Patterico's Pontifications

9/10/2008

If You Read Just One Article Today, Read This Op-Ed By Faoud Ajami In Today’s WSJ

Filed under: General — WLS @ 4:17 pm



[Posted by WLS]

This is a powerful piece on the foreign policy consequences of an Obama presidency.  It’s about 180 degrees from the views expressed by Sullivan regarding the imperative of an Obama presidency. 

I’m particularly struck by the characterization of the US moving back and forth between a nationalistic, imperialistic, and cosmopolitan posture vis-a-vis the rest of the world — which I read mainly as post-WWII Europe.

— WLS

35 Responses to “If You Read Just One Article Today, Read This Op-Ed By Faoud Ajami In Today’s WSJ”

  1. “When we elect a president, we elect a commander in chief. This remains an imperial republic with military obligations and a military calling.”

    I would suggest that you, and Ajami as well, read this

    An intelligence forecast being prepared for the next president on future global risks envisions a steady decline in U.S. dominance in the coming decades, as the world is reshaped by globalization, battered by climate change, and destabilized by regional upheavals over shortages of food, water and energy.

    The report, previewed in a speech by Thomas Fingar, the U.S. intelligence community’s top analyst, also concludes that the one key area of continued U.S. superiority — military power — will “be the least significant” asset in the increasingly competitive world of the future, because “nobody is going to attack us with massive conventional force.”

    Fingar’s remarks last week were based on a partially completed “Global Trends 2025” report that assesses how international events could affect the United States in the next 15 to 17 years. Speaking at a conference of intelligence professionals in Orlando, Fingar gave an overview of key findings that he said will be presented to the next occupant of the White House early in the new year.

    “The U.S. will remain the preeminent power, but that American dominance will be much diminished,” Fingar said, according to a transcript of the Thursday speech. He saw U.S. leadership eroding “at an accelerating pace” in “political, economic and arguably, cultural arenas.”

    Your defense of the empire, as opposed to the country, is both morally questionable and as a matter of logic, simply misguided

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  2. Fingar — you mean the criminal who disclosed classified programs to various news media outlets while with the CIA in an effort to sabotag Bush Administration policies?

    That Fingar?

    You obviously do not understand the point of Ajami’s article. Its not about empire — its about the protection of national interest.

    Globalization simply means an expansion of the Monroe Doctrine.

    WLS (26b1e5)

  3. “its about the protection of national interest.”
    The questions concern the best way to achieve that goal. You worry about Fingar, so why not worry more about Dusty Foggo? He’s one of yours.

    A former top CIA official accused of corruption and fraud is threatening to expose the identities of numerous agents and programs as part of his defense, prosecutors said.
    In a court filing, prosecutors allege that former CIA executive director Kyle “Dusty” Foggo is trying to gum up the works of his trial, scheduled for November, by delving into classified information that is irrelevant to his case. Foggo is charged with 28 counts of wire and mail fraud, unlawful money transactions and making false statements.

    We have to learn to deal with the rest of the world, not just rule over it. That won’t work anyway. And of course the Bush administration couldn’t even organize itself a clambake, let alone a civil defense plan or a war. Fancy ad campaigns and making “our own reality” don’t make the world a safer place, and don’t protect the national interest.
    Not one god damn bit.
    Talk to me about the history of US foreign policy. Show me what you know.

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  4. Jar — you assume the rest of world wants to “deal with us.” What supports the view that Iran wants to “deal with us”? Or Venezuela? Or Russia? Or, most importantly, China?

    You want to turn the foreign policy apparatus of the US back over to the Warren Christophers, Madeline Albrights, and Sandy Bergers of the world? Their ineptitude in the 1990’s laid the ground work for an extremely difficult first decade of the new century.

    I don’t want my government to apologize to the rest of the world for defending the interests of the US population. There has never in the history of man been a better force for good in the world than the US of the 20th century.

    As Hitler and Tojo learned, Americans are ready and willing to beat their plowshares into swords when necessary.

    But as the Iraqis have also learned, we’re willing to spend billions of our own money to leave a foreign land better than we found it.

    WLS (26b1e5)

  5. “Jar — you assume the rest of world wants to “deal with us”

    The rest of the world doesn’t have a choice. You know that, and I know that.

    Next.

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  6. Jar, your knowledge of the Bush administration foreign policy successes is extraordinary in its repetition of the usual insipid nonsense.

    The Bush administration has had some extraordinary successes – successes that have been transformative. The most significant has been to reform international banking to eliminate major funding routes for terrorism. It has had extraordinary success in its primary goal. And it has had amazing side effects in numerous other areas of interest to the US like the policies of North Korea. Secondly, the transformation of India from a nation in active opposition to the US and to US interests, to a nation that is an active and significant ally of the US.

    Making stupid claims about how bad the Bush administration is at international relations is just showing how shallow and uninformed you are.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  7. “Next,” go back and deal with the previous — pussy.

    Icy Truth (2c3adb)

  8. Comment 1 quoted the essential sentences of this column:When we elect a president, we elect a commander in chief. This remains an imperial republic with military obligations and a military calling.

    Ajami says this as if it’s a good thing.
    In reality, that there is the problem. We shouldn’t be imperial, we shouldn’t be thinking of ourselves as having some moral obligation to use the military for the benefit of the rest of the world, and we shouldn’t be thinking of ourselves as having a national military calling.

    Ajami apparently adheres to the theory that the US needs to be the biggest bully in the schoolyard; and he totally neglects the verity that the wisest use of power is not using it when one does not need to use it.

    kishnevi (3b491b)

  9. Obama’s policy of unilateral disarmament and surrender is not the answer.

    Evil Pundit (843b74)

  10. #8 kishnevi:

    we shouldn’t be thinking of ourselves as having a national military calling.

    While I agree with the tenor of your post, in that the US isn’t really an imperial power, there remains a martial component to our history and our future.

    You are correct in stating that the wisest use of power is knowing when not to: but our experience of the last two centuries shows that our interests are better served when that power is available, rather than simply a potential.

    And when not engaged in combat, our military has been engaged in humanitarian diplomacy for quite a while now, so perhaps the best view of the appropriations made for the maintenance of our armed forces is that they are multipurpose. That portion allocated to pursuing our national interests in an altruistic manner may be minor in comparison to the total, but has an effect all out of proportion in promoting our interests abroad.

    Because the military is such a visible face on our executive branch and its role as the arbiter of foreign relations, the choice of a commander in chief is an element that should be considered when discerning the qualities of the candidate that appeals to you.

    EW1(SG) (1c0755)

  11. kishnevi, I don’t think you understand Ajami’s point. I don’t think he was advocating that POV so much as describing a dominant POV among the electorate.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  12. “Americans are ready and willing to beat their plowshares into swords when necessary.”

    Many people have thought it in our best interest to control the world. That may be your opinion, and if it is I’ll listen to your defense. But your logic, as you state it here is that we have somehow always been on the defensive.
    With that in mind, here’s a start.

    “Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq”

    The recent ouster of Saddam Hussein may have turned “regime change” into a contemporary buzzword, but it’s been a tactic of American foreign policy for more than 110 years. Beginning with the ouster of Hawaii’s monarchy in 1893, Kinzer runs through the foreign governments the U.S. has had a hand in toppling, some of which he has written about at length before (in All the Shah’s Men, etc.). Recent invasions of countries such as Grenada and Panama may be more familiar to readers than earlier interventions in Iran and Nicaragua, but Kinzer, a foreign correspondent for the New York Times, brings a rich narrative immediacy to all of his stories.

    “America’s Kingdom, Mythmaking on the Saudi Oil Frontier, Stanford University Press, 2006″

    Robert Vitalis refutes popular claims that American-Saudi relations were idyllic for several decades and how the relationship between the two countries came into question, even fell apart, only after 9/11. On the contrary, the book shows how Americans in the Kingdom set up a kind of Jim Crow system or version of American Apartheid in the oil provinces in the 1930s. It traces the rise of a Saudi workers’ movement (discussed in this book for the first time) that confronted the Americans in the 1950s.

    David Ben Gurion

    If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We come from Israel, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been antisemitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that?”

    And spend some time reading Tony Judt.
    On a lot of things, including the post war European left, I disagree strongly, but he’s the real thing. You’re rambling as if Clinton was responsible for everything, is just odd.
    And no, I don’t expect Obama to agree with me on Israel. But I’m more than a little annoyed that the vice presidential candidate of the republican party would sit in church and listen to a guest argue that the Palestinian suicide bombings are god’s retribution for Jewish refusal to convert to christianity.
    As a Jew I find that particularly offensive.

    As I said: next

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  13. “Americans are ready and willing to beat their plowshares into swords when necessary.”

    Many people have thought it in our best interest to control the world. That may be your opinion, and if it is I’ll listen to your defense. But your logic, as you state it here is that we have somehow always been on the defensive.
    With that in mind, here’s a start.

    “Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq”

    The recent ouster of Saddam Hussein may have turned “regime change” into a contemporary buzzword, but it’s been a tactic of American foreign policy for more than 110 years. Beginning with the ouster of Hawaii’s monarchy in 1893, Kinzer runs through the foreign governments the U.S. has had a hand in toppling, some of which he has written about at length before (in All the Shah’s Men, etc.). Recent invasions of countries such as Grenada and Panama may be more familiar to readers than earlier interventions in Iran and Nicaragua, but Kinzer, a foreign correspondent for the New York Times, brings a rich narrative immediacy to all of his stories.

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  14. “America’s Kingdom, Mythmaking on the Saudi Oil Frontier, Stanford University Press, 2006″

    Robert Vitalis refutes popular claims that American-Saudi relations were idyllic for several decades and how the relationship between the two countries came into question, even fell apart, only after 9/11. On the contrary, the book shows how Americans in the Kingdom set up a kind of Jim Crow system or version of American Apartheid in the oil provinces in the 1930s. It traces the rise of a Saudi workers’ movement (discussed in this book for the first time) that confronted the Americans in the 1950s.

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  15. David Ben Gurion

    If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We come from Israel, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been antisemitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that?”

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  16. Jar, link spamming is the mark of a troll.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  17. And no, I don’t expect Obama to agree with me on Israel. But I’m more than a little annoyed that the vice presidential candidate of the republican party would sit in church and listen to a guest argue that the Palestinian suicide bombings are god’s retribution for Jewish refusal to convert to christianity.

    As a Jew I find that particularly offensive, and untrustworthy.
    I’m just looking out for my interests.

    Goodnight.

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  18. Jar, you’re right.

    A candidate should sit in a church for 20 years and hear his pastor ask God to damn America, over and over again. But a guest speaker who speaks in a church? Unforgivable! I can’t imagine how you’ve been able to endure it these past few weeks.

    steve miller (dcbd46)

  19. Sheesh, jar, your #17 is just the most bizarre application of backwards logic we’ve seen to date.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  20. “Sheesh, jar, your #17 is just the most bizarre application of backwards logic we’ve seen to date.”
    Sorry, but I have to ask: Are you telling me I should convert?

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  21. 17~

    And no, I don’t expect Obama to agree with me on Israel. But I’m more than a little annoyed that the vice presidential candidate of the republican party

    would prominently display a Magen David ensign in her office.

    Not something that you’ll find in O!bama’s to be sure.

    EW1(SG) (1c0755)

  22. Hooray! Amidst all of that spew we actually learned something. Well, just don’t forget which side of the political fence is really on Israel’s side.

    Icy Truth (2c3adb)

  23. Obama has a Rabbi in the family. Or at least his wife does.
    And I really don’t want to have to worry about the fate of the middle east -including members of my family- being in the hands of a woman (or a man) awaiting signs of The Rapture.
    Jews are not here to be seen as signs of anyone else’s anything.
    And Obama will get the vast majority of the Jewish vote, just as every democrat has in the past.
    Some of you idiots -most of you- would be horrified by what Israelis read in Ha’aretz every day.
    “Israel is full of self hating Jooos!”
    You’ll pardon my contempt, I just had two double shots of Jameson.

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  24. 23.

    And I really don’t want to have to worry about the fate of the middle east -including members of my family- being in the hands of a woman (or a man) awaiting signs of The Rapture.

    So instead, you’d rather leave it to a man who has expressed sympathy for a group whose collective goal is Jewish extinction?

    Jews are not here to be seen as signs of anyone else’s anything.

    No, they are to be a “Light unto the Nations,” charged with the responsibility of tikkun olam.

    And Obama will get the vast majority of the Jewish vote, just as every democrat has in the past.

    More’s the pity, and almost all of the Jewish Lite vote at that.

    Some of you idiots -most of you- would be horrified by what Israelis read in Ha’aretz every day.
    “Israel is full of self hating Jooos!”
    You’ll pardon my contempt,

    You’re doing a fine job.

    EW1(SG) (1c0755)

  25. “So instead, you’d rather leave it to a man who has expressed sympathy for a group whose collective goal is Jewish extinction?”
    Jews for Jesus?

    When you say something worth taking seriously we can have a discussion.

    Jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  26. we can have a discussion.

    On the contrary, you’re a petty little closed minded little shit content to engage in lashon ha-ra and vote against your own best interests in survival.

    While I have little more respect for “Jews for Jesus” than you appear to, I have a great deal of respect for an official who subordinates their own beliefs (based on principles and their understanding of the Ineffable Name) to the law when it comes to protecting the rights of groups they might disagree with. Somethng that Sen Obama has no proven history of doing.

    As far as taking you seriously, I can’t. But I will proffer some advice: pull your head out of your butt. You give Jews and friends of Jews and Israel a bad name. Find a knowledgeable friend to study Torah with. Your life will be much richer.

    I am done with you.

    EW1(SG) (da07da)

  27. Somehow, I italicized but didn’t get this link in that last comment:

    best interests in survival.

    EW1(SG) (da07da)

  28. David Ben Gurion
    “If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We come from Israel, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been antisemitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that?”

    Please explain. Justify.
    This has nothing to do with Obama since he panders to AIPAC as much as the rest.

    jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  29. Jar, it is easy to justify…

    The world, led by the UN, and a huge majority of the nations and their leaders, established Israel as a nation to be accepted as equals among the nations of the world. Yes, that meant that some nations of the world would have to capitulate and give land to establish that new nation, but, that was the decision of the world.

    Now, many of those nations, both those who gave land and those who made it happen, have decided to change their mind.

    That is wrong.

    So, Israel must be defended as a nation, just as Georgia must be defended, just as Iraq must be defended…..

    Just as America must be defended from the terrorist who have and will attack us…

    Did David Ben Gurion understand the real meaning of what happened in 1948??? Yes, he did, which is why he was willing to defend with his life the nation he became part of….

    Are you willing to defend that same right???

    reff (959425)

  30. “So, Israel must be defended as a nation, just as Georgia must be defended, just as Iraq must be defended….”

    -It’s not the nation, its the government. South Africa was not synonymous with Apartheid.

    -Georgia has not had control of Ossetia for almost 2 decades.

    -The US is still debating the partition of Iraq. Many Iraqis think that was the goal to begin with.

    “Did David Ben Gurion understand the real meaning of what happened in 1948???”
    What’s the moral justification of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine?: “God promised it to us,”
    “We come from Israel, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been antisemitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault?

    Defend 40 years of military occupation.
    look

    jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  31. B’Tselem.

    Statistics. Read the charts.

    jar@my home computer (6b0755)

  32. JAR, You are mentally ill. The Palestinians stay away because they refuse to accept Israel as the legitimate government. It was not ethnic cleansing.

    PCD (1df2b5)

  33. Republicans look at Israel from the perspective whether it is in the best interest of America for that little island of civilization to survive in a sea of barbarity. Democrats look at it from the perspective of how much money and how many votes they can squeeze out of American Jews by supporting Israel.

    nk (d681ef)

  34. Jar…wrong…

    It is the people, the belief, not the government…

    Israel is Jewish, and the two cannot be separated, so, it is not the government, because the Israeli government–meaning the people–accept and allow other religions to exist in their nation. You cannot say that about other people in the Arab nations…not their governments, but the people.

    South Africa–the government, not the people–was apartheid. There were many, MANY, people there who were against apartheid, but, their lack of control would stop it. Then, what happened when the government–not the people, but the government–changed??? The now minority white South Africans have been eliminated, either through theft of their lands/wealth, or by simply force. The people are not respected, or are they in control.

    Georgia was not trying to control Ossetia; that was the Russian excuse for action. Of course, Obama was not opposed to Russian action, and blamed it on the Georgians, until, of course, he read the tea leaves.

    Again, it is the Russian government, not the people of Russia, and definately not the people of Georgia, who are acting….

    What you, and your like, fail to see about America is that it is not the government, but the people, that make it great. Mistakes occur, and the people go into the voting booth to make attempts to change it, but, in the end, it is the people….

    How else could Israel have survived three wars against overwhelming numbers???

    As for partitioning Iraq, what planet do you get your news on??? If, as you say, our government is still negiotiating the partition of Iraq, it must be really REALLY shocking news to the government of Iraq….which by the way is on their way to being a government of the people, not the reverse…..

    reff (959425)

  35. Jar…I noticed something interesting about your link to the deaths of children…

    You only bring children into the discussion….

    Any death is a sadness, a wrong that cannot be reversed….

    So, why don’t the Palestinians, make a decision not to kill another Israeli???

    If one side stopped, what might happen???

    Next, didn’t the Arab nations in 1948 surround Israel, with the attempt to begin a battle that would destroy the new nation??? Oh, and I do know that Israel committed the first attack on those Arab armies, in an act even the Arabs have admitted was an act of self preservation.

    Why??? Why the armies poised to attack the new nation???

    They could have chosen to live in peace, but didn’t….

    I have read, and studied, the conflict, and one thing sticks out to me more than any other: that the Arab nations have chosen not to live in peace. That the Palestinians have always, through their leaders (the government again, not the people, whose voices we may not be hearing) chosen the path of violence and war.

    You call it an occupation, and there is semantic evidence that your identification is correct. I call it preserving a living nation, and there is evidence that my identification is correct.

    But, what would happen if the Palestinians would just live in peace???

    reff (959425)


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