I enjoy reading the posts and private emails, and here are some reactions, both to supporters and angry detractors.
World War II
I did not write that Buchanan is either a racist or an anti-Semite, only that his views on World War II are profoundly wrong—and wrong in a fashion we have not witnessed in a long time (perhaps since A.J.P. Taylor’s The Origins of the Second World War, which was, I think, far better argued).
We should remember that almost everything that Hitler said was either later contradicted by his actions or simply false or unhinged. In Italy as Gen. Kesselring was retreating, Hitler’s minion Himmler ordered the German high command there both to start rounding up Italian Jews (well over 10,000 were gassed in the camps), while Hitler lectured about avoiding blowing the river bridges in the face of advancing Americans and British on the grounds that they were of historic and artistic importance. We forget that was his method: to assemble thugs and murderers to carry out his butchery while he talked of art and culture and peace.
So it is not hard to find an isolated quote or act on Hitler’s part that seemingly suggests civilized considerations or by a great stretch might mitigate his entire and sole responsibility for millions of dead. But overall most disinterested historians and observers can see that there would have been no World War II without the career of Hitler in the 1930s.
As far as the Jewish issue, revisionists must accept that given the 6 million gassed in studied industrial fashion, neither quite seen before nor after, any suggestion that World War II was preventable had Hitler been treated with more consideration of his supposed legitimate grievances can only be interpreted as a certain callousness. While true that prior to 1939 Hitler had killed few Jews, his eugenics were well known and Nazi Jewish cleansing in business, universities, and public life was well under way in such a fashion that the later camps were logical, not an aberrant artifact of the war.
The Neocon Slur
Much of the correspondence centers on “neocon,” as in Buchanan’s wrong label “neocon court historian”. I’ve written no biography of any administration official, much less been subsidized or asked to do any particular writing to further an administration goal. I have been to the White House only on 3-4 occasions, always accompanied by a larger group of historians of widely differing views.
Neocon means “new conservative” and I suppose refers to those of the once hard left who, largely in distrust of the Soviet Union and disillusionment with Great Society programs, moved right, most prominently during the Reagan era. Buchanan himself worked with them in the Reagan White House, and I would imagine supported their tough, correct stance on rollback, and the questioning of 1960s entitlements.
The word became a pejorative slur with gusto in 2003 with the lead-up to Iraq. Perhaps some essays by neo-cons questioning the motives and patriotism (wrongly I think) of paleo-cons accentuated the falling out. But the big break came in 2004-6 with the insurgency in Iraq, when neocon became de facto synonymous with “Jew” and there were overt efforts to tie Kristol, Perle, Wolfowitz, Feith and others to a sort of covert cabal that had forced us to go to war for Israel—this despite the fact that Bush, Cheney, Powell, Rumsfeld and Rice were neither Jews nor neocons nor malleable dupes. That Francis Fukuyama, James Woolsey, or Bill Bennet were neocons seemed likewise to have had little effect on the Israel “amen corner” thesis.
I came to support neocon approaches first in the wars against the Taliban and Saddam, largely because I saw little alternative—in a post-9-11 effort to stop radical Islam and state sponsors of terror—to removing such odious enemies, and did not think leaving the defeated in power (as in 1991), or leaving in defeat (as in Lebanon), or installing a postbellum strongman was viable or in U.S. interests.
Few would agree, but I persist in thinking we will prevail in Iraq, and the consensual government there will not only survive, but have a positive effect throughout the region, finally give the Iraqi people hope for a civilized future, stop Iraq’s transference of petrodollars into dangerous arsenals, worry the theocrats in Iran, and remove Iraq as a perennial threat to its neighbors.
I have always detested communism, and have never been a hard-left, disillusioned Trotskyite, but rather a conservative Democrat. In the past, my only real political jousting had been in two areas, academia in which Who Killed Homer?” questioned postmodernism and contemporary leftwing academic theory, and in books on farming such as The Land Was Everything and Letters to an American Farmer, which were defenses of the agrarian tradition and won no support from either corporate agriculture or new-age organic growers who did not like the conservative rural ethos expressed. Much of my speaking in the 1990s was to small audiences of farmers, who were being squeezed by corporate subsidized agriculture and yet were not new-age, organic leftists. Mexifornia reflects that conservative worry about the effects of unchecked illegal immigration–at a time when many or most neo-cons were Wall-Street Journal open-borderites.
I thought the 1998 letter to Clinton asking for regime change and an attack on Saddam was wrong, but, after 9/11, came to the conclusion, like 75% of Americans, that there would never be peace in the region, nor a chance to rollback Islamic radicalism with Saddam’s terrorist-sponsoring regime in power. The 12 years of no-fly-zones, embargo, oil-for-food, and UN sanctions were not only weakening and losing support, but playing into the hands of our enemies.
I remember in 1998 being called by a news agency about preemption, given that I had written a book about Sherman and Patton, The Soul of Battle, but replied that I didn’t think starting a war with Saddam was wise or would garner public support. That said, I also remember being in Greece in 1998-9 and losing a number of Greek friends over the Clinton bombing of Belgrade, which I supported on grounds that it was clumsy, but apparently the only way to stop mass killing. Remember at that time, none on the Left damned Clinton for taking us to war without UN sanction or a Congressional ratification. And firebrands like Gen. Wesley Clark did and said things far more provocative than anything the sober and judicious Gen. Petraeus has yet uttered.
I disagreed with many of the decisions made about the Iraq war, and voiced them several times in print during the last few years—especially the concentration on WMD rather than on all 23 Congressional writs to go to war, the pull-back from Fallujah, the fiery “bring ‘em on” rhetoric that sometimes was not followed up by equally aggressive action, the mysterious sudden retirement of Tommy Franks as soon as the insurgency started, the inability to find generals who believed they could win the peace, and a number of other issues.
Disbanding the army was a mistake in the short-term, I think, not because purging Saddam’s high officers was unwise (it will eventually pay dividends), but largely due to the failure of finding jobs immediately for military-age soldiers with dangerous skills. I did not think that sending another 100,000 troops was either feasible or even wise in the long term, but supported the much smaller 30,000 surge, largely because it sent a message of determination, came with Gen. Petraeus, and ushered in a change of tactics. We forget that many who were demanding the present surge, were demanding a much larger one, well beyond our force capability.
In the end, Gen. Abezaid’s policy of keeping a light footprint may be proven right, but ironically only by the Petraeus surge of 30,000 more troops to provide a window of Iraqi security. Ironic I say because while the two’s views should be antithetical, they may end up being complementary.
But unlike some other critics, I never thought such lapses were either fatal to our cause, or by any standard unusual in military history. I took issue with those who had supported the war, and then suddenly abandoned it, and with the thinking that a brilliant three-week campaign reflected their views, while a botched occupation could only have belonged to others. Rather, I assumed that the US military would always find a way to win, that the victory would be of enormous importance, and that while observers should point out perceived mistakes in operations, it was easy to do so from the rear and such criticism should never reach a level to cause a loss of morale either here or abroad, especially while soldiers were in the field of fire.
What If History
I admire counter-factual thought exercises and have contributed to a number of such volumes myself. I agree with Buchanan that Stalin’s regime was every bit as monstrous as Hitler’s, and given the size and natural wealth of the Russian Empire, and the greater prostylizing efforts of global communism, in theory as, or more, dangerous. Long ago I wrote about the irony (voiced by George Patton) of fighting to save Eastern Europe from totalitarianism and ending up by ensuring it there.
But all that said, as many readers so eloquently pointed out, by the mid-1930s, given the innate doctrines of Nazism and the career of Hitler, I don’t think there were very many options given allied leaders. A review of the 1930s again and again shows efforts to the nth degree in France and England to disown World War I, to vow peace at all costs, and to send a message to Hitler that they would never repeat the Somme and Verdun. Other than Churchill’s influential realism, there were almost no prominent allied leaders in France or Britain who tried to galvanize their countries to oppose Nazism expansionism.
Once Hitler invaded Poland, the last chance to prevent a global conflagration would have been to launch an immediate invasion in the West, to cross the Rhine with well over 100 British and French divisions. It would have been touch-and-go, but might well have stopped Hitler and precluded the disastrous chain of events that followed. The Soviet Union and Japan, we forget, became formal or de facto allies or at least non-belligerents of Hitler largely on what they had seen in 1936-9, coming away with the lesson that the allies were weak and decadent and European fascism was the wave of the future and thus in some way should be joined or at least accommodated.
Obamiana
Some wrote that I was obsessed with Obama. Curious is a better word. I can’t think (readers help please) of a presidential candidate in the 20th century (not Carter, not Harding) so unprepared to be president.
The comparison with the young Congressman, Senator, student of history, and war veteran JFK proves the opposite.
By the same token, I persist in thinking that the novels, plays, and films comparing Bush to a Nazi or in some way deserving of assassination were both reprehensible and unprecedented, surely more than the hatred expressed for Nixon, Reagan, or Clinton. And I think such genres should and will stop with Obama. Indeed, one of the most startling developments in recent memory will be the utter about-face (compare already the Obama rejection of beloved federal campaign financing, his backtracking on the war timetable, etc.) of the liberal media. It would be incensed if one did to a President OBama what has been done to Bush. Suggesting that the Right in this instance does the same I don’t think is persuasive. Even the mainstream hysterical Clinton haters, here or abroad, did not write columns praying for a John Wilkes Booth to return.
The election
I think the Obama lead will widen, but that by October we will see a certain learning curve, in which the race will hinge on how quickly Obama discovers how to be prudent versus his dally gaffes and astounding pronouncements on education, geography, world affairs, race relations, and prior associates.
In key states, I don’t think he will learn fast enough and that will make the difference, as we saw in the latter primaries. I meet more and more prudent and centrist voters, who are impressed by Obama’s rhetoric and sympathetic to the notion of an African-American president and the undeniable symbolism it entails, but simply won’t entrust their country to someone of such marginal experience and dubious past associates.
A final thought. Both McCain and Obama are change/reform candidates with ample rhetoric about a kinder, gentler politics. That said, let’s see how really different this campaign becomes. I suspect it will be every bit as nasty and tough as 2004 on both sides.
I agree with your stated views above of Obama. Additionally, while I feel Obama’s an empty suit devoid of ideas and has a lack of understanding of the world and our country, his potential to arouse voters is scary.
What also brothers me no end is that support for Obama is based on his ethnic background and his Socialist views while corresponding support for McCain is deemed as being anti-Black. This is going to be a very dirty and rough election campaign and we’ve just started.
President Bush is going to be more highly viewed by history than the slams delivered by the media while that same media is blessing Obama as a messiah.
Dr. Hanson
Again, you have given us an eloquent and most persuasive lesson. Apologies and “what if“ scenarios cannot erase the realities of WWI or WWII. Certainly, we wish the paths and consequences could have been avoided. Those realities happened. One cannot look backwards in the binoculars and then judge actions against how the world operates in the present day. The leaders and governments did not have the luxury of instant global communications, satellite images, internet connections and the like…they made decisions based upon the best information available. Still mistakes and unfortunate actions or lack of actions happened in those wars. Today, the world still is imperfect, but I fear the 24/7 instant news cycle does not give leaders of any country much time to reflect before the drums of action are pasted in every newspaper, blog and run across the bottoms of the television news channels. Could the Cuban Missile Crisis been solved by Kennedy when he ignored the famous Khrushchev letter and responded with his own letter that set out positions without referring to the threats transmitted, if the pressure for news and action were as great then as today?
Thank you for writing this opinion. Your words ring just as true as they have in each column or posting of yours which I have read since your first one after 911.
Dear Professor,
It’s sick that you’ve been put in a position to argue that Hitler was evil. Yikes!
By the same token, it’s to your credit that you continue to respond to your detractors who seem to be both ignorant and/or one-time posters that hit and run. Actually, I’m starting to have a little fun with them.
It’s interesting to me that as McCain seems to be running a disorganized poor-man’s campaign, seems very uncharasmatic and not well spoken, that he’s not that far behind.
He can really use a good VP choice. I was a Romney guy after my initial infatuation with Thompson. Romney might be able to clean things up.
I believe you’ve implied in past writings that hubris will grow in Obama as money and adulation keeps pouring on and that his self image will be his undoing.
Let’s hope so.
:- )
Senator Obama’s recent ad is a barn-burner in many ways yet he really has not expressed concrete ideas. His apparent lack of knowledge of the world, history, and this country are astounding for someone running for president. Yet while the media has burned President Bush at the stake, in a sense, Obama has had a gilded pass even though there are signs that pass might not last too much longer.
As for your responses regarding Pat Buchanan, they are enjoyable only as reminders of the lessons available from that time. I’m especially concerned that the lessons learned from Munich not be lost when it comes to Iran. However, I fear that Obama might pay more attention to Buchanan’s hype then to reality. BHO’s hubris would carry him over the edge and us with him.
“….any suggestion that World War II was preventable had Hitler been treated with more consideration of his supposed legitimate grievances can only be interpreted as a certain callousness.”
These disingenuous ululations over Hitler’s bruised sensibilities, and clamourings about his slighted sense of dignity and national pride are as repellant now as ever they were as excuses for genocide. There is no excuse for genocide. It is the work of monsters — as true of the Nazis’ handiwork in World War II, as it was of the Albiégeois Crusade’s efforts to extinguish the Cathars in the Languedoc of the early 13th century.
What strikes me with chilling déjà vu as I read your post are the current utterances of Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA, when he expounds, like some tabloid psychoanalyst (any of his interviews with The Financial Times are real head bangers), about the need for sensitivity and understanding about the equally bruised sensibilities and self-confidence of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the serpentine murderers and thugs of the Iranian theocracy. Like Hitler, these gentle, artistic, devout souls have been misunderstood, their rightful dignity besmirched. No doubt, in El B’s reading, Ahmadinejad’s relentless prognostications about the imminent extinction of Israel are mere expressions of his wounded and unappreciated inner self.
The fault for the current trend of events, El B would give us to believe, is, of course, entirely ours, and we would do well to mend our ways, and repent — to appease. It makes one feel as though we are living in an eternal feedback loop — and perhaps we are, a karmic feedback loop that we enact again, and again, until we get it right. So far, like the idiot scientists in Einstein’s anecdote, or the madmen in another, we continue to do the exact same experiment over and over again, in the same way, seemingly even with the same, or at least similar, cast of characters, fully expecting a different result. It is madness. Continued delusional appeasement diplomacy in situations such as these will yield only the same result, over and over again. War. Genocide. The only difference this time — like all karmic lessons unlearnt, when they come back for yet another inexorable round, the pain and devastation for our unlearnt lessons are always exponentially greater. This time we will pay a nuclear price with untold millions of lives. Unless we change it — and the only way to change it is to change ourselves from the inside out, in our very being and thinking — only then will our choices, our actions, and our result be different. Will this happen, can this happen, when it is so clear that great hordes of the American electorate (to say nothing of the MSM) have gone so far around the bend? Time may tell….
VDH: Sorry to go off topic with such persistence. Your words seem to have brought up a rather vehement response from the vasty deep.
VDH:
I greatly appreciate this synopsis of your views. I’m not sure neocon or any other political label means much anymore, but your detractors have to call you something.
You do not obsess over Barack Obama. I know this because I do. He is a fascinating character, the lead actor in an unfolding drama. Unfortunately, he may turn out to be just another very shrewd plebian politician.
I apologize for spoofing on Hillary Clinton. She did yeoman’s work the last half of the primary season, unmasking or emasculating Obama. I’m glad she’s gone, though.
John McCain is a walking talking miracle. By all rights he should be dead politically. Does anyone agree with more than 50% of his views? If so, you have me beat. And if he physically drops dead between now and November 4th, I’m still going to vote for him. He deserves that for his support of a now successful effort in Iraq.
Hope you have farm friendly weather this season in the San Joaquin Valley.
Alex: Speaking of gentle souls, Hans Blix said after the fighting started in Iraq that he had wanted more time and that he had wanted to appeal to Saddam’s honor.
Your support of the Iraq War has been a great consolation to me, as I have been a steadfast supporter as well.
As you pointed out we were never in danger of being defeated militarily. It has been all about perceptions created by the media. By reading embedded bloggers like Michael Yon, Bill Roggio, Michael Totten, and Mil-blogs I managed to have a pretty good handle on what was really going down in Iraq.
After reading both Doug Feith’s book, “War and Decision” and Yon’s book, “Moment of Truth in Iraq,” I found many of the answers as to what went wrong and why things are now on the right track.
Feith describes the way DOD and State battled each other about the post- invasion plan. That created confusion and a poorly cobbled together plan that lead to Paul Bremer and the Iraqi Provisional Authority. When that turned out to be a bad move, they worked desperately to get an Iraqi government up and running. Elections were held, but security deteriorated and the new government struggled.
I’m not sure but what the course of events that actually occurred was necessary for the Sunnis to recognize that the Wahhabis (al Qaeda) did not have their best interests at heart and the Americans did. That lead to the Anbar Awakening. Because of that the surge succeeded with the only 30,000 additional troops and the change in tactics.
The Iraqi Army is growing in strength and capabilities, the people are beginning to understand how representative government works, and reconstruction is really beginning. Much remains to be done and terror attacks continue, but things are headed in the right direction.
Both of us should feel good because we believed in our warriors even when so many were losing faith. Every morning as I drink my coffee I say a prayer for those awesome men and women who have done their duty so magnificently.
I have never found your reflections on Obama “Obsessive”; rather, they are a badly needed lens to focus on the meteoric rise of this sudden superstar – the euphoria that surrounds him seems to move in direct proportion with hatred of George Bush, and the convergence of these forces will probably be a worthwhile topic of study for years to come, regardless of the election’s outcome.
I have to agree that Obama’s emergence has been a fascinating spectacle – I’ve never seen such naked appeals to racial solidarity in my life, and the stretches that his supporters indulge in to transmogrify the man from a predictable student of the counter-culture into America’s wisest sage have provided non-stop entertainment – although of a rather grim sort.
Please keep up the great work!
re: “I came to support neocon approaches first in the wars against the Taliban and Saddam, largely because I saw little alternative . . .”
The alternatives are
1) to pretend there is no threat as Obama and many on the Left, including much of Europe and our own state department, want to do or
2) to wage all-out war on Islam, including confiscating the Arab oil fields, obliterating their military infrastructure, and using ~5m US soldiers to enforce the rule of law throughout the Muslim world.
Seems we ought to give the middle ground a chance before seeing what’s behind door numbers one or two.
That said, I’m still dubious of the underlying values of Islamic culture, values that include entrenched resentment, ignorance, intolerance, envy, victimhood, and nihilism. That’s not a promising foundation for building a peaceful, productive society, however much American blood and treasure is expended.
One thing to keep in mind with Hitler is that he had plans to exterminate the Slavs. Had he won in Europe, you can bet the Jews and Slavs would have been a mere beta effort at racial cleansing. Unlike Stalin, who ruled purely through fear, Hitler inspired near hysteria in Germany, a lethal combination when combined with Hitler’s racist world views and German productivity and ferocity.
One big factor working against Obama is that lots of non-blacks will not tell a pollster that they are sick and tired of blacks blaming non-blacks for all the problems in the black community. By now, just about everyone has experienced egregious reverse racism (or knows someone who has), and the looming (if unspoken) potential of more government muscle behind the black victimhood industry will scare the daylights out of many people but in a way that will not show up until election day.
Very enlightening. Several liberal friends of mine have referred to me as a Neocon without knowing what it means. I didn’t know either, only because I reject any label other than conservative.
Next time one of my friend refers to me as Neocon, I can ask him if he’s aware of the anti Semitic over tones of the label. That ought to stop that particular line of argument.
The rest of your post is as your posts alway are, thought provoking.
Prof. Hanson
You and Prof Sowell are my favorite thinkers. You share a reasoned approach to issues that convinces without the having to sustain over inflated egos and overstatement.
I believe the election will come down to a referendum on Obama. I hope you are correct and the electorate finds him wanting. If his statements are in line with his beliefs (something about which I have no idea) he would indeed present a serious and lasting problem for the country.
Wow! Would that the PJ editors read this!
Bravo!
If there were 10 Victor Davis Hanson(s) advising the Federal Government — or one that was heeded — we would have only the smallest of large scale problems.
We can with hindsight play the “what if?” game and predict likely consequences.
What if the French had mobilized and marched into the Rhineland following Hitler’s move to remilitarize the region? We know now that the German army had orders to withdraw if they faced opposition.
What if Chamberlain had told Hitler at Munich that any encroachment on Czech territory would result in a British blockade of German ports? The supply of iron ore from Sweden to Germany would have been cut off.
What if Britain had forged alliances with Poland, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia to guarantee their sovereignty? The Sudetenland gave the Czechs a defensible border by virtue of topography and limited frontage. The Polish army (50 divisions) reinforced by the BEF including air and naval units might have given Hitler reason to pause.
What if Britain had made contact with members of Germany’s Junker class in an effort to have Hitler removed? The German aristocracy hated Hitler and the Nazi Party.
We do know one thing; appeasement never works.
Hans Blix, now there’s a name from the memory book….
Yes, always a little more time. It’s so tempting, to preserve the delusion — that Saddam (and here we can substitute Hitler, or Ahmadinejad, or Kim Jong Il for Saddam, au choix) could be reasoned with, that with Saddam it could be talked about and worked out, that Saddam possessed some variant of honor to which one might appeal, that Saddam was telling us the truth and not trying to manipulate, that Saddam was not merely being shrewd and calculating but really acting in good faith, and most of all, that Saddam was like us. Just a little more time, to stave off a painful sense of failure however illusory (for both HB and El B), to convince ourselves that the monster is not a monster at all (look how nicely they smile, and joke, and serve tea – no Iranian nukes here!), to keep hope alive that everything can be alright, that hope can triumph. These last are glories of human nature, good and noble things to be cherished, and protected, and nurtured…..but not for all circumstances. And there’s the rub. How to honor hope and our dreams with all our efforts, but still hold on to reality — and recognize the subtle machinations of a tyrant for what they are. How to extricate ourselves from the seduction of delusional thinking before it’s too late (this effort seems not to be going too well over at the State Department, nor the EU, let alone at El B’s office) — for it is the nature of monsters to invent ever greater evils, pain, and destruction. How to recognize the tyrant and put an end to the evil before all possibility of real hope and life are lost. How to know, when karma makes us blind. A healthy sense of self-preservation seems to me one good place to start. As I wrote in my first comment, I think that we’ve come up to our old karmic test again in the great world, and the question is whether we have learned enough to make different choices, and move on in a different direction this time. Have we learned enough to open our eyes, come out of our global trance, recognize the monsters are real, and step onto a different path? My hope is that we have turned another curl in the spiral of our evolution, that the strand goes always onwards and upwards, that we will dispatch the monsters and their machinations, and remember that life is for freedom, and joy, adventure, and discovery. Optimism will out.
Ruletopia says
“That said, I’m still dubious of the underlying values of Islamic culture, values that include entrenched resentment, ignorance, intolerance, envy, victimhood, and nihilism. That’s not a promising foundation for building a peaceful, productive society, however much American blood and treasure is expended.”
Ruletopia, why are you worried about Islam? You just described the black community in the USA and they must be stopped first. Once Obama is in, they might actually organize and further destroy this country.
vb:
Hans Blix, now there’s a name from the memory book….
Yes, always a little more time. It’s so tempting, to preserve the delusion — that Saddam (and here we can substitute Hitler, or Ahmadinejad, or Kim Jong Il for Saddam, au choix) could be reasoned with, that with Saddam it could be talked about and worked out, that Saddam possessed some variant of honor to which one might appeal, that Saddam was telling us the truth and not trying to manipulate, that Saddam was not merely being shrewd and calculating but really acting in good faith, and most of all, that Saddam was like us. Just a little more time, to stave off a painful sense of failure however illusory (for both HB and El B), to convince ourselves that the monster is not a monster at all (look how nicely they smile, and joke, and serve tea – no Iranian nukes here!), to keep hope alive that everything can be alright, that hope can triumph. These last are glories of human nature, good and noble things to be cherished, and protected, and nurtured…..but not for all circumstances. And there’s the rub. How to honor hope and our dreams with all our efforts, but still hold on to reality — and recognize the subtle machinations of a tyrant for what they are. How to extricate ourselves from the seduction of delusional thinking before it’s too late (this effort seems not to be going too well over at the State Department, nor the EU, let alone at El B’s office) — for it is the nature of monsters to invent ever greater evils, pain, and destruction. How to recognize the tyrant and put an end to the evil before all possibility of real hope and life are lost. How to know, when karma makes us blind. A healthy sense of self-preservation seems to me one good place to start. As I wrote in my first comment, I think that we’ve come up to our old karmic test again in the great world, and the question is whether we have learned enough to make different choices, and move on in a different direction this time. Have we learned enough to open our eyes, come out of our global trance, recognize the monsters are real, and step onto a different path? My hope is that we have turned another curl in the spiral of our evolution, that the strand goes always onwards and upwards, that we will dispatch the monsters and their machinations, and remember that life is for freedom, and joy, adventure, and discovery. Optimism will out.
George Best, that comment you made (“…the black community in the USA…must be stopped…”) is absolutely disgraceful. I’m sure that I have nothing to say to someone like you, but I do want you to know how vile and contemptible your words are to all decent people.
Jimmy J
Buy General Sada’s book. It was great.
I’m a third of the way through Feith’s. I learned in WWI they had Mustard Gas and Chlorine Gas. But Saddam was using ‘Nerve Gas’… a lot, and wondered what it was.
I asked a neurologist friend what it did and it wasn’t a pretty picture. Sorry lefties…I’m glad the US went to war against Saddam. %&@# Saddam. I’m glad somebody hanged his @$$.
Hey Fred. Sorry if you cannot accept reality. For all the worries we have over Islam, there is a scourge right in our own country. Just as not all Muslims are a part of the problem we talk so much about, not all blacks are a part of the problems in the black community. There are strong black people who deserve our praise whether its Condelleza Rice or whomever, but if you dont think the black community as a whole is causing problems with racism, our economy etc, then you are blind to reality.
The fact someone like Imus can lose his job for what he says and racist blacks go unpunished is a problem that further divides our society. I could go on about violence etc but I think you get it
Professor,
I believe you have been far too kind to Obama. He is completely comfortable with American defeat in Iraq, an ignominy of such disastrous proportions that he either a) is utterly unable to comprehend or b) only too happy to preside over. You take your pick and decide which is worse.
As for the Obamania – one need only consider the similar ethos of post WW1 Europe with post Cold War US. By 1900, Europe ruled the world. By 1920, she was a broken, defeated, starved and impotent region. Her art and literature reflected the cynicism and loss of faith that led directly to Hitler, Mussolini, Horthy, et al. We are not in the same vein yet, however, I think the lack of hope of the future – immigration, social security, debts, energy, etc. – all reflect a national unwillingness to do the simple things we need to secure our future. He is our political palliate. In fact, turn on any Sunday morning religious show and see the crowds, then compare them to an Obama “event”, or “gathering”, or revival, or whatever you choose to call it. Is there a difference? Only perhaps in the level of devotion of the followers, as Obama’s are far more so.
How simple it is: close the borders, begin dismantling of soc. sec. (even the AARP has acknowledged how well off are most seniors), balance the budget, and DRILL, DRILL, DRILL. Yet, he offers us “hope”. I figured it out when passing a large SUV with a “Got Hope” bumper sticker. Hope is for the forlorn, the desperate, the soulless. He is a scary and dangerous individual in many ways.
Your gentleness is reflective of your character, something we see far too lacking in his supporters and too often in polite society. Even should McCain win in november (and I have many reservations about him) the mere fact that Obama was ever taken seriously, became the nominee, and will garner perhaps 48% of the national vote, speaks even greater volumes than a McCain win.
Garys:
“Next time one of my friend refers to me as Neocon, I can ask him if he’s aware of the anti Semitic over tones of the label. That ought to stop that particular line of argument.”
A conservative would argue that not only is this a liberal argument on your part, but that the tying of anti-Semitism to the term “neocon” is an effort to shut down debate on this domestically liberal/foreign interventionist and globalist ideology that has taken over the Republican Party.
The same kind of ideology that equates “Democracy!” with freedom, even though that “freedom” elects Hamas in Palestine, allows the worst elements of Pakistan to rise to the top, and places Islam as the highest law (read the new “free” Iraq constitution and ask just how happy the non-Muslims in that country are about it….). All the while ballooning the size of our government here and rolling over to Mexico and the Saudis.
“Once Hitler invaded Poland, the last chance to prevent a global conflagration would have been to launch an immediate invasion in the West, to cross the Rhine with well over 100 British and French divisions.”-VDH
Wrong. The last chance to prevent the global conflagration came on September 3 when Britain declared war on Germany. Germany had not declared war on Britain, nor did it intend to. Germany’s interests were in Eastern Europe, recovering German lands amputated at the Peace of Paris (Danzig and the Polish Corridor), and eventually confronting the Soviet Union over the other weak states of the region who had since ancient times been ruled either by Romanovs, Hohenzoellerns, or Hapsburgs. By inserting Britain (and thus France and later the United States) into this battle between two ruthless dictators, Chamberlain, Halifax, and Churchill guaranteed the destruction of their empire as well as condemned many more millions unnecessarily to death.
Why not just leave Germany and Russia to fight it out, weakening each other and coming to some eventual stalemate? I know that would have outrightly condemned Eastern Europe to rule by dictatorship by one of these two men, but was the result of the war any better for these people who suffered under 50 years of rule by the “foul baboonery of Bolshevism”, in the words of Churchill in a more sane frame of mind.
Not excusing these murderers, I think Hanson’s idea of sending in 100 divisions,(where were these warriors when France was overrun in a matter of days in 1940?), is utterly ridiculous and shows a judgment perhaps clouded by the politics of western interventionism. It was this very intervention by the West, arrogantly assuming that we knew better and could structure the world according to our own ideals, that threw the gas on this regional struggle and exploded it into the global conflagration Hanson decries.
“Why not just leave Germany and Russia to fight it out, weakening each other and coming to some eventual stalemate? I know that would have outrightly condemned Eastern Europe to rule by dictatorship by one of these two men”
Better to stand by and not let the West arrogantly assume that intervention was better than the consequences… however at what point do the 6 million systematically killed by the Germans and two or three times that number murdered or dead in Stalin’s Russia become our interest? Do we merely accept one of these two murderers (“not excusing”, to use the preface) and turn our backs?
What if France and Britain had declined to declare war in 1939?
Hitler would have known that both nations would go to war only if attacked by Germany directly. This would have left Hitler free to attack the Soviet Union. He stated explicitly in Mein Kampf; Lebensraum was to be found in the east.
What would have happened had Germany been left to fight Russia without fear of a two-front war? Operation Barbarossa was launched later than planned in the summer of 1941. If the Wehrmacht had had an additional six weeks of good weather, Moscow most certainly would have fallen. Stalin’s bungling during the early months of the campaign had him convinced that another failure would result in his arrest and removal from power. The new government might have sued for peace.
What would the Nazi empire have looked like with access to Caucasian oil and Ukrainian manpower? Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary had already become axis satellites. The Greater Reich would have become unstoppable.
The war was inevitable whatever the scenario. The Anglo-French mistake was not in declaring war, but rather in the appeasement policies that only served to encourage more German aggression. A prompt counter-response in September of 1939 would have denied the Germans the nine month respite of the so-called Phony War. In this scenario heavy bomber raids by the RAF would have enjoyed fighter escort from bases in France. Germany industry would have been pounded from the beginning. The airwar would have been fought over German cities, not British.
Hitler’s early successes cemented his position as German fuhrer. Early failures would likely have had the opposite affect. The Junker class would have removed him from power and likely sued for peace.
Matt,
‘a judgment perhaps clouded by the politics of western interventionism’
I believe it was this interventionism that gave freedom and democracy to millions including the 50,000,000 people in Iraq and Afghanistan recently.
Before, they all had little hope for a bright free future. But thanks to the interventionism of the USA, the nastiest, most cruel and inhumane leaders have been vanquished.
Let them wear each other out? Do you have any German friends? They don’t wear out easy.
Ron Kean:
“I believe it was this interventionism that gave freedom and democracy to millions including the 50,000,000 people in Iraq and Afghanistan recently.”
Not only is that not a proper cause of war, it also isn’t really true.
The Iraqi and Afghani constitutions make Islam the highest law. That’s no recipe for freedom.
I wish people currently – particularly the “international affairs” majors who populate our State Department – had a better understanding of what “democracy” actually is, what a national interest is, how that would best be served, and that we do not exist as a nation to save the world from itself.
Jim Stutts:
“…we do not exist as a nation to save the world from itself.”
In my opinion, absolutely true. However, we did not invade Afghanistan to save it from itself, but to eliminate a regime which harbored terrorists who committed an act or war. 9/11 was a legitimate cause for military intervention in Afghanistan, period. Staying there to foster stability only makes sense, and is a cause at least nominally embraced by our European “allies”.
Toppling Saddam Hussein is obviously a more controversial subject. Like many Americans, I have spent the last five years trying to understand the Bush Administration’s decision making process which led to our intervention. The post hoc reports coming out now only cloud the issue, perhaps with one exception. The Senate Intelligence Committee report which came out recently clearly shows we were operating in the dark. The NIE from Oct 2002 concluded Saddam was a threat, possessed WMD and had some contacts with terrorist groups. A little over one year after 9/11, it would have been hard for any President to have ignored that assessment. Regardless of what justifications Bush has given us since then, I seriously doubt saving the Iraqi people from a murderous tyrant was ever a real factor in his decision making. We’ll be debating this one for along time to come.
Staying in Iraq for five plus years (to date) may turn out to be the correct decision and the saving grace for George Bush’s legacy. His stubbornness may some day be perceived as steadfastness (c.f. David Brooks’ article today in NYT) in the face of near universal condemnation. For me, the only reason to concede in this war is if we cannot find a strategy to effect a reasonable outcome that promotes our security interests. That point now seems moot.
I agree also with the entirety of your last paragraph.
“Staying there to foster stability only makes sense, and is a cause at least nominally embraced by our European “allies”.”
Creating an Islamic state in Afghanistan doesn’t, though. Attaturk had the only solution to a quasi-free country with Islam the dominant religion.
“I seriously doubt saving the Iraqi people from a murderous tyrant was ever a real factor in his decision making. We’ll be debating this one for along time to come.”
I believe this to be true. The “Iraqi Freedom” line was PR.
“Staying in Iraq for five plus years (to date) may turn out to be the correct decision and the saving grace for George Bush’s legacy.”
Maybe. The problem with attempting to replicate the Marshall Plan in the Middle East is that the people have to want freedom in a Western sense (most do not) and understand the implications. Being motivated to better their country is a help. This “hand up” we gave Germany and Japan at the end of WWII was only offered after they had been completely defeated. This did not happen in Iraq. Plus, this “war on terror” has become only about Iraq. Iraq is only a minor front in this war Islam has picked with us. Our territorial security and reducing Saudi influence is of no interest to this Administration. In fact, they’ve been active in promoting that influence and reducing our perimeter security.
To continue the World War II analogy, we’re appeasing Germany (Iran), rebuilding Italy (Iraq), and sucking-up to Japan (Saudi Arabia).
You cannot fight a war with Muslim terrorists when you fund organizations like al Fatah, encourage Saudi money to pour into the United States, leave our perimeter undefended, and cede every ideological point in conflict. I don’t care about Iraq or the people in Iraq. They’ve repeatedly made their own bed. I care about my own country. Iraq is ONLY worthwhile if it enhances our security. Otherwise, defeat them and issue them a stern warning to never do it again. Considering the constitution we let them create, I don’t think it will help us in the long run, despite all the money we’ve spent.
Addendum:
Like some of his colleagues at State, Barack Obama is one of your “international affairs” graduates (Columbia University 1983).
VDH:
You did not portray Mr. Buchanan as an anti-Semite and a racist. He has been more than capable of doing that with his own hot-headed rhetoric over the years. This recent unscholarly book of his concerning WW II is proof that Mr. Buchanan still does not “get it” about the current situation in the world. The idea of NOT fighting the Third Reich to destruction, or half-hearted engaging it and then giving up, so as to let it establish an iron grip on Europe and part of Asia gives me the chills to consider the state of the world in 2008 with such a situation.
The Cold War with the USSR was bad enough, and still very “hot” in places where traditional Western republican & democratic ideals clashed with the Communist ideals of submission to the collective will & demands of the State. The Nazis had all of that opposing attitude possessed by the Communists, plus a tendency to meet rejection or resistance with vigorous attempts at exterminating the rejecting/resisting populace. Even if the United Kingdom and its Empire, and our own great nation with far-flung territories, had managed to overcome the Imperial Dictatorship of Japan and kept the Pacific free, we should still be locked into a continual struggle with a global Power whose ruling elite would have been indoctrinated from birth to regard themselves as the natural rulers of an all-encompassing National Socialist empire with the self-imposed destiny of subjugating all humanity within its reach. Compared to the Thousand Year Reich, Osama Bin Laden, Ahmadinejad, and all their ilk are a bunch of mirror-gazing, tinhorn wanna-bes.
Why Mr. Buchanan should ever wish such a situation were upon us is beyond me, but apparently he would find it more satisfying than watching us try to stifle an outbreak of religious-based terorism & shadow warfare. Admittedly, the Global War on (Islamic) Terrorism has not been the stuff of Hollywood spectacle, and it is admittedly frustrating to try to contain and destroy the destructive element of an international culture without reducing those international regions to a lower level of civilization than they already possess. But, such is the evil of our times that we are called upon to face. If our great Nation has become slow to respond to hostile threats that do not conveniently label themselves with a symbol or uniform, we need to find ways to effectively stimulate it to greater efforts. Looking to past foes through the narrow focus of nostalgia will not solve the problem.
Your own books and essays have sometimes taken the United States in particular and the Western World in general to task over the collective lack of will to maintain the cultural and political values & traditions that have made the United States the preeminent nation in the world. At the same time, you recall those values & traditions to us, and remind us that they are still present, waiting to be upheld and used to the benefit of us, our descendents, and eventually to all the world.So, until Mr. Buchanan changes his mind, you shall always have the upper hand in the debate, with no need to sling ad hominem attacks in defense of an indefensible position, as he has done.
Jim Stutts,
The Marshall plan was in part put forth as a counter to Soviet aims in Western Europe. Stabilizing Iraq is possibly our best counter to Iranian intentions in the “Persian” Gulf, whether we pursue long term basing rights there or not. Rebuilding Japan post WWII made sense for similar reasons. However, unlike MacArthur in Japan, Bremer and associates were unable to write the Iraqi constitution. Remember, we “liberated” the Iraqis. We did not conquer them. The result is a bastardized democracy.
I agree with your implied concerns regarding Saudi Arabia, and if I were a so called Neocon that country, not Syria or Iran, would be next on my list for regime change. Yet one more reason to have a presence in the region. And while Shia terrorists are a legitimate problem, they are a political tool of the Iranians, and are seen as such, I believe, by a majority of Muslims (especially Sunni Arabs). Wahabism is the true enemy. We need an effective counter to this archaic religious philosophy, and to the Saudis who promote it.
“Stabilizing Iraq is possibly our best counter to Iranian intentions in the “Persian” Gulf, whether we pursue long term basing rights there or not.”
So, that’s why the ISG wants Iranian help to stablize Iraq?
“Remember, we “liberated” the Iraqis. We did not conquer them. The result is a bastardized democracy.”
Yes, I remember that. I said as much previously. It isn’t likely to last that long. Now with Islam as the highest law.
“Wahabism is the true enemy. We need an effective counter to this archaic religious philosophy, and to the Saudis who promote it.”
Islam is the true enemy. Wahabism is just the most visible and risible version of it. We do nothing to stop that promotion even within our own country.