Another stirring & verifiable report from John Latta today. I don't see eye-to-eye with him on the politics - I don't have the same faith in the anarchist's righteous thunderous "No" - but I appreciate his discerning literary ear.
So where do I stand now on the War (Kent Johnson wants to know)? I accepted the "WMD" argument & aligned it with 1) Saddam tyranny; 2) egregious failure of Iraq "sanctions" regime; 3) Saddam's unwillingness to negotiate before the war. I was offended by what seemed to me the knee-jerk, partisan and doctrinaire mentality on the anti-war (& poetry-world) left. I was tempted (as I often am) into gratuitous contrarianism.
What it comes down to, however, is that I assented to another round of war and military violence in history; moreover an "unnecessary" war (in that it was not provoked in defense against a real & immediate threat). This puts me in a rather demoralized and discouraged state of mind. (I suppose if the follow-up to the war had been more successful, I would not be having these twinges of conscience; I would have accepted the justification for violently pulling down the tyrant Saddam; it's easier to be complacent if you're among the victors.) On the other hand, I also believe the situation in Iraq is not amenable to simple armchair abstractions; good & bad are emerging together out of the great spectrum of intentions and actors on that vast stage. I think many (if not all) Americans there are working hard to make the best of it, to steer toward a better future. If history is any guide, that future will not justify the pronunciamentos of doctrinaire politicos & prigs on either side of the debate. I would be not at all surprised if John McCain's strategic view of the situation in Iraq proves (surprisingly) correct in the long run.
I'm not (obviously) a strict pacifist, but I do hope for a global, historical evolution beyond war, aggression, violence, oppression, and exploitation. This will not happen in some deterministic fashion, but depends on the decisions and actions of the human race. The arrogance and vanity of nation-states is maintained by the complacency and brutality of nations themselves. "Why do the nations rage, and the peoples imagine vain things?"
Showing posts with label Iraq2. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Iraq2. Show all posts
11.09.2007
8.03.2005
1.31.2005
A good day in Iraq yesterday, I'd say. Hope it goes forward. Jonathan Schell's book The Unconquerable World provides some interesting historical context. I think perhaps somebody in the Bush administration has been reading it, though the particular mixture of violence, realpolitik & popular will there is not exactly like any of the historical examples (Vietnam, the US civil rights movement, Soviet Eastern Europe, etc.) Schell studies.
The Iraq "occupation" and "insurgency" seem to display Schell's panorama in a reverse mirror : here the occupation is aligned with the majority; here the army, rather than the insurgency, loses every battle, but wins the war.
Schell, of course, looks beyond the arms market and the security state - seeing popular nonviolent democracy movements as the hope of the future. His keynote theme is the paradoxical power of mass nonviolence. Something of that was visible yesterday, in the photos of Iraqis bravely holding up their ink-stained voting fingers. Power to the people.
The Iraq "occupation" and "insurgency" seem to display Schell's panorama in a reverse mirror : here the occupation is aligned with the majority; here the army, rather than the insurgency, loses every battle, but wins the war.
Schell, of course, looks beyond the arms market and the security state - seeing popular nonviolent democracy movements as the hope of the future. His keynote theme is the paradoxical power of mass nonviolence. Something of that was visible yesterday, in the photos of Iraqis bravely holding up their ink-stained voting fingers. Power to the people.
11.11.2004
It's an odd path I traveled to election day. I don't believe in military solutions to human problems. I don't believe in one nation imposing its will by force on others. I think there is a disconnect, as well as a relation, between American wealth and power, on the one hand, and the world's poverty & social oppression, on the other, which no amount of imposed political ideals, in themselves, can ever ameliorate. Only social justice and an effort to address grievances and basic economic problems can do that. I believe there is a fundamental contradiction in the notion that a few nations, armed to the teeth, can police the other nations, with respect to weapons of mass destruction : only further & universal disarmament will bring real security in that regard.
All that having been said, however... I hold another set of views, perhaps contradicting myself in the process. I think there is a global terrorist network & movement, dedicated to a mix of tyrannical politics and Islamic-fundamentalist expansionism ("the Caliphate"). I think for about the last half century, the Middle-Eastern Arab nations have chosen the path of authoritarianism and violence; and while the colonial powers of the West bear much responsibility for this outcome, the primary responsibility lies with the choices of the Arab governments themselves. I think that the events of 9/11 left the US government no choice but to deal with the problem of global mass terror in a systematic way, and I think the Bush policy of confronting state sponsors of terror, as well as the terrorist networks themselves, made sense. I think the nature & practices of the Saddam Hussein regime fit the category of state sponsors of terror. I think Saddam brought his downfall down on his own head, when he thought he could respond to US demands with belligerence and stalling. I think Iraq and the Middle East will be better off with the Saddam mafia out of power, and an elected government. I think the response of the anti-Bush peace movement and the European governments was blinkered by a kind of self-righteous and naive attitude of appeasement, in an untenable and unjust situation, in which Saddam manipulated the sanctions system to benefit himself & punish his own people.
Much of my progress to this position came about as a kind of dialectical protest against the attitudes and propaganda of the politicized "poet-networks".
All that having been said, however... I hold another set of views, perhaps contradicting myself in the process. I think there is a global terrorist network & movement, dedicated to a mix of tyrannical politics and Islamic-fundamentalist expansionism ("the Caliphate"). I think for about the last half century, the Middle-Eastern Arab nations have chosen the path of authoritarianism and violence; and while the colonial powers of the West bear much responsibility for this outcome, the primary responsibility lies with the choices of the Arab governments themselves. I think that the events of 9/11 left the US government no choice but to deal with the problem of global mass terror in a systematic way, and I think the Bush policy of confronting state sponsors of terror, as well as the terrorist networks themselves, made sense. I think the nature & practices of the Saddam Hussein regime fit the category of state sponsors of terror. I think Saddam brought his downfall down on his own head, when he thought he could respond to US demands with belligerence and stalling. I think Iraq and the Middle East will be better off with the Saddam mafia out of power, and an elected government. I think the response of the anti-Bush peace movement and the European governments was blinkered by a kind of self-righteous and naive attitude of appeasement, in an untenable and unjust situation, in which Saddam manipulated the sanctions system to benefit himself & punish his own people.
Much of my progress to this position came about as a kind of dialectical protest against the attitudes and propaganda of the politicized "poet-networks".
11.10.2004
My decision to vote for Bush never was & is not easy on my mind, or simple. I remember before 9/11 I was angered & bothered by Bush's Supreme Court victory, & the hubristic foreign policy attitudes which followed. But I would say the vote came after a gestation period which began when I saw the Left's, & most of the world's, reaction to the Bush policy toward Iraq & the sanctions problem. I was struck at that time by the ideological rather than the pragmatic nature of the response. I saw a lot of Vietnam-spectre hand-wringing; I saw a lot of purely partisan Bush-bashing; I saw a lot of sanctimonious pacifism, willing to appease, and indeed collaborate with, the Saddam regime, in order to avoid holding him to account. I saw the UN willing to do almost anything besides actually enforce the sanctions; I saw Europe gladly join hands with the Baathists rather than support the US in bringing down that neo-Stalinist regime.
I already know the rebuttals that readers of this blog are thinking & perhaps preparing to post. There's the argument that the US should have been more patient with inspections. Then there's the argument that even if the war was justified, the aftermath has been botched, with horrific consequences. I understand the merit of these arguments, and of many others; but in the end they are not strong enough to convince me that the Bush long-term strategy of pushing democracy in the Middle East is fundamentally mistaken. Rather, I think the critics and the naysayers have got history wrong; they remind me, to a degree, of the people who opposed Lincoln in the Civil War, as a matter of fact.
History, fortunately or unfortunately, is not a clear glass displaying the clean triumph of good over evil; nor is the US exempt from deep wrongs of its own. But I happen to believe this particular cause is just.
I already know the rebuttals that readers of this blog are thinking & perhaps preparing to post. There's the argument that the US should have been more patient with inspections. Then there's the argument that even if the war was justified, the aftermath has been botched, with horrific consequences. I understand the merit of these arguments, and of many others; but in the end they are not strong enough to convince me that the Bush long-term strategy of pushing democracy in the Middle East is fundamentally mistaken. Rather, I think the critics and the naysayers have got history wrong; they remind me, to a degree, of the people who opposed Lincoln in the Civil War, as a matter of fact.
History, fortunately or unfortunately, is not a clear glass displaying the clean triumph of good over evil; nor is the US exempt from deep wrongs of its own. But I happen to believe this particular cause is just.
11.05.2004
6.04.2004
Why is Jim Behrle badmouthing Kent Johnson so much? I don't get it. I looked at Kent's Abu Graibh piece. It's standard political satire, it does what satire's supposed to do: it gets you down into the ugliness & makes you squirm. The last paragraph simply zeroes in on its probable readership (poets) & makes them identify/empathize/squirm too. He emailed me to ask what I thought of it, & I said the weakness of it is it seems aimed narrowly at the in-house poet audience, & that it should include more "emails" from all walks of life.
Behrle's take-off on Kent's last paragraph doesn't rise to the level of political satire, it just makes fun of somebody by harping on their supposed weaknesses.
Now I suppose the Behrle campaign will be mounted against me. I don't know all the "history" gossip or rumor behind Behrle's animus toward Kent, it's none of my business. As I recall, & my memory can be fuzzy, he's mad at me because he didn't like the way I was talking back to David Hess some time years ago (& he didn't like me calling him "Jimby", which I don't call him any more). But that's all water under the bridge. I'm blocked for some reason from his comment box (at his blog), so I won't be able to respond, when the torrent comes. I really don't care anymore about all this piss-ant poet "biz".
Everyone should lay off the badmouthing & recognize they have personality disorders which are not cured by aggression & petty sniping. That includes me, that includes you, Behrle.
[p.s. I see Kent has responded to the Behrle piece over at the Hotel today. Whenever I go to "Hotel Point" I think of some big windy light-filled drafty comfortable mostly vacant old hotel on some point in Lake Michigan. & then I think of the hotel in the "Quaker Hill" section of The Bridge.]
Behrle's take-off on Kent's last paragraph doesn't rise to the level of political satire, it just makes fun of somebody by harping on their supposed weaknesses.
Now I suppose the Behrle campaign will be mounted against me. I don't know all the "history" gossip or rumor behind Behrle's animus toward Kent, it's none of my business. As I recall, & my memory can be fuzzy, he's mad at me because he didn't like the way I was talking back to David Hess some time years ago (& he didn't like me calling him "Jimby", which I don't call him any more). But that's all water under the bridge. I'm blocked for some reason from his comment box (at his blog), so I won't be able to respond, when the torrent comes. I really don't care anymore about all this piss-ant poet "biz".
Everyone should lay off the badmouthing & recognize they have personality disorders which are not cured by aggression & petty sniping. That includes me, that includes you, Behrle.
[p.s. I see Kent has responded to the Behrle piece over at the Hotel today. Whenever I go to "Hotel Point" I think of some big windy light-filled drafty comfortable mostly vacant old hotel on some point in Lake Michigan. & then I think of the hotel in the "Quaker Hill" section of The Bridge.]
2.14.2003
More disjointed thoughts about the world crisis.
Consensus coming apart. The US has a strategy of global "peacekeeping" which involves pre-emptive military attacks on other nations. The rest of the world repudiates this more strongly every day, which increasingly isolates the US. Asymmetry of perspectives.
The strange shadow-symmetry between Bush & bin Laden. Oil boys who need each other's aggression to justify their own. Useful to each other. We go to war (against the wrong guy) & get color-coded threat warnings.
Yet still I can hear the weird optimism coming from the hawk planners : bringing down Saddam will make things better, safer. We will liberate Iraq. & strangest of all (to me) - I'm not yet ready to deny they might be at least partially right!!
I hear what Jordan & Anastasios & so many everywhere are saying - about the consequences, the pure immorality of aggressive war, the ordinary people who will suffer & die for the sake of these "plans". But then I also think of the Marsh Arabs, the Kurds, the people in Iraqi prisons & torture cells - the people who have been suffering from Saddam's killer regime since he installed it (via murder of his associates) decades ago. & of the nature of the Saddam regime : its sick focus on torture, repression, experimentation with WMDs. . .
So I am still not the one with the firm voice to say NO to Bush; not the one with the clear vision of a post-militarist world in balance. Have I lost my own morality? Am I become a "good German"? These are the thoughts that oppress me.
Consensus coming apart. The US has a strategy of global "peacekeeping" which involves pre-emptive military attacks on other nations. The rest of the world repudiates this more strongly every day, which increasingly isolates the US. Asymmetry of perspectives.
The strange shadow-symmetry between Bush & bin Laden. Oil boys who need each other's aggression to justify their own. Useful to each other. We go to war (against the wrong guy) & get color-coded threat warnings.
Yet still I can hear the weird optimism coming from the hawk planners : bringing down Saddam will make things better, safer. We will liberate Iraq. & strangest of all (to me) - I'm not yet ready to deny they might be at least partially right!!
I hear what Jordan & Anastasios & so many everywhere are saying - about the consequences, the pure immorality of aggressive war, the ordinary people who will suffer & die for the sake of these "plans". But then I also think of the Marsh Arabs, the Kurds, the people in Iraqi prisons & torture cells - the people who have been suffering from Saddam's killer regime since he installed it (via murder of his associates) decades ago. & of the nature of the Saddam regime : its sick focus on torture, repression, experimentation with WMDs. . .
So I am still not the one with the firm voice to say NO to Bush; not the one with the clear vision of a post-militarist world in balance. Have I lost my own morality? Am I become a "good German"? These are the thoughts that oppress me.
2.12.2003
There will be calls to action now, and people will be encouraged to get in line or shut up. Like a weak mirror of Bush policy.
I learned to play devil's advocate on the Buffalo Poetics List. Now it's no longer a game, but I'm still playing.
Ron's measured & sensible rationale (but see Joe's) against war:
the parallels - Vietnam, Nazi Germany;
the warnings - roiling Middle East, Fortress America;
the dismissals - UN resolutions, evidence of terrorist collaboration;
the evaluation - "spreading democracy" through US invasion is foolhardy. . .
the Bush admin. viewpoint:
we are already at war (viz. 9/11);
the goal is to isolate & defang global terrorism;
the strategy is to confront states that sponsor terrorism, to liberate Iraq & thereby isolate Iran, Syria & al Qaeda.
contra Ron, this MIGHT actually work. But too bad it's a war strategy rather than a peace strategy (if the Prez were Jimmy Carter we would be defanging al Qaeda by making peace between Israel & Palestinians).
I learned to play devil's advocate on the Buffalo Poetics List. Now it's no longer a game, but I'm still playing.
Ron's measured & sensible rationale (but see Joe's) against war:
the parallels - Vietnam, Nazi Germany;
the warnings - roiling Middle East, Fortress America;
the dismissals - UN resolutions, evidence of terrorist collaboration;
the evaluation - "spreading democracy" through US invasion is foolhardy. . .
the Bush admin. viewpoint:
we are already at war (viz. 9/11);
the goal is to isolate & defang global terrorism;
the strategy is to confront states that sponsor terrorism, to liberate Iraq & thereby isolate Iran, Syria & al Qaeda.
contra Ron, this MIGHT actually work. But too bad it's a war strategy rather than a peace strategy (if the Prez were Jimmy Carter we would be defanging al Qaeda by making peace between Israel & Palestinians).
2.11.2003
Joseph Duemer at his (scintillating) blog Reading & Writing has some comments on my war thoughts.
I share his reservations about the Bush administration's foreign & domestic policy, as put out in the strategic defense plan (transcendent military superiority from now to eternity), in the dismissive attitude toward international consensus on many global problems, & what appears to be the ancient political device of using war to clamp down on civil liberties & social justice at home.
Setting aside (if possible) the question of the morality of pre-emptive military attack, or the morality of modern war in general, it remains to be seen whether the risky game being played with Saddam will result in the strengthening & furthering of the administration's plans, or their defeat & undoing.
In any case, it seems to me that, as I mentioned before, WHETHER OR NOT there is a new battle in Iraq, the disconnect & dissonance between the worldviews of Islamic revolutionaries/religious conservatives, on the one hand, and the worldviews of the West (& the US as a special case), will continue to exacerbate conflict & confusion for at least another generation, unless some attempts to mediate that dissonance take place.
I note Joe's interest in philosophy as exhibited on his blog. & I wonder again if some kind of philosophical dialogue across cultures & disciplines could be instigated, and whether this would have any practical meaning. I'm not very knowledgeable about Islam; what strikes me about it, as an ignorant Western observer, is the way it seems to assert the authority of a transcendent divinity - but at the same time a special kind of divinity, INSTALLED at the political/legal/cultural nexus of civilization. In conservative Islam, there seems to be no separation of religion & state. The question to be put to Islam, then, is how it proposes to live at peace with the non-Muslim, the non-believer, the secular aspects of the world?
Turning to the worldview of the West (& specifically the US): one would want to ask the Bush administration in particular: what morality or authority sanctions the world military hegemony you seek? And how in turn would such a strategy be implemented without actually disturbing the peaceful co-existence of various peoples & nations?
It seems to me that PERHAPS there is an area of discussion which might provide some kind of mediating function. That sphere would be the discourse around the notion of "freedom". Freedom, democracy, or popular sovereignty might, MIGHT, be the social force which is capable of limiting the utopian/dystopian/utilitarian extremism of the US administration's dream of hegemony; it MIGHT also be the social force which provides a contemporary analogue to the "separation of church & state", which the Islamic world has not experienced in the same way the West has. So it might be interesting to pursue a cross-cultural public dialogue around the global question of freedom & human rights, as a way of clarifying basic norms. . .
I share his reservations about the Bush administration's foreign & domestic policy, as put out in the strategic defense plan (transcendent military superiority from now to eternity), in the dismissive attitude toward international consensus on many global problems, & what appears to be the ancient political device of using war to clamp down on civil liberties & social justice at home.
Setting aside (if possible) the question of the morality of pre-emptive military attack, or the morality of modern war in general, it remains to be seen whether the risky game being played with Saddam will result in the strengthening & furthering of the administration's plans, or their defeat & undoing.
In any case, it seems to me that, as I mentioned before, WHETHER OR NOT there is a new battle in Iraq, the disconnect & dissonance between the worldviews of Islamic revolutionaries/religious conservatives, on the one hand, and the worldviews of the West (& the US as a special case), will continue to exacerbate conflict & confusion for at least another generation, unless some attempts to mediate that dissonance take place.
I note Joe's interest in philosophy as exhibited on his blog. & I wonder again if some kind of philosophical dialogue across cultures & disciplines could be instigated, and whether this would have any practical meaning. I'm not very knowledgeable about Islam; what strikes me about it, as an ignorant Western observer, is the way it seems to assert the authority of a transcendent divinity - but at the same time a special kind of divinity, INSTALLED at the political/legal/cultural nexus of civilization. In conservative Islam, there seems to be no separation of religion & state. The question to be put to Islam, then, is how it proposes to live at peace with the non-Muslim, the non-believer, the secular aspects of the world?
Turning to the worldview of the West (& specifically the US): one would want to ask the Bush administration in particular: what morality or authority sanctions the world military hegemony you seek? And how in turn would such a strategy be implemented without actually disturbing the peaceful co-existence of various peoples & nations?
It seems to me that PERHAPS there is an area of discussion which might provide some kind of mediating function. That sphere would be the discourse around the notion of "freedom". Freedom, democracy, or popular sovereignty might, MIGHT, be the social force which is capable of limiting the utopian/dystopian/utilitarian extremism of the US administration's dream of hegemony; it MIGHT also be the social force which provides a contemporary analogue to the "separation of church & state", which the Islamic world has not experienced in the same way the West has. So it might be interesting to pursue a cross-cultural public dialogue around the global question of freedom & human rights, as a way of clarifying basic norms. . .
. . . but then I think again. Of the dying & suffering. Of the permanent residue of pain & illness & bitterness.
Of the disconnect between the culture & mentality of the hawks, and the lessons they should have learned from the 20th century. Not only the lesson of "standing up to evildoers" : the lesson of the desolation & madness of war & militarism.
I see the logic of preventive action. But I see the greater logic of never being the aggressor. That's why the case for preventive action would have to be very strong and crystal-clear. Which is why it would be better to accept the European proposal of steadily increased inspection pressure.
I wish I could see more clearly. I see both sides, unlike many of my fellow poets, & I'm wavering.
Of the disconnect between the culture & mentality of the hawks, and the lessons they should have learned from the 20th century. Not only the lesson of "standing up to evildoers" : the lesson of the desolation & madness of war & militarism.
I see the logic of preventive action. But I see the greater logic of never being the aggressor. That's why the case for preventive action would have to be very strong and crystal-clear. Which is why it would be better to accept the European proposal of steadily increased inspection pressure.
I wish I could see more clearly. I see both sides, unlike many of my fellow poets, & I'm wavering.
2.10.2003
Yes, as the Platypus of Doom, I find myself increasingly alienated from the poets who circulate in blogworld, so secure in their antiwar sentiments, so certain that they have seen through the conspiracy of Tex & Rummy et al. I want to agree with them, I want to think we are fighting the Vietnam War all over again against the American War Machine...
but then I look at all the facts I can gather & it seems to me a legitimate case can be made that the current Iraqi dictatorship does not deserve to have these mass-killer weapons, and if they are not willing to give them up, they should be removed by force. The arguments from fear are very powerful ("the Middle East is a tinderbox. . .
they will come & take revenge on us. . ." etc), but we should be moved by reason & not by fear. If Islamic extremists decided to massacre thousands of Americans because they were angry that we were taking away Saddam's WMDs - well, are we going to let them dictate the agenda? Because that is what it would amount to if we gave in to them.
The proto-fascism & extremism emanating from Islamic reactionaries must be opposed. So must the injustices of fundamentalist Israeli zealots & extremists.
So must the complacent imperialist logic which allows might rather than diplomacy to manage policy. So must the Karl Roves of the world, who think they can spin international crises into dividends for their faction & its plutocrat supporters.
I am very ambivalent about the situation. Maybe only poetry can express the ambiguities with sufficient exactitude & irony. I'm think of Marvell's ambivalence & his Horation Ode. Someone could take the descriptive satirical powers of prose & make a real poem out of this impasse, from the sands of Texas to the sands of Ur. The trouble is most of the poets are pleased to express cardboard opinions & make febrile tinny sounds. I suppose I'm one of them.
but then I look at all the facts I can gather & it seems to me a legitimate case can be made that the current Iraqi dictatorship does not deserve to have these mass-killer weapons, and if they are not willing to give them up, they should be removed by force. The arguments from fear are very powerful ("the Middle East is a tinderbox. . .
they will come & take revenge on us. . ." etc), but we should be moved by reason & not by fear. If Islamic extremists decided to massacre thousands of Americans because they were angry that we were taking away Saddam's WMDs - well, are we going to let them dictate the agenda? Because that is what it would amount to if we gave in to them.
The proto-fascism & extremism emanating from Islamic reactionaries must be opposed. So must the injustices of fundamentalist Israeli zealots & extremists.
So must the complacent imperialist logic which allows might rather than diplomacy to manage policy. So must the Karl Roves of the world, who think they can spin international crises into dividends for their faction & its plutocrat supporters.
I am very ambivalent about the situation. Maybe only poetry can express the ambiguities with sufficient exactitude & irony. I'm think of Marvell's ambivalence & his Horation Ode. Someone could take the descriptive satirical powers of prose & make a real poem out of this impasse, from the sands of Texas to the sands of Ur. The trouble is most of the poets are pleased to express cardboard opinions & make febrile tinny sounds. I suppose I'm one of them.
Responding to Jordan's comment today:
There's rationality, and there's self-interest. Everybody has to integrate them both. But there's something else too: fellow-feeling, altruism, self-sacrifice for the greater good.
Isn't rationality, or enlightened self-interest, the ability to work beneficially for others as well as ourselves?
The past few weeks I've really begun to question my own capacity to think rationally, because I find myself tempted to take stands on the Iraq crisis which amaze me, which I can't believe I believe in, which I don't completely believe. That is, I'm tempted to argue FOR war (and marshall those arguments on my blog). Why?
1. For the hell of it. For the curiosity of it. Because Saddam has it coming.
2. Because all the poets seem to be marching lockstep, of one mind. I have a reflexive need to differ (learned in the Poetry Wars). I question some of the self-righteousness of those who are always ready to impugn the motives of the ones they disagree with (ie. perhaps it's not just "oil profiteering by Bush & Co.").
3. Because over the years, without even being aware of it, I've become complacent or conformist - I simply don't want to believe what's happening to my government & my country, I close my eyes.
4. Because I can't completely discount the arguments for attacking Saddam either. In the post-9/11 world, I can entertain serious justifications for a pre-emptive strike, if the claims being made about Saddam's aims & capabilities are really true.
5. Because I'm having a failure of imagination : failing to consider the real alternatives to attack; failing to reckon the carnage & suffering war will bring; being naive about the mentality of those promoting this war.
I'm having difficulty with this. . .
There's rationality, and there's self-interest. Everybody has to integrate them both. But there's something else too: fellow-feeling, altruism, self-sacrifice for the greater good.
Isn't rationality, or enlightened self-interest, the ability to work beneficially for others as well as ourselves?
The past few weeks I've really begun to question my own capacity to think rationally, because I find myself tempted to take stands on the Iraq crisis which amaze me, which I can't believe I believe in, which I don't completely believe. That is, I'm tempted to argue FOR war (and marshall those arguments on my blog). Why?
1. For the hell of it. For the curiosity of it. Because Saddam has it coming.
2. Because all the poets seem to be marching lockstep, of one mind. I have a reflexive need to differ (learned in the Poetry Wars). I question some of the self-righteousness of those who are always ready to impugn the motives of the ones they disagree with (ie. perhaps it's not just "oil profiteering by Bush & Co.").
3. Because over the years, without even being aware of it, I've become complacent or conformist - I simply don't want to believe what's happening to my government & my country, I close my eyes.
4. Because I can't completely discount the arguments for attacking Saddam either. In the post-9/11 world, I can entertain serious justifications for a pre-emptive strike, if the claims being made about Saddam's aims & capabilities are really true.
5. Because I'm having a failure of imagination : failing to consider the real alternatives to attack; failing to reckon the carnage & suffering war will bring; being naive about the mentality of those promoting this war.
I'm having difficulty with this. . .
2.07.2003
I am still struggling to understand what is happening with the Iraq crisis, & how to respond; I haven't come to conclusions yet. But I want to speculate & think out loud a little here tonight, in Providence, where 8 inches of snow fell this afternoon, & my wife & I shoveled the sidewalk around the Church of the Redeemer (across the street).
I'm beginning to think that perhaps what we are witnessing in government councils & at the U.N. is not the working of international relations, but something approaching, perhaps reaching, their breakdown. & I can't simply assign blame - like some of the self-righteous moralists on the left & in the peace movement do; like some of the self-righteous moralists among the fundamentalist Islamists do; like some of the self-righteous moralists in the Bush Administration & its supporters do.
Perhaps it is a breakdown impelled in part by the failure of incommensurate discourses - ways of thinking - to connect, to communicate. & perhaps one of the causes of this failure to communicate is an inability to articulate. & perhaps one of the root causes of this failure to articulate is that the parties on both sides have unacknowledged mixed motives, which result in uncontrollable mixed messages.
What are these mixed motives? On both sides - on the side of Western, secular democracy & its enforcing power, the US - as well as on the side of conservative, fundamentalist Islam, its allies, supporters, & soldiers - there is a blending of the ideal & the real. The ideal, for both, is characterized in different languages & different constellations of value, which rarely connect; the real, for both, includes a basic struggle for power, domination, prestige, victory - a rivalry, an agon between the two. Thus the US insists it is the world's peacemaker, applying "overwhelming force" to police & protect the civilized world; yet this overwhelming force is also, inevitably, convenient for the achievement of more narrow, selfish interests; and just as inevitably, the idealistic claims of the US are suspected of hypocrisy by the rest of the world. Thus the Islamic fundamentalist claims access to transcendent, absolute, divine value : which absolutism happens, conveniently, to be his most powerful weapon - because it allows him everything in the way of strategies & tactics against the infidel - there are no limits to the carnage he can inflict, there are no limits to his fantasies of the Caliphate & its dominion, because his faith is the ultimate weapon - the ultimate sanction for his will to power. On the side of the secular world of nations, the undertone is realpolitik; on the side of the religious world of Islamic fundamentalism, the overtone is - realpolitik. Yet the language of their ideals - a global Caliphate ruled by Islamic law on the one hand, a global association of free happy co-operating nations on the other - these languages are utterly different.
Is there a solution to this dilemma - which is pressing us all toward the breakdown of international relations & violence on a massive scale? I think that somehow, some of us must step back - step to one side - engage both sides from a position of analysis & mediation. Rather than instantly politicizing & aggravating the situation further by strident ideological condemnations, perhaps we need to try to analyze dispassionately - treat both sides as, in a sense, SICK rather than EVIL. We need to engage the parties as patients rather than allies or enemies. (I admit this sounds like a fantasy as well!)
Whether or not the US goes to war against Iraq, this dilemma of conflicting & incommensurate discourses & goals will remain. Police action & military force alone will never uproot Islamic fundamentalism; nor will American global military supremacy bring about the freedom & equality it claims as its ideals. By the same token, terrorism will never achieve the global Caliphate, nor will the ideals of Islamic law & tradition justify the massacre of infidels & the denial of freedom.
What might bring peace to these warring rivals is a mediating discourse which sets limits to the absolutism underlying both sides - the doctrinaire tendencies which act as a counterweight to the hidden & unacknowledged contradictions - the hypocrisies of ideologies, driven as they are by their claims both to absolute, ideal value on the one hand, & to secular power, efficacy & hegemony, on the other. This is perhaps the essence of absolutism: to claim to join ideal & real, heaven & earth - to the distinct advantage of the claimant.
This would have to be a discourse - a dialogue, a conversation - about the nature of the Good. For Americans, it would have to consider how it would be possible to achieve a world community of nations without domination, hegemony, empire, self-interested power, realpolitik, inequality, injustice, fear, & militarism. This is a very necessary conversation, because it is clear that the means & methods given priority by the current Administration - ie., overwhelming military might - are insufficient & often counter-productive to achieving this goal. For Islamists, it would have to consider how one justifies a theology & theogony which allows for absolutism, authoritarianism, rigid theocratic legalism, and the massacre of "infidels". How are these practices in any way a reflection of a divine nature or reality? Isn't a theology - or ideology - which justifies such practices merely the flimsy disguise of a ruthless hunger for power & prestige - perhaps even an envy of the power & prestige flaunted by the representative infidel nation?
What then is the Good, and how in this imperfect mortal world are we to aim for it? This is the conversation which free people need to undertake, in order to drown out the rabid absolutisms, the will to power, the disregard for human life, the narrow realpolitic of power & self-interest - all those behaviors which are all too often displayed by secular nations & religious collectives alike. By using such a term as "the Good" I don't mean to allude to any particular philosophical method or tradition; I am simply speculating, at this point, that such a term or something like it might serve as a focus for the examination I have outlined. I am thinking about an international conversation, across the borders of nations & faiths. I don't think it begins with those who are quick to condemn either the Bush administration for seeking to create peace & security through military & political dominion, or, on the other hand, those who are quick to discount the discourse of religious tradition, which seeks to restore some sense of wholeness, dignity & self-determination to a region & a culture. (This is in no way meant as a justification of authoritarian fundamentalism, terrorism, or aggressive, militaristic realpolitik; nor is it an attempt to equate, morally or in any other way, the main antagonists. It is an attempt to emphasize the incommensurability of their language & goals, and the necessity to address that disjunction with means other than force, violence & war. Nor are these speculations an attempt to pass implicit judgement on the immediate details of the crisis at hand, which, as I said at the beginning of this, I don't feel at this point I am capable of doing.)
I'm beginning to think that perhaps what we are witnessing in government councils & at the U.N. is not the working of international relations, but something approaching, perhaps reaching, their breakdown. & I can't simply assign blame - like some of the self-righteous moralists on the left & in the peace movement do; like some of the self-righteous moralists among the fundamentalist Islamists do; like some of the self-righteous moralists in the Bush Administration & its supporters do.
Perhaps it is a breakdown impelled in part by the failure of incommensurate discourses - ways of thinking - to connect, to communicate. & perhaps one of the causes of this failure to communicate is an inability to articulate. & perhaps one of the root causes of this failure to articulate is that the parties on both sides have unacknowledged mixed motives, which result in uncontrollable mixed messages.
What are these mixed motives? On both sides - on the side of Western, secular democracy & its enforcing power, the US - as well as on the side of conservative, fundamentalist Islam, its allies, supporters, & soldiers - there is a blending of the ideal & the real. The ideal, for both, is characterized in different languages & different constellations of value, which rarely connect; the real, for both, includes a basic struggle for power, domination, prestige, victory - a rivalry, an agon between the two. Thus the US insists it is the world's peacemaker, applying "overwhelming force" to police & protect the civilized world; yet this overwhelming force is also, inevitably, convenient for the achievement of more narrow, selfish interests; and just as inevitably, the idealistic claims of the US are suspected of hypocrisy by the rest of the world. Thus the Islamic fundamentalist claims access to transcendent, absolute, divine value : which absolutism happens, conveniently, to be his most powerful weapon - because it allows him everything in the way of strategies & tactics against the infidel - there are no limits to the carnage he can inflict, there are no limits to his fantasies of the Caliphate & its dominion, because his faith is the ultimate weapon - the ultimate sanction for his will to power. On the side of the secular world of nations, the undertone is realpolitik; on the side of the religious world of Islamic fundamentalism, the overtone is - realpolitik. Yet the language of their ideals - a global Caliphate ruled by Islamic law on the one hand, a global association of free happy co-operating nations on the other - these languages are utterly different.
Is there a solution to this dilemma - which is pressing us all toward the breakdown of international relations & violence on a massive scale? I think that somehow, some of us must step back - step to one side - engage both sides from a position of analysis & mediation. Rather than instantly politicizing & aggravating the situation further by strident ideological condemnations, perhaps we need to try to analyze dispassionately - treat both sides as, in a sense, SICK rather than EVIL. We need to engage the parties as patients rather than allies or enemies. (I admit this sounds like a fantasy as well!)
Whether or not the US goes to war against Iraq, this dilemma of conflicting & incommensurate discourses & goals will remain. Police action & military force alone will never uproot Islamic fundamentalism; nor will American global military supremacy bring about the freedom & equality it claims as its ideals. By the same token, terrorism will never achieve the global Caliphate, nor will the ideals of Islamic law & tradition justify the massacre of infidels & the denial of freedom.
What might bring peace to these warring rivals is a mediating discourse which sets limits to the absolutism underlying both sides - the doctrinaire tendencies which act as a counterweight to the hidden & unacknowledged contradictions - the hypocrisies of ideologies, driven as they are by their claims both to absolute, ideal value on the one hand, & to secular power, efficacy & hegemony, on the other. This is perhaps the essence of absolutism: to claim to join ideal & real, heaven & earth - to the distinct advantage of the claimant.
This would have to be a discourse - a dialogue, a conversation - about the nature of the Good. For Americans, it would have to consider how it would be possible to achieve a world community of nations without domination, hegemony, empire, self-interested power, realpolitik, inequality, injustice, fear, & militarism. This is a very necessary conversation, because it is clear that the means & methods given priority by the current Administration - ie., overwhelming military might - are insufficient & often counter-productive to achieving this goal. For Islamists, it would have to consider how one justifies a theology & theogony which allows for absolutism, authoritarianism, rigid theocratic legalism, and the massacre of "infidels". How are these practices in any way a reflection of a divine nature or reality? Isn't a theology - or ideology - which justifies such practices merely the flimsy disguise of a ruthless hunger for power & prestige - perhaps even an envy of the power & prestige flaunted by the representative infidel nation?
What then is the Good, and how in this imperfect mortal world are we to aim for it? This is the conversation which free people need to undertake, in order to drown out the rabid absolutisms, the will to power, the disregard for human life, the narrow realpolitic of power & self-interest - all those behaviors which are all too often displayed by secular nations & religious collectives alike. By using such a term as "the Good" I don't mean to allude to any particular philosophical method or tradition; I am simply speculating, at this point, that such a term or something like it might serve as a focus for the examination I have outlined. I am thinking about an international conversation, across the borders of nations & faiths. I don't think it begins with those who are quick to condemn either the Bush administration for seeking to create peace & security through military & political dominion, or, on the other hand, those who are quick to discount the discourse of religious tradition, which seeks to restore some sense of wholeness, dignity & self-determination to a region & a culture. (This is in no way meant as a justification of authoritarian fundamentalism, terrorism, or aggressive, militaristic realpolitik; nor is it an attempt to equate, morally or in any other way, the main antagonists. It is an attempt to emphasize the incommensurability of their language & goals, and the necessity to address that disjunction with means other than force, violence & war. Nor are these speculations an attempt to pass implicit judgement on the immediate details of the crisis at hand, which, as I said at the beginning of this, I don't feel at this point I am capable of doing.)
Then again, am I just being gulled due to an inability to accept the truth about this country? Are the longtime hawks like Perle, Rumsfeld & Cheney EVER to be believed? Are war, violence & killing going to improve anything? Are the underlying motives of the US (control of the oil & the region) using the war on terror as a smokescreen?
There are aggressive networks of terror fanatics who are actively preparing to attack the US again. There is evidence of Iraqi collaboration with those networks, along with evidence of Saddam's obsession with WMDs. But starting a huge new "battle" in this war will have huge consequences in turn. Before I am completely won over to the hawkish view I will have to find an answer to the questions above.
I guess the answers are easy for all those marching poets for peace out there. They always seem to know right away who the bad guys are.
There are aggressive networks of terror fanatics who are actively preparing to attack the US again. There is evidence of Iraqi collaboration with those networks, along with evidence of Saddam's obsession with WMDs. But starting a huge new "battle" in this war will have huge consequences in turn. Before I am completely won over to the hawkish view I will have to find an answer to the questions above.
I guess the answers are easy for all those marching poets for peace out there. They always seem to know right away who the bad guys are.
Over at Equanimity, Jordan provides a link to a book by John Mearscheimer, Can Saddam Hussein be Contained?. The link includes a lengthy abstract.
It's a reasonable argument, but Mearscheimer downplays a few things:
1. there probably are operational ties between Saddam & some of the international terrorist networks. The assassination of diplomat Foley in Jordan has been directly linked to a high-up al Qaeda operative based in Iraq.
2. the impact of the "success" of the 9/11 strikes, as an incitement for further action by the international terror networks. This has serious implications in gauging the danger posed by Saddam's activities.
3. the current existence of a major WMD production program in Iraq. Mearscheimer tries to portray Saddam as a logical actor in world politics, which in my view is pretty untenable, given the obsessions & policy priorities of this extremely brutal Stalinist-type regime. This is why the UN limits on those activities & priorities were imposed in the first place.
Mearscheimer tries to make the argument that containment rather than preventive action can work with Saddam. But containment was precisely the policy instated by the UN after the Gulf War. Colin Powell made a pretty forceful argument at the UN that containment is NOT working.
While I'm still trying to figure out where I stand in this tumultuous situation, to my great surprise I seem to be finding myself swayed, if not yet completely convinced, by the hawks' arguments. The big question mark - aside from the almost guaranteed attacks from al Qaeda which will follow any attack on Iraq - aside from the impact of a war on civilians - is how the Middle East & the Islamic world as a whole will respond to an American invasion. Bush's whole strategy in the war on terrorism seems to be, that the best defense is a good offense. But does this apply across the board, in all situations?
It's a reasonable argument, but Mearscheimer downplays a few things:
1. there probably are operational ties between Saddam & some of the international terrorist networks. The assassination of diplomat Foley in Jordan has been directly linked to a high-up al Qaeda operative based in Iraq.
2. the impact of the "success" of the 9/11 strikes, as an incitement for further action by the international terror networks. This has serious implications in gauging the danger posed by Saddam's activities.
3. the current existence of a major WMD production program in Iraq. Mearscheimer tries to portray Saddam as a logical actor in world politics, which in my view is pretty untenable, given the obsessions & policy priorities of this extremely brutal Stalinist-type regime. This is why the UN limits on those activities & priorities were imposed in the first place.
Mearscheimer tries to make the argument that containment rather than preventive action can work with Saddam. But containment was precisely the policy instated by the UN after the Gulf War. Colin Powell made a pretty forceful argument at the UN that containment is NOT working.
While I'm still trying to figure out where I stand in this tumultuous situation, to my great surprise I seem to be finding myself swayed, if not yet completely convinced, by the hawks' arguments. The big question mark - aside from the almost guaranteed attacks from al Qaeda which will follow any attack on Iraq - aside from the impact of a war on civilians - is how the Middle East & the Islamic world as a whole will respond to an American invasion. Bush's whole strategy in the war on terrorism seems to be, that the best defense is a good offense. But does this apply across the board, in all situations?
Here is a post by Anselm Berrigan, sent to the Buffalo Poetics List. In putting this on my blog, I in no way mean to suggest that Anselm Berrigan agrees with MY position on Iraq (which I haven't completely figured out yet). Only that I found his post interesting.
Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 17:10:17 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group
From: Anslem Berrigan
Subject: Re: war
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
Is it not important to point out that we are already at war? I believe we are
meant to take the War on Terrorism as literal fact, since the government
does, and certainly the soldiers in Afghanistan have no choice but to do so.
Invading Iraq would be an expansion of the current war, though it requires,
ostensibly, a new resolution from the UN. The protests against invading Iraq
are often publicly spoken of without the context of the War on Terrorism
being applied, and anyone who is willing to protest this expansion is, for
the most part, well aware that war is already upon us. In this vein, the
movement to oppose invading Iraq is not merely crying "war bad, peace good",
but attempting to exert public will (consciousness) upon the way the ongoing
war is being framed. The President believes his cause to be a moral one, and
the opposition to invading Iraq largely believes that pre-emptive invasion an
extremely immoral action. Of course, anyone might disagree with this,
particularly those who do not wish to see any of this described in moral
terms. But that's the tag and collar Bush has on the situation, and what he's
crushing his opposition with.
Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 17:10:17 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group
From: Anslem Berrigan
Subject: Re: war
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
Is it not important to point out that we are already at war? I believe we are
meant to take the War on Terrorism as literal fact, since the government
does, and certainly the soldiers in Afghanistan have no choice but to do so.
Invading Iraq would be an expansion of the current war, though it requires,
ostensibly, a new resolution from the UN. The protests against invading Iraq
are often publicly spoken of without the context of the War on Terrorism
being applied, and anyone who is willing to protest this expansion is, for
the most part, well aware that war is already upon us. In this vein, the
movement to oppose invading Iraq is not merely crying "war bad, peace good",
but attempting to exert public will (consciousness) upon the way the ongoing
war is being framed. The President believes his cause to be a moral one, and
the opposition to invading Iraq largely believes that pre-emptive invasion an
extremely immoral action. Of course, anyone might disagree with this,
particularly those who do not wish to see any of this described in moral
terms. But that's the tag and collar Bush has on the situation, and what he's
crushing his opposition with.
2.04.2003
Strong statement on poetry & politics by Eliot Weinberger in talk at Poetry Project in NY, forwarded by Kent Johnson to Poetryetc. list on February 3 (see February poetryetc archive under posting titled "Poetry is News"). Not sure his either/or argument about the last 30 years (which goes something like: either you have direct political speech & political engagement or you have pseudo-engagement & obscure wind-baggage over academicized issues of race/class/gender(basically a right-wing argument itself); and we've had the latter, while the Right has been dismantling rights & justice) - not sure either/or is that simple, but it's certainly a challenging polemic to those on the left. (Is it also sour grapes over the criticism of his anthology of 20th-cent poetry as too exclusively white & male?) But his comments about 3 typical approaches that poets have taken to political engagement are interesting & maybe useful.
As I see it, poetry can have a very substantial political character, while remaining poetic language (see for example the pervasive & deep political context of Montale's poetry of the 30s & 40s - often damned by ideological Italian critics as politically neutral or irrelevant); yet at the same time poetic language is just about as far from "political speech" as you can get, and the 2 should not be confused. . . but with poetry there are always the stunning exceptions. . .yes. "poetry is news".
As I see it, poetry can have a very substantial political character, while remaining poetic language (see for example the pervasive & deep political context of Montale's poetry of the 30s & 40s - often damned by ideological Italian critics as politically neutral or irrelevant); yet at the same time poetic language is just about as far from "political speech" as you can get, and the 2 should not be confused. . . but with poetry there are always the stunning exceptions. . .yes. "poetry is news".
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