[lit-ideas] Semi-Pacifism's EU Model
- From: "Lawrence Helm" <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Lit-Ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 4 Jan 2005 23:16:44 -0800
From off-line SP, the Semi-Pacifist, suggested that the EU ought to be our
ideal. Who could have imagined 50 years ago, he asks, that Germany, France
and England would be living in harmony? Fifty years ago historians
probably would have anticipated that these three nations would eventually
fight each other in another World war. Yet what a different world we see
today. Surely if nations harboring such bitter animosities can bend their
swords into pruning hooks and their spears into plowshares, there are
peaceful solutions to be found in the Middle East.
I disagreed with SP off-line saying that before we could get France,
Britain, and Germany into this state of harmony, France was conquered,
England was driven from the continent and ultimately became bankrupt and
Germany had to be defeated in a hard-fought war. Furthermore, Germany was
split up and several nations hovered over the two parts for decades.
SP however doesn?t think that it was ?war that created peace. Rather, it
was commerce, logic, forward thinking, and compromise that (has) prevailed.?
I don?t believe that France, Britain and Germany would be living in this
present day harmony were it not for the war. Just look at the history:
France had been very rough on Germany after World War One. She insisted
that Germany pay her reparations which Germany deeply resented. If somehow
we avoided World War Two, France and Germany would still be harboring their
grudges. Both nations would be building up their war machines and forming
treaties in case the other attacked. We wouldn?t have the EU.
In Christian evangelism it is typically observed that individuals don?t
realize that they need a savior until they have tried everything else and
finally been brought low. Something like that was true of France, Britain,
Germany and the rest of Western Europe. They needed to be saved from
themselves, but they didn?t realize it until they were brought low by World
War Two.
Robert Kagan suggested in Of Paradise and Power that America is from Mars
and Europe from Venus, but I don?t think that?s true. Europe has been more
martial than America over the years. America?s tendency has been toward
isolationism. As John Lewis Gaddis suggested in Surprise, Security and the
American Experience, America didn?t launch its imperialistic enterprise
across the continent until Washington was invaded by England on August 24,
1814. England attacked us so we set about shoring up our defenses, taking
over places like Florida that were vulnerable and ultimately stretching from
sea to sea. But Europe was different. I believe Europe is from Mars and
America is from Venus.
Wait a minute, SP will surely say. Who is throwing its weight around in the
Middle East even as we speak?
Yes, that?s us all right, but look at why it happened. We were happily
taking our peace dividend by reducing our military. The USSR gave the Cold
War up and we had finally got those pesky Europeans to quit drawing us into
war?sort of. They did draw is into their Yugoslavian difficulties, but it
could have been worse. But then the Islamists attacked us. Now we are
engaged in an activity that is mistaken for imperialism once again. We are
engaged in doing our best to defeat the Islamists and make sure that we are
not attacked by them again.
Europe has been at peace for a while and many of them think that we (who
have protected them from themselves for decades) should not engage in
preventive wars designed to protecting ourselves (and our allies). We
aren?t doing it the way we ought, or we aren?t doing it as we should, or we
should just wait out those Islamists because they may mellow and be
influenced by the Middle-East?s moderates.
I?ve been studying all these matters and from my standpoint there was
nothing we could have done differently that would have had so much success
in opposing the Islamists and in working toward preventing future attacks,
not only against America but against our allies. We are still engaged in
this effort and our successes aren?t visible to those who choose superficial
means of keeping up with what is happening, but we have made enormous
progress.
Thomas Barnett refers (in The Pentagon?s New Map) to new ?rules? to combat
modern threats. The PSI is such a rule. The PSI (Proliferation Security
Initiative) was advanced by the U.S. and approved by 60 nations. It is
intended to halt arms proliferations. According to Bill Gertz of The
Washington Times, ?details about the small number of boarding operations of
ships and seizures of illicit cargo under PSI remain secret . . . The one
action made public was the Oct. 4, 2003, seizure of the German-flagged ship
BBC China that was on its way to Libya with equipment for Moammar Gadafi?s
covert nuclear-arms program.?
?A U.S. warship forced the ship to divert to Italy. On board, investigators
found containers of uranium-enrichment equipment. That discovery led to the
unraveling of the covert nuclear supplier network headed by Pakistani Qadeer
Khan that stretched from
Germany to South Africa to Malaysia. The network had supplied
nuclear-weapons materials to Libya, Iran, North Korea and others.?
?PSI, launched by President Bush in May 2003, was an outgrowth of the
administration?s effort to prevent weapons of mass destruction from reaching
terrorists. Its core participants include the governments of the United
States, Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan,
the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Singapore,
Spain, Thailand and Britain. But more than 40 other states have signed onto
its principles and have chosen to keep their participation secret or
limited. . . .?
This PSI may be one of the new set-rules advocated by Thomas Barnett. I
notice that the illegal equipment confiscated by the U.S. warship came from
a ship flying a German flag. Isn?t Germany one of the models you wish the
US to emulate, SP? Now that I think about it, wasn?t Germany helping Saddam
build his nuclear factories, and hadn?t France helped with the earlier Iraqi
nuclear factory that Israel bombed?
I?m sorry, SP, but I don?t have a lot of confidence in your examples.
Neither do I have confidence that things will work out if we back off and
let the UN handle the Middle-Eastern problems. I suppose that we are just
going to insist on throwing our weight around until we neutralize the
Islamist threat against us. When Al Quaeda is gone and the Wahhabis and
Islamists have become pariahs to Middle-Eastern nations, we shall be
delighted to return to our Venusian shores ? and if there are some that wish
to hang around over there to make sure the embers are really out, our
congress will undoubtedly attempt to force them to return.
I think I am more concerned about peace than you are, SP, because I realize
that peace often requires a war before peace is possible. Europe couldn?t
appease its way to peace when its antagonist was Adolph Hitler, and we can?t
now that our antagonist is epitomized by Osama bin Laden. Indeed there are
moderates in the Middle East, as you say. Another one was assassinated by
Iraqi Jihadists just today.
Lawrence Helm
San Jacinto
--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.300 / Virus Database: 265.6.8 - Release Date: 1/3/2005
------------------------------------------------------------------
To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
Other related posts:
- » [lit-ideas] Semi-Pacifism's EU Model
