18/12: Staying the Course
Category: America and the World
Posted by: A Waco Farmer
Today, Real Clear Politics features Charles Krauthammer's address to the Foreign Policy Research Institute from November 14, 2006 (full address here).
Some highlights:
"We are now in a period of confusion and disorientation, almost despair. I think it is worthwhile to look back historically to see how we got to where we are today."
"The Bush Doctrine held that besides attacking the immediate enemy who had perpetrated 9/11, it would have to engage in a larger enterprise of changing the underlying conditions which had given birth to this idea of Islamic radicalism, and to change the conditions that had allowed it to recruit and breed, particularly in the Arab world."
"Unless it [the Arab world] was somehow encouraged and brought along on that march [economic and political modernization], it would remain recalcitrant, alienated, oppressed, tyrannical, and the place from which the kind of atavistic attacks on America and the West that we have seen on 9/11 and since would continue.
"That's why the entire enterprise of changing the culture of the Arab world was undertaken. It was, as I and others had said at the time, a radical idea, an arrogant idea, a risky idea. But it was also the only idea of any coherence and consistency that anyone has advanced on how to change the underlying conditions that had led to 9/11 and ultimately to prevent the kind of conditions that would lead to a second 9/11."
"What we have seen [after three years of great successes], however, in the last almost two years now is what I think historians will write of as the setback.
"[In the aftermath of] November 7, 2006, the American election, in which it was absolutely clear that the electorate had expressed its dismay and dissatisfaction with the policies in Iraq, and more generally, a sense of loss, lack of direction, and wish to contemplate retreat...we are in position now where people are talking about negotiating, for example, with our enemies Syria and Iran, which, given the conditions that Iran and Syria would lay and their objectives, which have been expressed openly and clearly, would mean very little other than American surrender of Iraq to an Iran-Syria condominium."
"We Americans, looking at a situation like the one that has unraveled in Iraq, immediately want to blame ourselves."
"The root problem [however] is the Iraqis and their own political culture."
"And again, the reason is not, as many critics now claim, that there is something intrinsic within Arab culture that makes them incapable of democracy. Yes, there are political, historical, and even religious reasons why the Arabs might be less prepared to be democratic in their governance than, say, East Asians or Latin Americans. But the problem, I believe, is Iraq's particular culture and history."
"You can tinker with American tactics and troop levels all you want, but unless the Iraqis can establish a government of unitary purpose and resolute action, the simple objective of the war--leaving behind a self-sustaining, democratic government--will not be achieved."
"I don't think that [retreat] is the only alternative, however. I think there is at least a chance of trying to save the situation not only in Iraq, but the general idea of trying to establish more liberal democratic and less confrontational governments in that region.
"Part of that effort I think has to be a very important and exerted effort now to try to rescue the Lebanese government, which in the next week or so will be under threat of demonstration, perhaps even civil war and perhaps even open Syrian intervention against it. That's why even though our situation today is a rather gloomy one and there is a lot of disorientation and despair, I think that if we do not lose our nerve and lose our way, there is a way to actually emerge from this two-year era of setback."
"As the Bush Doctrine has come under attack, there are those in America who have welcomed its apparent setbacks and defeats as a vindication of their criticism of the policy. But the problem is that that kind of vindication leaves America in a position where there are no good alternatives. The reason that there is general despair now is because if it proves to be true that the Bush Doctrine has proclaimed an idea of democratizing the Arab/Islamic world that is unattainable and undoable, then there are no remaining answers to how to counter ultimately the threat of Islamic radicalism.
"It remains the only plausible answer--changing the culture of that area, no matter how slow and how difficult the process. It starts in Iraq and Lebanon, and must be allowed to proceed and not precipitate an early and premature surrender. That idea remains the only conceivable one for ultimately prevailing over the Arab Islamic radicalism that exploded upon us 9/11. Every other is a policy of retreat and defeat that would ultimately bring ruin not only on the U.S. but on the very idea of freedom."
Read the entire unabridged version of the address here.
Some highlights:
"We are now in a period of confusion and disorientation, almost despair. I think it is worthwhile to look back historically to see how we got to where we are today."
"The Bush Doctrine held that besides attacking the immediate enemy who had perpetrated 9/11, it would have to engage in a larger enterprise of changing the underlying conditions which had given birth to this idea of Islamic radicalism, and to change the conditions that had allowed it to recruit and breed, particularly in the Arab world."
"Unless it [the Arab world] was somehow encouraged and brought along on that march [economic and political modernization], it would remain recalcitrant, alienated, oppressed, tyrannical, and the place from which the kind of atavistic attacks on America and the West that we have seen on 9/11 and since would continue.
"That's why the entire enterprise of changing the culture of the Arab world was undertaken. It was, as I and others had said at the time, a radical idea, an arrogant idea, a risky idea. But it was also the only idea of any coherence and consistency that anyone has advanced on how to change the underlying conditions that had led to 9/11 and ultimately to prevent the kind of conditions that would lead to a second 9/11."
"What we have seen [after three years of great successes], however, in the last almost two years now is what I think historians will write of as the setback.
"[In the aftermath of] November 7, 2006, the American election, in which it was absolutely clear that the electorate had expressed its dismay and dissatisfaction with the policies in Iraq, and more generally, a sense of loss, lack of direction, and wish to contemplate retreat...we are in position now where people are talking about negotiating, for example, with our enemies Syria and Iran, which, given the conditions that Iran and Syria would lay and their objectives, which have been expressed openly and clearly, would mean very little other than American surrender of Iraq to an Iran-Syria condominium."
"We Americans, looking at a situation like the one that has unraveled in Iraq, immediately want to blame ourselves."
"The root problem [however] is the Iraqis and their own political culture."
"And again, the reason is not, as many critics now claim, that there is something intrinsic within Arab culture that makes them incapable of democracy. Yes, there are political, historical, and even religious reasons why the Arabs might be less prepared to be democratic in their governance than, say, East Asians or Latin Americans. But the problem, I believe, is Iraq's particular culture and history."
"You can tinker with American tactics and troop levels all you want, but unless the Iraqis can establish a government of unitary purpose and resolute action, the simple objective of the war--leaving behind a self-sustaining, democratic government--will not be achieved."
"I don't think that [retreat] is the only alternative, however. I think there is at least a chance of trying to save the situation not only in Iraq, but the general idea of trying to establish more liberal democratic and less confrontational governments in that region.
"Part of that effort I think has to be a very important and exerted effort now to try to rescue the Lebanese government, which in the next week or so will be under threat of demonstration, perhaps even civil war and perhaps even open Syrian intervention against it. That's why even though our situation today is a rather gloomy one and there is a lot of disorientation and despair, I think that if we do not lose our nerve and lose our way, there is a way to actually emerge from this two-year era of setback."
"As the Bush Doctrine has come under attack, there are those in America who have welcomed its apparent setbacks and defeats as a vindication of their criticism of the policy. But the problem is that that kind of vindication leaves America in a position where there are no good alternatives. The reason that there is general despair now is because if it proves to be true that the Bush Doctrine has proclaimed an idea of democratizing the Arab/Islamic world that is unattainable and undoable, then there are no remaining answers to how to counter ultimately the threat of Islamic radicalism.
"It remains the only plausible answer--changing the culture of that area, no matter how slow and how difficult the process. It starts in Iraq and Lebanon, and must be allowed to proceed and not precipitate an early and premature surrender. That idea remains the only conceivable one for ultimately prevailing over the Arab Islamic radicalism that exploded upon us 9/11. Every other is a policy of retreat and defeat that would ultimately bring ruin not only on the U.S. but on the very idea of freedom."
Read the entire unabridged version of the address here.
