But... but... wasn't one of the central points of the Iraq invasion to spark successful revolts against the 'friendly' regimes in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Syria, Iran and any other place where people generally don't like America? It was Domino Theory redux.
Look it's not my logic, but that's what was proferred.
You misremember the point. The long term objective is to clean out the terrorist snake pit by converting the regimes in question from oppressive Islamofascist fostering dictatorships to regimes answerable to the people. This is a long term project, as has been reiterated countless times. That's why Miller was so adamant last night. Combating Islamofascism is not like cruising through MacDonald's drive through. You gotta get out, go inside, and stay there until you are done.
What Ben "baa" A. says about the foreign policy angle is reasonable indeed, especially the second paragraph that you quote. It doesn't give one a reason to vote for Bush, but it does give one the feeling that one doesn't have a terribly good reason to vote for Kerry on this score.
What's decisive for me are all the domestic issues that Ben omits to discuss and that I'm not sure it's so reasonable to ignore.
Apostropher: About what do you think I'm joking? Here's my take on Grenada -- coup d'etat aligned with if not instigated by Cuba. The US reverses this result by force. Why is this not a good thing to do? Why is calling this great power bullying, as Kerry did, not 70s dovishness of the worst sort?
Peter: The danger I was thinking of was Pakistan or Saudi Arabia being overthrown by an islamist coup, or breaking into semi-open civil war. A liberalizing revolt in Iran, by constrast, would be a good domino.
Sorry Ted H, I wasn't ignoring you, but you posted just as I did. Domestic policy is a long story for me, but here's a brief accounting (from my center-right perspective)
pro-Bush
--the courts
pro-Kerry
--general care for poor people
--environment
Who is better for the budget depends entirely on the balance of power. If the house and senate remain GOP, I would agree that Kerry is less likely to blow out the budget (because less will get through). Again, with a war on, my willingness to vote on these issues is pretty minimal.
Well, for me it comes to this: what difference could it possibly make who runs Grenada or St. Lucia or Martinique? Seriously, where is the threat? I suppose I am just philosophically opposed to invading other nations because we don't approve of their governments, no matter how they rise to power. As for the coup d'etat, the socialist Bishop (with Cuban ties) was overthrown by his deputy Coard, a more hard-line Communist. Castro condemned the coup, declared a day of mourning for Bishop, and threatened to cease assistance to Grenada.
I think one could judge that invasion to be silliness without invalidating ones foreign policy judgment for the rest of a career.
Let's not fool ourselves. We didn't invade Grenada because the leadership of a dirt-poor Caribbean island had changed. The whole damn island is only 133 square miles - about twice the size of DC - and had fewer than 90,000 citizens (though, to be fair, they did have us cornered between Mexico and Canada). We invaded to take the Beirut barracks explosion off the front pages.
What would have been the result of leaving Coard in power of that tiny pile of dirt? The airstrip?
Giving Bush credit for not bungling post-war Iraq enough to spark an Islamist coup in Pakistan is damning praise indeed and leads me to wonder why this is a point in his favor over Kerry at all. An Islamist coup in Saudi is a bit of an oxymoron as the current ruling regime is very much Islamist.
I would take issue with the premise of your original choice. That description of Bush v. Kerry does not reflect the reality. Bush may make pretty speeches about his vision for foreign policy, but it's his record that we have to assess. His record indicates that he thinks ousting a regime is all that is required to reform a country. That is not the case as post-war Afghanistan and post-war Iraq demonstrate. Bush's record also shows that he does not care to devote the resources to fulfill the vision outlined in his speeches. It is enough to remember that he did not include a single dollar for aid to Afghanistan in his 2003 budget submission. It is no wonder that the Taliban are resurgent there.
Kerry, in contrast, does understand and is committed to working to fulfill the vision of a more peaceful and democratic Middle and Far East. He knows that these are not challenges the US can undertake without broad allied and local popular assistance, as Bush's failures have so ably demonstrated. The choice is not between clear goals with poor execution or vague goals and skilled execution. We all (that is, those that are serious about US and international security) share the same vision. The choice resides solely in who will be more skillful and effective in realizing that vision. An honest assessment of Bush's record these four years would conclude that his execution has been very poor indeed. He has never shown any indication that he is aware that there have been any mistakes or failures at all during his tenure and that is very troubling and does not bode well for his prospective second term. Since it is conceeded that Kerry would be superior in the execution of our collective vision, his election is the only way to ensure we make real progress.
The disagreement is as follows: I don't think Kerry shares my vision of foreign policy, rather, I think he has a bad vision. Example: I think he would not have waged Gulf War I. I doubt we can convince each other of our respective pictures of "reality" on Bush 43's foreign policy performance, so I won't try. But let me ask: do you think Kerry would have waged Gulf War I. If no, why do you think thsi would have been the right call?
Apostropher: I see little wrong and much good in toppling a communist regime during the cold war, blacking Castro's eye, and ensuring a better life for Grenadans into the bargain. Were I a Grenadan citizen it would have been a dream come true. As to Castro being against the coup, I don't think that's accurate. Weren't Cuban troops on the island?
-------
Ok, the answer to that question is yes:
"Three or four dozen Cuban Army regulars were in Grenada," said Captain Thomas A. Brooks, CinCLant assistant chief of staff for intelligence. "They were not organized into a regular military unit, but were primarily advisers and instructors to the Grenadian military. "
"The Cubans and PRA were very well placed," said Captain Thomas Scott, CinCLant [Commander-in-Chief Atlantic] assistant chief of staff for current operations. "They had occupied the high ground and strategically placed their anti-aircraft positions around the airfield before the initial assault by U.S. and Caribbean forces. They were probably where we'd have been if we'd been on the resisting side."
Your cause and effect are a little off, baa. Yes, Cuban troops were there, but they had been there well before the coup. They were advisors to the Grenadan military under Bishop, the leader who was overthrown. Bishop and Castro were friendly. Carter and Reagan didn't like Bishop because he hadn't joined in the embargo of Cuba, and the CIA had been working to destabilize him since 1979.
When Reagan announced that the invasion was going to happen, Castro told the US that the Cuban troops were neutral, would not fire upon American positions, and were remaining there to protect the 600 or so Cuban workers during a time of violent upheaval. The US went after them anyhow, thanks to our bizarre obsession with Castro, who hadn't posed any sort of threat to the US for years.
If anybody helped foment the coup, it was the CIA, not Cuba. As for ensuring a better life, Grenada has now reverted to the economic state it was in prior to Bishop: desperately poor and utterly lacking in social services. The entire affair was much more complicated and byzantine than it was portrayed in the US media (which was banned from covering the invasion, btw).
I think, though, that we simply have a fundamental disagreement on the appropriateness of armed intervention in the affairs of other countries. I don't believe that being Communist or friendly to Cuba is a sufficient reason for us to go drop bombs on other people. Grenada never attacked us, nor did they have any intention of doing so. Reagan wanted to invade long before Coard overthrew Bishop; the coup was just his excuse.
I know you asked this of Peter, not of me, but I think Gulf War I was just as inane. What have we accomplished by waging two wars on Iraq? Only getting our fists stuck in the world's biggest tarbaby. I frankly don't give a good goddamn who runs Kuwait, Inc., and they had gotten plenty of warning that if they continued slant drilling into Iraqi oil fields that they would get invaded.
How much money have we spent since 1988 maintaining military operations in Iraq? Way way way too much, across administrations of both parties. Was Saddam really significantly worse than Khomeini or the Saudis? I don't believe so, despite the decade and a half of demonization. That region is chock full of nasty regimes. However, it isn't incumbent upon the United States to remove them any more than it is our responsibility all over Africa or Central Asia.
I suppose you could call me an isolationist, but really, I just don't like our military being constantly employed to protect private business interests, which is what has driven most of our military interventions since Vietnam. I'd like our Defense Department to actually focus on defense. That said, I suspect Kerry is significantly more hawkish than I am.
I second Ogged, though: despite us having utterly divergent worldviews, you are consistently reasonable and polite. Those traits stand out starkly in blogland.
Did this really become a thread about the legitimacy of the invasion of Grenada?
But seriously, two things bother me about your analysis, baa. First, I'm with Ted in saying that domestic policy is a major concern for me. Generally speaking, I care about three domestic issues: civil liberties, the environment, and poverty. Bush isn't just worse than Kerry on all of those, he really and truly scares me on the first two.
Second, I don't think you sufficiently account how much popular opinion narrows the range of acceptable foreign policy options. What horrible course might be both plausibly advocated by Kerry, and not ruled out by popular objections? And it's worth considering that it's in Kerry's interest to be vague about what he would do, because he 1) doesn't want to be unduly constrained if he's elected ("you said no nation buliding!") and 2) would rather the election were a referendum on the results of Bush's actions, rather than a battle of competing rhetoric and plans.
And, a question: do you not think that the Bushies lie more and more brazenly than other administrations?
Did this really become a thread about the legitimacy of the invasion of Grenada?
Heh. Sorry about that. My support for any given presidential candidate doesn't hang on foreign policy arguments, though obviously for others it can and does. When you get down to brass tacks, I'm a single-issue voter, and my single issue is which candidate is more likely to jam a pencil in Pat Robertson's eye?
Kinda lends itself to straight ticket voting, dontcha know?
He, personally, has been wrong on most of the major foreign policy judgment calls of the past 20 years.
I just don't buy this. It was "Team B" (including the eternally wrong Perle and Wolfowitz) that was wrong, not the traditional intel establishment, in believing the Soviet Union was re-girding for an arms race in the early 80s. It was Reagan, not Kerry, that was wrong about SDI being a worthwhile use of tax dollars. It was McFarlane, Poindexter, Abrams, and North that were wrong about trading arms for hostages and subverting American democracy, not the people who objected to them. And Iraq 1 was only right because our losses were so minimal; had they been as bad as the ones in the current conflict, restoring the emirate of Kuwait would not have been worth it.
To believe that Kerry was "mostly wrong", you have to believe that the likes of Elliott Abrams have been "mostly right", and they haven't been.
AND ANOTHER THING, DARNIT! seriously, the right side in geo-strategic debates want you to think there are only two factions: theirs, and the Adlai Stevenson crowd. But there are three: the Stevenson/McCarthy/McGovern axis, the LeMay/Rumsfeld axis, and the Kennedy/Johnson/Carter/Clinton/Kerry centrist axis.
Had we listened to the Adlais during the Cuban Missile Crisis, we would have suffered a crucial loss in prestige and credibility. But had we listened to the Strangeloves, we'd all be dead. Thankfully there was and is a third option, which has been the dominant thread in foreign policy from Wilson's time to our own (albeit with a couple of ill-advised detours).
Thanks for the kind words Apostropher. I certainly don't feel your equal on the fine points of Grenada. If, as you suggest, the the account you give differs from the "standard model" provided by the American press, I would be very interested in any information you could provide.
But ogged is right. Grenada isn't the issue. At issue is the focus and emphasis of the executive in foreign affairs. A person who thinks the first gulf war was an error should definitely vote for Kerry. Likewise, someone who advocated a non-confrontational approach to the Soviet Union and regarded Reagan as a cowboy should also vote for Kerry. A reasonable person can hold these positions, but I'm not that guy. I'm an interventionist who believes that the exercise of American power in this century has been overwhelmingly positive not just for America, but for the world. Let's be clear, these were all "wars of choice": Gulf War II, Gulf War I, Kosovo, Bosnia, the Cold War, Korea, and, I would argue, WWII (we didn't need to support Britain against Germany; and peace could have been made easily with either Axis power short of the demand for unconditional surrender). These aren't easy decisions, or always right. I know Vietnam was a war of choice as well.
Ogged, you think Kerry will be required by public opinion to hew to a steady course in Iraq and in the war on Al Queda. I disagree. This is all about the will of the executive to make and maintain aggressive policy. Nothing in Kerry career suggests he will do this. I think he would "seek peace with honor" in Iraq, and get neither. Against Al Queda, I suspect he'd be OK.
Son volt, I agree the debates of the 70s and 80s weren't binary, and that that all the errors weren't on one side. But as I see it, the idea that the USSR was an "evil empire" was one side, and the idea that this was a naive simplification was another. And Kerry, and most of the democratic left, basically got this wrong. If you don't see it this way, I suspect we are at an impasse.
On domestic policy, my general view (summarized here) is "a pox on both their houses." But for this election, here's what I'd say. First, I simply can't agree that civil liberties are endangered by Bush in any meaningful way. Please feel free to convince me. On the courts, I'm for Bush, plain and simple. That captures two of the big areas where the executive can have a major impact.
On the environment, I agree. Global warming is real, and I would trust a Kerry team better to sort out implications and deal with them. But that's not the issue I'm voting on in this election.
On the second paragraph (and this is directed as much at Ted as at Ben), I agree that it may be too soon to judge the results of Iraq. But I don't feel that it's too soon to judge the process. And in this, we know that the Administration did not have a plan for what to do in postwar Iraq if transferring power to Chalabi failed. I think this alone is enough to convict the administration of a major bungle, even if (as I fear will not happen) things turn out well.
And--directed at Ben--if you grant that Kerry will have decent goals with respect to Al Qaeda, I think it's important that those goals be executed well rather than bungled. Competent execution of a good plan against Al Qaeda and a bad one in Iraq might beat good plans for both, executed poorly.
(I also don't find Bush's current plans for Iraq clear--it seems to be about freedom rather than democracy, and I'm just not sure what freedom means here.)
Matt, You could have just walked across the hall and made your point in person instead of cluttering up ogged's post! If you had, I'd have noted that I said that the second paragraph is "reasonable," not that it's correct to say that Bush didn't bungle anything.
Moreover, I think you're misconstruing Ben's point. I don't want to put words in his mouth, but I assumed that he was answering the following yes/no question: Did Bush bungle Iraq (or Afghanistan)? That's not a very illuminating question to try to answer -- it's too all-or-nothing -- but I assume that Ben's "it's too soon to know" doesn't rule out the concession that the Bush team has hugely bungled aspects of their Iraq policy. I sure think they have, and I'll be surprised if Ben doesn't think so too. (For my part, I blogged at length about this.)
Matt, I am unconvinced Kerry would attemtp the right policies because he is basline suspicious of the exercise of American force. That is often a good suspicion to have, just not right now.
Ted--true enough! And for Ben as well, if we're in agreeance that Bush has bungled aspects of the policy then I'm happy.
Ben--does that suspicion apply to policies with respect to Al Qaeda as well? I'd think that Kerry wouldn't hesitate to use force against Al Qaeda, but that there aren't any obvious ways to do so right now .
Will the man who oppossed action in Grenada be the man to pull Iraq out of the fire?
Grenada? Grenada? Are you being satirical?
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 10:32 AM
But... but... wasn't one of the central points of the Iraq invasion to spark successful revolts against the 'friendly' regimes in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Syria, Iran and any other place where people generally don't like America? It was Domino Theory redux.
Look it's not my logic, but that's what was proferred.
Posted by Peter | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 10:33 AM
Peter,
You misremember the point. The long term objective is to clean out the terrorist snake pit by converting the regimes in question from oppressive Islamofascist fostering dictatorships to regimes answerable to the people. This is a long term project, as has been reiterated countless times. That's why Miller was so adamant last night. Combating Islamofascism is not like cruising through MacDonald's drive through. You gotta get out, go inside, and stay there until you are done.
Posted by buck_wheat | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 10:44 AM
What Ben "baa" A. says about the foreign policy angle is reasonable indeed, especially the second paragraph that you quote. It doesn't give one a reason to vote for Bush, but it does give one the feeling that one doesn't have a terribly good reason to vote for Kerry on this score.
What's decisive for me are all the domestic issues that Ben omits to discuss and that I'm not sure it's so reasonable to ignore.
Posted by Ted H. | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 10:45 AM
Ogged, I'm flattered! Really.
Apostropher: About what do you think I'm joking? Here's my take on Grenada -- coup d'etat aligned with if not instigated by Cuba. The US reverses this result by force. Why is this not a good thing to do? Why is calling this great power bullying, as Kerry did, not 70s dovishness of the worst sort?
Peter: The danger I was thinking of was Pakistan or Saudi Arabia being overthrown by an islamist coup, or breaking into semi-open civil war. A liberalizing revolt in Iran, by constrast, would be a good domino.
Posted by baa | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 10:46 AM
Sorry Ted H, I wasn't ignoring you, but you posted just as I did. Domestic policy is a long story for me, but here's a brief accounting (from my center-right perspective)
pro-Bush
--the courts
pro-Kerry
--general care for poor people
--environment
Who is better for the budget depends entirely on the balance of power. If the house and senate remain GOP, I would agree that Kerry is less likely to blow out the budget (because less will get through). Again, with a war on, my willingness to vote on these issues is pretty minimal.
Posted by baa | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 11:12 AM
Well, for me it comes to this: what difference could it possibly make who runs Grenada or St. Lucia or Martinique? Seriously, where is the threat? I suppose I am just philosophically opposed to invading other nations because we don't approve of their governments, no matter how they rise to power. As for the coup d'etat, the socialist Bishop (with Cuban ties) was overthrown by his deputy Coard, a more hard-line Communist. Castro condemned the coup, declared a day of mourning for Bishop, and threatened to cease assistance to Grenada.
I think one could judge that invasion to be silliness without invalidating ones foreign policy judgment for the rest of a career.
Let's not fool ourselves. We didn't invade Grenada because the leadership of a dirt-poor Caribbean island had changed. The whole damn island is only 133 square miles - about twice the size of DC - and had fewer than 90,000 citizens (though, to be fair, they did have us cornered between Mexico and Canada). We invaded to take the Beirut barracks explosion off the front pages.
What would have been the result of leaving Coard in power of that tiny pile of dirt? The airstrip?
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 11:27 AM
baa,
Giving Bush credit for not bungling post-war Iraq enough to spark an Islamist coup in Pakistan is damning praise indeed and leads me to wonder why this is a point in his favor over Kerry at all. An Islamist coup in Saudi is a bit of an oxymoron as the current ruling regime is very much Islamist.
I would take issue with the premise of your original choice. That description of Bush v. Kerry does not reflect the reality. Bush may make pretty speeches about his vision for foreign policy, but it's his record that we have to assess. His record indicates that he thinks ousting a regime is all that is required to reform a country. That is not the case as post-war Afghanistan and post-war Iraq demonstrate. Bush's record also shows that he does not care to devote the resources to fulfill the vision outlined in his speeches. It is enough to remember that he did not include a single dollar for aid to Afghanistan in his 2003 budget submission. It is no wonder that the Taliban are resurgent there.
Kerry, in contrast, does understand and is committed to working to fulfill the vision of a more peaceful and democratic Middle and Far East. He knows that these are not challenges the US can undertake without broad allied and local popular assistance, as Bush's failures have so ably demonstrated. The choice is not between clear goals with poor execution or vague goals and skilled execution. We all (that is, those that are serious about US and international security) share the same vision. The choice resides solely in who will be more skillful and effective in realizing that vision. An honest assessment of Bush's record these four years would conclude that his execution has been very poor indeed. He has never shown any indication that he is aware that there have been any mistakes or failures at all during his tenure and that is very troubling and does not bode well for his prospective second term. Since it is conceeded that Kerry would be superior in the execution of our collective vision, his election is the only way to ensure we make real progress.
Posted by Peter | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 2:32 PM
Peter,
The disagreement is as follows: I don't think Kerry shares my vision of foreign policy, rather, I think he has a bad vision. Example: I think he would not have waged Gulf War I. I doubt we can convince each other of our respective pictures of "reality" on Bush 43's foreign policy performance, so I won't try. But let me ask: do you think Kerry would have waged Gulf War I. If no, why do you think thsi would have been the right call?
Apostropher: I see little wrong and much good in toppling a communist regime during the cold war, blacking Castro's eye, and ensuring a better life for Grenadans into the bargain. Were I a Grenadan citizen it would have been a dream come true. As to Castro being against the coup, I don't think that's accurate. Weren't Cuban troops on the island?
-------
Ok, the answer to that question is yes:
"Three or four dozen Cuban Army regulars were in Grenada," said Captain Thomas A. Brooks, CinCLant assistant chief of staff for intelligence. "They were not organized into a regular military unit, but were primarily advisers and instructors to the Grenadian military. "
"The Cubans and PRA were very well placed," said Captain Thomas Scott, CinCLant [Commander-in-Chief Atlantic] assistant chief of staff for current operations. "They had occupied the high ground and strategically placed their anti-aircraft positions around the airfield before the initial assault by U.S. and Caribbean forces. They were probably where we'd have been if we'd been on the resisting side."
source
Posted by baa | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 4:03 PM
Your cause and effect are a little off, baa. Yes, Cuban troops were there, but they had been there well before the coup. They were advisors to the Grenadan military under Bishop, the leader who was overthrown. Bishop and Castro were friendly. Carter and Reagan didn't like Bishop because he hadn't joined in the embargo of Cuba, and the CIA had been working to destabilize him since 1979.
When Reagan announced that the invasion was going to happen, Castro told the US that the Cuban troops were neutral, would not fire upon American positions, and were remaining there to protect the 600 or so Cuban workers during a time of violent upheaval. The US went after them anyhow, thanks to our bizarre obsession with Castro, who hadn't posed any sort of threat to the US for years.
If anybody helped foment the coup, it was the CIA, not Cuba. As for ensuring a better life, Grenada has now reverted to the economic state it was in prior to Bishop: desperately poor and utterly lacking in social services. The entire affair was much more complicated and byzantine than it was portrayed in the US media (which was banned from covering the invasion, btw).
I think, though, that we simply have a fundamental disagreement on the appropriateness of armed intervention in the affairs of other countries. I don't believe that being Communist or friendly to Cuba is a sufficient reason for us to go drop bombs on other people. Grenada never attacked us, nor did they have any intention of doing so. Reagan wanted to invade long before Coard overthrew Bishop; the coup was just his excuse.
I know you asked this of Peter, not of me, but I think Gulf War I was just as inane. What have we accomplished by waging two wars on Iraq? Only getting our fists stuck in the world's biggest tarbaby. I frankly don't give a good goddamn who runs Kuwait, Inc., and they had gotten plenty of warning that if they continued slant drilling into Iraqi oil fields that they would get invaded.
How much money have we spent since 1988 maintaining military operations in Iraq? Way way way too much, across administrations of both parties. Was Saddam really significantly worse than Khomeini or the Saudis? I don't believe so, despite the decade and a half of demonization. That region is chock full of nasty regimes. However, it isn't incumbent upon the United States to remove them any more than it is our responsibility all over Africa or Central Asia.
I suppose you could call me an isolationist, but really, I just don't like our military being constantly employed to protect private business interests, which is what has driven most of our military interventions since Vietnam. I'd like our Defense Department to actually focus on defense. That said, I suspect Kerry is significantly more hawkish than I am.
I second Ogged, though: despite us having utterly divergent worldviews, you are consistently reasonable and polite. Those traits stand out starkly in blogland.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 5:36 PM
Did this really become a thread about the legitimacy of the invasion of Grenada?
But seriously, two things bother me about your analysis, baa. First, I'm with Ted in saying that domestic policy is a major concern for me. Generally speaking, I care about three domestic issues: civil liberties, the environment, and poverty. Bush isn't just worse than Kerry on all of those, he really and truly scares me on the first two.
Second, I don't think you sufficiently account how much popular opinion narrows the range of acceptable foreign policy options. What horrible course might be both plausibly advocated by Kerry, and not ruled out by popular objections? And it's worth considering that it's in Kerry's interest to be vague about what he would do, because he 1) doesn't want to be unduly constrained if he's elected ("you said no nation buliding!") and 2) would rather the election were a referendum on the results of Bush's actions, rather than a battle of competing rhetoric and plans.
And, a question: do you not think that the Bushies lie more and more brazenly than other administrations?
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 5:58 PM
Did this really become a thread about the legitimacy of the invasion of Grenada?
Heh. Sorry about that. My support for any given presidential candidate doesn't hang on foreign policy arguments, though obviously for others it can and does. When you get down to brass tacks, I'm a single-issue voter, and my single issue is which candidate is more likely to jam a pencil in Pat Robertson's eye?
Kinda lends itself to straight ticket voting, dontcha know?
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 6:18 PM
He, personally, has been wrong on most of the major foreign policy judgment calls of the past 20 years.
I just don't buy this. It was "Team B" (including the eternally wrong Perle and Wolfowitz) that was wrong, not the traditional intel establishment, in believing the Soviet Union was re-girding for an arms race in the early 80s. It was Reagan, not Kerry, that was wrong about SDI being a worthwhile use of tax dollars. It was McFarlane, Poindexter, Abrams, and North that were wrong about trading arms for hostages and subverting American democracy, not the people who objected to them. And Iraq 1 was only right because our losses were so minimal; had they been as bad as the ones in the current conflict, restoring the emirate of Kuwait would not have been worth it.
To believe that Kerry was "mostly wrong", you have to believe that the likes of Elliott Abrams have been "mostly right", and they haven't been.
Posted by son volt | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 8:07 PM
AND ANOTHER THING, DARNIT! seriously, the right side in geo-strategic debates want you to think there are only two factions: theirs, and the Adlai Stevenson crowd. But there are three: the Stevenson/McCarthy/McGovern axis, the LeMay/Rumsfeld axis, and the Kennedy/Johnson/Carter/Clinton/Kerry centrist axis.
Had we listened to the Adlais during the Cuban Missile Crisis, we would have suffered a crucial loss in prestige and credibility. But had we listened to the Strangeloves, we'd all be dead. Thankfully there was and is a third option, which has been the dominant thread in foreign policy from Wilson's time to our own (albeit with a couple of ill-advised detours).
Posted by son volt | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 8:12 PM
Thanks for the kind words Apostropher. I certainly don't feel your equal on the fine points of Grenada. If, as you suggest, the the account you give differs from the "standard model" provided by the American press, I would be very interested in any information you could provide.
But ogged is right. Grenada isn't the issue. At issue is the focus and emphasis of the executive in foreign affairs. A person who thinks the first gulf war was an error should definitely vote for Kerry. Likewise, someone who advocated a non-confrontational approach to the Soviet Union and regarded Reagan as a cowboy should also vote for Kerry. A reasonable person can hold these positions, but I'm not that guy. I'm an interventionist who believes that the exercise of American power in this century has been overwhelmingly positive not just for America, but for the world. Let's be clear, these were all "wars of choice": Gulf War II, Gulf War I, Kosovo, Bosnia, the Cold War, Korea, and, I would argue, WWII (we didn't need to support Britain against Germany; and peace could have been made easily with either Axis power short of the demand for unconditional surrender). These aren't easy decisions, or always right. I know Vietnam was a war of choice as well.
Ogged, you think Kerry will be required by public opinion to hew to a steady course in Iraq and in the war on Al Queda. I disagree. This is all about the will of the executive to make and maintain aggressive policy. Nothing in Kerry career suggests he will do this. I think he would "seek peace with honor" in Iraq, and get neither. Against Al Queda, I suspect he'd be OK.
Son volt, I agree the debates of the 70s and 80s weren't binary, and that that all the errors weren't on one side. But as I see it, the idea that the USSR was an "evil empire" was one side, and the idea that this was a naive simplification was another. And Kerry, and most of the democratic left, basically got this wrong. If you don't see it this way, I suspect we are at an impasse.
On domestic policy, my general view (summarized here) is "a pox on both their houses." But for this election, here's what I'd say. First, I simply can't agree that civil liberties are endangered by Bush in any meaningful way. Please feel free to convince me. On the courts, I'm for Bush, plain and simple. That captures two of the big areas where the executive can have a major impact.
On the environment, I agree. Global warming is real, and I would trust a Kerry team better to sort out implications and deal with them. But that's not the issue I'm voting on in this election.
Posted by baa | Link to this comment | 09- 2-04 9:32 PM
On the second paragraph (and this is directed as much at Ted as at Ben), I agree that it may be too soon to judge the results of Iraq. But I don't feel that it's too soon to judge the process. And in this, we know that the Administration did not have a plan for what to do in postwar Iraq if transferring power to Chalabi failed. I think this alone is enough to convict the administration of a major bungle, even if (as I fear will not happen) things turn out well.
And--directed at Ben--if you grant that Kerry will have decent goals with respect to Al Qaeda, I think it's important that those goals be executed well rather than bungled. Competent execution of a good plan against Al Qaeda and a bad one in Iraq might beat good plans for both, executed poorly.
(I also don't find Bush's current plans for Iraq clear--it seems to be about freedom rather than democracy, and I'm just not sure what freedom means here.)
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09- 3-04 11:16 AM
Matt, You could have just walked across the hall and made your point in person instead of cluttering up ogged's post! If you had, I'd have noted that I said that the second paragraph is "reasonable," not that it's correct to say that Bush didn't bungle anything.
Moreover, I think you're misconstruing Ben's point. I don't want to put words in his mouth, but I assumed that he was answering the following yes/no question: Did Bush bungle Iraq (or Afghanistan)? That's not a very illuminating question to try to answer -- it's too all-or-nothing -- but I assume that Ben's "it's too soon to know" doesn't rule out the concession that the Bush team has hugely bungled aspects of their Iraq policy. I sure think they have, and I'll be surprised if Ben doesn't think so too. (For my part, I blogged at length about this.)
Posted by Ted H. | Link to this comment | 09- 3-04 3:33 PM
Bingo, Ted H. Put words in my mouth anytime.
Matt, I am unconvinced Kerry would attemtp the right policies because he is basline suspicious of the exercise of American force. That is often a good suspicion to have, just not right now.
Posted by baa | Link to this comment | 09- 3-04 4:03 PM
Ted--true enough! And for Ben as well, if we're in agreeance that Bush has bungled aspects of the policy then I'm happy.
Ben--does that suspicion apply to policies with respect to Al Qaeda as well? I'd think that Kerry wouldn't hesitate to use force against Al Qaeda, but that there aren't any obvious ways to do so right now .
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09- 4-04 2:24 PM
Lets backtrack and assume that you had instead drawn a third card which was an 8 gambling zone We dont .
Posted by Eliana Shayna | Link to this comment | 01-18-06 10:25 AM