The Death of an Enemy

The gestation period for revenge is 9 years, 7 months, 20 days. Or for justice. Or for closure. However you read the death of Osama bin Laden, it took about twice as long as the Manhattan project to go from notion to completion. We messed it up once before - in November 2001, just two months after the attacks of September 11th, we failed to capture him in a battle at Tora Bora. We have kept a military presence in Afghanistan since then, with it escalating over the past several years into counterinsurgency against a resurgent foe. We went chasing other demons abroad, declared that we had found one in Iraq and embroiled ourselves in a regime change there as well. For just shy of a decade, the man who twice bombed the World Trade Center evaded capture, to the point that seven years after 9/11, prioritizing his capture became a presidential campaign promise. It became the stuff of far-ranging speculation (not to discredit these guys - their approach to the problem was both novel and damn close to accurate). And yet, here it is, the death of America's Most Wanted.

Other people have more interesting and informed accounts of what his death mean. Here's my favorite of the facty ones, in ten bullet points. Here's my favorite emotional reaction read, in lots of words. And here's my least favorite spot-on response, in 140 characters: "Recall, this is a huge operation, a huge cost (over $1 trillion since 9/11/01) to get an elderly man on dialysis in a small town in Pakistan"

The 9/11 attacks cost $500,000. That's chump change to pay if the goal, as it was stated in later years, was US bankruptcy. What bin Laden did was unquestionably an act of evil. But it was one that provoked something very much like an allergic reaction - in responding to one threat, the US spent over a trillion. We as a nation failed to adequately respond to the threat. Not that we didn't respond - we did, with excess and paranoia and jingoism and two wars, one relatively justified and one entirely superfluous. We surrendered civil liberties, made air travel a farcical exercise in security theater, and justified torture and indefinite detention of people who we maybe had evidence on. We ignored large swaths of the constitution and made ourselves less safe. The way we responded to 9/11 was all out of proportion. Hunting down the criminal took a year of intelligence work, the cooperation of Pakistan's government, and a strike team consisting of exceptional skilled men in boots on the ground.

What this means going forward comes from the writer at Transitionland with, I think, the best short statement of the impact this will have:

To be clear on Osama bin Laden's death: 1) I wish he had been captured alive. 2) His death isn't a blow to the Taliban, because his life was pretty irrelevant to the post-2001 Taliban. 3) For better or worse, bin Laden's death will be used to cement US withdrawal from Afghanistan.

This isn't really a moment about that future, though. This is a reconciliation with a long overdue past. In late September 2001, my uncle wondered "why are we focusing on getting the messenger, instead of getting the message?" I was 12 when this happened, and never particularly clear on the message we were supposed to get (was it that America must acknowledge bin Laden's demands? was it that we were responsible for generic capitalist unpleasant byproducts in the world at large that turn people against us?).

I like to think it was "maybe the US should stop explicitly supporting autocrats so that radicals direct their frustration with domestic politics outwards at us," which I like to think it was, and we did. It is still supremely satisfying to know that, at the very least, we have reached a moment of closure, if not exactly a moment of justice.

Amidst the immediately jubilant atmosphere of last night, a couple of friends, posting in various places, quoted the same line of scripture, which is especially fitting for the moment. "Rejoice not when your enemy falls, and let not your heart be glad when he stumbles. Proverbs 24:17"

This is a time of closure, a awareness that this worst moment of the last decade is, finally, over.

Gaza Redux

(Thanks to Christine at iMinister for the link recommendation)

Last week, I wrote a post on Gaza. In my post, I attempted to do two things - paint the Gazans as innocents, and point to the breakup of negotiation as the key failing, not the Israeli invasion or the firing of rockets. I succeeded in part, but by defending the Gazans so vehemently, I ended up demonizing the Israelis. Part of this is fatigue from a long discussion with an ardent supporter of Israel - heated discussion polarizes, and I as I was unclear of my orignal stance, I ended up playing the opposition to his point. Another part of this is my natural sympathies towards the historic underdog, engendered in part by my identification with the left and in part by my identification with browncoats (no joke). But arguing on behalf of one side is folly - innocent Israelis suffer too, and playing an umbers game doesn't work here. My post fell short of its aspirations.

Fortunately, the infinite typewriters of the blogosphere have come up with a far, far better post and position to take. This position was hinted at by the above-mentioned Christine's post on the inhumanity of it all, but it's true genesis is found elsewhere. That elsewhere happens to be Doug Muders' Weekly Sift blog post. What I like about Doug's post is that he firstly hits upon my main point - if Israel wanted to solve with entirely with violence, they'd act differently and be committing genocide. But he expands from that to the greater political reason behind all of this:

Many of the things done by terrorists (and corresponding anti-terrorist extremists) may look crazy, but they are actually part of a coherent strategy. To understand that strategy you need to grasp one key idea: If you're an extremist, your first enemy isn't the extremist of the opposite side, it's the moderate of your own side. Opposing extremists are actually allies in a battle against the center.

Let me repeat that, because it takes a while to sink in: Opposing extremists are actually allies in a battle against the center. They'll fight each other in the second round, after the center is eliminated.

Now, I'm not saying that opposing extremists actually conspire. They don't need to. But those cycles of attack-and-reprisal that look insane and counterproductive are in fact very productive, if the purpose is to derail any possible compromise and make the center untenable.

(bold italics his; bold on its own emphasis mine).

That, right there, is the heart of the matter. Doug makes the point I couldn't, and does it concisely. I couldn't be happier.

9/11/2008 - Political Elasticity

As is habit, here's an obligatory 9/11 blog post.

John Fleck has been blogging lately about elasticity, about how people are changing behaviors responding to the high price of gas. What's interesting is the range of successful options - biking is easy for short commutes (high elasticity). Public transportation is becoming more popular, meaning that the buses in Albuquerque are carrying more riders than ever, and that the demand is great than can currently be met (fairly high elasticity). People are looking at trains instead of flying for travel, and the rail system in this nation cannot possibly keep up for at least a year or two (low elasticity). Other people are looking at natural gas, given how cheap it is, and wondering why we don't have cars than can use it as fuel; others are just wondering why people aren't, all of a sudden, driving more fuel efficient cars. Specialized car production to meet this crisis is slow, lagging behind demand. For cars to adapt will take several years, and new fuels will take longer (low, very low elasticity). That's elasticity as it concerns travel and fuel costs among consumers in the US.

The elasticity that concerns 9/11 is with policy advisors. Condoleeza Rice is the latest in a long line of presidential cabinet members who grew up and academically came of age as Russia experts - the Cold War has produced professionals who are longer lived than their knowledge set. The best minds in US foreign policy for decades have been specialists on Russia.

Seven years after 9/11, I'm taking Arabic, History of Islam, and a class called "War on Terror". Those classes are bursting - they had to offer a new section of Arabic, and in a school that prides itself on small class size they cannot trim the numbers in these classrooms down below 25. Two years ago, when I took "Middle Eastern Culture and Civilization" at community college in New Mexico, the class was small, maybe 15 students. This sudden rush, this explosion of interest, is the political elasticity. Seven years after the fact we have responded to the crisis, and the crises that have emerged since then.

Here's hoping our knowledge is needed before this is all over.

Edit 9/11/2008: I've a more personal post about the day, and my reaction to it, up on livejournal.

Brinkmanship

Yesterday I finished reading "The Crisis of Islam" by Bernard Lewis. While I recommend a lot of books, I don't make the recommendations lightly, and that is especially true for this book. "Crisis of Islam" reads and feels like the best history and context for understanding the actions of Usama bin Laden (or as we know him, Osama), and the conflict he sees with the west. The book is a scant 169 pages, and it goes quickly, which is why I'm inclined to recommend it over every other book of the sort a person can find. This is a book that can be read, read easily, and will have a profound effect on a person's understanding of the War on Terror. (This makes sense, given that the book is assigned reading for the "War on Terror" class I'm taking). The book, again, is great history.

The problem I have with it is that the book is poor political science, and it tries to be. In fact, the book was drawn in part from articles in Foreign Affairs (my favorite source of international relations political science), and the book was written with the intent of influencing major policy decisions. Checking the wikipedia on Bernard Lewis, it was kind of startling to read that he was one of the major intellectuals arguing in favor of the United States invasion of Iraq. The book itself doesn't overtly advocate the actions wikipedia attributes to Lewis's influence. But it's implied, and it's a strong undertone in the last chapter.

The book was written and published before the United States invaded Iraq. Lewis' plan, as it can be inferred, was for an externally imposed democracy to become a catalyst for more genuine democratic movements in the middle east, which would lead to prosperity, stability, and a positive outlet for moderate Islam to regain control of the debate from radical extremes. This is, as you've probably reasoned, absurd.

The logic behind it states that Islam, as nation-religion, no longer has adversaries to play off against each other. The rest of the West is out, Russia is out, and the United States stands as the only civilization opposing the glorious spread of Muhammad's nation and religion. Bernard Lewis does such a good job explaining the desire for the global religion-state as the objective of radical Islam, and he does such a good job showing the current regimes in the middle east as failed custodians of the faith and successors to the Caliph, that he can't figure out how a nativist movement could be anything but violently radical. In Lewis' view, the only hope for democracy in the middle east (excepting Turkey and Israel) is an external catalyst.

This contradicts his own understanding of the importance of nativism to the nation-religion of Islam. The importance of bin-Laden and the threat that he represents is based on and enhanced by his success in driving Russia out of Afghanistan. Khomeini and al-Sadr both can be pointed to as having had meaningful action against the corrupt and the foreign, and without the legitimacy of the act they would be fringe elements. That Khomeini's state became more oppressive than the one it succeeded is a grave flaw, but the quasi-democracy it operates, the poor economic fortunes of many Iranians, the concentration of poor economic prospects in the younger half of a nation where the media age is 26, and the fading memory of revolution all provide the opportunity for a nativist change in government, and a move away from oppressive and radical Islam. The state bin-Laden supported has been reduced to the margins, and with luck will remain there. Meanwhile, a variety of ethnic parties have filled the void left by a religious government, and this too bodes well for nativst change. Perhaps the devolution of the state of Afghanistan, but certainly a trend towards nativist rule over outsider radicals.

And then we have Iraq. Iraq is my major sore point with Lewis, and it baffles me how he can write that history and assume an imposed democracy will work. The way Lewis sees it, the United States needs to just maintain a presence, outlast the terrorists, and it can claim victory. He points to the fact that the PLO repeatedly engaged in terrorist activity but never had Isreal give in as a sign of success, and treats the largely one-sided negotiations between Israel and Palestine as a positive sign. The trick, Lewis seems to be saying, is for the US to master brinkmanship - we stay right on the edge, we keep our opposition there, and we don't blink. If we can hold out, prove by our existence their futility, they will be forced to adopt other means, and the whole crisis of radical Islam will be over. This actually justifies making the Iraq the battleground for the war on terror, as it is an overt desire to create an actual battlefield on which terrorism can lose.

It's a bold statement, but it's fundamentally stupid. In all his reading of history, and in his undertanding of bin Laden's reading of history, Lewis makes the astute observation that the terrorists are motivated by percieved marks against the dignity of the nation-religion of Islam. Specific grievances cited are the crusades (which are much more of an after-the-fact grievance), the breakdown and destruction of the Ottoman empire, and US support for corrupt and weak leaders in the middle east. Again, the grievances are: 1- an invasion by infidels, 2-the destruction of an important and powerful muslim state, and 3-the support of government that otherwise shouldn't exist. Having made this claim, I cannot understand how he thinks the overthrow of the government of Iraq by the US with the express purpose of putting in place a new government is a good idea. That is two of the above indignities, and close to the third (Iraq was, in name, secular, but it has a muslim population and is a historic center of muslim government).

The problem with the crisis is that it is too big an issue to be tackled by one solution. Catalysts are nice, and sometimes essential, but that are very hard to create from the outside. And I think that is the fundamental frustration that Lewis is unable to address. The United States has suffered from terrorism, and the destruction of the United States is the stated objective of radical Islam. The United States, as the most power country in the world, should be able to do something about it. The wars is Iraq and Afghanistan were moves to do something about it. But the problem is that they don't work, and the thing that is absolutely terrifying about this conflcit is that the United States is powerless here. To end radical Islam, moderate Islam has to make real gains at home. That will require the end of oil money and the end of US interest in backing corrupt governments that provide oil, and then it will require American non-interference in the potentially revolutionary or democratizing moves that follow. The United States must let native movements take place, and let self-determination and human dignity be affirmed by these movements of their own will, even in the shape of religious parties or states. Without dignity, the terrorists will continue. With human dignity restored, with governments responsive to the needs of the populace (or at the very least vulnerable to the populace), then and only then will we have outlasted the War on Terror.

But we've created a battlefield on which it is impossible for us to win. Brinkmanship won the Cold War, but that was against a nation. The Nation of Islam that bin-Laden wants to establish doesn't exist in a present form, and as a transient quantity, it can't be destroyed. As an ideology, and as an ideology with at 1400 year legacy, it can be outlasted. That's an impossibility, and even turing Iraq into an accelerator of the movement, the lighting of match to burn out the gas leak, will not help. The problem cannot be changed in that way, and our continued actions only breed contempt.

We need to find a solution other than this impossibility.

Edit 9/12/2008: It's well worth mentioning that Lewis is very orientalist in his perspective, and that he sees most of the past two centuries of development in the Muslim world as adapted or inspired by Western ideals. That said, the history is still good, and he even counters his own emphasis on the West by repeatedly referring to the necessity and importance of nativist trends.

The Israel Question

Before I state anything, I'd like to direct you to this photo gallery of female Israeli soldiers, and ask you to both look through the gallery and read the authors statement with an open mind and in the spirit of respecting art.

After checking that out, feel free to form opinions of your own. If you want some pre-made opinions, many can be found here.

Israel is and has been the pressing issue of the middle east. It's a nation born in the aftermath of tragedy that finds itself in a perpetual state of alert. Public service, most commonly military service, is compulsory for Israelis when they turn 18. The photographer does, in my opinion, a really good job examining with minimal judgment the juxtaposition of adolescence with military service, and by using pictures of female soldiers she's allowed to open up a new avenue for understanding what military service does to young people. Soldiering is too often tied up in definitions of masculinity and male duty, so it is fascinating to see it in another context.

And then we have Israel itself, as discussions over anything related to Israel must return back to the state. My family has a small personal history with the nation; my grandfather, Alfred Leroy Atherton Jr (Roy), was ambassador to Egypt for the United States from 1978-1979. He was present during the assassination of Anwar Sadat. And he personally met with Yassar Arafat. This legacy, as a burgeoning student of history and politics, informed my understanding of the world and of international relations. At the center of this legacy is figuring out a right relationship with Isreal.

Israel is a state whose origins I will not dispute and whose right to exist is an anarchronistic question. The modern state of Israel is, and will be, a reality. There is no sense in arguing otherwise, and there is only ill will to be gained that way. Besides, saying Israel shouldn't exist is much the same as arguing that Global Warming isn't happening - both statements delay real, meaningful debate, and both fly in the face of obvious and accepted fact. So what is the debate I have in mind?

The classical debate over the US and Israel is what the relationship should be. Under the Carter presidency, and when Roy was ambassador to Egpyt, the US backed off from it's standard unwavering support for Israel and tried to create a meaningful dialogue with the parties in conflict. Since then, the attitude and tone have changed from administration to administration, but the general purpose has been the same: to secure a stable relationship between Isreal and its neighbors, with accomodation for Palestine that still leaves Isreal in a position of strength.

To there benefit, Palestine and Isreal can rely on world media coverage, and the fact that many nations have a vested interest in the outcome of a peace process. To the detriment of most any cause elsewhere, Isreal takes media priority. This is a tricky balance - Isreal is a democracy of sorts, and Isreal is a western country. We (being the West) have high standards for Israeli conduct, and constant media attention helps keep things honest. And it is important to be aware of and acknowledge the Palestinian grievances as real and meaningful, and media attention helps with that as well.

The problem is that almost any government could use the same scrutinty in its actions, and that this media attention has been an objective of terrorist action. That helps no one, and while grievances need to be aired and addressed (and don't think that I am anything like in favor of letting Isreal off the hook for what has amounted to serious crimes ans flaws in conduct), terrorism undermines moves for stability, it undermines the potential for democracy, and it doesn't allow for any other option besides the destruction of Israel. It is, to put it mildly, unrealistic. And the media does a disservice to the public by continuing to focus so much on Isreal.

I have no answers for the Israel question. I have general notions, ideas of way more carrot and way less stick, and an emphasis on responsible diplomacy. Human dignity as a cornerstone of US policy would be a good plan, especially if the plan emphasized Palestinian and Israeli human dignity as equally important. But I don't think the solution for Isreal is high-profile and external, and I don't think that every slight development in Isreal needs the world media pouring over it. Again, grievances recorded and tragedies documented and protested, but the emphasis on covering Isreal over every other crisis in the world isn't beneficial. Israel is an important nation, but it is not the only important nation. And Israel has interesting and modern problems, but it is not alone in that.

My point is this: the Israel question is not as important as we make it, and the issue is too divisive, too complicated to really be dealt with well. I think that we, as a civilization, can collectively move on. I think we'll be better for it, and I think on the whole it will help the situation.