>>Acts of war are designed to create "shock and awe:" to make
manifest the power of one's nation.
Reminds me of Hansen's thesis--that only wars which completely
annihilate the adversary produce lasting peace.
For example, WWI ended with Germany more or less intact (no
troops ravaging toward Berlin) and as a result, the German nation
was back to war again in a couple decades. In WWII on the other
hand, Germany was annihilated and troops ravaged their way
through every nook and cranny of the country. The German nation
has enjoyed peace for sixty years and counting.
Applied to Iraq, this military historian's argument implies that
to successfully "reshape" the country, Iraq should have been
completely conquered. The US "shock and awe" never happened. As a
consequence, the insurgency is still very much at it. They were
not demoralized, and so they fight on.
What would it take to "completely conquer" Iraq? Certainly
allowing the encircled Iraqi troops to "run to ground" as our
advancing forces did, is not part of completely conquering an
adversary. "Total defeat" involves a lot more killing, bombing,
and terrorizing of the Iraqi people than actually happened.
Would it have been possible to completely conquer Iraq? Of
course, the US military could easily have clobbered every last
bit of resistance there, BUT it would have been politically
impossible. It would have been politically impossible because
everyone was watching on TV all over the world, and Bush was
spouting homilies about how the world would see the humanity and
courage of American troops. Yadda-yadda-yadda ...we're so
humane...yadda-yadda-yadda.
Which brings me to this point. Assuming Hansen's thesis is
correct, and assuming that global TV coverage now prevents any
nation but dictatorships (like China) from exercising the
brutality necessary to totally conquer an enemy--that may mean
that TV will prevent humanity from achieving lasting peace. TV
was supposed to end war by showing the world the true face of
war. Yet it may be that TV will end lasting peace by preventing
the brutality necessary to force a lasting peace.
It would be a bitter paradox if TV ultimately caused lots more
wars because it prevented one side from totally defeating another.
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