Let me note in parting, though, that what Bill calls “clannishness” is, I think, both necessary and inevitable notwithstanding the truth of his point about the interconnectedness of nations. Inevitable because common culture and gratitude for their sacrifice on our behalf mean most of us can’t help placing a bit more value on the lives of American troops vis-a-vis other peoples’, just as other people can’t help feeling the same way about their countrymen vis-a-vis American troops. And necessary because while Bill is quite correct that “we are ALL fucked” when troubled societies fail, America and Britain seem to be the only two countries expected to do anything about it. With the rest of the world content to take a free ride, I think “clannishness” in the form of excessive scrupulousness about when and where our soldiers are put in harm’s way is more than justified.

And as far as agricultural subsidies go, if we cut all of them in the end it will be something else to add to the trade deficit.

I mean come on, people in the third world were starving before there was a dairy program.

Details are the crux of the matter. I believe that democracy will flourish in Eastern Europe because the people involved have a sense of themselves as belonging to nations rather than tribes. National (rather than tribal/ethnic/religious) identity lends itself to the commonality of identification and interest necessary for long term democratic stability. There are other factors that may be as important but I like to stick to the obvious.

ìIf we truly wish to support freedom then why do we have protectionist tariffs on agricultural products and why do we subsidize corporationsî

Ah, tariffs! Sugar is my particular ìfavoriteî.

If we really wanted to help the developing/undeveloped countries we would do what you propose, but how politically viable is that? Even the free-trade agreement with Australia had an exemption for that vile sugar subsidy. Again, I will play the betting game: we will sooner withdraw from the UN than we will have rational policy regarding global trade. There are too many interests screaming for protection (remember the steel tariffs ñ and how is the American Big Steel doing those days, after the ìmuch neededî period of artificially set prices, did they to catch up with competitors?)

But I think the discussion was about using military force. I repeat: it just so happens that getting rid of tyrants is in our selfish interest and we should be doing it ñ when situation dictates (details, details). I also believe that once this is done we have to put the freshly freed country on some sort of promising path, politically and economically, to prevent backsliding. Recall that Mugabwe used to be an much praised ìenlightenedî ruler, before he caught the ìSoros diseaseî.

When I speak about economic aid I would prefer to see us setting some infrastructure, such as banking, and entering into free trade agreements, but not direct governmental aid, which usually ends up padding the accounts of corrupt officials. As the example of our St. Kofi demonstrates, all officials are quite corruptible ñ as long as they are certain that there are no consequences.

All this is not exactly easy. Building civil society from scratch is not a 5-year project and I am not sure that I have much stomach for righting ALL the ills that the rest of humanity brings on itself.

I only hope that we can avoid major catastrophes.

Military force is a blunt tool which happens to be extraordinarily expensive to use (in all senses). It is a last resort and its use indicates the exhaustion of all other means. Sgt. Norwood died protecting and defending America – not Achmed’s right to vote. He died after the US had gone an extra mile (and more) in the diplomatic arena and had been rebuffed by a cabal marked primarily by its overwheening venality. Corrupt politicians working with a corrupt institution insured that force (which they all profess to abhor) was the only option left.

Should our elected officials determine that deposing other tyrants be in the best security interest of the country I will have no problem in supporting the effort. In the event that the extension of “freedom” ( a very hazy ideal to those unable to garner the days rations for themselves) is proposed as the rationale for intervention in nations incapable of posing a security threat, then I would firmly oppose it – unless we had gone twice as far as we did in the case of Iraq in exhausting means other than military.

If we truly wish to support freedom then why do we have protectionist tariffs on agricultural products and why do we subsidize corporations? Freedom is a “higher need” that works best when “base needs” have been met. In one sense it is a luxury good. Getting rid of Mugabe or Kim (or the Chinese poliburo) will not lift the peasants in Zimbabwe, Korea and China to the status of “free men” able to self determine their lot but will instead create a rabble who will vote their stomachs at every opportunity until those stomachs are filled.

A focus on setting (or enabling) conditions for the filling of peasants stomachs will advance the cause of freedom far more effectively than the use of military force ever shall. Keep the bayonets shining and never fear to use them – but only as a last alternative.

We are nearing the end of diplomatic possibilities with regard to Iran. The Iranians have the right to vote. When we exercise the military option there (and I believe we will) we will not be doing so in furtherance of anyone’s freedom but our own.

Obviously I misunderstand what the points your trying to make. John Moore apparently follows what your after and claims it makes some level of sense. I’ve failed to make any sense of it.

There is no “See Table B-4″ list that says when we should use military forces and when we shouldn’t. That’s why we elect presidents, so they can run the executive branch of government with its State Department, DoD, NSA, Justice Department, intelligence agencies, etc. Those are the people we expect to figure out how to go about dealing with the various dangers of the world around us given our vast, but not unlimited, power and resources and taking into account our current and projected commitments. These are the people we pay to assess the information available, collect more if necessary and possible, identify the possible courses of action and tools available, determine the potential range of outcomes, analyse costs vs. benefits, and make the difficult and imperfect decisions about priorities, actions, and resource allocations.

You keep mentioning the use of the military for “solely” humanitarian purposes and brought up Liberia. I don’t actually recall what the whole Liberia catfight was all about anymore but apparently we did use some two or three-hundred marines in Liberia. Googling the thing shows reports of that but I find nothing that tells me whether they encountered any military resistance or casualties of any sort or whether we remain engaged or have left. Do you know what the outcome was and what it cost us in terms of resources?

We sent an aircraft carrier and some 15,000 troops to do “solely” humanitarian work for disaster relief for the tsunami. What guarantee did we have that some lunatic fringe, Sri Lankan, Claw of Allah’s Tiger or whatever wasn’t going to sieze the opportunity and attack US troops? Now that we’re pulling out the aircraft carrier and ~10,000 of the troops, how do we know the remaining 5,000 will not have their lives placed at risk?

Playing “fast and loose” with the lives of our troops involves a whole lot more than simply deciding where and when to send or not send them. Consider Somalia. I recommend that anyone who wants to get some feel for how US troops become involved in UN humanitarian “quagmires” to read Operations in Somalia.

The point I’m trying to make here, after all that, is that the good folks here are not charged with making any of the decisions you ask about. We can only play rhetorical ping-pong. We hire POTUS to make these decisions and that is reason enough why one might prefer, for example, Bush-43 as CIC over, for example, Howard Dean or John Kerry.

ìMaybe if they had been more interested in reform 20 years ago it might have made a difference today.î

Though to be fair to the decision-makers 20 years ago we still had Soviet Empire to deal with, and that made the geopolitical equation somewhat different than it is now.

And I second Bostonian: throwing money at a messed-up country even after successful military intervention has proven time and time again to be a dreadful mistake: the country usually end back where it started except that Swiss bank gains a shiny new account of a shiny new dictator. If we want that kind of outcome we might as well let the UN ìtake careî of the problem.

We are trying something unprecedented in Iraq and the chances are that we might be successful. So I hope. WRT rest of the region, the devilís in the details. One problem at a time.

PS. Salt Lick, I am most emphatically NOT an elephant. Just thought to clear this upÖ

The sticky part is that sometimes we argue about what is needed for our country’s defense–witness the ongoing war about the war.

If I were in the Cabinet, my foreign policy would be to recruit the people of the world themselves, bypassing their idiot and/or rulers.

In the case of Iraq, that meant a rather forcible bypass. So be it.

I don’t know what’s next, but I do know that we are making a big mistake if we omit from our calculations the people in these countries, whom we have treated as pawns for so many decades.

Let us see what emerging democracy does in Iraq to the politicial & world outlooks of the millions of people in the surrounding countries.

***

Allah, you suppose the US president (whoever he is) to have such power as to force the US population to go along with any plan. You neglect public opinion. You want a precise answer in a world that doesn’t give them–there is little precision when decisions are jointly arrived at by millions of people and their elected leaders. Whatever happens will be a messy compromise. For your homework assignment, go read _The Wisdom of Crowds_.