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"The stream of Time, irresistible, ever moving, carries off and bears away all things that come to birth and plunges them into utter darkness, both deeds of no account and deeds which are mighty and worthy of commemoration. . .Nevertheless, the science of History is a great bulwark against the stream of Time; in a way it checks this irresistible flood, it holds in a tight grasp whatever it can seize floating on the surface and will not allow it to slip away into the depths of Oblivion. "
- Anna Comnena (1083-1153), The Alexiad
"I have taken all knowledge to be my province."
- Francis Bacon, 1592
Saturday, May 1, 2004
Mirror, Mirror
You know you're living in the bearded Spock universe when you liberate 50 million people from two of the most oppressive regimes on the planet and it's headline-making news that you actually have some support among their co-religionists in your country.
Update: Charles Krauthammer has further evidence that we're in the bearded Spock universe:
The Arabs have variously denounced this as Israeli unilateralism, a departure from the "road map" and a ruse and a plot. The craven Europeans have duly followed suit. And when Tony Blair defied the mob by expressing support for the plan, he was rewarded with a letter from 52 Arabist ex-diplomats denouncing him.
This Nuremberg atmosphere has reached the point where, if Israel were to announce today that it intends to live for at least another year, the U.N. Security Council would convene to discuss a resolution denouncing Israeli arrogance and unilateralism, and the United States would have to veto it. Only Britain would have the decency to abstain.
Against that backdrop of rising anger, the U.S. enterprise in Iraq may not be able to withstand the release of the images from Abu Ghraib, where six U.S. soldiers (six out of 130,000) of the 800th Military Police Brigade tortured imprisoned Iraqis.
Spencer Ackerman is right. Those involved should be prosecuted and if convicted given the punishment they deserve.
In one fell swoop, they undo so much that is good of what we have done there. Rebuilding schools, stocking hospitals, repairing infrastructure, and getting Iraqis economically on their feet again will all be ignored in the face of such appalling misbehavior. The people involved in this are a disgrace to their uniform and to the United States of America. Crime happens everywhere and in every context, but there is no tolerating this.
*Mutter* Ok, one thing's for sure when I get settled I'm going to get broadband or a cable modem or something if it's at all possible.
At home, all I have is dialup, and very slow dialup at that. I think I mentioned I live out in the boonies. We're fairly far out, and there's a couple miles of copper wires before getting to anything "decent". Nope, not even fiber optic dialup here.
Everything takes forever to load, pages sometimes (often) hang and won't load properly and thus need to be reloaded. Thus reading stuff on the web becomes more of a chore than it should be. Writing isn't that hard, but reading stuff to get the info is a pain. Actually, the reading is ok it's getting to the pages that is a chore and a half. So much time is wasted waiting for pages to load. I have a practice of having multiple windows open so I can read something in one window while waiting for the other(s) to load, but even that only goes so far.
Well, just a post venting. But that's one of the reasons I haven't posted much at night over the years, only occasionally, and one of the reasons - but by no means the only one - why posting has been lighter lately. Getting materiel is too frustrating, and contributes to the mental distraction that is an obstacle to writing.
It's not the only factor. There are plenty of reasons why posting here hasn't been as extensive as before, most especially the mental distraction itself. Posts used to flow naturally. It didn't take much external stimulus to get thoughts rolling in my head that would lead directly and often immediately to a post on whatever subject. Lately, however, my mind has been filled with all sorts of other things and it's been difficult to focus on something worth blogging about. It's been difficult to even think of subjects worth writing about.
Part of it is all about "detaching", moving from one physical place to another involving a shift of mindsets. I've been thinking about what I'm going forward into and what I'm leaving behind. I've also been regretting lost time. If only can be a curse. "Get over it" and "snap out of it" I my mind tells myself when I get in such a mood. At least we're going forward now, and it isn't as if I did nothing worthwhile over the last several years.
There's also the process of getting everything sorted out here, all lose ends wrapped up, packing up my stuff so that it can be shipped later and getting rid of things I'm attached to but no longer have a use for and haven't used in years. Even with disposing of a fair amount of what I own in the way of books &tc, I have a lot of stuff that will eventually have to be moved. I'm not a twenty year old and, like I said above, it isn't as if I did nothing worthwhile over the last several years. My accumulated stuff is part of what I have achieved, just as with any life. None of that will accompany to Basic or AIT of course, but it will be saved, stored, and moved later.
Anyhow, lightish posting today.
Update: Markellus N.K. shares a different frustration and oh, boy, I know how that goes, too! Often I have something rolling around in my head that I want to post about, but by the time I get through doing other things that need to get done I'm too exhausted to write it up. . .
I think I agree with Rakhiir, Japan is a bit odd, but in interesting ways.
I think there's an affinity between America and Japan, not because we are identical nations but because there is something about the differences that each other finds fascinating. There seems to be far more interest in Japanese cultural products in America, from games to cartoons to movies, than there is in, say, French or German stuff, even though more Americans are of French or German background than are of Japanese ancestry. It's not just current international differences, either, and it's not because our culture is more closely related to Japans than to French or German culture.
That's why the false dichotomy critics of a transformative foreign policy are off-base. We don't have to make other countries into a copy of America to be on good terms with them. Nor do they have to agree with us on everything. The Japanese have their own way of doing things and while there might be some things we could learn from them, I wouldn't want to do everything their way either. There are possibly things they could learn from us, but that does not imply they will do it our way - when they modernized, industrialized, and democratized, they did not have to Americanize. There is a whole literature in Japan rubbishing American civilization but also a whole set of cultural product admiring it, too. There is variety in Japan just as there is variety in America, but that variety is not a mirror image.
In University I took a course in Japanese politics & society. I wouldn't want us to copy their political system, but nor do I expect them to adopt ours. I think ours is superior, and no doubt the Japanese believe theirs is. A difference of opinion does not lead to antagonisms, however, unless one side insists upon imposing their methods on the other. Arguably, we imposed upon Japan. Actually, inarguably: they were defeated in WWII, and our proconsul, heading up the American occupation, told them what their Constitution would be. They live under it to this day.
This Constitution does not, however, transform Japan into a second, inferior, copy of America - not culturally, and not even politically. It reflected a study of Japan and what would work best in Japan. It has been adapted in practice by the Japanese. No doubt there are some things about how the political system works in Japan that the people criticize, the same way Americans often grouse about how things work (or not) here.
We don't have to Americanize Iraq or the Middle East or the world, and we shouldn't try. That is not our goal and that is not what is intended. If our policy works, and if we win the larger war aimed at eliminating the causes of Islamic terror, we will not be creating a host of mini-Americas. There is nationalism in Japan, sometimes expressed in some of that literature I mentioned above, and sometimes it is ugly – no country or people are perfect. But (knock on wood) it does not express itself in unhealthy ways. But we’re not out to create utopia, either. We can’t do so at home nor do we try to do so abroad. Indeed, utopianism is one of the most destructive forces in history, causing untold misery while simultaneously precluding realistic ambitions from being attained.
America is an odd country, too, but a great force for good in the world - without trying to make everyone like America, though that is often charged by people in the very countries that have benefited from our transformative impulse without having been transformed into America.
The State Department is one of the institutions in need of reform, as I pointed out in my 21st Century Foreign Policy series. It is not because they take the enemy's side, but it is because they are on the other side of an internal divide in the Pan-Western Culture War. This causes them to engage in the war against the war. The consensus atmosphere of career State Department officials is one of collectivist internationalism (see here also) where they act more as the world's envoys to America rather than promoting American interests abroad.
Daniel Pipes has an article up at FrontPageMag exploring why this is. The piece is a review of Samuel Huntington's latest book. Pipes writes that:
Along the way, Huntington observes that Americans can choose among three broad visions for their country in relation to the outside world.
· Cosmopolitan: America “welcomes the world, its ideas, its goods, and, most importantly, its people.” In this vision, the country strives to become multiethnic, multiracial, and multicultural. The United Nations and other international organizations increasingly influence American life. Diversity is an end in itself; national identity declines in importance. In brief, the world reshapes America.
· Imperial: America reshapes the world. This impulse is fueled by a belief in “the supremacy of American power and the universality of American values.” America’s unique military, economic, and cultural might bestows on it the responsibility to confront evil and to order the world. Other peoples are assumed basically to share the same values as Americans; Americans should help them attain those values. America is less a nation than “the dominant component of a supranational empire.”
· National: “America is different” and its people recognize and accept what distinguishes them from others. That difference results in large part from the country’s religious commitment and its Anglo-Protestant culture. The nationalist outlook preserves and enhances those qualities that have defined America from its inception. As for people who are not white Anglo-Saxon Protestants, they “become Americans by adopting its Anglo-Protestant culture and political values.”
Huntington sums up this triad of choices: “America becomes the world. The world becomes America. America remains America.”
Of course, that's not quite the entire range of options. Charles Krauthammer's Irving Kristol award lecture seemed more accurate in its breakdown of options. In some ways, Huntington's options resemble the classic "false choice", at least as Pipes describes them. France does not have to become America and neither does Russia, for example. Nor does Iraq or the Middle East, just as Japan and Germany did not have to become America after WWII.
But the State Department clearly inclines towards the "Cosmopolitan" choice. They have always been keenly interested in getting the world to like us, in preference to advancing America's interests in the world (which makes social gathering with friends from abroad uncomfortable experiences). The easiest way to accomplish that is to go along to get along, adopt the consensus of global elites as defined in foreign capitals where the people they admire reside. Pipes writes:
Cosmopolitans reject the unilateralism of the Iraq campaign, despise the notion of guiding the Iraqis to “a free and peaceful” country, and deeply suspect the Bush administration’s motives. They demonstrate on the streets and hurl invectives from television studios.
Or sabotage from within institutions and engage in hostile leaking to fuel the fires of the television studio ranters. The State Department is far more hostile to and resistant of the policies of a Republican President than a Democratic one - just recall Reagan. They disliked his policies towards the Soviet Union, claiming they would never work and would inflame international tensions. Well, Reagan was right - but that changed few minds in the State Department because this is ideologically driven, and remains so today.
This is one reason why the "Pan-Western Culture War" is so intimately connected to the external war. It's hard to see how one can be won without winning the other as well. It would be far better if we did not have to wage both, but the old saw about it "taking two to fight" is and always was wrong. It only takes one, and then we are stuck with the choice of either capitulation or fighting back. In both these wars, the stakes are too high for capitulation to be an option.
If it's done by the enemy in the war and highlighting it could end up supporting the case the Bush Administration (the "real enemy here") has made:
Perhaps the problem here is that covering this story might mean acknowledging that Tony Blair and George W. Bush have been exactly right to warn of the confluence of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction.
For many whose main war is the one at home to defeat their partisan enemies, stories are looked at primarily on the grounds of whether they help Kerry or, more importantly, hurt Bush. Ones that do are played up, ones that don't are downplayed.
Kenneth Timmerman argues that Saddam's WMDs have been found, but connections aren't being made in news reports, like they might be if Clinton were still President, because it would undermine the case against Bush to report the evidence against Saddam. The big question is why the Bush Administration doesn't emphasize this stuff more. I wrote in the wake of the press conference that I wondered why they couldn't say "programs". It seems like there's a lot more they are reluctant to say, for whatever reason.
But in other contexts, press reporting is not dependent upon what the Administration emphasizes or does not. Especially when it comes to that which doesn't help them. So the only excuse for not mentioning what we have found alongside their reports on what we haven't is partisanship. Full and accurate reporting would include both and let people make up their mind as to whether it was significant or not. Instead, the press prefers to decide for people, and in ways that support their own ideological affinities. Timmerman certainly has his – but so do the “objective” reporters who mention none of this.
Responding to this post from earlier in the week, Jeff Metcalf writes, via e-mail:
Actually, I think that the Army needs to reclassify these reformed brigades. What is actually happening is that the brigades are adding some combined arms integral to their structure, and division combat support and combat service support assets are being assigned to the brigades, while divisions themselves are becoming command nodes (much the same way that numbered armies - well, the one remaining numbered army - are) rather than maneuver elements. (Frankly, our divisions are now so powerful that deploying them as maneuver elements short of a full-scale invasion is ludicrous.) There is an old, proud term for larger units than brigades, with integral support, and we still have a few of them in our Army. Maybe we just need to start calling these units regiments.
Actually, a Brigade is traditionally larger than a Regiment. This is reflected in the rank structure - a Regiment is normally commanded by a Colonel, who is outranked by a Brigadier (General). In the American military today, Regiments and Brigades are typically commanded by Colonels, but the rank structure reflects past practice.
Further confusing things, Armored Cavalry Regiments are really "brigade-like". They are called Regiments precisely to draw upon the Regimental tradition that Jeff mentions. In the rest of the Army, Battalions are associated with traditional Regiments, but the Regiments they are said to belong to are not organizationally meaningful. Brigades in a Division have been the operationally significant unit, and they have simply been consecutively numbered.
It's quite possible to associate a Brigade with a Regiment. After all, that was what was done with the Armored Cavalry Brigades, designating them Regiments and flying the colours of historical Regiments to draw upon their tradition. I suspect - and hope - that with the reorganization that will elevate the Brigade's importance as the basic operation organization, they will be designated as Regiments or at least given the number and colors of a historical Regiment.
There is already some of this, most often in the National Guard. Often a Guard Brigade will be associated with a historical unit, though it's at least as commonly an old Division. When I was in the Wisconsin Army National Guard, I was in HHQ, 132nd Spt Bn, 32nd Infantry Brigade (Mech). The 32nd's Battalions were affiliated with the 32nd Infantry Regiment - but that was simply redesignating the old 32nd Division from WWI & WWII as a "Regiment". That was a Wisconsin Guard Division, and designating things that way allowed the Brigade to draw upon and maintain that unit's history and tradition. It wasn't a "meaningless" designation, as continuity had been maintained. Our Brigade was composed of units that had been part of the 32nd Division. But it's certainly possible for Regular Army Brigades to adopt the numbers, colours, and traditions of historical Regiments, since the Battalions they will be composed of have maintained such ties all along.
I'm alerted to this article by my friend Solmyr, via ICQ, on the new "Arab way of War". Check it out, it looks interesting. I hope to have a better look at it myself when I get back from Denver.
In two week's time this webblog will cease to publish. May 11th will likely be the last day of posting for most of summer, possibly through mid September, unless a suitable "Guest Blogger" appears to fill in. In any case, I won't be here. No internet access in Basic of course, though from what I gather possibly limited e-mail through a .mil account. I might put that up before I go in case people are interested in writing. It's possible that at AIT when we reach the point where we have weekend liberty I'll write some posts from time to time.
I'm hopeful that when I am settled in at my permanent duty assignment I'll have time to resume blogging. There's a host of "Milbloggers" out there. I also want to get cracking on finishing my degree. I'm looking forward to going off to training but will miss the internet. I don't expect people to keep coming to this blog when there's nothing new here for you to read.
I hardly ever write about myself here, though from time to time I have put in personal stuff. But it's not that kind of blog because I'm not that kind of person. But I hope readers will indulge me a bit while I break that practice. I'm a huge optimist about the opportunities out there in this country, as regular readers will probably know from having read this blog. But I have not been confident of my ability to take advantage of those opportunities. In the realm of ideas, writing, thinking, politics, policy, and all sorts of impersonal stuff I am very confident, but not so much personal stuff.
The internet has been a blessing for me. I have more people who I consider friends who I have never seen than those who I have. In part that is because of where I live, out in the boonies. There are few people here, and even fewer who share my interests. But in large part it's because I'm introverted and shy until I get to know someone. The thing I'm going to miss most of all is interacting with people on the internet. When I was in Basic last time around, in '88, there wasn't that (or I wasn't really aware of it, anyhow) so I didn't miss its absence. I'm pretty confident that Basic isn't going to be a problem - I still remember a lot from before. I'm looking forward to the Army and I should have gone in years ago. As I wrote when I announced signing up, a lot of things held me back over the years, some significant and others in retrospect less so. Giving this up, even for two or four months, was one of those mental blocks. There are people out there who I game and chat with who I'm going to miss in the interim.
It's silly and stupid. I know that. But people can be silly and stupid. I also know it'll be over quickly and I'll be doing kewl and interesting things, quite busy no doubt - especially in Basic; even if there was internet access by some chance, there would be no blogging. Your days are very busy and by the end of the day you're good and tired. I met some good people the last time around, in both Basic & AIT. But while I'm looking forward to all the things I'll be doing I can't help but have some trepidation about the things I'll be leaving behind, even while knowing I can jump right back in when training is over.
Thinking and writing is where I am most comfortable. In a lot of ways, this will be an excellent break and bring with it new experiences. Over the last several months, I think that this blog has improved in some ways but also gotten worse in some. Improved because I think my writing has gotten crisper and better. Special thanks to Joe Katzman for helpful tips on writing. But it's gotten worse in other ways because my mind has not been as sharp and focused. When it's on, it's still on, but that hasn't been as frequent as before and I have often had to make a very conscious effort to get things rolling in my head. Before it would just come automatically in response to something I read or heard or picked up.
There's been a lot of mental clutter and the source of that is obvious. I've stagnated here and it's time to get up off my butt and go out and jumpstart my life. But people - most people - don't like change and I never have been comfortable jumping into the unknown. What I really want is to be settled in at my permanent duty station, doing my job, contributing to something worthwhile, with all my stuff moved, and once again able to think, write, and interact with people who I've never seen or met but many of whom I consider friends none the less. We'll see what the future brings.
There will be limited posting today and hardly any tomorrow, as I have to go up to MEPS for an MOS-related test. That will be a snap; it's to see if I can type 20 wpm. I can type three times that fast. I can type almost as fast as I used to be able to think. They're flying me all the way to Denver for that. *sigh*
If you're into "Gawd Games" but don't have a lot of time or like 'em simple, check out NationStates. It's skewed Left - the author's idea of "unbiased" is the same as that of the New York Times - but can be fun anyhow.
If you join, drop by the Region "The YoungWorld" (no space between YoungWorld), say hi to "The Free League" (my nation). If you bump into Gothic Kitty, be as nice to her as you would to me.
Reader Marquis sends, via e-mail, a link to this article on China's continued interference with the democratic process in Hong Kong. Hong Kong's democracy movement is unlikely to simply accept this.
People have always said that the Chinese government wouldn't do anything to "kill the goose that laid the golden egg" in Hong Kong. But that implies that a corrupt post-communist oligarchy knows what the goose is. I've written before on the unlikelihood of that.
In one sense, the headline Militants in Europe Openly Call for Jihad and the Rule of Islam comes as no surprise. In another sense, the relative lack of attention even now, does. The cult of death is still there, with Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammad describing his following as "people who want death". No doubt he doesn't include himself - the leaders of these sects are happy to encourage their following to want death but do not put themselves on the line.
European governments express concern over things like this, but if you judge real concern by action, it's hard to see much. We do not expect other cultures to tolerate movements dedicated to their destruction, but there is a level of passivity throughout much of the West to not only threats, but actions, based on that desire. I have written before that I am adamantly in favor of welcoming immigrants of whatever background who want to join our society and live within our civilization. But that is not the same as welcoming a viper to your bosom.
Phillip Beckman, who sent the link to me (via e-mail), wrote as follows:
How soon until Europe becomes the battleground between the West and Islamist radicals? Perhaps sooner than people would like to believe. Europe is more vulnerable than the US. The Transnational Progressive ideology has weakened Europe's institutional and philosophical commitment to the defense and perpetuation of Western Civilization. Reading this article underscores for me how important the War of Ideas within the West truly is. The postmodern leftist interpretation of Western Civilization that has come to dominate our institutions of higher learning is corrosive in that it presents WC (and America) as deserving of the wrath of Islamist terrorists and that WC is so horrible and evil that it would actually be a good thing for it to disappear. Those of us who believe that America and Western Civilization are worth defending have a lot of work to do...
All true. I'll note here that immigrants have been at the forefront of such defenses, because they know the alternative, having experienced it. But we have a different breed here. We need to be careful to winnow the wheat from the chaff, welcome those who value what they are entering and not those who wish to see it destroyed.
As I've written before, though, it would help if so many of the people born in the West hadn't been taught to distrust and devalue it themselves.
An interesting observation and conflict between historical Persia and the Mullahs who hold the Iranian people in thrall today. Guess which side the people of Iran are on?
The Mullahs can't last forever, but people should remember that despotism has often held people in its grip for long periods in spite of their lack of support.
Did a staff ride, about a month ago. Hit the Ardennes, around the Schnee Eiffel. Battle of the Bulge. Two interesting facts. During WWII, the Army built 66 divisions. Of the 8 million, or so, Soldiers in the ETO, there was a recognition that there were not enough rifles.
Fast forward to today.
Today, the killing power of the US Armed Forces (Ground) is not in the division, but in the brigade (Unit of Action--what the 1st MEF has arrayed against Falujah, if politics would let them free). GEN Schoomaker is pushing for going from 33 UAs to 45.
Air Defense Artillery is a dying MOS (as long as the USAF is supreme). Those, "fungible" personnel will be retrained as rifles.
Bottom line. We are transforming. But not in the "peace dividend" sort of way.
I argue with my friends, but for me, it is a reality--- the only way to transform is under pressure.
We feel the pressure. And are transforming.No more could Bush have attacked
Afghanistan in 2001 (early), than we could have seen the changes we're experiencing now. Pressure.
Hold off on the "draft". Please.
Gah! I wondered if I was making a mistake in not explicitly saying I don't favor a draft and don't believe it is needed or even desirable. The Army transformed in the '80s as well, becoming the much better force that triumphed in the Gulf War (I) in '91. It underwent a lot of change and improvement, but also got bigger. It was significantly larger then than it is now, drawn from a smaller population base than we have now.
It was also an all-volunteer force. So the force can be expanded without resorting to a draft (see posts here and here from last summer; also here). Indeed, a conscript army is exactly what we don't need and don't want.
A conscript army would be a major step back. Service would be either short, or there would be a super-abundance of exemptions from service, or we would end up with way more people in service than we need. Probably a combination of all three. Standards would decline with shorter terms of service, as the highly technical modern army benefits from having well-trained soldiers, not short-term draftees. It's one of the main differences between our armed forces and those of some of our European allies, Britain again excepted. It's not an accident that Britain has one of the few militaries that is operationally compatible with ours on distant battlefields. Other countries are now attempting, or at least considering, the transformation that our military underwent in the '70s, abandoning conscription in favor of an all volunteer force.
I'm certainly not in favor of us going in the reverse. People who make proposals to bring back the draft are doing so out of military ignorance and are driven by politics. I remain committed to a volunteer military, but it was once bigger and it can be enlarged without a draft. The transformation Beets talks about remains necessary, but in my opinion increasing the force structure is part of that.
Update: Of course, what Beets points to is an effective increase in maneuver elements &MEGs, the equivalent of adding 4 division's worth (lots of us still think in terms of divisions), without significantly increasing the force structure (though the Army has approval to increase by 40,000 - a number Kerry is taking credit for advocating but is already in its strength). That might be enough. Some people think it will be, but I still wonder.
The state of the economy, and in particular job growth, is a major issue in the campaign. It's important to be accurately informed on it, so check out my latest piece at Enter Stage Right. As usual, there's a bunch of good articles there, check 'em all out.
In this Buggy Professor post, related to this post from Saturday. This stuff does have an affect outside of the university, and the Buggy post illustrates both. On the one hand, good scholars can help inform us of the nature of our enemies (and friends, and everything else under the sun), but the ideologues who dominate scholarship cloud and obscure reality rather than illuminating it. It isn't just students that are affected. Policy and the lens through which the larger society views the world is skewed as a result.
