perfidy

There's been some fairly kickass Perfidious discussion recently about Presidential policy and Iraq, and somehow we've managed to suckerentice new commenters to weigh in. Sweet!

Buckethead posted yesterday an excerpt by Rosemary, QOAE that argued that liberals are impossible to please right now. All in all, she is right that many people have knee-jerk responses against every move the President makes. But at the end of the day, that's a straw-man argument that doesn't get at anything terribly important.

[Here comes the first-person perspective!] Even though I'm not a liberal per se (at least not on Tuesdays), I do generally oppose the President's views and treat his actions with overall suspicion. But I think Rosemary is giving me and many others too much credit for our discernment.
Back when Clin-ton was in the White House getting hummers and ordering opportune missile strikes, I second-guessed his every move. I spent 1993 convinced that NAFTA was economic poison (hey... I was in college), and when he launched those rockets in 1998, I was positive that that strike had been ordered to take media heat off his impending blowjob testimony.

All this is simply to say that there's a class of people in this country, probably pretty large, who have a hard time giving any President the benefit of the doubt. The office is held by mortals not gifted with foresight, and they are bound to have human flaws. I for one don't often have the intestinal fortitude to trust them to overcome those flaws.

That all being said, Bush's policies abroad do scare the bejeezus out of me, and I tend to grip at every new development. I'm still not convinced that the libervasion of Iraq-- though undoubtedly and manifestly a good thing-- is the best way to crush international terrorism. Maybe it is. Maybe it ain't. So far the Prudential Center hasn't blown up, so Boston at least has been safe for the last 18 months. Am I willing to give him the benefit of the doubt? Sort of. I'm the guy in the back seat of the car going 120 mph with his hands over his eyes, saying "I hope you know what you're doing!"

Anyway, I had a point here...

Right. Buckethead highlighted another section of Rosemary's post in which she argued that regarding terrorists, we only have two choices: to wait and die; or move now and kill. I disagree. I think that we are actually in the midst of pursuing a third way right now, and that more should be done along these lines. [note to Buckethead: yes, here comes the hearts and minds bullshit again. Pls hold fire until I'm done.] One reason I'd like to see more troops in Iraq, especially specialists rather than fighters, is that the faster and more effectively the general public decide "yes, they're infidels, but the lights work!" the better.

The Marines are as usual way out in front in doing this. Recently they resurrected the "Small Wars Manual", which was written back when the US had actual imperial designs on places like Haiti, Guam, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Cuba. Although a lot of the information is entertainingly outdated, it still contains a great deal of heard-won wisdom on how to make villages accept your presence and work with you. That, in the long run, is the most potent weapon we have in the war on Terrorism. When the recent Sunni Uprising went down, I saw in it an opportunity to demonstrate the power of the Third Way. Smack without mercy anyone who shoots at us, and resolutely resist attempts to draw us into backing down or levelling the place. News out of Iraq is spotty, so I don't know what the hell to think now, but I still hope that my way is a good way out of Iraq's and out current trouble.

One last thought. I've long advocated learning more about the thought processes of terrorists and the populations that spawn them, as a way to stem the future tide of 'splodeydopes and radical jihadists. Some would disagree. They are the Second Option radicals. Others, mostly stinky hippies, think the US deserves what it gets and prefer to celebrate the free and liberal policies of Kim Jong Il and Fidel Castro. They are the First Option radicals.

We keep seeing evidence that in the Middle East in general, and within each country in specific, there are certain cultural differences that make all communication difficult. What comes across and gentlemanly conduct in Oklahoma translates as being a real pussy in Baghdad. The troops on the ground have to learn-- are learning-- how to bridge these divides and make their missions a success. But how can we ensure that the lessons they learn there make their way back up the chain of command and get written into a new edition of the Small Wars Manual? If Rumsfeld and his crew have one failing (and they have many), they seem to cling with evangelical fervor to their ways. Because of that, I'm having a hard time giving them the benefit of the doubt.

Rosemary, I do agree with you that doing nothing and waiting means that more people around the world will die in spectacular and horrifying ways thanks to terrorism. I'm just not convinced that the only other option is to kick all the ass you say we should.

[wik] Via Kathy Kinsley I find this Weekly Standard editorial that comes to the exact opposite conclusion that I have. Funnyguy (sorta) Larry Miller writes some excellent observations about the "end-zone dance' that was the aircraft carrier landing ("Mission Accomplished" my ass!), but then argues this:

Message to the administration: No one in Europe or on the left is ever, ever, ever going to like you from seeing a photograph of a marine handing a bag of groceries to a woman in a burkha. Jacques Chirac is never going to say, "Well, they have built a lot of community centers. Maybe Bush was right."

Win. Stopping building schools. Win. There's plenty of time and need for hospitals, but first . . . Win. Yes, yes, Iraqi girls can be very empowered by seeing a female colonel running an outreach program, and we can all chip in for the posters that say "Take Your Daughters To Mosque Day," but in the meantime, would you please win.

Larry, we are winning. On all fronts. The schools are not for the French, and the hospitals are not for college-age liberals. They are for Iraqis to use, so their country has the institutions that create stability. It would be a terrible thing to win the battle and lose the war, to have a newly free and nominally democratic Iraq elect a radical Islamic government with state legitimacy and lots of tax money to fund terrorists. It would be a terrible thing for Iraq to devolve into regional squabbles, and subdivide into a Balkans-esque set of interlocked ethnic zones. We need to win on all fronts, and bullets will only help with one of them.