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| Bush Needs to Better Explain Complex Terror War |
| 2006-07-13 |
| By Victor Davis Hanson The Bush administration should stop repeating that it is fighting the war on terror for truth, justice and the American way. Instead, the president and his staff should be blunt and explain that, since Sept. 11, it has had to choose between options that are bad or far worse. By all means, the administration should invite critics to suggest constructive alternatives to the way it's handled this war. But it should also point out that those who have honed in on flaws in current U.S. anti-terror policies have so far been bereft of other workable ideas. Take the uniform-less and stateless terrorists being held at Guantanamo Bay. To be sure, there are alternatives to the current U.S. policy, but are they any better? Should we try hundreds of them in American courts like Zacarias Moussaoui or in international tribunals as the Europeans attempted with Slobodan Milosevic? Or send them home to face torture in autocracies like Egypt or Saudi Arabia? Or do we ship the terrorists back to countries that would simply declare them heroes and let them go? And can the critics offer better ways to track terrorists than through wiretapping and surveillance? How, otherwise, would one have learned in time about those in Miami who plotted to take down the Sears Tower, or the Lebanese cadre who planned to blow up the Holland Tunnel? The Bush administration can also use history to show that, despite what detractors say, its techniques aren't so unreasonable. It's worth reminding the American public that Lincoln suspended habeas corpus and shut down newspapers; that Woodrow Wilson imprisoned prominent dissenters like Eugene Debs; and that Franklin Roosevelt ordered the internment of Japanese-American citizens and secret military tribunals for German saboteurs (six of whom were executed) and allowed for the cover-up of military catastrophes (such as the hundreds killed during training exercises for the Normandy landings). In other words, there's an advantage to providing historical perspective by engaging one's critics and answering their charges. The public, for example, should be informed that the accusation that the U.S. went into Iraq for oil ("no blood for oil," as the slogan goes) is not merely inaccurate, but crazy. For starters, gas prices skyrocketed once we induced risky change in the Middle East. How does that benefit the American people? Meanwhile, because of the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq's energy sector has been purged of corruption (such as the U.N.'s scandal-plagued oil-for-food program). In Europe, a poll recently showed that people there view the U.S. as a greater threat than Iran. If this is the case, is it not time to politely suggest to our "allies" that many of our half-century-old military bases in prosperous Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy and Spain have outlived their usefulness? The Arab world's perennial grievances against the United States don't hold up either, given that America has saved Muslims in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Kosovo, Kuwait and Somalia, and provided billions in aid to Egyptians, Jordanians and Palestinians. The Bush administration would also be in the right to wonder aloud whether its domestic critics wish to go back to bombing away without consulting the U.S. Congress or the United Nations as we did in the Balkans. And when Americans are butchered, are we to skedaddle, as both Presidents Reagan and Clinton did, from Lebanon and Somalia respectively? Our present muscular policy - and we also hear this all too infrequently - grew out of just such past bipartisan inaction that led to 3,000 murdered Americans. The truth is that the old way of doing business, rightly or wrongly, was seen by jihadists as encouragement to up the ante with Sept. 11. Ultimately, the Bush administration needs to do a better job of presenting this current war in a far larger context. Jihadists of the Arab world for decades have been at war not with George Bush alone, but with modernity itself. The radical Middle East street may be fascinated by the Internet, satellite television, ATMs and cell phones - but not by the foreign anathema of democracies, religious tolerance, free markets and gender equality that ultimately accounts for such goodies. Here at home, we are witnessing the end of the multicultural dogma. Yes, there are really evil people who wish to kill us for who we are, not what we do - and they embrace cultural assumptions that are not just different from our own, but, let us be honest enough to admit it, far worse. So, there are many fronts in our struggle against Islamic terrorists from the 7th century. The American people must be reminded of our challenges constantly in lieu of platitudes about the inevitable triumph of freedom and democracy. In short, our government should provide much more explanation of this complex war and far less simple declarations about it. Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author, most recently, of "A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War." |
| Posted by:ryuge |
| #12 Anginens Threreng8133, how hard is it to copy paste my name and spell it correctly? Why add the T? Did you think I forgot how to spell my own name? |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2006-07-13 22:25 |
| #11 rjschwartz: Are you not aware that the government of Iran holds only provisional respect for any borders, anywhere? The Islamists believe that sovereignty belongs to Allah, and man-made laws must conform to Sharia. They don't respect our borders, therefore we shouldn't respect theirs. As for the oil fields in what is currently Iran: local savages had little or nothing to do with creation of that industry. One option Bush has is to demand something like $20 billion compensation for the 1979 hostage taking of US diplomats. And, react to Iranian refusal. I don't know exactly what is the Bush administration game plan, but I read something into the fact that the IAF work against the Beirut airport, will prevent quick resupply of Iranian missiles, and that is not something that would have been done without US knowledge. In the cases of the US invasions of Grenada and Panama, President Reagan waited until the days of intervention, before giving reasons for the attacks. Why would President Bush throw his cards on the table before tossing out the Ayatollahs. I would advise that the justification be partly on the fact that the Ayatollahs have each created conditions where they have amassed hundreds of millions of dollars (Rafsanjani has $1.4 billion), by manipulating the economy. Besides the fact that there are minorities who are oppressed by the Islamofascist government, many Iranians are ashamed of the emulation of Arabs by the kleptocrats. Ahmadinejad may have some popularity based on his confidence, but when he begins to look like a pathological loser, that will collapse. |
| Posted by: Anginens Threreng8133 2006-07-13 18:54 |
| #10 Don't think it's been commented on here flyover, and I can't remember how I found it, but it's some article isn't it! :) |
| Posted by: Tony (UK) 2006-07-13 17:48 |
| #9 Damn, Tony! That's a great article - was it ever posted here? Thanks! |
| Posted by: flyover 2006-07-13 17:31 |
| #8 Perhaps AT8133 is alluding to something like this by Ralph Peters, Blood Borders: How a better Middle East would look - it's a great article. Ok, I'm getting the Roadside America brushoff again, the img is here, do check it out...the Soddies really take it in the shortz ;) |
| Posted by: Tony (UK) 2006-07-13 15:23 |
| #7 "and that Iran's borders will be shrunk before September" Anginens Threreng8133 What does this mean exactly? Dismembering Iran into ethnic groups? Invading and taking chunks of land? Removing Iranian clients and thus shrinking their "virtual border"? It's an odd phrase and I'm not sure I get it. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2006-07-13 14:39 |
| #6 There is a great mass of people outside the Islamic world who don't believe there is such a thing as Islamic fascism, and a big chunk of that mass would prefer Western civilization to go out of existence altogether. Hanson presupposes that this mass doesn't constitute the bulk of the opposition to Bush's war. Better explanations by the Bush administration would have no effect whatsoever on the "opposition", really a fifth column. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2006-07-13 14:04 |
| #5 This article reminds me of a boss I once had. He made a bad decision that I had argued against at the time it was made. Later, when the ramifications became apparent, he said it was my fault because I couldn't talk him out of it. Bush has been straightforward in his message. It takes two to communicate, a sender and a receiver. If the receiver is turned off or otherwise screwed up, it is not the sender's fault. There are a great mass of people who don't believe we need a War on Terror. There are people who believe, and scream, that Bush is worse than the terrorists. Nobody's mind will be changed by more sophisticated arguments; only by events. The only question is how many WTC's, Madrids, Londons and Mumbai's its going to take. |
| Posted by: DoDo 2006-07-13 12:21 |
| #4 Bush has also shown he will follow words with actions. When we do go kinetic, it won't be a surprise. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-07-13 11:39 |
| #3 Anginens Threreng8133 I hope you're correct. Either way, you've put forth an intertesting analysis. In today's WaPo, Robert Kagan speculates that Bush is practically bending over backwards on the diplomatic front so as to silence critics if and when diplo-options run out and US chooses to reduce part of Iran into an irradiated ash-heap. |
| Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden 2006-07-13 11:24 |
| #2 Some good points, but: silence speaks. Something huge and decisive is brewing. The White House has said nothing about Ahmadinejad's archipelago of genocide-against-Israel rallies in Iran, and they are taking a business-like approach to the Hamas-Hizbollah war against the Roadmap to Middle East Peace. Nothing will happen until the G8 process ends. I believe that some surprising US allies will be disclosed, and that Iran's borders will be shrunk before September. No Dem with an ounce of integrity would suggest continuing the peace process after what has happened in the last week. Israel is talking total war, and the US will join the chorus. The Euros will come on line. |
| Posted by: Anginens Threreng8133 2006-07-13 10:49 |
| #1 Instead, the president and his staff should be blunt and explain that, since Sept. 11, it has had to choose between options that are bad or far worse. Yeah, like world domination by the islamofascists. And wearing burkas. And forced slavery by the a*shats. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2006-07-13 09:26 |
