25 July 2006
Pandaemonium
Those who agree with Peter Galbraith’s op-ed in the New York Times of 25 July 2006 include Lawrence O’Donnell. He was at one time a legislative aide to Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who wrote a brilliant survey of the breakup of multiethnic societies, includingYugoslavia, in 1993: Pandaemonium. Perhaps O’Donnell had something to do with that book.
One of Galbraith’s conclusions is that Iraq ought to devolve into three separate entities, including a Kurdistan where the U.S. military should be installed, Shia and Sunni states. As O’Donnell said today on the Al Franken Show, people pretty much accepted the disappearance of Yugoslavia because it became evident that it didn’t make sense. What he didn’t say was that the only person to whom it made sense was Tito—it fed his megalomania.
The same was true of Saddam and his predecessors, beginning with King Faysal. Although Saddam’s brutality may have provided some justification for the U.S. invasion, the melting away of the authoritarian regime that was holding together a country of warring factions may be the serendipitous result of the neocon war on Iraq.
Those who agree with Peter Galbraith’s op-ed in the New York Times of 25 July 2006 include Lawrence O’Donnell. He was at one time a legislative aide to Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who wrote a brilliant survey of the breakup of multiethnic societies, includingYugoslavia, in 1993: Pandaemonium. Perhaps O’Donnell had something to do with that book.
One of Galbraith’s conclusions is that Iraq ought to devolve into three separate entities, including a Kurdistan where the U.S. military should be installed, Shia and Sunni states. As O’Donnell said today on the Al Franken Show, people pretty much accepted the disappearance of Yugoslavia because it became evident that it didn’t make sense. What he didn’t say was that the only person to whom it made sense was Tito—it fed his megalomania.
The same was true of Saddam and his predecessors, beginning with King Faysal. Although Saddam’s brutality may have provided some justification for the U.S. invasion, the melting away of the authoritarian regime that was holding together a country of warring factions may be the serendipitous result of the neocon war on Iraq.
10 July 2006
Enemy Combatants
Defining terrorists as “enemy combatants” in a war on terror analogizes military forces in traditional nation-state conflicts. In this war on terror, Western civilization is the victim and radical Islamicists, the aggressor.
Terrorists do not choose to join this attack as a result of a rational process. They are not part of a conspiracy. They are closer to being draftees. They are impressed into service not by civic coercion, but by the emotional suasion wielded by their spiritual leaders.
This is not to say that terrorists deserve sympathy for having unwillingly taken part in a harmful act. They must be subjected to the rule of law in the civil society that they have violated. However, it is clear that that society would be less civil if it suspended its laws in order to deal with terrorists.
Defining terrorists as “enemy combatants” in a war on terror analogizes military forces in traditional nation-state conflicts. In this war on terror, Western civilization is the victim and radical Islamicists, the aggressor.
Terrorists do not choose to join this attack as a result of a rational process. They are not part of a conspiracy. They are closer to being draftees. They are impressed into service not by civic coercion, but by the emotional suasion wielded by their spiritual leaders.
This is not to say that terrorists deserve sympathy for having unwillingly taken part in a harmful act. They must be subjected to the rule of law in the civil society that they have violated. However, it is clear that that society would be less civil if it suspended its laws in order to deal with terrorists.
