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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, December 16, 2006
Economic Interconnectivity and Peace
Does economic interconnectivity promote peace?
In many cases, yes. But in some of those cases it's in the sense of the European Union and others not wanting to confront Iran over their nuclear ambitions, because of economic connections, or anyone confront Putin's Russia too strongly when it brazenly assassinates political opponents in our capital cities, &tc.
This isn't to say that interconnectivity is bad, just that it isn't the unvarnished good, sans downside, that many people present it as.
Economic interconnectivity does promote peace, usually in a good way. But not always or inevitably so - especially when the decent are timorous, and use it as an excuse for an absence of stalwartness in confronting challenges to the values they claim to hold dear. Thus, economic connectivity decoupled from strong policy is essentially empty and platitudinous.
In any case, we are, or were, at it. I'm reminded of a three-volume history of the Byzantine (East Roman) Empire written some years ago by John Julius Norwich. The middle volume was titled "The Apogee". After that, everything was tragedy.
Will it be so for us? Well, right now things are looking like a tragic farce: Never has a nation been so powerful, and never has a nation so powerful been so apparently impotent. Mostly for reasons of its own creation.
Of course, many people say such - but they usually mean it in the wrong way (in my opinion), and Krauthammer cautions us against the Amerocentric Fallacy (wherein all good, or more commonly all evil, things are ascribed to American causation). But much of what renders us impotent is of our generation, or the consequence of our politics. I mean, overall, an impartial observer with a sense of history would not say that the enemies the West (broadly considered) faces today are all that puissant. Indeed, they are notable for their inherent weakness, individually or collectively - at least if opposed by anyone willing to be stalwart and resolute. Yet they are obviously feeling their oats now, triumphantly murdering people from Beirut to the heart of London and mocking the possibility that anything will be done about it, sounding the victory horns from Pyongyang to Teheran to Caracas, not even daring us to do anything about it but knowing nothing will be done about it, openly and brazenly Sadr opposes us in Baghdad and our own allied government their shields a man wanted by their own law, knowing that when the "satanic, abusive occupier" is told to back off from bringing him to justice, we shall stay our hand and do nothing.
People talk about the West being in decline, but it still has approximately 50% of global GDP. Materially, it is at least as powerful as it has been for a century. What it is lacking in is the fortitude to stand up to the challenges of even minor enemies with resolve. That will make all the difference, in the end. Call it the "broken windows theory of international relations", if you'd like.
I need not even get started about our domestic politics, which, if anything, resemble nothing so much as that of the self-destructive domestic politics of Imperial Byzantium in the middle half (roughly 1025-1081) of the 11th century.
"So in the Libyan fable it is told,
that once an eagle, stricken with a dart,
said when he saw the fashion of the shaft
'with our own feathers, not by others' hands
are we now smitten."
- Aeschylus
Well, anyhow, at least one of the parties is fighting mad, now. It's just that our brave "Fighting Dems" are fighting mad against their domestic political opponents, not our country's enemies.
Does running for President allow a candidate to freelance at a time of war by talking to our enemies and triangulating against the president? Why is Gov. Richardson talking to North Koreans, or Sen. Kerry trying to talk to the Iranians, or Sen. Bayh to the Syrians? Wouldn’t that be like a Tom DeLay talking to Milosevic to undermine Clinton during the Kosovo bombing? Or Trent Lott dealing with the Taliban as Clinton sent cruise missiles against them?
Read the whole thing, as they say, especially the final suggestion, which is close to what I said
What the ISG offers us are mere aspirations, with no serious consideration of the concrete means required to fulfill those aspirations.
I've been in agreement with those who have said that if we're going to send someone to Syria, it should be Baker himself: Let him put up or shut up. Only problem is, he would happily sell our allies in the region down the river on behalf of his Saudi employers and other "forces of regional stability", and give concessions to our enemies. So that might not be a good "call his bluff" act after all.
Realism my arse: This the ISG was an exercise in academic wishful thinking at best, and actively mischevious at worst. Sure, there are some good ideas in there, but most of the proposals that are being most widely highlighted are the worst ones, the ones most dependent on fatuous King Canute pronouncements.
We never should have gotten rid of it. It was a false economy, an ironic one since the closest thing to immortality is a government program: Especially "temporary" ones.
It's a sad commentary on the last fifteen or so years that one of the very few government programs that actually got eliminated/"cut" was one we actually need and one which made a positive contribution (rather than a negative one, as many do). All kinds of boondoggles survived the "ruthless Republican Class of 1994's" "budget axe", in the end (sometimes despite actual effort to rid us of such things, I will give that credit). The success in eliminating USIA was a tragic loss.
Of course, the USIA wouldn't make up for the fact that we live in a global media environment such as the one satirized here, an environment where all our information efforts are dismissed as "propaganda" while enemy propaganda is unskeptically reported. But it would be helpful none the less.
You can't win if you don't try, and the lack of USIA essentially means that all too often "our team" forfeits the information game because it doesn't even show up.
So, if there was an agency the Democrats wanted to bring back in their efforts to "reverse the draconian cuts imposed by the Republican Congress", I'd support them in bringing back the USIA, restoring it as it once was. It isn't a silver bullet, but it doesn't have to be.
