Rinse. Repeat.

So, OK, speaking of Caribbean islands as emblems of our commitment to promoting democracy ...

The United States is currently entangled in a years-long -- perhaps decades-long -- nation-building experiment in Iraq. The theory being tested in this real-life laboratory is that it is possible to liberate a country from tyranny by invading it, overthrowing its government, occupying it militarily and then helping it grow into a self-reliant democracy.

Proponents of this theory acknowledge that such an invasion and occupation will be violent, and that most of the cost of this violence will be borne by the very people they are meant to liberate. But, hey, broken eggs and omelets, you know?

The people of Haiti have seen this sort of thing tried before. More than once. And they've lost their taste for omelets.

During the 20th century, more Haitian administrations were installed by invading armies than took office after a legitimate election. The nation-building tactics currently being employed in Iraq aren't much different from the cyclical history of 20th-century Haiti: invade, occupy, install, rinse, repeat.

If such methods were generally effective, Haiti would be a model of democracy and prosperity by now.

It's not. In fact, it's in much, much worse shape than most countries that did not have the benefit of these repeated efforts at violent nation-building.

The parallel, of course, is not exact. Iraq and Haiti are very different in many important ways. Most of these differences, however, suggest that military nation-building in Iraq will be even more difficult than it has been in Haiti.

Comments

[SPG]

The break some eggs to make an omelet analogy has always bothered me...why doesn't anyone consider keeping the eggs warm and letting them hatch into more chickens?

[Chris_uk]

To stay with the anology

- Unfertillised eggs don't hatch - they just go rotten.

If noone had gotten rid of Saddam, sooner or later his even more evil child would of taken over...

.. not to mention the fact that iraq would of used the evidence of Iran building nukes as an excuse to build their own.

Oh as an aside:

Anyone who;s ever read Sun Tzu, will see the immense irony in america declaring its not going to attack Iran.

"the immense irony in america declaring its not going to attack Iran"

only if you take "a vote of confidence" at face value.

[SPG]

Eggs aside, did anyone hear the exchange Bush had yesterday?
Something to the effect: All this talk of the US attacking Iran is ridiculous. That said all options are on the table.
Slight pause, then laughter from the press corps.
I heard the exchange with and without editing out the laughter part depending on what network was airing it. NPR laughs. BBC no laughs.
As far as Iraq and Saddams evil ways, weren't we sold a war against an imminent threat of chemical biological and nuclear holocaust?
". not to mention the fact that iraq would of used the evidence of Iran building nukes as an excuse to build their own." That's not a fact, that's a supposition at best. With the UN inspections and sanctions Iraq was hardly in a position to build any kind of nuclear weapons. Could they have? Perhaps, but unlikely.

[patter]

"heard the exchange with and without editing out the laughter"

That's the problem with radio; you couldn't see the wink.

Okay. Perhaps someone needs to explain why america's recent 'diplomacy' with regards to Iran is so awful.

In tradition for this thread, I'll do it in the form of an analogy ;-)

Your walking down the street when someone walks upto you and declares " I'm not about to Punch you in the face!" what does this tell you?
a) He wants to punch you
b) He has no fear of your retaliation
c) But he feels that the time isn't quite right.

its amazing how such seemingly innane statement is both a serious insult and a threat - thats how the entire middle-east is seeing it and you can be sure that the President cracking jokes over it will only enrage them further.

[drieux just drieux]

Hold it? Why talk about Haiti - that is some failed liberal democratic blue helmeted one worlder fiasco.

Fred, you should have been discussing Venezuela! It has oil! It is rasing it's royalty rates and corporations like Exxon are all upset about that. So Clearly we have always been at war with Venezuela.

Now if Haiti had oil, well, that would be a different case.

[Mabus]

And if Iran were innocently walking down the street, your analogy would be apt, anonymous.

But Iran has a shotgun strapped to his back and is idly toying with the shells in his pocket, muttering about the last guy who crossed him.

[Merlin Missy]

And meanwhile North Korea has his gun out and pointed at you, saying "All I want to do is talk," and you're standing there with your fingers in your ears going "Lalalala, I can't hear you."

Are we done with this metaphor yet?

[Josh]

Fred, it's a good warning. I'll have to study more about Haiti. Did you approve or disapprove of Clinton's use of force there?

Actually do you have a post listing uses of US force in the last century which you felt were just or unjust? Afganistan? The first Gulf War?

Better yet can you forecast precisely what conditions would justify a future war with, for example, Iran or North Korea?

[Graydon]

Josh -

Those would be the same conditions that have always been required -- Iran or North Korea have attacked the United States.

Bush's cynical and deliberate abuse of the pre-emptive defense doctrine, which was already kinda shaky in moral terms, has left it unusable by anyone interested in anything other than a naked appeal to abusing power because you can.

[drieux just drieux]

Interesting how folks FORGET how the evil clinton invaded Haiti.... Remember how we stood back and shelled the island for months, and after massive air bombardments went in all guns blazing.... You Know with those Nuclear Weapons First... In retaliatioon for the Haitian Flying Saucer Attacks that the liberal media is still covering up...

Come on josh - you might want to work out why you have this fetish for war stuff and can't work through the clear distinctions. Do you want to attend a war in Iran simply because it is the noo coolz meme???

Fred, How exactly does this "pre-emptive defense doctrine" actually Work? Wouldn't it require something like an imminent threat. But if you listen to the ProWarFanClub they all backed away from the idea that the president had actually said 'imminent threat' as it became more and more clear that there was no such threat exitent.

You do have a point on North Korea - since we are merely in an 'armistace', and there has been no actual 'peace accord' ending the 'korean war'. Similarly with Iran, since the invasion of the embassy IS an 'act of war'. But these would require that the ProWarFanClub work out 'how much at war' does it really think we are - rather than it's habit of using the @WAR clause when useful.

[Donald Johnson]

I suspect that if the US really had been interested in building democracy in Haiti and in other places in the Western Hemisphere, the history of these places wouldn't have been nearly as bloody as they have been. There's been talk about democracy, but what that has often meant has been installing people who will do the bidding of the helpful folks in Washington. Republicans are the greater of two evils, but this cynical appraisal applies to Democrats as well. From what little I've read, I doubt Clinton was serious about building democracy in Haiti.

[animus]

Clinton went into Haiti to reinstate Aristide, who at least had some semblance of an electoral mandate. The latest US intervention in Haiti appears to have been to abduct Aristide at gunpoint so that he wouldn't resist the latest coup by his opponents...

[Josh]

Graydon,

You wrote your standard for using US force is to wait until another nation has "attacked the United States."

That is the standard that has always been the position of Pat Buchanan and, under the Bush administration, much of the new left. It has not been the US policy based on the actions of any recent administrations.

I doubt it is Fred's position - which is why I asked. And I asked him to project into the future what his criteria would be for using force in specific nations - because it's too easy to just Monday morning quarterback the past. (Although I think his list of justified wars from the past would be really interesting too.)

I'm hoping increased global pressure for democracy can avert wars in both Iran and North Korea - but here is another really practical question. Should we permit Iran to develop a nuclear weapon and thereby hold neighboring countries hostage? Should we help fund the development of that weapon like the previous administration did in North Korea?

[Fred]

Josh --

Again, who is "we"? You have said that for you it is the church -- but it's a bit hard to read the question "Should we permit Iran to develop nuclear weapons ..." with the church as antecedent.

Your alternative history of the last 10 years of America's relationship with North Korea is fascinating, but unrelated to the actual last 10 years. You are, as always, entitled to your own opinions but not to your own facts.

I do not have the time, or the inclination to revisit or retype for you here all of Walzer's "Just and Unjust Wars."

And even if I did, you provide every indication that your reading of it would be perverse, hostile, lawyerly and far less interested in what others actually say than in what you can twist it into sounding like they said. In other words, you have earned my distrust. Repeatedly.

So please, just go buy the damned book and leave me alone.

Walzer, Michael. Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument with Historical Illustrations. (New York: 1977).

[Beth]

I wonder, might political and social stability be a prerequisite for democracy to take root? I'm not a historian, but I can't think of a single instance where chaos and infighting have blossomed into democracy.

In the 20th century, communist revolutionaries sought to create "people's republics" by force and succeeded only in creating "people's military dictatorships" and totalitarian societies. I suspect the neo-con dream of creating capitalist democracies by similar methods will have similar results.

Did you approve or disapprove of Clinton's use of force there?
What difference does that make Josh? Whatever Fred's or anyone else's opinion of Clinton's action at the time, it should by now be clear to everyone, even you, that it did not result in a stable democracy in Haiti.

[drieux just drieux]

Beth, there is that little problem with Haiti.

How much of the current crisis in Haiti lays at the feet of the current administration's efforts to starve it of the foreign aid that was suppose to help make democracty happen? A systemic problem that we watch in Afghanistan as well.

As fred notes in his perception about foreign aid entry, there is this huge air gap between what americans think they are funding with their 'foreign aid' and the reality of what is actually being paid for. A systemic problem with what is suppose to be in the pipeline to 'restore iraq' and what is actually being spent on that project.

But josh is avoiding those sticky bits. To go there would mean dealing with the fundamental crisis of faith - "Should one live one's belief?"

Or should one just wave about the clinton doll when nothing else seems to be scary enough...

[Dave]

Iraq, as a relatively modern, relatively rich, relatively resource-rich country, is streets ahead of Haiti as a subject for democratization.

Haiti is much like Kurt Vonnegut's San Lorenzo, where they decided to redistribute the national wealth and discovered it came to 3 dollars a head.

Why don't you mention the Dominican Republic or Panama, both of which were invaded by the US in recent memory, and both of which are reasonably functioning if imperfect democracies?

[Josh]

Fred,

I know I go after you hard, but it feels pretty mutual to me. I’m trying to provoke dialogue - I’m sorry it’s led to your sense of distrust.

I’ll look for Walzer, but I’m genuinely interested in your opinions and criteria rather than opinions held 30 years ago. (Do you agree entirely with Walzer’s conclusions? And is it obvious to anyone how to apply Walzer’s conclusions to the present and the future?) I want to know whether you believe a war can only be just if, as Graydon suggested, some nation has "attacked the United States." What if someone just attacks and ally? And what magnitude of assault to call it an “attack”?

I think it’s a fair question, even an essential question, to ask what behavior on the part of North Korea or Iran would justify the U.S. using force against those nations. Do you, like Walzer, support the agressive use of international sanctions? I’m still not aware whether Afghanistan met you criteria for a just war – and on what basis. Do you agree with Walzer who said in a 2003 interview:

Question: “You have been very critical of the American left's opposition to the war in Afghanistan, especially the left's refusal to see it as a just war on terror. Do you think that there are other countries in which the US should intervene militarily in order to combat terror, as President Bush has suggested?

Walzer: “I supported the war in Afghanistan because I believed that this was a defensive war (the paradigmatic case of just war) against a regime that did not merely harbor terrorists but was an active partner of the terrorist organization that attacked New York and Washington on 9/11. The Taliban regime provided Al Qaeda with all the advantages of sovereignty, most importantly, a territorial base. It was entirely legitimate for the US to attack that territorial base and to overthrow the regime that provided it. I have reservations about the way we fought the war, and I have criticized our behavior in Afghanistan after it was over. But the war itself was eminently defensible. And should there be other countries that enter into a partnership of the same kind with Al Qaeda, I would think, other things being equal, they would be subject to a similar attack. But, right now, there are no such other countries. As for countries that harbor terrorist organizations, they can and should be dealt with through non-military means: diplomacy and, in extreme cases, international sanctions. Of course, if there were a visible readiness to apply international sanctions, there would be many fewer countries harboring terrorist organizations.”

Fred, because I respect your heart and mind I’d be fascinated to hear you work out your perspective on just war criteria for both Afghanistan and a future conflict. I’d love to hear what you think U.S. and Christian strategy should be in North Korea or Iran?

Josh

ps: "In 1994, the Clinton administration convinced North Korea to stop its nuclear weapons program and allow United Nations monitors into the country. In return, the US and other countries pledged to replace North Korea's nuclear power plants that produce plutonium, a key ingredient in nuclear weapons, with light-water reactors, which don't. They also agreed to send North Korea oil to help replace the electricity lost when the nuclear plants shut down.

Both sides also agreed to lift trade barriers and pursue diplomatic and economic relations, including economic aid to North Korea.

However, North Korea's admission [in 2002] that it had not completely ended its nuclear program angered the US enough to stop the fuel oil shipments." - pbs.org

From 1994 to 2002 we (the U.S. government), under an agreement negotiated by the Clinton administration, subsidized the North Korean government while they were investing in the development of nuclear weapons. I’m Monday morning quarterbacking here (Clinton couldn’t know that bribing North Korea wouldn’t stop their nuclear program) but these are the facts.

[Josh]

"It is hard work trying to sustain an oppositionist politics in the US today – especially when part of what I feel I have to oppose is the idiocy of many of my fellow oppositionists: knee-jerk anti-Americanism, old left dogmatism, and the rejection of any fellowship larger than the sect of the politically correct and the morally pure. I live on the left, but quarrel with some of my neighbours, and in the aftermath of 9/11 the quarrels have gotten more intense. But I would resist the idea that I am 'working' on these quarrels. They are just occasionally necessary engagements."

Fred, another Walzer quote. Do you agree?

[Josh]

Sorry to hog the comments but this Walzer guy is great. Check this out.

[Patrick J. Mullins]

Josh is still trying to do something, he is one of those persons who don't think it is anti-social behaviour not to leave people alone when they tell him to. Isn't it? I am so dizzy with the Josh posts I can safely say it would be nearly impossible to discern a good idea, since he only wants to get agreement on something he writes in the comments box, but has absolutely no power and knows it. This is a well-known syndrome, but people don't want to not get asked for a date they told someone else to ask them out for. Josh must invade the undemocratic country of Fred because Fred is an undemocratic country and mistreats its people with torture and Josh is willing to go to jail for this, because Fred is such an evil duchy located somewhere up the east coast but south of me is what I gather. In other words, without nuclear weapons and even while going to church Fred has victimized innumerable of his citizens because he has not supported the immediate overthrow of Iran, Cuba, North Korea and turned them into places which would make it so Josh could shut up before he really does have to go out and be an activist and use Ti-D-Bowl, since that's so much more difficult than must using blog terrorism on the Republic of Fred--not a democracy, note, but a place in which Josh's own little Abu Ghraib operates. He will torture the inhabitants of the Republic of Fred till they tell him all he wants them to know, and when they're dead he will buy a digital camera and take pictures of Lyndie England look-alikes above corpses on ice with Halliburton (hell, I can't even spell anymore, there's so much nuclear fallout in the the Republic of Fred and the mucous and blood are coming out because Josh knows torture is what is needed in the land of the heathen.)

There is a such thing as people who are so drunk that you don't even care if they went to AA and got better, then they expect you to listen to them when they have alligator mouth just so long as they don't touch the sauce, they think only the alcohol mattered and now that they don't drink they don't have any more objectionable qualities.

No such post exists in which Josh could bring up anything worth paying any attention to because he shows no respect, and just tries to put people into slave labour. Look at me, I've got eptileptic fits, uh, pardon, can't spell, epilepsy and knee-jerk comment to Josh evil-agent of neocon Democracy. I want nothing he has. Online people often say 'I am very nice in person.' I know I would hate Josh in person and he is proud of that. I would kill in the name of opposing anything Josh stands for. Josh is plain repulsive and presumably leads a life of automatic chastity and self-flagellation.

[Fred]

Jeebus Josh, when I said go read the Walzer i didn't mean out loud, or that you had to retype the whole thing here in comments, asking me to give a line-by-line approval of the author I just recommended.

You wonder why I say you're lawyerly, then you turn around and try to conduct a deposition.

I'm glad you liked that Walzer quote on Afghanistan. If you had bothered to look, you might have found that very comment here in the archives. But, of course, you don't bother reading the archives. That's what one might do if one were legitimately interested in what I'd had to say about the war in Afghanistan, and not just in trying to construct some weird perjury trap.

You're an increasingly strange man.

[Josh]

Fred, is there a way to search your archives? I tried to google a portion of the Walzner quote along with "slacktivist" and got nothing. Or can you at least direct me to posts where you take a position on the questions I've asked? I'm genuinely not trying to make you repeat yourself. I'm interested in what you think about these key issues and, particularly when you, like Walzer, see a need to detour from the party line. I've been reading your posts for year now and I recall strong opinions but not through attempts to work through these issues.

Walzer says, so much more effectively than I do, much of what I've been trying to say about the new left in my comments. His position on Iraq is so much more coherent than anything I've seen prior on the left. Thanks for directing me to him. You might want to hope that he doesn't start commenting on your blog.

Josh

[Merlin Missy]

*reads* *sighs* Chin up, people. At least he's stopped invoking the name of the most famous advocate of non-violence in modern American history to keep trying to justify a pre-emptive war.

[Patrick J. Mullins]

You think that's enough, Merlin Missy? He's actively trying to cause harm.

[Patrick J. Mullins]

.'Fred, is there a way to search your archives? I tried to google a portion of the Walzner quote along with "slacktivist" and got nothing. Or can you at least direct me to posts where you take a position on the questions I've asked? I'm genuinely not trying to make you repeat yourself.'

Everything you say is a lie, Josh. You are the perfect reflection on a personal level of the government violence you support at the international level. You are a fake in every possible way, and you are actively trying to cause harm.

[Josh]

Pat,

My questions you quoted above are absolutely genuine. I don't know how you're discerning they are "lies". I also don't know how asking Fred to state his position on the criteria for just and unjust past and future wars causes any harm. Fred suggested I read Walzer - I did - but I still don't know if Fred agrees with Walzner or not (I couldn't find the post he referenced). Does Fred agree with Walzer's belief that Afghanistan was a just war, or Walzner's belief that the war in Iraq was caused as much by the reluctance of Germany and France to be more agressive as by the Bush administration. I don't know if Fred agrees with Walzer's critique of the new left - which is exactly the themes that most of my comments on this site focus on.

I'm asking real questions and being met by you with a level of intolerance I find a bit disturbing and, candidly, unjust.

Josh

p.s. Merlin Missy - King was hero in his advocacy of a profoundly nonviolent strategy. We're calling others to follow in his footsteps (freedomfromfear.org.uk). But he did call for law enFORCEment even when it required outsiders to come into the South to enforce just laws against the wishes of regional white tyrants. Indirectly the civil rights movement required the use of force to implement just laws just as much as it required the courageous actions of those who followed Dr. King. If you have doubts about this just look for pictures of the troops battling with protestors against school desegregation. You can start here.

Like Dr. King we’re working on nonviolent strategies to remove from power the worst human rights abusers on the planet. Still I’m concerned that some of the readers here, were they in Eisenhower’s shoes, might not have sent troops to support Dr. King and justice. I openly recognize that I’m willing to encourage more revolutionary risks in pursuit of ending oppression than my more conservative friend Fred. Still I know Fred well enough to know that our hearts – fueled by the gospel – are not that far apart. And Fred’s one of the smartest people I’ve ever met, which is why I love to pick his brain, even if, it seems, I mostly just antagonize him.

[Patrick J. Mullins]

Josh--I have to leave this place once and for all. You are no activist and have to be left to chase Fred around the room, because that's what you want to do. Clearly, he's not going to stop you, or rather, can't. You could have read every single one of the archives--they're only 2 years old--and found out what you wanted or if it wasn't there. It's your endless NAGGING that is so disgusting. My level of intolerance has indeed grown to the point that I don't think you are doing anything but trying to convince others of something they are not interested in being convinced of,are not going to be convinced of, and that they have said it time and time again. You know they are not going to be convinced of it, and that fuels your rancid missionary zeal. Fred's done some good posts over the months I've looked in here, but you've ruined the place, at least for me. Beth is perhaps better at dealing with you without having to disturb Fred too, which I am sure I have. I can only register my full protest, my 'disturbing, and, candidly unjust' perception of your crafty techniques, by removing at least this one single person from the premises--myself.

I can honestly say that you remind me more than anything else of those types of people in communes and ashrams who want to make sure that you don't have even a second alone and untouched by the guilt-giving apparatus of religion--otherwise, it might not have enough real time to determine policy in; and in that lies much of the fake 'democracy-peddling' that you and the other Bushies are pushing. You want that, and you think you can will it. You're smarmy and when you say 'I love to pick his brain, even if, it seems, I mostly antagonize him,' that doesn't stop you. To you, that's an expression of affection, to me it's as out of order as your assuming you can call me 'Pat' instead of 'Patrick' without asking me. But it is true that I have no way of knowing if anything you do really pisses Fred off all that much.

However, you are absolutely right. The endless continuation of what looks to me like nothing but circularity is not my responsibility to legislate, especially when the bottom line may be the 'Gospel' you share, which I just see as a hypnotic 'Gospel-concept.' So I am better off with my atheists and Badiou/Deleuze enthusiasts, which is where I have for some months spent most of my online discussion time anyway. I can offer nothing here, so one can only hope for the best. Over and out.

[Josh]

"Perhaps the most striking consequence is the inability of leftists to recognize or acknowledge the power of religion in the modern world."

"For the moment we can make do with a little humility, an openness to heterodox ideas, a sharp eye for the real world, and a readiness to attend to moral as well as materialist arguments. This last point is especially important. The encounter with Islamic radicalism, and with other versions of politicized religion, should help us understand that high among our interests are our values: secular enlightenment, human rights, and democratic government. Left politics starts with the defense of these three."

"The left has little difficulty understanding the need for distributive justice with regard to resources, but we have been practically clueless about the just distribution of praise and blame. To take the obvious example: in the second half of the twentieth century, the United States fought both just and unjust wars, undertook both just and unjust interventions. It would be a useful exercise to work through the lists and test our capacity to make distinctions-to recognize, say, that the United States was wrong in Guatemala in 1954 and right in Kosovo in 1999."

"Yes, we are entitled to blame the others whenever they are blameworthy; in fact, it is only when we do that, when we denounce, say, the authoritarianism of third world governments, that we will find our true comrades-the local opponents of the maximal leaders and military juntas, who are often waiting for our recognition and support. If we value democracy, we have to be prepared to defend it, at home, of course, but not only there."

- Michael Walzer

[Josh]

sorry I didn't realize linking would underline everything...

[drieux just drieux]

Hum... I know that Fred has decided to 'block' Josh from further folly. But there is this real problem that he may want to work out. Is 'blaming the left' a solution? Or merely an avoidance tactic?

Should we be interested in developing a single moral standard that can be held for both the 'left' and the 'right'? Or has the United States of America, and the NeoEvangelicals in particular, decided to live in a bifurcated epistemology, where the validity of a proposition rests upon the political allignment of the speaker.