Kaplan on Nation Building.
Robert Kaplan has another installment on army transformation and building civil societies out of anarchy. The Atlantic also has an interview with Kaplan as an on-line extra. I find over and over again that Kaplan understands what is required to combat insurgency and can describe it with clarity. My own approach is historical, from that greatest of all counter-insurgencies, the Gallic wars, the English conquest of Wales, the Penninsular War to the winning of the American West, the Philippines, Vietnam, and so on. Kaplan's obviously much more anthropological, at least in the sense that he spends most of his time on contemporary insurgencies and hot spots. Yet the results are the same. The force with the most will to stay its course prevails. This is far, far truer in insurgency than it is in conventional warfare. In such contests, what Victor Davis Hanson calls, the Western way of war, opposing forces stand up against one another and test their resolution in a main battle. By presenting yourself as a target, you demonstrate a certain fearlessness, but you can also get killed. The guerilla war is much more a war of wills.
Once you have the will to fight, or to stay, you can stay in the game. But will does not mean victory, only a continued struggle. Victory requires right actions taken at the right times. Marshal Suchet pacified Catalonia while Soult, Ney, and the other marshals failed. David Chandler attributed this to Wellington and the English Army he commanded out of Lisbon.
On this subject of will, we speak not only of the will of leaders, or of soldiers, but of institutions. Old, established, strong institutions on the one hand, and weak, fragile institutions on the other. Sometimes the strongest institutions are the most primative. One of the key reasons for Allied success in WWII was the friendship of Churchill and Roosevelt. Another was the cultural similarities of the Americans and the Commonwealth. From 1939 to 1941, the totalitarian states were united against the democratic states. But Germany, Italy, Japan, and the Soviet Union were not united in any firm sense. All that united them was a mutual self interest and opposition to the democracies. Cleavages between these powers resulted in Italy being flipped and Russia being dropped. Japan and Germany, on the other hand, had elements of suicidal commitment to resistance. Both Japan and Germany could have made the terrible switch to an insurgency. Japan was activly making plans for it. This is one of the reasons for the use of the A-bomb. In Germany, Hitler was so disapointed in the conventional failures that he pursued the destruction of the whole German nation. Imagine WWII in which Hitler and Stalin, especially, had a cordial friendship in the vein of Roosevelt and Churchill.
Friendships, cultural similarities, and even kinships, are a more primitive basis for social order, but being more natural, can exist without the effortful cultural creations of the West. Commitment to abstract principles requires habituation. Commitment to kin groups is ab initio.
Kaplan describes how tribal leaders are employed to get things done while the civil authorities take root.
Kaplan describes how in Nimrud, LtC Norris first relies on a thuggish police chief, Salim, but gradually nudges him aside in favor of the more democratic and lawyerly Mayor Isa. One of his other themes, which also appeared in Imperial Grunts, was that order must preceed civil development, or that order must proceed freedom. This is a most Hamiltonian observation.
Sunday, March 12, 2006
Friday, March 03, 2006
Hitchens on Hewitt
Christopher Hitchens was on Hugh Hewitt on Thursday (and I was listening to the early AM reboradcast on KIDS) . I have downloaded the interview of Hitchens and Mark Steyn as well as the one from a few days ago with VDH. I'll bring these to work on my flash drive. Hewitt's on at some pretty unfriendly hours in Springfield Missouri, but KRLA's webcast, Hewitt's website, and radioblogger make it easier to touch bases with this excellent resource.
Christopher Hitchens was on Hugh Hewitt on Thursday (and I was listening to the early AM reboradcast on KIDS) . I have downloaded the interview of Hitchens and Mark Steyn as well as the one from a few days ago with VDH. I'll bring these to work on my flash drive. Hewitt's on at some pretty unfriendly hours in Springfield Missouri, but KRLA's webcast, Hewitt's website, and radioblogger make it easier to touch bases with this excellent resource.
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
Gaurav on Berlinski
Glenn and Helen interview Claire Berlinski on her new book Menace in Europe : Why the Continent's Crisis Is America's, Too. Its worth listening too. But I was struck by a commenter, Gaurav, who had lived in Europe for many years and was an American of Indian origin. His comments are also worth taking a look at.
Glenn and Helen interview Claire Berlinski on her new book Menace in Europe : Why the Continent's Crisis Is America's, Too. Its worth listening too. But I was struck by a commenter, Gaurav, who had lived in Europe for many years and was an American of Indian origin. His comments are also worth taking a look at.
Strange Theodicy
A guy claiming to be a reverend, a certain Fred Phelps, is taking protests to funerals with the argument that bad things happen to good peolpe because America tolerates homosexuality. The Jefferson City News Tribune has an editorial condeming these protests, which gives a little background on the story. Missouri and other states have imposed a content neutral ban on demonstrations within an hour of a funeral. Here is a News Tribune news account of the legislation's passage. Two days earlier there was a story when the House passed the legislation.
Tom Scharbach over at Purple Scarf has found a source that suggests Phelps is actually an agent provocateur to discredit Biblically based opposition to any gay-friendly agenda. While its certainly possible that Phelps is an agent provocateur, I think its just as likely that he and his supporters are just nuts, and have no clue how much opposition they will get from the Right. By pitting a conservative warm regard for the military against a conservative hostility to any gay-friendly agenda, Phelps will inevitably split conservatives. By employing such an unpleasant tactic, its also inevitable that the weight of opinion will be against Phelps.
I am told that Phelp's people are praying outside the Missouri State capitol this morning, and have been given information about how Phelps and his protestors disrupted Lutheran services during discussion of the ELCA's position on homosexuality which involved serious injuries to a minister who approached the protestors to ask that they withdraw and allow the service to procede without disruption. Attacking clergy in the name of God certainly has to fall into the catagory of "things that will alienate your natural constituancy." Dennis Prager has identified that the Commandment against "taking the Lord's name in vein" means to attach God's name to a cause which is not Godly, and has nothing to do with swearing. In the current situation globally, this often refers to Islamicists who use terror in the name of Allah. It would seem that Phelps' efforts likewise qualify as a distinctly unGodly set of tactics (and perhaps purposes) dressed up under a Godly banner.
As I have posted once or twice, I don't think the Bible issues general condemnations of homosexuality. I do think the Bible frequently issues condemnations against the adoption of practices of neighboring people. This rejection of cultural assimilation has allowed Jews to maintain a distinct identity despite three thousand years of hardships, domination, and oppression. If a neighboring people engaged in distinctly different sexual practices, its to be expected that the Bible would condemn them as foriegn. If people ate distinctly different foods, that too would be forbidden. And if they worshiped different gods, that also is forbidden. The condemnations in the Bible reject assimilation to neighboring lifeways as a means of preserving a distinct identity, not because any of the prohibited actions (whether style of dress, foods, family arrangements, or sexual practices) are neccesarily bad. Of course there are prohibitions on some bad acts, whether medically (some of the dietary laws are good health advice), or because it is meant to invoke some attention to moral issues (such as the proscription of ways of killing an animal to be as humane as possible, or the injunction of an eye for an eye as a prohibition of demanding a life for an eye, or the slaughter of a family for an eye).
Distinguishing between universal claims of a text and simple descriptions of a particular set of conditions requires a level of text criticism which apparently eludes Fred Phelps. No doubt he reads the injunctions against bathing not to refer to Greek or Roman style bathing, but as a universal prohibition on bathing. Whether Phelps is an agent provocateur or just an idiot, its clear that his efforts do undermine his cause.
A guy claiming to be a reverend, a certain Fred Phelps, is taking protests to funerals with the argument that bad things happen to good peolpe because America tolerates homosexuality. The Jefferson City News Tribune has an editorial condeming these protests, which gives a little background on the story. Missouri and other states have imposed a content neutral ban on demonstrations within an hour of a funeral. Here is a News Tribune news account of the legislation's passage. Two days earlier there was a story when the House passed the legislation.
Tom Scharbach over at Purple Scarf has found a source that suggests Phelps is actually an agent provocateur to discredit Biblically based opposition to any gay-friendly agenda. While its certainly possible that Phelps is an agent provocateur, I think its just as likely that he and his supporters are just nuts, and have no clue how much opposition they will get from the Right. By pitting a conservative warm regard for the military against a conservative hostility to any gay-friendly agenda, Phelps will inevitably split conservatives. By employing such an unpleasant tactic, its also inevitable that the weight of opinion will be against Phelps.
I am told that Phelp's people are praying outside the Missouri State capitol this morning, and have been given information about how Phelps and his protestors disrupted Lutheran services during discussion of the ELCA's position on homosexuality which involved serious injuries to a minister who approached the protestors to ask that they withdraw and allow the service to procede without disruption. Attacking clergy in the name of God certainly has to fall into the catagory of "things that will alienate your natural constituancy." Dennis Prager has identified that the Commandment against "taking the Lord's name in vein" means to attach God's name to a cause which is not Godly, and has nothing to do with swearing. In the current situation globally, this often refers to Islamicists who use terror in the name of Allah. It would seem that Phelps' efforts likewise qualify as a distinctly unGodly set of tactics (and perhaps purposes) dressed up under a Godly banner.
As I have posted once or twice, I don't think the Bible issues general condemnations of homosexuality. I do think the Bible frequently issues condemnations against the adoption of practices of neighboring people. This rejection of cultural assimilation has allowed Jews to maintain a distinct identity despite three thousand years of hardships, domination, and oppression. If a neighboring people engaged in distinctly different sexual practices, its to be expected that the Bible would condemn them as foriegn. If people ate distinctly different foods, that too would be forbidden. And if they worshiped different gods, that also is forbidden. The condemnations in the Bible reject assimilation to neighboring lifeways as a means of preserving a distinct identity, not because any of the prohibited actions (whether style of dress, foods, family arrangements, or sexual practices) are neccesarily bad. Of course there are prohibitions on some bad acts, whether medically (some of the dietary laws are good health advice), or because it is meant to invoke some attention to moral issues (such as the proscription of ways of killing an animal to be as humane as possible, or the injunction of an eye for an eye as a prohibition of demanding a life for an eye, or the slaughter of a family for an eye).
Distinguishing between universal claims of a text and simple descriptions of a particular set of conditions requires a level of text criticism which apparently eludes Fred Phelps.
Europe and American-style Conservatism
The American Right is a combination of liberalism (liberty seeking) and conservative (order seeking) while the American Left is a combination of liberalism and socialism (equity seeking). Europe has actual liberals, conservatives, and socialists. Attempts to build a coallition of economic liberals and social conservatives proves hard in Europe, as this piece in the Brussels Journal demonstrates. Liberals are wary of funding them, because of the social conservatism, and conservatives seem to not be interested either. In the comments you can see the Liberals posting warrily about how an illiberal social policy can support a liberal agenda (the notion that liberal economics is best insured by a Christian society). The Brussels Journal mostly publishes about its Liberal agenda of smaller goverments, EU-scepticism, lower taxes, less regulation, and free trade. As such its not a regular stopping point for European conservatives who might otherwise be posting in complaint of a social order which does not protect its people from the vicitudes of a liberal economy.
The American Right is a combination of liberalism (liberty seeking) and conservative (order seeking) while the American Left is a combination of liberalism and socialism (equity seeking). Europe has actual liberals, conservatives, and socialists. Attempts to build a coallition of economic liberals and social conservatives proves hard in Europe, as this piece in the Brussels Journal demonstrates. Liberals are wary of funding them, because of the social conservatism, and conservatives seem to not be interested either. In the comments you can see the Liberals posting warrily about how an illiberal social policy can support a liberal agenda (the notion that liberal economics is best insured by a Christian society). The Brussels Journal mostly publishes about its Liberal agenda of smaller goverments, EU-scepticism, lower taxes, less regulation, and free trade. As such its not a regular stopping point for European conservatives who might otherwise be posting in complaint of a social order which does not protect its people from the vicitudes of a liberal economy.
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