Lessons Learned
Victor Davis Hanson ponders the lessons learned from the successes, and the failures, in the U.S. response to 9-11. Is it my imagination, or is he more cynical than usual? Especially in this section on the Europeans and the U.N.
And I think he's right on, too, about bracing Americans for the truth that, no matter how much good we accomplish or encourage in the world, we're just going to be hated and hated and hated, especially in the Arab world, for the rest of the natural lifetime of everyone reading this. Whether you're an idealist or a realist, in foreign policy terms, this applies. Get used to it. The good news is, the ideal and the real do converge on democracy promotion, regardless of whether it gets us loved or not.
As I've said before, the image of the Middle East that I expect, if we succeed there, is not Yankeephilia. It's more like Robert Pollock's depiction of Turkey. Or France. We're hated there. But they have something better to do with their lives than trying to kill us all. As New Sisyphus put it:
The worst attitude toward the Europeans and the U.N. is publicly to deprecate their impotent machinations while enlisting their aid in extremis. After being slurred by both, we then asked for their military help, peace-keepers, and political intervention — winning no aid of consequence except contempt in addition to inaction.
Praise the U.N. and Europe to the skies. Yet under no circumstances pressure them to do what they really don’t want to, which only leads to their gratuitous embarrassment and the logical need to get even in the most petty and superficial ways. The U.N. efforts to retard the American removal of Saddam interrupted the timetable of invasion. Its immediate flight after having its headquarters bombed emboldened the terrorists. And a viable U.S. coalition was caricatured by its failed obsequious efforts to lure in France and Germany. We should look to the U.N. and Old Europe only in times of post-bellum calm when it is in the national interest of the United States to give credit for the favorable results of our own daring to opportunistic others — occasions that are not as rare as we might think.
And I think he's right on, too, about bracing Americans for the truth that, no matter how much good we accomplish or encourage in the world, we're just going to be hated and hated and hated, especially in the Arab world, for the rest of the natural lifetime of everyone reading this. Whether you're an idealist or a realist, in foreign policy terms, this applies. Get used to it. The good news is, the ideal and the real do converge on democracy promotion, regardless of whether it gets us loved or not.
In response, American policy should be predicated not on friendship or the desire for appreciation, but on what is in our national interest and what is right — whose symbiosis is possible only through the current policy of consistently promoting democracy. Constitutional government is not utopia — only the proper antidote for the sickness in the Middle East, and the one medicine that hateful jihadists, dictators, kings, terrorists, and theocrats all agree that they alike hate.
As I've said before, the image of the Middle East that I expect, if we succeed there, is not Yankeephilia. It's more like Robert Pollock's depiction of Turkey. Or France. We're hated there. But they have something better to do with their lives than trying to kill us all. As New Sisyphus put it:
Turkey is the new Middle East’s future. We are likely to be hated for some time to come. But we are hated in Spain and France as well. The hatred, by itself, the opposition to U.S. policies, by itself, is only of minimal import.
A nascent fascism has taken root in the Muslim world. There is no escaping the hate, the anger, the all-important grievances. But what we can escape is the full consequence of that hatred. By opening up a democratic space in the Middle East, we allow other, competing interests—like the interest of bettering one’s lives, of one’s children having a better life—to fight it out with the Grievance Party. By creating a context for the natural give-and-take of democratic politics we increase the likelihood that the hatred will be deflected and minimized until it recedes.
Make no mistake: Bush’s policy is designed to protect us specifically and the West in our interest. It’s nice when an Iraqi thanks us for their election day, but the truth is it doesn’t matter whether or not they are grateful.
The goal is Turkey: hate-filled, conspiracy-fuelled, but still democratic, moderately secular, peaceful and relatively prosperous. As bad as it is for us to look at squarely, a Middle East full of states like Turkey is the best we can hope for out of a terrible situation.
This is what victory looks like. They still hate us, they still despise us, but they also have their lives, other things to devote energies to.
Let the next generation work on their hearts and minds. Right now we must do everything we can to make this work. Fail, and we’re looking at a repeat of World War II.
