who have differing views; and about the fact that warmaking is actually, these days, not very good at-- or quite possibly even harmful for-- the attainment of moral goals of real and lasting substance.

So Tom Friedman (and the rest of you onetime "liberal hawks") please tell us a lot more about how exactly you think it was that the US went "completely out of balance" after 9/11. And in particular, whether you now think it is possible that your own views and writings on Iraq in the lead-up to March 2003 might have been a part of that.

September 29, 2007 5:21 PM EST | Link

Washington's month in Iraq/Iran

I know I've been a bit AWOL from watching Iraq/Iran developments this past month. So this post is intended as a quick September's-end round-up of all the biggest developments in official Washington's consideration of the (increasingly closely linked?) challenges regarding Iraq and Iran.

"September" was awaited with considerable advance publicity and anticipation. It was a long-awaited rock star of a month. For it was September that was to bring us... (drum-roll)... The Petraeus Report! The showdown in the Senate! The sight of the two big parties going mano-a-mano over the war, with the prospect that maybe enough GOP senators would switch sides as to cause serious embarrassment!

In the end, though, I think September fizzled. The antiwar movement in this country seems noticeably weaker (well, certainly, in noticeably greater internal uncertainty and disorder) than it was a month ago; and I am still trying to figure out why. Here is my preliminary list of reasons:

1. Bush's strategy of, essentially, "hiding behind Petraeus" largely succeeded.

Petraeus received a much gentler reception from the Democrats in Congress than any civilian cabinet member would have. The Dems-- like the antiwar movement in the country at large-- has taken to heart as one of the key "lessons" of the Vietnam-era antiwar movement that it's wrong to demonize the military, since they are "only carrying out the orders" of the civilian leadership. Well, I certainly agree that no-one should be demonized. But still, I think the present general pandering to the military may have gone quite a lot too far. We should remember, after all, that unlike in the Vietnam era, the people in today's US military are all volunteers. No-one drafted them. They chose to do this job which involves killing and running the risk of getting killed. And (again, unlike in the Vietnam era), many of them get paid quite decently for doing this job.

I also think that Moveon.org made a really stupid mistake in publicly impugning Petraeus's patriotism. Their ad was childish and counter-productive. Most importantly, it failed to engage with the content of what Petraeus said in his testimony. How much better if they had waited until after his two appearances and ran an ad drawing attention to the admission he was forced to make, in response to Sen. John Warner's questioning, that he couldn't actually clearly state that the campaign in Iraq is making the US any safer! But no, they didn't want to wait till after his testimony and then respond to it-- they insisted on designing their ad before he had even spoken, and used up-- presumably-- huge amounts of their money on that ill-conceived project... which then itself largely diverted attention from the content of what was discussed in the hearings.

2. Discussion of Iraq/Iran affairs has now been caught up heavily in an intense fundraising phase of the 2008 presidential election.

I guess this one caught me by surprise a bit. But basically, what's been happening is that (a) in both parties there are extremely hard-fought pre-primary contests going on, and at the same time (b) the calendar for the various states' primary election has been moving further and further forward (i.e. from February 2008 to very early January 2008-- and there is still a possibility that Iowa and New Hampshire might hold their primaries this December!)

Of course this latter development is sheer craziness, and brings us closer and closer to the specter of US politics becoming a single continuous election season with no interlude left for any rational governance. But its effect on poor old September has been devastating. Under US election laws, the campaigns have to file reports at the end of each quarter on how much money they've raised to date. These reports are seen as important early indicators of the degree of support each candidate has within his/her party. So right now-- Sept. 29-- the candidates are all screeching to their supporters to "Write your checks now! Now!"

Compiling these reports and getting them published takes a few days. So what is now increasingly clear is that the end-of-September reports will be the last ones published before the primary voting begins.

Now, during the primary process itself, there's a certain general dynamic whereby the candidates have to appeal to the slightly more radical and/or committed wings within their own parties. But during this pre-primary, fundraising period, the candidates need to appeal overwhelmingly to the well-organized fundraising organizations... And among the very best of these are lobbies like the pro-gun lobby, the Big Agribusiness lobby... and of course, the pro-Israel lobby.

It is this latter player--well, actually, a widely distributed network of staunchly pro-Israel organizations from within both the Jewish and the evangelical Christian communities-- that has probably had the most effect of all on the behavior of candidates regarding Middle East-related questions.

AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, is the "information headquarters" for this network, publishing calls to action for its supporters nationwide-- like this one, titled "Support Sanctions Against Iran", and then also publishing detailed lists of which senators and Congressmembers voted for or against AIPAC's favored legislative initiatives.

... And thus, we had 76 Senators voting this week in favor of the Kyl-Lieberman Amendment that expressed the "sense of the Senate" in favor of tightening up the sanctions on Iran. That, despite this eloquent explanation by Virginia's very own Sen. Jim Webb as to why this was such a reckless act. Sen. Clinton voted FOR the Amendment. Sens. Obama and McCain-- who should have voted against it, chose not to vote at all. Biden, to his credit voted "Nay." (Note: I had gotten that wrong here earlier and am glad to correct it. Sorry about that, Senator.) Only 21 other senators ended up voting against it.

Here by the way is the text of a letter that the Friends Committee on National legislation sent to the 22 bravely dissenting senators. It said,

We at the Friends Committee on National Legislation thank you for voting yesterday against the Kyl-Lieberman S. Amdt. 3017 expressing the sense of the Senate on Iran.

Although the modified amendment passed by the Senate omitted a section that could be construed as authorizing military action against Iran, the amendment still increases the likelihood of war and undermines efforts to persuade the Bush administration to pursue diplomacy with Iran.

The amendment’s call for the administration to designate Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization reinforces administration policy to provoke and threaten Iran instead of engaging in negotiations. The administration could agree to apply the terrorist label and conclude that it had Senate backing to attack the IRGC, which is part of Iran's army...

Note to Biden: The US Senate is not the Senate of Classical Rome, which sought to order the governance structures of distant, Roman Army-controlled provinces according to its own whim! Nor is it the Parliament of Empire-ruling Britain! (And pssst: The Iraqis already have a "Constitution".)

Biden was, as usual, showboating, trying to "prove" he had something distinctive to say regarding Iraq, and was able to pull around half the GOP senators away from the administration's position on this (which is the rather sensible position that unwarranted interference on this point by showboating US senators is not helpful to anyone in Iraq.)

Anyway, read Reidar Visser's excellent commentary on this whole issue, here.

And finally, I cannot let this survey of "This month in Washington-by-the-Persian-Gulf" pass without highlighting this really disturbing report from the WaPo's Tom Ricks about the positions that B. Obama, H. Clinton, and J. Edwards all staked out during a pre-primary debate in New Hampshire-- to the effect that they could not promise to have the U.S. military out of Iraq by January 2013 -- more than five years from now.

I was gobsmacked when I first read about that.

What has happened to the passion of the antiwar wave that carried the Democratic Party so high during the elections held just over 11 months ago today? Why are these three-- the frontrunners in the Democratic primary process-- all being so extremely timid regarding the still-urgent need to bring the troops home and end the occupation?

My big guess is two things have been happening: (a) they've been talking to their fundraising people much more than, recently, they've been talking to their get-out-the-vote people, and (b) they are all three desperate to "look presidential"-- without realizing that, in truth, the way to "look presidential" right now is to adopt bold and clear ideas that stand in clear contrast to the failed policies pursued by Pres. Bush.

Well, more on this later, no doubt. But for my part, I just might have to whip out my checkbook and make a donation to Bill Richardson or Dennis Kucinich. They, along with GOP candidate Ron Paul are the only ones calling straighforwardly for a rapid and total troop withdrawal from Iraq.

September 28, 2007 3:52 PM EST | Link

The fate of the Bushites' "demagogratization" project in the Middle East

I went to a lunch-time discussion at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, titled "Recovering from Arab Spring Fever". That's a reference to the fad for "democratizing" the Middle East that swept through the Bush administration in 2004-2005 and that came to an abrupt end in late January 2006.

The presenters were Nathan Brown and Amr Hamzawy, who have an article on the state of democratization in the Arab world in the current issue of a mag called "The National Interest", and Suzanne Maloney, who has a broadly parallel piece on democratization in Iran in the same issue. (Those links, alas, won't give you the full texts, for which you have to pay.)

Maloney's presentation was pretty good. She pointed out that Congress's funding of the $75 million program to support citizen-based regime-change efforts in Iran had been almost unanimously opposed by Iranian democrats, precisely because it delegitimized their role. She said the State Dept would have a very hard time spending even the first tranche of this funding. Moreover, because of the intensely controversial (among Iranians) nature of the program, the identity of recipients of the funding would remain classified-- for their own protection. This could end up tainting all opposition activists; plus, the State Dept-- where, incidentally, she used to work until recently-- would not have any real internal or external accountability for how the money gets used.

Altogether, a rather counter-productive way to try to "spread" (and even to demonstrate) democratic values at work...

The other presentation was, necessarily, more nuanced. The "Arab world" is, after all, a much more politically and institutionally diverse a place than Iran. Brown and Hamzawy did a generally good job of describing the present, fairly tenuous, status of the pro-democracy movement in many Arab countries. But in their consideration of what had happened to Washington's "democratization" project of 2004-2005, I think they did less well. They really failed to identify and explain the impact of the 180-degree turn the Bushites made on democratization in Arab countries in late January of 2006-- once it became clear to them that the free and fair elections they'd been calling for in the occupied Palestinian territories had generated a robust Hamas plurality in the PLC.

When I was talking with numerous Arab democrats in Egypt, Jordan, and Syria earlier this year, they all pinpointed two particular positions the US government adopted in 2006 as crucial in their sense that Washington had betrayed the spirit of democracy in the Arab world. The first, as mentioned, was the harshly punitive policy the Bushites adopted toward the elected leadership of the PLC after January 2006; and the second was the strong support Washington gave to Israel's vicious attack in July-August 2006 against the country and people of a Lebanon that was headed by Fuad Siniora-- a man who had emerged from the "Beirut Spring" democratization moves of 2005.

The politics of each of those developments was, at one level, distinct: Hamas was seen as an anti-US (or at least, anti-Israel) force, whereas Siniora was viewed in Washington as very much "on the US side". But for Arab democrats, the fact that the US in one case openly participated in, and in the other strongly encouraged, harsh actions taken against Arab leaderships who had emerged precisely through the Bushite pro-democratization campaign of 2004-2005 led to, as I have said, a strong sense of betrayal.

It strikes me that to promote democratic values and democratic practice one should also practice these values oneself?

Indeed, it is hard to see how anyone in the Arab world-- or, come to that, Iran-- can take seriously Washington's avowals of support for "democratization" if Washington itself is not prepared to deal with differences of policy and opinion using the existing institutions for dialogue and nonviolent conflict resolution but chooses, instead, to do so through force and threats of force.

From this perspective, perhaps we ought to rename the Bushites' campaign. It was not, after all, a true campaign for democratization but rather, an attempt to demagogue the issue for narrowly defined strategic purposes in the Middle East: demagogratization, not democratization.

September 27, 2007 10:28 PM EST | Link

Climate change: Will the real George W. Bush please identify himself?

As President, George W. Bush has been strongly opposed to any treaty-based international mandates regarding greenhouse gas emissions. Condi Rice reiterated this point during the opening presentation she made at the Washington meeting on climate change today, where she said, " Let me stress that this is not a one-size-fits-all effort. Every country will make its own decisions, reflecting its own needs and its own interests, its own sources of energy and its own domestic politics."

Bush and other administration officials have also frequently stressed that technological innovation will provide the answer-- with the strong implication that only an unregulated, mandate-free approach will allow that to happen.

But reel back the time-clock to 1999, and there was Gov. George W. Bush of Texas, enthusiastically signing into law important legislation on "Renewable Portfolio Standards"-- legislation that mandated the state's energy retailers to bring on-line a firmly established amount of renewable energy each year (with the responsibility to do this divided in a proportional way among them.)

If you read p.44 of this (PDF) recent study from Greenpeace International and the European Renewable Energy Council you can read more details about how the Texas RPS legislation worked. The report notes that it worked very well-- establishing the regulatory/incentives context in which Texas rapidly went on to become a real national-level leader in the development and use of windpower:

This year the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) believes as much as 2,000 MW of new wind power could be installed in Texas, potentially a full two-thirds of wind development in the United States.This would bring the total wind power in Texas to over 5,000 MW effectively reaching the state RPS goal set for 2015 only two years ago...

The common view of the success of the wind industry in Texas is that the RPS jumpstarted the market, but now wind competes well on the open market with fossil fuels. Also, the industry development has continued in part because of the creation of a proactive planning process to drive investment in necessary power line upgrades and extensions.

Because the point is, that the regulatory/incentive structure established by government is essential to provide the context in which technological innovation will flourish.

It seems Bush forgot that, somewhere on the way from Austin, Texas, to the White House?

It is also interesting that GWB has not been the only Republican governor who acted sensibly and with foresight on climate-related issues. There is also, of course, Arnold Schwarzenegger over there in California, trying to do a number of fairly farsighted things. (Though I would note, nothing yet as bold as would have been required of the US as a whole if it had been a party to the Kyoto Protocol.) But anyway, there's Arnie, trying to do some two-thirds-good stuff over there in California-- and according to this piece in Tuesday's WaPo, President GWB's officials have been actively working behind the scenes to try to block him!

Here's what Juliet Eilperin wrote there:

The Bush administration has conducted a concerted, behind-the-scenes lobbying campaign to try to generate opposition to California's request to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks, according to documents obtained by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

California, along with 11 other states, is hoping to enact rules that would cut global warming pollution from new motor vehicles by nearly 30 percent by 2016. To do so, California needs a waiver from the Environmental Protection Agency, a request that has been pending for nearly two years. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) has threatened to sue if EPA does not rule on the waiver by Oct. 22.

A flurry of e-mails among Transportation Department (DOT) officials and between its staffers and the White House, released yesterday, highlights efforts that administration officials have made to stir up public opposition to the waiver...

I guess on Friday morning, he is due to address this group of governmental reps at the Washington meeting on climate change that Condi opened today. Frankly, given his appalling record on the climate issue as president, it boggles my mind that at this point he seems to be trying to position himself as in some sense a "pro-green" president.

It was the height of chutzpah, at the APEC meetings last month, when he and Australian PM John Howard-- the two leaders of significant nations who had notably stayed outside the Kyoto process-- were both trying to position themselves as enthusiastic front-runners in the green movement.

I don't think anybody was really taken in. In today's WaPo, Gordon Brown's special rep for limate change, John Ashton, was quoted as saying that self-imposed targets are not enough. "We need to make commitments to each other, not just to ourselves."

And still on the climate-change issue, here's a little chart I made-- using official US government data-- of the different rates of CO2 emissions per-head in various parts of the world. You will see that the US's level is more than twice as high as that of Europe and Japan-- which have equally "advanced" but much more carbon-efficient economies. You can read that in conjunction with this post I put up on JWN on the human-equality aspects of the climate issue a couple of weeks ago.

And finally, we certainly need to pay attention to this public-opinion poll report from the BBC and Globescan/PIPA, which shows that strong majorities in all 21 of the countries where polling was done agree that human activity has been a significant cause of climate change, though the proportions judging that it is "Necessary to take major steps very soon" to deal with the problem is less robust in a number-- but not all-- of the countries.

Significantly, in the US, 59% of respondents agreed with this latter statement-- as did 70% of Chinese respondents.

September 26, 2007 11:23 PM EST | Link

Brzezinski on the power to control vs. power to destroy

I was (re-)reading Zbigniew Brzezinski's recent, shortish book Second Chance: Three Presidents and the Crisis of American Superpower, actually looking for a short couple of sentences that might work as an epigraph in the new book. Brzezinski is a consummate "Realist" in terms of his view of the world. Of proudly Polish heritage, he was a strong Cold Warrior back in the day... (Including, the day when he was Pres. Jimmy Carter's National Security Advisor.)

Well, I haven't found the perfect epigraph-quote yet. May still happen. But I did come across one absolutely riveting quote on the utility (or otherwise) of raw military power in the present era that I want to explore more a bit later in this post. First, though, for anyone who wants to see Zbig talking about the book on the Lehrer News Hour, you can see a Youtube clip of that here.

Okay, so the quote in question is on p.215. It runs thus:

In the past, power to control exceeded power to destroy. It took less effort and cost to govern a million people than to kill a million people.

Today the opposite is true: power to destroy exceeds the power to control. And the means of destruction are becoming more accessible to more actors, both states and political movement. Consequently, with absolute security for a few (notably America itself) becoming only relatoive security for all, collective vulnerability puts a premium on intelligent, cooperative governance, reinforced by power that is viewed as legitimate. Global leadership must now be accompanied by a social consciousness, a readiness to compromise regarding aspects of one's own soveriegnty, a cultural appeal with more than just hedonistic content, and a genuine respect for the diversity of human traditions and values.

"In the past... [i]t took less effort and cost to govern a million people than to kill a million people. Today the opposite is true: power to destroy exceeds the power to control." That is a very important-- and, I believe, true-- observation. But then, there are two directions you can take an argument based on it. He takes the argument primarily in the direction of noting how easy it has become for groups/organizations-- non-state actors as well as states-- to acquire and deploy mega-lethal devices; and from that to the question of the "new" vulnerability of Americans. (Americans were, of course, vulnerable to far more lethal, rapid, and loomingly "imminent" destructive power during the Cold War; and then we had, I guess, a brief decade, 1991-2001, when most US citizens felt largely "invulnerable".)

But you could take an argument based on his initial observation there in the other direction, too: to note that controlling other people in the days of broadband international connectivity is much, much harder nowadays than it was in the old days of European (or Japanese) colonialism. Indeed, if you go to the Youtube clip, he doesn't make exactly that point; but he does say that Bush's foreign policy has been one of trying to enact colonial policies "in the post-colonial era", etc.

The difference between today and the classic colonial era is, it seems to me, twofold. First, nowadays we have the fairly well-established "global norms" of human rights, human dignity, the right to self-governance, etc... and most people around the world really do value and uphold those norms even if large numbers of US citizens really do not seem to. And secondly-- possibly even more importantly-- we have the new capabilities of international communications... so that even if the Bushist spinmeisters are assuring us that everything is going just peachily in Iraq, we can still find out from numerous sources that that is not at all the case.

Indeed, it is that new connectivity between the different parts of the world that makes the "control" paradigm Zbig wrote about so hard to maintain, and that has so radically changed the balance between the "ability to control (or govern)" and the "ability to destroy."

In my view, it is the ability to control that has been eroding in recent decades-- due to the two factors I identified above-- much faster and more significantly than the ability to destroy has been increasing.

After all, fuel-filled airliners are not "new", and nor even was the possibility they might be used as "weapons" new. And roadside bombs and suicide belts are not new, either. What is "new" is the fear-- luckily unsubstantiated as of now-- that rogue elements might get hold of nuclear weapons. But even that fear is not particularly new. (And hey, if we didn't have any nuclear weapons in the world, we wouldn't need to be nearly so fearful about them getting into the wrong hands, would we? Also, are anybody's hands in the world the "right" hands to have nuclear weapons, if nobody else has them? I believe Brzezinski was one of those "wise men" who a few years ago wrote an article saying that the only possibly valid use for nuclear weapons is to deter the use by other people of their nuclear weapons-- in which case, why on earth not go along with the idea of verifiably dismantling everyone's nuclear arsenals all together??)

My bottom line here: I do not in any way disagree with what Zbig wrote after he had made that initial astute observation. But I think his argument could have been a lot richer there. Also, the general point he makes can be seen as strong collateral evidence for what I have started to think and write about the radically decreasing utility of raw military power in the present era.

Regarding the bottom line of his argument in the book, it is that in 1991, the US had a first great chance to build a peaceful, stable, US-led world order, and basically the three Presidents who came along all in one way or another blew it. On p.185 he has a slightly overly cute "Report Card" in which he gives Bush I an overall B for handling of the eight listed items on the global agenda; he gives Clinton a C; and Bush II he gives a clear F.

So that was "the first chance" Washington had to-- in his view-- get it right. And after 2008 Washington will, in his view, have a second chance-- and he warns that it had better get it right "for there will no third chance."

As for me, I'm not sure that he (or Mike and the Mechanics, come to that) has it right. I'm not sure there is a second chance for the US, or perhaps any other power, to play a classic "superpower" role in the world in the present era. Because power has become so widely distributed. Because it is now so hard to "control" even a million people-- let alone 26 million people; let alone 6.4 billion people.

Look, the US is not going to become nothing. It is not about to be invaded by anyone, or pulled apart by outsiders (as Iraq has largely been, by the Bushites), or to slip down into the ranks of being a fourth- or fifth-rank power. Life will still be very good in this country. But in the future we just might-- shock! horror!-- have to figure out how to be and act a little more equal to the other peoples of the world.

Actually, I think we would all become a lot more secure, and our lives a lot richer and better, if we rejoined the rest of the human race as equals.

September 25, 2007 7:59 PM EST | Link

Ramazani: "Bridging the Divides"

** Updates posted below **

As regular justworldnews readers will recognize, Helena and I have presented and commented on numerous essays here by R.K. - "Ruhi" - Ramazani. Here's one on Jefferson & Iraq, another on "Making Gulf Security Durable," and this one on why massive arms sales are not the answer. Tomorrow, he faces a complex heart surgery.

On the eve of this potential life crossroad, the University of Virginia, via UVA Today on-line, published a multimedia tribute to Professor Ramazani's generous service to students, the University, and to the cause of "understanding" between Americans and peoples of the Middle East.

I especially like Professor William Quandt's comment at the essay end:

“One of Ruhi's great hopes has been that he could personally help bridge the divide between the country of his birth, Iran, and the country where has lived for most of his adult life, the United States,” said William B. Quandt, the Edward R. Stettinius, Jr., Professor of Government and Foreign Affairs and an expert on the Middle East. “It remains to be seen whether Ruhi’s hope for reconciliation between the two countries he knows best will take place, but if and when it does, he will have played an important role behind the scenes.”

Several years ago, I published a biographical sketch of how Ramazani's scholarship has compelling echoes in his own life journey. I hope to have it available on line shortly. I'm also in the early stages of a project to "digitize" the best of his half century of writings for ready access to all via the web.

The UVA Today item includes marvelous clips from a recent interview with "the" Professor himself. (look for the link near the top right) In addition to the quotes on what the University has meant to him, about America's fixation with "fixing" things, and his ending optimism about the "oneness of humankind," do enjoy the breathtaking scenery behind him. Warms the heart.

Let's send our good thoughts, wishes, and prayers for his surgery and speedy recovery. We can endeavor to emulate the bridgebuilder; but not replace him.

****************************

Update as of Sept. 26h, 5:00 p.m. est: Via Ruhi's family, we are greatly encouragedby the good reports from the outstanding University of Virginia heart surgeons. Ruhi has pulled through the surgery, with even a few positive surprises. Thank you Dr. Kron!

Ruhi, enjoy your "vacation...." :-} We - and the world - still need you.

September 25, 2007 10:03 AM EST | Link

Bookwriting "Mission Accomplished"

Well I haven't decided which aircraft carrier to make a showboat appearance on yet... Gotta try on my fighter-aircraft piloting duds and have the midshipmen paint the banner...

Nah, that all sounds like too much darn work. Because me, I feel I really did accomplish something already, getting this book manuscript produced and sent off to Paradigm very darn close to the agreed deadline... And anyway, in time to meet my personal deadline, which was today.

It's been a lot of work but I feel I've learned a lot by doing it, and have usefully pulled together in new ways things I knew in some sense before.

The "new" things were mainly what you'll see in Chapters 5 and 6, which are on, respectively, climate change and the shifting global power balances. Re climate change, I have of course long been aware there's a huge "issue" out there. But frankly, when Tom Friedman would keep going on an on about it I often felt that

(1) It looked suspiciously like an attempt on his part to divert attention from the failure of the Bushites' "transformative" project in Iraq to which he had earlier given such strong support (a fact about which to this day he's never provided anything like an adequate self-evaluation or 'mea culpa' for), and

(2) There were huge aspects of the climate change story-- mainly those to do with US policy, as such-- that he was completely missing.

Climate change and the shift in global power balances are the two huge issues of which Bush-- along with the vast bulk of the US political elite from both parties (except Al Gore)-- have all remained recklessly unaware while they have kept 90% of their attention on the still-unfolding debacle in Iraq and the completely mis-focused, and actually unsuccessful, "GWOT".

Indeed, re the shifting global power balances (see my earlier post on the subject here) it is not just that the US political elite has been AWOL attention-wise as these shifts have been occurring in the past 5 years, but the actions and choices of the Bush administration have themselves considerably accelerated these shifts. Well, okay, mainly one fateful choice and all the actions that flowed from that: viz., the choice to invade Iraq unilaterally, without UN approval of the decision and indeed in the face of the publicly expressed opposition of most other world powers to it.

From that point of view, we can see Iraq as the "Angola" of US imperial over-reach... the bridge too far whose taking then sets in train a much broader rollback of the power-projection project. (I have to note that my old and dear friend the strategic analyst Mike MccGwire foresaw all this in a phone conversation he and I had just days after the US invasion, in March 2003.)

The US militarists' misadventures in Iraq have also-- like those of their Israeli counterparts in Lebanon last year-- provided a very valuable lesson to the whole world about the rapid decline in the strategic utility of raw military power in an age when people all around the world can actually see and understand what happens to the people living in the war-zone.

So anyway, I've been learning a lot and shall use much of this new material in shorter pieces that I'm planning to write between now and when the book comes out, next spring.

Meanwhile, big thanks to all of you who responded to my requests for help along the way (and for the general support you expressed for this book project.) I think Christiane will definitely be getting a couple of free copies of the book for her suggestions re epigraphs and graphics. I need to figure out if anyone else will be on the list...

As for me, I wish I could curl up in a ball and sleep for a week but alas I have lots of other things to do. Tomorrow I am giving this talk at the World Bank on the last book (the Africa book.) Yesterday something really nice happened. Last week I sent out an electronic notice about the World Bank gig to an old email list I had of people connected with that book. Over the past few days I've heard back from quite a lot of them-- nice supportive stuff. But the best was yesterday, from Norbert Mao, who's the elected chair of the "LC-5" district in Gulu, Uganda... He wrote that the copies of the book I sent him last year had really helped him deal with all the pressure the Northern Ugandans have been facing to let the ICC proceed with its plan to prosecute the LRA leaders, at a still very complex time in the peace negotiations there.

So it was great to get that feedback from Mao. It reminded me why I write books at all, rather than just posting here on the blog or doing newspaper columns or magazine articles. Books have a solidity and a shelf-life to them that is still quite distinctive. So I guess it is worth all the anguish??

September 23, 2007 10:01 AM EST | Link

Nonviolent actions growing in Burma

I have been so moved to read of the determined and well-disciplined pro-democracy activities of the Buddhist monks (and nuns) in Burma. The Boston Globe has a good picture, along with the AP daylead on the story, here.

English-Al-Jazeera has pretty good version of the Burmese events, too. It includes a picture of monks walking with calm, nonviolent nonviolent activism.

One little mistake there. The parliamentary election that the National League for Democracy won was on 8-8-1988, not in 1990. The results of that election (= power to govern) were then immediately stolen from them by the military-- very similar to what happened to Hamas, 18 years later. And since then, the NLD's leaders and many of its cadres have been ruthlessly hunted down, imprisoned, and in many cases tortured.

NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1991; but that has not prevented the junta from keeping her either in prison or in very tight home-confinement since 1988-- with just one short period when she was allowed a small amount of travel around the country before they clamped down once again.

In my 2000 book The Moral Architecture of World Peace: Nobel Laureates Discuss Our Global Future I had a whole chapter about Daw Suu, as she is called. It was very inspiring to learn about her and the development of the NLD's thinking and organization. I learned a lot from, in particular, these two books: The Voice of Hope (1997), a compilation of discussions she had with writer Alan Clements; and Freedom from Fear (1995), a compilation of her own writings.

In the discussions with Clements, in particular, he seems to be somewhat of a skeptic, asking "But what about choosing violence out of compassion, if it's the right word... ?" Daw Suu replies, "It depends on the situation and I think that in the context of Burma today, non-violent means are the best way to achieve our goal. But I certainly do not condemn those who fight the 'just fight', as it were. My father did, and I admire him greatly for it."

... Well, I am in the last couple of days of work on my book. I totally need to get back to it. Right now. But I couldn't resist blogging about this.

What's happening in Burma these days could change things a lot. In Burma, I certainly hope. But also, far beyond Burma.