A Second Hand Conjecture

You know you’re in an American recession when British observers start reflecting on the inevitability of American decline, and volunteering their allegedly privileged perspective gained from the fall of the British Empire (Mark Steyn, as always, excepted). So it is that Matthew Parris joins an old tradition and writes this of the incoming Obama administration:

Though he may not yet know it, the role for which the US President-elect has been chosen is the management of national decline.
(The Times)

It should still be within our memory of course, that it was widely believed that Richard Nixon held this dubious distinction in 1968. Indeed, Nixon himself believed it, and his assessment that the United States had passed into decline informed almost all of his foreign policies. Mr. Parris’ countryman, the historian and strategist Paul Kennedy, had thought even more seriously on this issue and concluded in 1987 that the apex of American power had been reached in the 1970s, after which the United States had passed into another ultimately nonexistent long-term decline.

Retrospectively, this is all rather embarrassing. The United States is naturally vastly more powerful today than it was in the 1960s or 1970s, and the structure which enabled those gains commercially, socially and politically, remains unassailed. Given past experience, it’s entirely likely in coming years that we will feel similarly embarrassed by the current declinism.

But Mr. Parris is obliquely correct on one matter though:

Mr Obama will have to find a way of being honest with Americans about their country’s fall from predominance. Reading, as I often do, the furiously chauvinistic online reaction from US citizens to any suggestion that their country can be beaten at anything, I quail for him.
(The Times)

The experience of Nixon –pursuing policies to cushion the fall of an America which was just beginning to scale new heights– might suggest that it doesn’t really matter what Obama thinks. But if Americans themselves genuinely started to believe in their impending decline, and shelved their ambitions in favor of the crowded retirement home of great powers, they could actualize the prediction.

As with American greatness in light of her continental scale, vast and growing labor force, enormous capital resources and limitless dreams, a prophecy of American decline is largely contingent on whether or not Americans can be persuaded to self-fulfill it. If they cannot, that faint light on the horizon is another dawn, not an inevitable sunset. After all, the retirement home for the false futurists of American decline is an even more crowded house.

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Roland picks up an interesting piece by Jacob Heilbrunn for the National Interest, describing an ongoing purge of neoconservative intellectuals from the American Enterprise Institute, allegedly instigated by Vice President Danielle Pletka. So far Michael Ledeen and Reuel Marc Gerecht are gone, with Joshua Muravchik soon leaving. Others are said to be soon in following.

This could signal the reemergence of an old conflict over machtpolitik and just war doctrine, which used to exist in Republican security policy circles (ie, coercion-for-values vs. coercion-for-interests). If Pletka is indeed purging with intent, we may even expect AEI to shift its attitude toward the Middle East, Asia and Africa, given how much more amenable authoritarian regimes tend to be to interest pressure.

And the idealism of the AEI departed is considerable. Gerecht for instance wrote a fascinating but bizarre book I read in the late 1990s under the pen name Edward Shirley, in which he smuggled himself into Iran in the trunk of a car, essentially for the romance of it.

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Commentary
“More complacency will only feed Russia’s ambitions.”

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Seth Weinberger picks up Foreign Policy’s “10 Worst Policy Ideas” for Obama and McCain and adds some commentary. What’s immediately striking to me is how few objections FP offers to McCain’s foreign policy proposals. A peculiar thing, if you’re familiar with the doctrinal tilt of the pub. There’s really only one they single out against McCain (League o’ Democracies), the rest is purely domestic politics. By contrast Obama comes in for scorn on four (NAFTA, CAFTA, Pakistan, Iran).

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says Hillary Clinton would have been a better pick than himself. A little amusing naturally, but I’m impressed by the candor and humility of it. Fine characteristics for a serving vice president who is expected to exert substantial influence on foreign policy.

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Westhawk
“Ukraine is the big prize and thus a dangerous flash point between Russia and the West. For the West, a firm alliance with Ukraine would anchor the containment of Russia. But for Russia, such an alliance would be a step too far. For Russia, winning Ukraine is vital. For the West, winning Ukraine would largely end its problems with Russia. It is for these reasons that the battle over Ukraine is both so tempting and so dangerous.”

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Extremely interesting post from Seth Weinberger on the opportunity for pulling China in the pro-Georgia camp, after the SCO failed to endorse Russian actions in Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

Seth is as mystified as I am that the Russian foreign ministry could possibly have believed it would persuade China to endorse ethnic separatism and provincial secession. If there is such a thing as an enduring Chinese ideology from ancient times, it is the idea of struggle against separatist disorder and provincial independence. A fear that is only amplified to extraordinary degrees by the prospect of other great powers assisting in the dismemberment of traditional territorial unity.

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photo: Michael Levesque

It seems the international media is crawling all over the tiny town Sarah Palin began her political career in. Being fond of leaders for whom membership in the general public is a recent memory, I think it’s great to see.

Although, how strange it must be for the residents of Wasilla to suddenly have the Los Angeles Times looking for perspectives on leadership in the Mocha Moose Cafe, or The Guardian speculating on the size of their town, or Deutsche Welle trying to divine foreign policy perspectives from their suddenly famous neighbor’s vacation travel.

Has to be fun.

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NRO
“Critics are already trying to damn Sarah Palin for her perceived lack of foreign-policy experience, but what they are not allowing for is something more important — that she has the right basic attitudes and sense of priorities. She understands that aggression has to be resisted and commitments have to be honored.”

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Powerline
“In yesterday’s radio address, John McCain talked about how the energy issue unites foreign and domestic policy”.

Exactly right. Energy is more than a Green issue or a Carbon Footprint issue. It is intrinsically linked to our survival.

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Russia wants Saakashvili gone and then categorically rejects the French ceasefire agreement Saakashvili signed. Even while the increasingly uncomfortable Medvedev says they’re all but finished with military operations. The humiliating exposure of Medvedev’s “presidency” is one of the more comical aspects of this episode.

Putin, the master of I’m-not-you-are school of geopolitical disputation, accuses the US of a “Cold War mentality.” I would agree, of course it does tend to happen when you start acting like the Soviet Union.

He’s also rather upset that the United States flew the Georgian contingent home from Iraq. Quite literally, the absolute least we could do. One gets the feeling that an IBM sales office in Tbilisi would constitute unwarranted American influence in Georgia for Putin.

And…Estonia “the other plucky”, speaks:

‘Russia’s military strikes in Georgia toll a knell for many of Europe’s hopes, such as the possibility of sharing common fundamental values with Russia,’ Toomas Sildam said Ilves told the European Union’s foreign policy chief Javier Solana on Sunday.
(Forbes)

Enough to turn you green.

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(Photo: Alice E. Backer | blog)

Andrew Galasetti at Lyved is an extremely devoted admirer of Obama. While fanatical devotion can blind — Galasetti thinks for instance that the McCain celebrity charge backfired, when the polls suggest a different picture (last week Ras had +6 Obama, now it’s +1 McCain) — it can also be a benefit when you’re looking for someone to find hidden advantages in faults. Often there are adantages, particularly foreign policy advantages, wrapped up inside domestic political vulnerabilities.

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(photo: dgeuzen)

John Riley at Newsday is criticizing John McCain’s “” ad on the grounds that “anyone knows” Britney Spears and Paris Hilton just aren’t celebrity enough. Points for novelty at least.

To reinforce his argument, he cites the Forbes Celebrity 100 as proof positive of this. Where are they in the list Mr. McCain? Not there! Tsk. Clearly they’re not celebrities.

Ah, but if that wasn’t enough for you, Riley isn’t yet finished. Reaching deeper into whatever depths the above point came from, he detects a sinister gender and racial subtext informing ad:

[T]hey didn’t pick other big celebrities, who were either men, or black, or married. What they picked was two sexually available white women.

But it must have been a coincidence, because we know John McCain wants to run an elevated campaign focusing on the serious issues that America faces.
(Newsday)

You know, it’s honestly hard to imagine typing something that ludicrous. I’ve typed plenty of bad analysis in my time, don’t get me wrong. But this is cringe inducing.

If you’re against the McCain campaign or even just its marketing strategy, is it really so difficult (or far from the truth) to dismiss the ad as empty, trite, and needlessly cheapening of a very serious debate? By elevating a frankly rather irrelevant ad to the level of a harmful racist conspiracy, Mr. Riley’s only reducing himself far below it.

Nietzsche’s injunction that one should be careful not to become a monster when fighting one, might be shrunken here. One should be careful not to become a very petty mouse, when fighting mice.

(H/T: Blake Hounshell | Foreign Policy)

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Sober, secular and educated new residents to New Mexico can often be found painting the frames of their doors and windows a vivid bright blue. Having seen the habit practiced on the homes of locals, the newcomers invariably assume it’s a quaint regional decorative touch. They’re unaware of course that the locals have painted their frames the color of the Virgin, and the purpose isn’t decoration, but defense.

In superstitious, Catholic New Mexico, the Virgin’s color is believed to prevent the nomadic witches that prowl the streets at night from entering the house and murdering its inhabitants. Such is the manner in which old and very sinister traditions can be unknowingly perpetuated by people who have no interest in original intents.

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Obama makes his first effort at diplomacy with the Palestinians. The response:

F- - - Washington, f- - - Obama and f- - - you.

I feel encouraged, how about you?

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I’m no fan of Obama—his social programs are enough to make him a no-go in my book—but much of the hoopla over things like his foreign policy are ludicrous. Take the “negotiate without preconditions” bit. Is that really so outrageous? Many people here have argued quite vociferously that it is tantamount to retreat, surrender, appeasement, or capitulation, somehow rewarding the world’s thugs for their bad behavior. Negotiations, of course, are not a panacea, but they are a marked change from the current Administration’s mostly ineffective foreign policy, and, according to History Professor Ralph Shaffer, actually quite a good thing.

While Bush and McCain seem unmoving in their opposition to meetings between an American president and those they consider terrorists who head foreign governments, it is inconceivable that they would rule out lower echelon diplomatic contact. But their uncompromising position on high-level meetings was not held by several of their Republican predecessors. Instead, Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and even George H. W. Bush met with foreign leaders whom many Americans considered to be terrorists, radicals or just plain evil dictators

The most glaring instance in which a president refused to meet with the head of a potentially threatening nation occurred not under a Republican conservative but a Democrat. In 1941 Franklin Roosevelt ignored pleas from Japanese Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoye for an urgent meeting to resolve differences between the two nations. Konoye felt that his civilian government could best be strengthened by talks between himself and Roosevelt. Throughout the summer and fall, 1941, American insistence upon detailed agreements prior to a conference aroused Japanese fears about delays that would bring a crisis before diplomats could meet. Roosevelt held firm and, with their oil supplies running low, the Japanese moved into the Dutch East Indies and simultaneously attacked American possessions in the Pacific.

Republican Cold War presidents, on the other hand, blustered publicly about “evil empires,” but went to the conference table, sometimes in secret. Dwight Eisenhower, proponent of massive retaliation and rolling back the Iron Curtain, held a crucial summit meeting with Nikita Khrushchev and Nikolai Bulganin at Geneva in 1955. This effort to relieve the tension that had developed between East and West over the previous decade proved more symbolic than substantive. Still, the Geneva meeting set a precedent for more productive meetings in subsequent years.

Perhaps what Bush and McCain have in mind is the danger inherent in meeting with a powerful and potentially threatening head of state without a proper awareness of your opponent’s ability and toughness in such negotiations. That situation faced an unprepared diplomatic novice, not unlike Obama, when a recently inaugurated Kennedy engaged a summit-hardened Khrushchev at Vienna in 1961. Kennedy later admitted: “He beat the hell out of me.”

Indeed, the larger danger is that Obama is not skilled or experienced at these sorts of meetings, not that he wants to hold them. “Negotiations,” as he says, “are not appeasement.” They might go nowhere. But if they do, then that is itself an important step to go through, not whether we can make them jump through the required number of hoops before we’ll even talk. That has its own set of dangers.

The point Shaffer raises about Taiwan is key as well: many of us gloss over the fact that we sold out a small democratic country in exchange for a broader goal of normalizing relations with the country everyone knew would be the regional power. Only we didn’t—Taiwan is still Taiwan, China is still China, and there is really very little danger of one taking over the other any time soon.

Perhaps there is a lesson there.

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There seems to be some confusion on the part of some as to exactly what sort of place ASHC is:

I was rather surprised to read this dubious and scornful appraisal of Michael Yon’s Wallstreet Journal editorial at A Second Hand Conjecture, a heretofore conservative site.

The post Mick Stockinger is referring to was created by Joshua Foust, our resident curmudgeon. Josh took aim at Michael Yon’s apparent advocation for more troops in theater:

This leads us to the most out-of-date aspect of the Senate debate: the argument about the pace of troop withdrawals. Precisely because we have made so much political progress in the past year, rather than talking about force reduction, Congress should be figuring ways and means to increase troop levels. For all our successes, we still do not have enough troops. This makes the fight longer and more lethal for the troops who are fighting.

The title of Yon’s WSJ piece was “Let’s ‘Surge’ Some More.” So the obvious inference was that Yon thinks we should be committing more troops to Iraq as we did with Petraeus’ “surge” last year. Josh took exception with that (in his typical, short-post, snarky way), and he made a valid point: our military is admittedly stretched and strained, to the point that further commitments are not exactly feasible.

I’m not concerned here with the merits of Josh’s post, but instead with the characterization of ASHC as “a heretofore conservative site.” I understand why Mick (and others) think that, but we should set the record straight. This is not a “conservative” site by any stretch of the imagination. The great majority of us support the war in Iraq, but not based on any sort of conservative principles. Essentially we all believe that winning is possible, and that winning is in the best interests of America. The only difference between Josh and the rest of us on this score is that Josh thinks (and can cogently explain when he wants to) that the war was a mistake and that the costs of continuing it are greater than any perceived benefits. Josh and I fundamentally disagree on this point, but that does not make him “liberal” nor me “conservative.”

Which leads me to the ultimate point: ASHC is not a conservative site. We are an amalgamation of views loosely coalesced around the idea that more freedom is better than less. We each hold different views on what that means, and the sole issue on which we are diametrically opposed is with respect to the war in Iraq. Josh stands alone here on ASHC, but I defy anyone to produce a more intelligent and reasoned voice when it comes to articulating why taking on Iraq was a bad idea. Even as I routinely and vociferously disagree with Josh’s assessments, I appreciate the value that Josh adds to the discussion. In other words, Josh may be wrong, but he makes wrong look as right as anyone possibly could.

In sum, if ASHC is deemed insufficiently “conservative” because of Josh’s posts then so be it. We never claimed that moniker, nor is it one that we’ve ever expressed any interest in holding. Personally, I’m proud to have Josh as a co-blogger precisely because our views conflict. You will often find arguments here opining as to how we are winning in Iraq and the GWOT, and you’ll also see arguments suggesting that Iraq was a huge mistake. That does not make ASHC deficient in any category. It makes us more useful and interesting.

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Neither George Snuffalufagus nor National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley seemed capable of distinguishing between Tibet and Nepal this weekend. Given that one is a Buddhist monarchy democratizing in fits and starts with a Maoist insurgency gaining a permanent foothold, and another one is a formerly Buddhist monarchy overrun five decades ago by Maoist foot soldiers… well that’s understandable. I guess.

Blake Hounshell suggests this is because Hadley was trying to run interference over Bush’s ambiguous plans to attend the opening ceremony of the Olympics. I’m a bit more cynical—to me this seems like par for the course. They’re all Asiatic, so who really cares anyway? Anyway, whatever reason you choose, it was pretty damned pathetic on both counts. These are experts?

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photo: Chris Dunn

Spiegel has a typically aggressive (and aggressively European) interview with John McCain today. In many ways it’s an interesting yet disappointing exercise, due to its focus on the perceived past sins of the Bush administration. While much ground is covered, a little too often Spiegel essentially asks “Bush did XYZ, which is bad. How will you differ?” That comes at the expense of examining many questions about the future Atlantic partnership.

However, the responses are interesting…particularly in tone. McCain gives Europe answers that in many ways will not conform to their desires in practical terms. But in a way, may be answers which seem more palatable to them. After all, the European adoration of international negotiation, consultative diplomacy and multilateral consent for its own sake, is on a certain popular level a superficial partiality for words and handshakes. One that by nature is always highly susceptible to the rephrasing of any given position to achieve acquiescence.

A few key responses from McCain:

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It seems Daniel Hannan has been getting some email of the “what the heck is wrong with you?” variety over his support for Barack Obama. Today he argues that he’s thrown his support behind the rather vague candidate because of his policy vacuity and favoritism for style over substance:

Isn’t it possible to argue that we want a relatively supine president, at least in the sense that a strong legislature is preferable to a strong executive, and that strong states are preferable to both?

The Republican heyday was arguably the last three decades of the 19th century, when they controlled 14 out of 16 congresses and generally held the White House, too. The party of that era believed in building up Congress at the expense of the presidency. Who were the presidents of that time? James Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, Rutherford B Hayes. (Rutherford B who? Exactly.) Yet these were the years when the US grew from a weakling among nations to a colossus.

To put it another way, I’d rather have a president who was decorative than one who was over-active. And Obama is certainly decorative.
(The Daily Telegraph)

Never mind the fact that the congress is very likely to be retained by the Democrats in 2008, and that a weak president led around by Nancy Pelosi, isn’t something anyone right-of-center should dream of. But there is nevertheless a certain logic to this from Daniel’s point of view.

Daniel is afterall unpersuaded that Iraq is an issue of any real significance to the national security of the United States, and he is highly sympathetic to Ron Paul’s isolationist views. When you don’t need or want a strong foreign policy, you don’t need or want a strong presidency occupied by a sharp and experienced leader with loads of specific plans. The bigger the boob, the less the interventionism, you might say. Marshalling public and political support for an aggressive foreign policy is no task for a man more comfortable weighing the advice of image consultants than that of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Therefore it might be an interesting political question to ask how many other current Republican Ron Paul supporters could be persuaded to vote similarly, were Obama facing an advocate of a vigorous foreign and national security policy.

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One of my favorite bloggers has resurfaced, and I am hurt, hurt, hurt that D. A. Ridgely didn’t let his fans (okay, me) know to where he had disappeared. He is now blogging at Positive Liberty, and the blogosphere has now gone from diminished by his absence to a place where civil, insightful cultural and political commentary has once again one of its finer practitioners.

I wasn’t going to avoid Charlie Wilson’s war, but his review makes me want to see it all the more. I also appreciate his dead on cautionary note on the ending. D. A. is quite comfortable with the ambiguous and uncertain nature of our world, including the past, a trait in foreign policy discussions which is quite rare and much needed in this time. Unfortunately, such admitted lack of certainty pays little dividends in gaining adherents. Thus the rise of the neo-cons, and their alter ego’s, who preach a certainty and confidence in their views which attracts to our great loss. It also means there is little market for such commentary, and probably one of the reasons he spends comparatively little time entering the fray.

I also recommend his thoughts inspired by Jonah Goldberg’s new book I brought up here.

Glad to have you back D.A.

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