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News Gram™ September 2006

September 2006 ~ Volume 13, No. 2

America is at war. The strange thing is that a lot of Americans don’t recognize this fact. With nightly terrorism alerts, news from two fronts, concerns that a third is imminent and the looming possibility of nuclear terror, most people – here and abroad – are going on with their lives as if nothing has changed. False. Everything has changed – the future of the next generation, the economy and the social fabric. We have not yet re-instituted a draft, though that question will be raised before the next presidential election.

There are numerous explanations for and against the present conflict. Here’s one model, the Two Camp Model, to consider when thinking about these still early days of the new millennium:

The Historical Camp: This position argues that the war is but the latest iteration of a modern historical struggle between fascism and democracy. Its adherents argue that we have already seen what happens when we take a “reasoned” or “diplomatic” approach to the likes of Hitler or Mussolini. Neville Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister in the dark days leading up to World War II appeased Hitler by not opposing his intrusion into Czechoslovakia, after meeting with him in Munich, and the result was the most devastating conflict the world had ever seen. This view is a bit simple-minded, as Henry Kissinger points out in his book, Diplomacy, but it has merit when one considers that we might have prevented war if the allied powers had stopped Hitler’s aggression two or three years before his invasion of Poland in 1939. The question, though, is whether this historical analogy works or whether the resemblance with Europe circa 1935 is only apparent. For one, the present enemy is not a nation state. There is no single army. There are few diplomatic channels through which to negotiate with whomever speaks for the enemy on a particular day. Nevertheless, the idea of a belligerent opponent relatively limited in its ability to inflict ongoing damage to its foes does have traction in the present context.

A historical position that does not necessarily reach the same conclusion takes the view that a better historical model for the present situation is not Europe in the thirties but the same place in the first decade of the 20th century. These are the days leading up to World War I. First, it’s well to recall that Europe had succeeded in achieving 100 years of peace from the days of the Congress of Vienna between 1814 and 1815 to the guns of August, 1914. However, this peace was paid for, in part, by numerous alliances that would oblige the member states to take up arms in case of one or another of their partners were attacked. In other words, Europe was a powder keg waiting for a match to be lit. That match was the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, assassinated on June 28, 1914 by anarchists who were furious with the European state system. They had already murdered about 2000 people prior to the assassination.

In a recent Atlantic article, James Fallows makes the point that the anarchists may have won the conflict they began. Baldly put, their murder of a single individual brought about not just the First World War, but also the Russian Revolution, World War II and the Cold War. The face of Europe – and its soul – would likely be very different today. Since the immediate cause of the war was the assassination of the Archduke, we can reasonably ask, “Was that single act justification for starting the war? Analogously, was the bombing of the World Trade Center reason enough for the bellicose actions of the United Sates?

The Political View: Again there are two positions here. The first argues that American hegemony will ultimately bring about worse calamities than its early successes might suggest. It will inevitably instigate ongoing resentment and rebellion against the status quo it imposes on the rest of the world, say its advocates. Nor is it a fair arrangement, since they view America as exploiting other states for its own narrow and selfish purposes. Those with such a view are opponents of the present conflict and regard the United States as the primary aggressor.

On the other hand, there is the preemptive view. This position argues that in the case of the present situation, there is a clear justification for preemptive war, a preventive measure that would avoid a more calamitous conflict. Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz, in his book Preemptive War, argues that had England and France opposed Hitler in the thirties, World War II would never have taken place. Of course, the problem is that it is very hard to know what the outcome would have been if such a preemptive action were not taken.

Hopefully, this is a model that can serve as a basis for reasoned discussion. At least, we can hope for such a result.

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