Pax Americana

Daniel McCarthy, unsurprisingly, uses my remark that "unless you’re a very stringent non-interventionist" almost any foreign-policy theory can provide grounds to argue for a given overseas intervention to mount a brief for non-interventionism. He writes:

Yes, exactly — which is why some of us at TAC (by no means all) counsel “very stringent” non-interventionism. Douthat is correct that whatever the theoretical differences between neoconservatism, liberal internationalism, and a variety of other interventionist perspectives may be, they all give policymakers — specifically, the executive branch — wide discretion for waging war. Stringent noninterventionism and pacifism provide a check against that. Douthat criticizes Michael by saying, “the paleocon lens tends to obscure some very real distinctions between neocons and liberal internationalists,” but Douthat himself acknowledges that, performatively, those “real distinctions” aren’t so real after all. I think Douthat would have to agree with Michael that Yglesias is wrong when he says, “America traditionally hasn’t engaged in Iraq-scale blunders.” Over 50 years, liberal internationalism, Cold War conservatism, and neoconservatism have engaged in many such wars, some rather bigger (Vietnam, Korea) and others somewhat smaller (Gulf War I, Kosovo) than our present neocon adventure.

But hope springs eternal for Douthat. Five decades of blundering interventions doesn’t convince him that interventionism in general is a bad idea. Like Doug Feith and everybody else, he just wants smarter interventions, prudent interventions — better management ... But where is this caution going to come from? Who counsels it? There was at least a minority of liberal internationalists who opposed the Iraq War, and I tend to agree with Douthat that if Gore had been president we would not have invaded Mesopotamia. But I think it’s quite probable that Gore would have taken us into Darfur or Somalia (which, unlike Iraq, actually was and is an al-Qaeda base), and I doubt such an intervention would have proven much more prudent or successful than Bush’s Iraq farrago. Liberal internationalists have at least as bad a record as the neocons ...

If you want a prudent foreign policy that keeps America out of unwinnable wars in places like Iraq and Somalia, you should support noninterventionism. Neither neoconservatism nor liberal interventionism nor old-fashioned Cold War conservatism will ever be cautious enough to avoid such entanglements. To hope that any of these ideologies of intervention will “proceed with greater caution” than they have in the past half-century is as vain as to hope that visiting the Department of Motor Vehicles will one day, under the right management, be an efficient and pleasant experience.

I think my disagreement with the non-interventionist point of view comes down to the question of whether the benefits that flow from the Pax Americana that's been created by America's quasi-imperial role in the world are worth the blunders that more-or-less inevitably accompany it. If you think that the international scene over the last sixty years would have looked roughly the same without a large American presence abroad - without the doctrine of containment and its sometimes-effective, often-clumsy implementation, and without the likelihood that the American military would intervene to punish cross-border aggression and the possibility that the American military would intervene to prevent humanitarian tragedies - then non-interventionism makes a great deal of sense. If, on the other hand, you believe - as I do - that the Pax Americana is largely responsible for the absence of major cross-border wars and the general upward ascent in human affairs since the calamities of the early twentieth century (an ascent from which the United States itself has benefited enormously), then you'll be more inclined to look at the various disasters we've waded into as arguments for greater caution in exercising our quasi-imperial function, rather than arguments for giving up our present role entirely. So I think that Harry Truman blundered, obviously, when he order American troops across the 38th Parallel; likewise, I think George H.W. Bush blundered (though to a lesser degree than Truman) when he left the U.S. stuck garrisoning Saudi Arabia following the first Gulf War. But overall, I think better a Korean War and the two Iraq Wars, however badly executed, than the more, shall we say, freewheeling international order that prevailed prior to the Pax Americana - better for the world, and better for America.

As for the secondary point of whether it's vain to hope for the sort of caution I'd like to see in foreign policy without a purist non-interventionism as our north star, I'm afraid I don't agree. There have been plenty of reckless decisions undertaken by American leaders over the last half-century, but there have also been plenty of leaders who proceeded with an admirable caution in committing American troops abroad, without being anything close to purist non-interventionists in spirit or in practice. The presidencies of Reagan and Eisenhower, in particular, stand out as eras when a broadly internationalist spirit proved compatible with avoiding large-scale blunders overseas. But there are plenty of other examples within specific Presidencies: I'm no admirer of John F. Kennedy and Harry Truman, but they showed admirable caution in refraining from invading Cuba and bombing China, respectively, when many hawkish voices were urging such a course. Likewise, George H.W. Bush refrained from occupying Iraq in 1991 (though of course that created other problems down the road), Bill Clinton refrained from intervening in Rwanda (wrongly, in my view, but that's an argument for another day) and from committing ground troops to the Kosovo War, and even George W. Bush has displayed a great deal of caution (albeit only after the chastening experience of Iraq) in his approach to North Korea and Iran, among other states. All of which is to say that the notion that we cannot hope for prudence in our leaders unless they explicitly renounce interventionism in all (or almost all) cases seems to me to borne out by neither logic nor experience.

Comments

To hope that any of these ideologies of intervention will “proceed with greater caution” than they have in the past half-century is as vain as to hope that visiting the Department of Motor Vehicles will one day, under the right management, be an efficient and pleasant experience.

Not strictly germane, but--I recently had to get my driver's license renewed, with a fresh photo--meaning I couldn't renew by mail. I went to DMV, and was out in ten minutes. A computer station let me check my information, I stepped to a camera station for the photo, the license was printed out, was laminated, and was handed to me. An efficient and pleasant experience. I know it's inconceivable to conservatives, but that's part of the problem with conservatives.

Posted by David in Nashville | June 18, 2008 10:56 AM

"the Pax Americana is largely responsible for the absence of major cross-border wars and the general upward ascent in human affairs since the calamities of the early twentieth century"

And once again, a central tenet of conservatism is reduced to blind faith.

Posted by rickm | June 18, 2008 10:57 AM

The whole idea of pax Americana is absurd in the first place. To honestly think that the United States is, can be, or ought to be the arbiter of world policing is the ultimate hubris, equalling the Roman Empire which also believed its own press releases.
Pax Americana is a mere disguise for American self-interest. While I have no problem with taking care of our own first, with everyone else coming later, I am content in calling self-interest exactly what it is. To hide behind some facade of moral superiority, a la Neocons or other Interventionists, is an outright hypocrisy.
Call it what you want, but the Unted States proceeds at its own risk when it decides to "intervene." When the intervention inevitably backfires, we must simply look in the mirror to see who is the fool.

Posted by hartman_john | June 18, 2008 11:25 AM

I don't think we can give Eisenhower a pass on replacing Mossadegh in Iran to make room for the Shah (An operation led by Kim Roosevelt). It may have been a bloodless coup, but the ramifications are, obviously, still with us today.

Posted by anonymous | June 18, 2008 11:36 AM

If, on the other hand, you believe - as I do - that the Pax Americana is largely responsible for the absence of major cross-border wars and the general upward ascent in human affairs since the calamities of the early twentieth century ....

Would you mind posting on why you believe this? It's a hard question to answer, but which parts of the world might have seen cross-border wars if the USA had not kept troops abroad following WWII and Korea?

Posted by Joe Magarac | June 18, 2008 12:01 PM

Eisenhower was under enormous pressure to fight North Vietnam , China [Quemoy, Matsu islands], Egypt [Suez Canal] and others. He resisted these pressures for various reasons including that most of his advisors didn't really understand the reality of war.

However, Eisenhower, mainly through Dulles, kept these countries off balance with credible threats to go to war. Stalin for one was very aware of Eisenhower's view that America, if necessary, was ready to fight a punishing war against the Soviet Union.

This fits with Donald Kagan's thesis in The Origins of War and Preservation of Peace that wars are often caused by vacillating leaders and prevented by resolute ones.

That's why in my view there is probably more danger of war with Obama than McCain.

Posted by Peter Leavitt | June 18, 2008 12:38 PM

Peter-

Eisenhower never posed a creditable threat to go to war against Egypt. Thank you goodbye.

Posted by rickm | June 18, 2008 12:41 PM

rickm, true, Eisenhower didn't pose a threat directly to Egypt. In this case he decided that it was not in the West's interest to go to war over Nasser's nationalization of the canal; he showed his resolve by threatening various measures against Israel, France, and Britain in order to back them off from their fight for the canal. Sorry for not making this clear in the earlier post.

Posted by Peter Leavitt | June 18, 2008 1:27 PM

It's a hard question to answer, but which parts of the world might have seen cross-border wars if the USA had not kept troops abroad following WWII and Korea?

Well, it seems amazing no one has mentioned the fact that most of the post-WWII era is usually described as the "Cold War" and that most of the pre-Bush-I interventions were designed to strategically counterbalance or contain the Soviets.

Without US troops abroad, it's fairly easy to imagine the Red Army pushing westward across Europe, China or Russia fighting Japan, Soviet power-grabs (in place of our own) in the Middle East, and much greater pro-Soviet penetration into Latin America.

Since the end of the Cold War, the flashpoints are mainly leftovers: North vs. South Korea; China vs. Taiwan; the pro-American regimes in the Middle East vs. Iraq, Syria, and Iran; Pakistan vs. India; ethnic conflicts in SE Europe. The US is integrally involved in most of these conflicts based on historical legacy, so it's not really so easy to just say "pull out" and assume everything will somehow be better.

Posted by right | June 18, 2008 1:33 PM

Small scale interventions where we presumed to choose for others how they should be governed--Iran is the consequential example--have not always worked out well. So large is the Iranian disaster that one could well conclude that in the net we'd have done better to have followed a strict rule of abstinence.

Since World War II, we've engaged in four large wars. Two of them (Korea till we crossed the 38th parallel, and the Gulf War) accorded with international law and responded to acts of aggression. The US had some interest in protecting Japan from an all-communist Korea, and in denying Iraq control over Kuwaiti oil.

The intervention in Vietnam was not, IIRC, authorized by a UN Security Council Resolution, and the threat to the South Vietnamese regime was as much internal as external. Moreover, it seems clear in retrospect that whether southern Vietnam was ruled from Hanoi or not did not impinge on any vital interest of the United States.

The intervention in Iraq has done Iran a lot of good and the US a lot of harm. It contravened international law and has not served American interests. (I confess to not having read Douthat enough to know whether he believes it was a mistake or not. If not, I distrust both his foreign policy instincts and his credentials as a conservative.)

The principle that seems to emerge from these four bits of history is that responses to cross-border aggression may be justified and well advised, but not offensive wars whose justification centers on chimerical threats.

Posted by Clausewitz | June 18, 2008 2:12 PM

Uh oh!; Ross is being ostracized from the conservatives by Justin Raimondo, Daniel McCarthy and "Clausewitz."

It's a hard blow, Ross, but you'll survive.

Posted by anonymous | June 18, 2008 3:10 PM

Clausewitz. So large is the Iranian disaster that one could well conclude that in the net we'd have done better to have followed a strict rule of abstinence.

The Iranian disaster is traceable mostly to the bumbling, irresolute policy of Carter who with his typical moralism didn't understand the realpolitik need of the Shah. The result was the Mullahs with whom we are dealing today.

Eisenhower and Churchill in context of the Cold War properly arranged Mossadegh's fall through a mainly CIA operation headed by Kermit Roosevelt. The last thing the West needed at that time was a leftist government in Iran.

Posted by Peter Leavitt | June 18, 2008 5:19 PM

The original post and several comments strike me as so far removed from reality as to earn the title Bamboozlement. A reminder that our host's political convictions spring from his religious, traditionalist-Catholic faith; to which, I salute and honor him for his fidelity.

So it of course follows that he grounds his justification for military interventions on moral grounds. Catholics tend to fall back on Tomist 'just-war' philosophy.

But wait...our Ross justifies the killing and blowing apart of important things that always accompany 'interventions' (what a sweet word!! like we're trying to improve the inner life of those folks in SanSalvadore or Kuwait) with the most blatent statement of moral relativism and situational ethics possible. "(W)hether the benefits that Pax Americana...are worth the blunders that inevitably accompany it," is the operative moral-ethical question.

Well, the question of whether we should use naked military force to get our way and say the results 'prove' that we are the good guys is a reasonable debating point. But Ross should quit this hypocritical Christian posturing if he's going to advocate it.

As to the amazing lack of cross-border wars during the ColdWar period, I remind our host that the two SuperPowers were able to discipline their alliances (as Ike did r/t Suez). Had they failed to discipline their allies it was possible for a nuclear war to follow. Incentivised indeed.

Mr Hartman pulls the curtain from the little man by saying, 'Pax Americana is a mere disquise for American self interest.' To which I would only add, 'SOME Americans self interest'. Not all of us share the burden of actually intervening nor reap a fair share of the rewards.

Mr Leavitt could spend a moment thinking and searching and save himself embarassment. He states that Eisenhower had a non-interventionist Mid East policy "because most of his advisers didn't understand war." Uh...if Eisenhower were alone in a stadium full of Nuns and Consciencious Objectors--because of Ike's single presence there would be in that place as perfect an understanding of war as has existed anywhere. What an amazingly stupid remark.

And 14,000 GI's who went ashore (from LSTs!!! Like Normandy!!!) in Beirut in 1958 would disagree that they weren't 'intervening' in the Mid East.

Posted by JohnMcC | June 18, 2008 5:56 PM

By Middle Eastern standards, even by more demanding standards, Iran's government in 1953 was democratic. Mossadegh asked for a share of oil profits that was fair and reasonable. This offended Churchill, but Truman refused to do his neo-colonialist bidding. Eisenhower did. Kermit Roosevelt succeeded--just barely, but succeeded--in using hired street toughs and pliant journalists to overthrow a duly constituted government.

Britain cajoled Eisenhower into this intervention only after having pleaded its case in the International Court of Justice and lost.

As between Mr. Leavitt's interpretation of events and mine, I'm sure we could agree that few Iranians agree more with his than mine. To this day, Iranians deeply resent America's improper--better, arrogant and shortsighted--intervention. The Shah was put in power by the machinations of the United States, and nothing Carter did eased the way for the mullahs so much as did Roosevelt's great success on the streets in 1953.

In 1953 it was not plain to see that powerful nations are ill advised to ignore the sentiments of the peoples of the Middle East. Now it is. The oil that lies in the territory of other sovereign nations is theirs to dispose of, not America's.

Posted by Clausewitz | June 18, 2008 6:17 PM

Clausewitz, Britain's oil problem was minor in Eisenhower's thinking about Iran. In 1953 he was dealing with an expansive and threatening Soviet Union with real ambition to control the very strategically located Iran He was advised by Dulles that Mossadegh, though affecting neutralism, was partial to the Soviet Union.

After Mossadegh's fall, US military and intelligence operations took advantage of the thousand-mile border between Iran and the Soviet Union to set up electronic listening and radar posts, make surveillance flights, and infiltrate agents into the country. However cold during this period, we were involved in a serious war with the Soviet Union.

With the perspective of comfortable hindsight you can moralize about the result of this intervention simply due to the reality that men like Eisenhower and Dulles laid the foundation to eventually win the Cold War.

Posted by Peter Leavitt | June 18, 2008 8:19 PM

I'm doubtful that the listening posts, surveillance flights, and infiltrated agents were vital to preventing a Soviet attack in the 50s let alone to bringing about the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 80s (winning the Cold War). I'm even more doubtful that the nationalist Mossadegh wanted to kowtow to Moscow, or that Dulles' abhorrence of neutrality was the keystone of a sound diplomacy. But I am glad to hear a reliance on mistaken strategic judgments rather than mistaken notions of propriety.

Propriety--conformity to international law, principled respect for the sovereign rights of other states and for a nascent democracy--in the perspective of hindsight had a lot going for it, as Truman saw and Eisenhower didn't. So also did a hesitancy to take advantage of the impunity with which a single superpower an can always act.

Weaker states--all the states but ours--are constrained and disciplined by external dangers. From these limits we are freer than any other state. Hence the importance of internal checks on the exercise of American power. If the parties divide between one that stresses the importance of limits and another that would remove them, I stand with the party of limits. The historical record--Vietnam, Iraq--hardly suggests America suffers from a reluctance to intervene by force in the affairs of other nations. Quite the contrary.

Posted by Clausewitz | June 18, 2008 9:16 PM

"To honestly think that the United States is, can be, or ought to be the arbiter of world policing is the ultimate hubris, equalling the Roman Empire which also believed its own press releases." hartman_john

TR: This is a rather absurd comparison. As superpower the US has done nothing like what the Romans did in crushing the Jewish revolt or the Gauls. Rome also never had the ability to impact the entire world. If the US claims it can effect the entire world it's because it actually can and has shown that.

South Korea is much better off now than it'd be under North Korean rule. Same with Kuwait and Iraqi rule. Non-interventionism is just another word for moral cowardice. Like it or lump it America is the largest economy with the most powerful military. That power does imply a certain responsibility. Granted that responsibility means intervening responsibly, which we don't always do, but it can't really justify retreating into yourself. Even nations much less powerful than us, like the Danes, intervene in several situations.

Posted by Thomas R | June 19, 2008 12:56 AM

Thomas R.,

Is Guatemala better off for the US intervention there? Is Nicaragua? Is Viet Nam? Is Chile? Is the Dominican Republic? I think the answer to these things would all be "no".Moreover we aren't as a matter of fact, always able to "effect the world" in precisely the way that we want. Viet Nam showed that, if nothing else.

I support non-interventionism not really on principle but because I think that on balance US intervention has done more harm than good at least since about 1955 or so.

Posted by Hector | June 19, 2008 8:25 AM

"This is a rather absurd comparison. As superpower the US has done nothing like what the Romans did in crushing the Jewish revolt or the Gauls"

Really? Jewish revolts..? Brutally putting down revolutions in land controlled by the empire.. How about the war with Mexico in the 1840s - christ we didn't even control that land at the time. Or the Phillipines, our troops there killed 250,000+ Filipinos to for a few naval bases. Or how about Haiti. Nicaragua (Sandino anyone?). Dominican Republic. Vietnam? how many you want?

The slaughter of innocent Gauls? Hmm, how many innocents died in Hiroshima or Nakasaki?

The comparison between Rome's republic and the US republic is a bit hackneyed, yet still fun. Rome won a series of world wars with Carthage, found themselves the "empress of the world" then money starting rolling in from the lesser peoples. Most of which was hoarded by the upper roman classes who didn't like to share with the lesser citizens.

The Republic soon fell replaced by a tyrant who left in place the shadow of the republic so citizens can fool themselves that they were still free.

Short story - the complications of foriegn domination, and stolen wealth (the damn Celtiberians were sitting on Roman silver - like the Persians/Arabs are sitting on America's oil) lead to the fall of the Roman Republic.

Posted by Hankest | June 19, 2008 8:43 AM

"Is Guatemala better off for the US intervention there? Is Nicaragua? Is Viet Nam? Is Chile? Is the Dominican Republic? I think the answer to these things would all be "no"."

TR: People are real black and white here sometimes. Thinking US intervention is on balance positive, or at least sometimes necessary, doesn't mean thinking it's always positive or necessary.

"How about the war with Mexico in the 1840s - christ we didn't even control that land at the time. Or the Phillipines, our troops there killed 250,000+ Filipinos to for a few naval bases. Or how about Haiti. Nicaragua (Sandino anyone?). Dominican Republic. Vietnam? how many you want?"

TR: The US was not a superpower during most of these. Further none of these people so totally lost their nation that they had to wander for centuries. The American Indians did, but I clearly said "as superpower" and that happened before it.

The Romans as a Republic didn't exactly give ordinary people the vote. In that they might have some similarities to the Founding Fathers, but by the time the US was a superpower men and women voted directly for their Senators. This is not the evolution Rome took. Rome had nothing like the Marshall Plan for their vanquished peoples. Instead they cleared Carthage and salted the ground. The US helped rebuild Japan.

On balance I think the US is a benign superpower. I say this with more chagrin than you might think as I'm not at all patriotic. In principle I'm not sure the US should've been created. It's largely born from hatred of indigenous peoples, Anti-Catholicism, and whining. It rose through exploitation of Catholic nations and indigenous peoples. It celebrates the kind of narrow nationalism and utopianism I consider dangerous. It's kind of "the worst superpower in history, except for every other one."

Because that's the reality. As superpower the US hasn't pulled anything remotely like the British or Russian Empires did. The world we live in is almost certainly going to have a superpower and that superpower will have to intervene. Right now the US is the best option. It might be nice if the world were ran by Ireland or New Zealand, but it's not realistic. Th US is the best of bad alternatives. And compared to France or Britain or China I find it much more appealing.

Posted by Thomas R | June 19, 2008 11:00 AM

The US wasn't a superpower during Vietnam? It's not a superpower now? We invaded two nations recently, the invasions drove people from their homes and caused the death of 100s of thousands.

Our war in Vietnam was to root out "communists" (actually nationalists) who were fighting western domination, just as the Romans were rooting out Jews fighting Roman domination. The Romans were more brutal then US, of course, but compared to other ancient empires they allowed their conguered rights of self governance, even a chance at citizenship. Roman citizens prided themselves on it's Pax Romana justice, just as you pat yourself on the back for Pax Americana benifits.

As for Roman republic citizens not being able to vote, that's not correct. It gets complicated, but the plebs had power to make laws during much of the Republic's history..

As for "salting carthage" that of course never happened.

The first Punic war started over nonsense (think WW1), Rome won and forced a Carthage to pay a huge and humiliating homage. Rome did not destroy Carthage.

The second Punic War was initiated by a war happy lunatic (Hadrian) still furious over the humiliation suffered during Punic War 1. He launched a direct attack against Roman forces. Rome eventually won, after Carthage sued for peace Rome took away their colonies and forbade them from having a significant army or navy (sound familiar?). No salting going on. Carthage was left very much intact.

Carthage left defenseless was harrassed by Numidians, in their own defense they decided to re-build their military, that and Romes need for grain lead Rome to taunt them into a third war, which is when Rome sacked Carthage. I'd say Carthage was left no worse after that than Berlin or Tokyo 1945, and a lot better than Desden, Hiroshima.

Interesting, a superpower taunting a lesser nation to war so it can take it's resoruces...hmmmmm. Pax Romana baby.

Anyway, Rome would no more salt Carthage than the US would deliberately burn Iraq oil fields.

Posted by hankest | June 19, 2008 11:34 AM

A bald statement that a superpower has a right to intervene seems to rest on a notion of might makes right. One doubts that anyone not a citizen of the superpower would see it that way. (And from the time of Mark Twain or even before him, Abraham Lincoln, not all the citizens of America have seen it that way.) The state system that emerged after the Thirty Years War rests on principles of sovereignty that preclude intervention at will.

No doubt intervention has on occasion served not only American interests but those of the people where America intervened. Maybe absent American intervention the Filipinos would have led an existence more wretched than the one they did, wretched enough to justify the carnage of the insurrection against American intervention. (Though what our boys did there takes a lot of justifying.) Maybe the Panamanians have done better because Noriega was deposed. Whether American interests were served is another question.

But in Vietnam it’s evident American interests weren’t served: we lost, South Vietnam went red—and nothing very bad for America ensued. In Iraq and the region, Sunni-Shiite antagonism has been intensified and Iranian power augmented, and America’s reputation for probity and even decency has suffered greatly.

So far as Vietnamese and Iraqi interests are concerned, one must start with estimates of Vietnamese civilian casualties running to 4,000,000 million and military casualties running to 1,700,000—in what wasw, from our standpoint, a lost cause. In Iraq civilian fatalities since the April 2003 on one estimate run to 88,000 and the refugee count to 2,000,000. That’s a lot of misery, whatever the ultimate outcome. Enough to put the United States in competition with Britain before it, albeit far short of the mark set by Germany and the Soviet Union.

Twice in the last half century American interventions have gone massively awry—first in Vietnam, then in Iraq. It wasn’t wise or prudent to have favored them. Nor was it cowardly to oppose them. Quite the contrary, in 1964 and 1965, and again in 2002 and 2003, the hawks had only to go along with the crowd. It was the doves who needed to summon some courage. Anyway, it’s strange to call it brave to send other men’s sons to die.

Posted by Clausewitz | June 19, 2008 3:25 PM

Thomas R.,

Well, to be fair, the Carthaginians did roast babies alive on the altar of Molech....if I were a Roman I might feel inclined to treat them the way we treated the Germans at Dresden. (Not that that would necessarily be _right._)

I don't know that the British empire was necessarily worse than the "Pax Americana", as empires go. The British were certainly more decent imperialists than Wilhelmine Germany, Soviet Russia, Imperial Japan or Leopold's Belgium, and they were probably better than the contemporary French or the Portuguese as well. When it became necessary to do so they surrendered their empire with much less bloodshed than the French or the Portuguese, for example.

Posted by Hector | June 19, 2008 4:26 PM

The British did have their moments- hundreds of sepoys shot from cannons in a frenzy of British vengeance, consigning 5 million Kenyans to 135 square kilometers of poor land, killing hundreds of rebellious Kikuyu at a stroke, jailing a third of Kikuyu men.

Forgot to mention an important reason why the Iraq intervention was bad strategy--the drain of resources from Afghanistan, likely a decisive factor in the revival of the Taliban, and a boost to bin Laden and other Islamists in Pakistan.

Posted by Clausewitz | June 19, 2008 5:10 PM

"As for "salting carthage" that of course never happened."

TR: I wondered about that part as I knew of later people from Carthage. I guess Carthage was merely burned and its citizens sold into slavery. As the US destroys entire nations and then enslaves their people in interventions I guess it is similar. Huh.

"A bald statement that a superpower has a right to intervene seems to rest on a notion of might makes right." Clausewitz

TR: No, because I'm not saying it must intervene whenever it wants to. I'm saying there are situations where intervention is right and proper. As the superpower we're best equipped to do that. Opposing all interventionism is "moral cowardice" because it simply avoids the hard choices and pretends they don't exist. Which is what this constant trotting out of Vietnam does. It reduces everything to "it's all bad don't do it", which is both moral cowardice and utter foolishness.

In addition there's nothing noble in opposing Vietnam or Iraq because you just don't want us involved in anything. It's simply a way of saying American lives are worth more than funny foreign people. If you opposed it because you felt it was unjust, wouldn't work, or would cost lives needlessly that's a different matter.

"Well, to be fair, the Carthaginians did roast babies alive on the altar of Molech"

TR: Good point. Still Carthage wasn't sieged by some eminently moral people. The Romans practiced infanticide, crucifixion, and had people killed for entertainment.

"I don't know that the British empire was necessarily worse than the "Pax Americana", as empires go." Hector

TR: The British Empire was worse, but admittedly it was often worse by neglect. Colonial governors or what have you had somewhat free reign to be good or horrid. The British Empire did good things like education, ending widow burning, protecting Southern Sudanese, and stopping the slave trade. The British in Australia and Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) did acts that make most things America did pale. Many of the harsher interventions of Iran were done due to British petroleum and the British Empire is greatly responsible for the situations in both Afghanistan and Iraq. British interference in Oman continued into the 1970s. Although this might be more arguable there's also the Opium wars, the Irish, and the somewhat unequal treatment faced by Chinese in Hong Kong. Some of the worst basketcase nations on Earth were ruled by the British Empire. (Myanmar, Zimbabwe, and much of Southern Africa)

Posted by Thomas R | June 19, 2008 8:42 PM

"Forgot to mention an important reason why the Iraq intervention was bad strategy--the drain of resources from Afghanistan, likely a decisive factor in the revival of the Taliban, and a boost to bin Laden and other Islamists in Pakistan."

TR: I agree with this. Although Afghanistan is itself an intervention and if you're just against all intervention than this point is a bit moot.

Posted by Thomas R | June 19, 2008 8:44 PM

Thomas R.,

You bring up some very good points. I hadn't been thinking about Ireland or Australia but you're right, the British there did do things that we would concider genocidal (e.g. with the native Tasmanians). I was more thinking about Africa where the British were _relatively_ benign. While they did dispossess Africans and take their land in places like Zimbabwe and Kenya, at least they did not kill massive numbers of people as in the French Congo, the Belgian Congo, or German Southwest Africa. They were a somewhat progressive force in South Africa where they suppressed the Boers' oppression of black Africans, and to some extent in East Africa where they ended slavery.

In India the British were also a relatively progressive force- actually the areas of India that were under direct British colonization seem to me much better off today than most of the areas that were under "indirect" rule. One could make the criticism of the British in India that they were in fact not interventionist enough, and too tolerant of native oppressive structures like the subjugation of women, the caste system, usurious landlords and native monarchies. Hindus in India probably suffered more under Muslim rule than under British rule. India owes its pretty good educational system and infrastructure largely to the British.

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 8:07 AM

In the current issue of Ethics and International Affairs, a pertinent article by Richard MIller, summarized as follows:
This article examines three arguments according to which the Iraq war has been justified: preemptive or preventive self-defense, law enforcement, and humanitarian rescue. It concludes that for empirical and moral reasons, the Iraq war lacks a just cause. In the course of making that judgment, the article explores moral and practical implications of a preventive war policy. It also examines efforts to invoke one justification—rescue—retrospectively to justify the war. The article claims that such ex post justifications confuse the meaning of intention and, wittingly or unwittingly, allow leaders to authorize a resort to force in bad faith. Retrospective justifications also fail to understand that different burdens are attached to ad bellum rationales. That claim is premised on the idea that self-defensive wars join duty and interest in ways that wars of rescue do not. To assume that arguments can shift from self-defense to rescue, without recognizing that these entail different kinds of sacrifice, is to discount the respect due to those whose sacrifice is required. If altruistic policies are expected to be carried out by soldiers, stronger reasons than self-defensive purposes are necessary to justify the risks, reasons that avoid the allegation of leading in bad faith.

Posted by Clausewitz | June 20, 2008 2:44 PM

"Eisenhower and Churchill in context of the Cold War properly arranged Mossadegh's fall through a mainly CIA operation headed by Kermit Roosevelt. The last thing the West needed at that time was a leftist government in Iran."

>Sorry. The CIA wanted to pullout when the going got tough but MI6 wouldn't transmit their pullout messages.

"I hadn't been thinking about Ireland or Australia but you're right, the British there did do things that we would concider genocidal (e.g. with the native Tasmanians)"

>The genocide of the Tasmanian aboriginals is a fabrication:

In "My history thesis still stands" by Keith Windschuttle, in the The Australian on September 1 2003, Windschutlle says in part:

"The first volume of The Fabrication of Aboriginal History makes three main points: there was no genocide in Tasmania; there was no frontier warfare; and academic historians have grossly exaggerated and in some cases invented the conflict between Aborigines and colonists that did occur..."

Windschuttle's comment that "academic historians have grossly exaggerated and in some cases invented the conflict" applies to the histories written by many historians around the world since the 60s.

I recommend reading the entire article.

Posted by davod | June 21, 2008 6:46 PM

Hankest, the fact that you don't know the difference between Hadrian, who came about
three centuries later and Hasdrubal and Hannibal
is disconcerting. That goes for the rest of your interpretations of the Punic Wars. A more appropriate example is Iraq/Afghanistan with the
Jugurthan Wars that was Rome's first real insurgency to deal with. From there would rise
Marius, who would be the third commander and his
former aide and future rival Sulla. Who began the
practice of factionalizing the Roman army that
broke down under the pressures of the Social
"Civil" War and the campaign against Mithridates of Pontus. Other conflicts would yield the Triumvirates of Pompey, Lepidus & Crassus and ultimately the reign of Caesar and his conflict with Marc Anthony which would ultimately lead to Empire.

The British Empire specially in the East arose from commercial relationship (India being one of the more particular examples) It was the tie between British holdings in Egypt from 1882 on;
to establishing secure trade routes to India that
led to the British involvement in Iran and later
Mesopotamia. Yes they discovered oil in Iran in 1907; should they not done it. They were
unwilling to let it fall to a demagogic oligarchy
such as that represented by Mossadegh.
Nationalization; has always been a fool's errand
particular in the 3rd World.

One would agree with the fate of Guatemala except for the fact that events in the 1980s were not unlike those under Estrada Cabrera when Minor Keith's United Fruit was barely getting underway
or Ubico, back during the 1930s, when America was
kind of busy to intervene significantly.

Posted by narciso | June 22, 2008 1:01 AM