A Debate

A debate on a past public musings post.

I. The problem: A series of attacks on us, the richest, strongest nation-state on earth, by a group of small individuals brought together by a narrow uncomprosing ideology.

Each attack grew bolder and bolder. On 9/11 they destroyed symbols of America's military and economic might. The human and financial loss alone were enormous. But the biggest fear was not what just happened, but the nightmare of what could happen next?

We have not had a war of this kind before - and so finding a descriptive name for it is difficult. It would be easier if it were a nation vs. nation war. Easier to describe, easier to fight, and so forth. But that's not what we are facing. First, it was named war on terror. Not the right choice. War on Islamic Fascism is better, I think, because it describes the movement which has given birth to Al Queda. This war involves fighting, but more fundamentally, it is about ideology - and more specifically, what will become the dominant ideology of the Islamic world - will it be what we call "moderate Islam," or "radical Islam, or "secular," or "autocratic," or "democratic," or "a unified caliphate," or "tribal," or some huge mix-mash of all?

I'm welcome to hearing another descriptive name to identify what we are fighting. (or should I say, who is fighting us) Some argue is it merely criminal - mass murder. I think this is incorrect. Some think it Al Queda is merely a violent wing of the anti-globalization movement. I don't particularly agree with that characterization, either. I find Islamic Fascism to be the most descriptive. AN IMPORTANT NOTE: most Islamic Fascist will not be beaten by guns and bombs - most will need to be defeated ideologically, their influence stunted and proven unpopular.

So, yes, America's institutions were not set up to fight this war, prior to it beginning. Call it bad planning. But the fact is, you can't plan for everything, and I am willing to give Bush I, Clinton, and Bush II a pass for not forseeing the Al Queda threat. There's certainly an argument to made that they or their administrations failed us, by not listening to the terrorist experts beforehand. But I hardly think it was obvious (at the time) that all this would happen. After all, PLO groups and Libyan groups, and Hezbollah have been around for a long time and never openly declared war on America.

II. Solution

There are two basic modes for developing solutions to complicated problems: 1) Plan, plan, plan. Take all the knowledge from experts and compile it into a creative morass for leaders to shift through and take the wisest course of action on how to deal the aformentioned problem. This includes all the experts listed...NGOS, Army, Cultural Linguists, all that shit...Bush obviously didn't go for this option. The other option is essentially 2) Trial and Error. You test a solution, if it doesn't work, you make an adjustment, if it does work, you move on. And on and on and on...clearly, this is the approach the Bush admin has taken.

Neither approach is inherently better than one another. Some people plan every last detail...take Michael Mann. The dude plans shots on specific days at specific locations at specific times because of the light quality. Versus says, Robert Altman, who gets a group of friends together and sees what happens. Whose to say which approach is better? Each has an upside and each a downside. I like the trial and error approach, which is why I supported the Iraq war. I don't mean to be flip about war and lives, but from a theoretically perspective, this is how one approaches such problems. In my opinion, we tried NGO and UN and being sensitive and limited military response to the Islamic Fascist issue. It didn't work. We tried, it failed. Some things worked, but overall, the issue got larger, not smaller. So we try something else - getting rid of a dictator to see whether democracy or some other form of government will draw generations of Muslims away from the radicals. It's a gamble, a test. It might well fail. But I don't think it's failed yet.

With respect to Nate's point...it goes back to this issue. He thinks we need to plan it out...change our institutions, shore up support, etc. Fair enough, these are tactical and strategic choices. I think we take what institutions we have, apply those to the problem and make adjustments along the way seeing what does and doesn't work.

III. Last Point

I don't find it fair or accurate to paint the American soldier as a kid pulled off a tractor to go fight against his will. Our army, right now, is a volunteer army. People choose to become soldiers. I can't stand this argument that poor people are forced into the army from a lack of other options. Poor people around the world and across time always have had fewer options and without an army, have fewer still. Don't get me wrong, I'm thankful for the soldiers, like I'm thankful for policemen, firemen, farmers, and garbage men. Most of them do a good job - and maybe all of them are better people than me....

...and I can see that going to Iraq and putting your labor where your opinions lie would be a bold, brave thing to do. I'm not sure it would make you wiser in terms of understanding the entire conflict. I don't think grips on film sets make better story tellers than a lawyer simply because they've worked on movie sets.

But anyway, if GW Bush or the Army came up to me and said, Greg, we really need you skills (running fast, blogging a lot, making jook) to win this war against the Islamicists, well shit, I'd probably do what they asked. In the absense of that, I'll still have opinions, still blog them, and try to make a good movie about it.

Anyhow, don't think i'd make a great soldier anyway...maybe a good spy.