Tuesday, April 29, 2008

The Will to Power

"What do you want to do today, Brain?"
"Same thing we do everyday, Pinky.... Take over the world."


In response to my denial post, Mark argues that America's problem isn't denial but a failure of the will to confront evil. At root, this is Green Laternism gone totally haywire, as Mark seems to think every problem in the whole world could be solved through strong application of American Will. But while this practically unrealistic (not every problem can be solved by mere willpower, and America doesn't possess infinite resources to enact will into policy), the disjuncture with reality is actually less frightening to me than the theory itself. The "will" Mark demands America use would appear to involve the US invading, occupying, bombing, or otherwise attacking a huge chunk (well over half) of the world over the course of the last 60 years.*

But Mark doesn't just want to impose American will on any country. It's not even the relatively simple metric of imposing our will on evil countries. Evilness is certainly a part of Mark's criteria. But the bigger one is alignment. Countries which are doing nothing actively wrong, but seem broadly aligned on an anti-American axis, are legitimate targets of our Will (Chile, 1973). And, as Mark's post was a prolonged justification for allying with undeniably evil groups (such as death squads) so long as they were on "our side", I assume the reverse is also true: a country that is aligned with us ought to be spared facing America's Will -- or even get the support of American Will against rebel forces. Beyond that, for countries or organizations who are not aligned for us or against us (or perhaps, are too unimportant to matter), then evilness becomes the defining factor (Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army, for example).

So, using that as our criteria, which countries in the post-WWII era should have faced (or benefited from!) America's Will? Well, let's start with the one's that Mark appears to explicitly endorse in his post: Chile, Nicaragua, North Korea (he says we shouldn't have accepted the "stalemate" at the end of the Korean War), Vietnam, Uganda. Where else? Well, there are the other locations where America has Exerted Our Will since World War II; places such as Iraq, Columbia, Granada, El Salvador (hell, virtually all of Central America saw US Marines at one point or another during the 20th century), The Balkans, and Iran (imposing the Shah). Each of these would seemingly be okay with Mark. But now let's move into hypotheticals. Where did American Will fail to manifest itself, when it should have?

Start with the Americas. We already mentioned that basically all of Central America was forfeit, but Cuba deserves special mention for being the Communist Big Papa -- and the Bay of Pigs hardly was a sufficient statement of Will. Venezuela, today, is an easy mark (and we did support a coup there). Bolivia? Maybe. Brazil escapes because it went socialist (Lula) after the Cold War ended, but during the Cold War it was an ally (so who cares that it tortured folks constantly?).

In Europe, we have -- the entire Soviet Bloc. And the Soviet Union. But particularly Czechoslovakia and Hungary. Could France be considered anti-American enough to render it vulnerable to America's Will? Maybe.

Africa is another place where we could justify sending troops nearly anywhere this side of Botswana, either to overthrow communist leaning dictatorships or to support Western-leaning regimes against communist backed rebels. But certainly, Libya, Sudan (even prior to Darfur, with the North/South civil war), Ethiopia, Rwanda, Rhodesia (supporting the White apartheid government), South Africa (ditto), and Angola all were legitimate targets of The Will.

The Middle East, amazingly, gets mostly a pass, on the grounds of "alignment". Iraq is an exception -- but only after the Cold War (when they actually were gassing their own people, they're cool. Invading Kuwait is a problem). Syria, too, probably should face the Will of America. But Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Qatar, UAE? All okay.

Central Asia is a fun one. Pakistan escapes -- narrowly -- on alignment grounds. Uzbekistan, despite being far eviler than Pakistan, is an easier non-call than Pakistan, as it is firmly on our side. But Afghanistan gets to enjoy US will twice: once in support of the Taliban against the Russians, and once in support of the North Alliance against the Taliban. Iran, obviously, must face American Will again.

East Asia also sees plenty of action. We already got Korea, and China, too, is a definite. Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos are further obvious choices. Indonesia gets supportive Will of America in its anti-communist fight as Suharto slaughtered 300,000 people. He may be a sonofabitch, but he's our sonofabitch, after all.

So what's the final tally? Basically all of Latin America and Eastern Europe, and most of Sub-Saharan Africa. In addition, Chile, Venezuela, Columbia, the USSR, China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Indonesia, Iran (twice), Afghanistan (twice), Iraq, Syria, Korea, and Libya. And possibly France. Some places we did attack (but in many of these, Mark thinks that still our Will was not sufficiently imposed), some we did not

I don't oppose the use of military force in all circumstances. But this...this is imperial hell. I am glad we have not "The Will" to undertake it.

"I believe in something greater than myself. Building a better world. A world without sin...."

"I don't murder children."

"I do. When I have to."


* * *

* In the comments, Mark denies that his "will" is necessarily military force. But every example he's ever given of the proper use of will was a military option, and I can't conceive of a non-military response he would find sufficiently "willful" in most of the countries I'm laying out. Indeed, in some of the cases, he finds even what military response the US did initiate to be insufficient (Vietnam, Central America). But for the sake of defusing conflict, I'll refer to what Mark wants to do to these nations as "imposing our will."

14 comments:

Mark said...

David,
Are you the same writer who declaimed our lack of resolve (will if you prefer) to do anything about genocide in Darfur? Or the Congo? You're remarkably inconsistent on this.

When did we fail regarding will? How about when Soviet tanks rolled into Hungary? How about the warships idling in the harbor during the Armenian genocide you mentioned earlier? How about when we returned a million Soviets to Stalin and thereby death, enslavement after WWII? I could go on ... it's a long list.

You're too fixated on troops as well. I replied on that matter in the post you linked. We didn't use troops in the Cuban missile crises but we showed resolve, unlike Chamberlain dancing with Hitler. But more often we ape Chamberlain than not.

You really really really do enjoy completely misinterpreting what I write don't you?

David Schraub said...

Kweh?

First of all, the fact that I don't think we should support a coup in Venezuela right now, or continued WWII by pressing forward into East Germany, does not mean I oppose military action in any given case (such as Darfur -- though I believe sending in troops to Congo would be counterproductive). This "inconsistency" you see appears to boil down to "you don't always see want to attack every country in the world the looks at us the wrong way." That's not inconsistency, that's sanity.

Second, a military blockade of Cuba is a military action, albeit one by the navy instead of the army (see also, Egypt blockading the Straits of Tiran prior to the 6-day war). And of course, the public resolution to the Cuban Missile Crisis was really just posturing. Russia placed missiles in Cuba in response to America missile installments in Turkey. Russia eventually backed down and removed the Cuban missiles under the implicit promise we'd do likewise in Turkey, which we did several months later. It was a face-saving exercise on both parts -- albeit one started by the need to show Will And Resolve in the first place. Undoubtedly, you'd have viewed getting rid of the Turkish missiles to be a Failure of the Will, when it's what actually resolved the conflict, not JFK having a steely eye.

The point is, your Will seems to manifest itself at least as often as not in terms of an unquenchable thirst for war or other military involvement around the world. Military blockades in Cuba (which still left them under communism! Failure of Will alert!), military coups in Chile and Iran, civil wars in Central America, military invasions in Southeast Asia -- Where there's a Will, there's a War. It's terrifying.

PG said...

Hey, why no invasion of India during Indira Gandhi's Emergency? Doesn't failure to align with U.S. + evil = Will? Heck, India's currently making a big show of its foreign policy independence from the U.S. by entertaining Ahmadinejad right now. Let's send in the Marines! We wouldn't want to let a little thing like the existence of a liberal democracy slow Will down.

Mark said...

David,
I have not advocated military action in all cases. Actually if you prefer "comic" analogies like you allude to in your essay, I don't ascribe to any sort of "Green Lantern" theory of foreign policy ... "Spiderman" would be more accurate. And I don't necessarily think military action is the solution in either Darfur or the Congo ... but action is what I would prefer. Again, I refer you to the Collier book. Different situations require different responses. However, rarely is "doing nothing" the required response.

Are you implying "supporting Hungary" = "pushing into East Germany"? Odd that.

I've stated on my blog comment thread that I don't think Will=War. I don't see why you don't understand that. It doesn't.


PG,
Uhm, it is David trying to goad me into response who (mis)interprets my stance as "not aligned with US=evil". I think killing lots of people, enslaving them, or otherwise doing horrible things is what defines evil. I think that is a necessary feature of Communism, which is what confuses David it seems.

PG said...

Mark,

I think killing lots of people, enslaving them, or otherwise doing horrible things is what defines evil. I think that is a necessary feature of Communism

Comparatively speaking, Tito seems to have avoided killing, enslaving, and doing horrible things to people much better than some of his non-communist successors (e.g. Milosevic). This while holding together a Yugoslavia composed of warring ethnic groups. So why do you consider evils of the type you enumerated to be a "necessary feature of Communism"? Moreover, what do you think we should have done, and should now do, about Red China? Shall we stop worrying about the lack of freedom and the human rights abuses now that it's gotten quite capitalist?

David Schraub said...

I find it (killing, enslaving, etc.) to be, if not a defining feature, then a strong correlating factor of authoritarianism (or non-democratic regimes more generally) -- communist or otherwise. The USSR was authoritarian and communist, but Nicaragua was (going to be) democratic and socialist/communist (one could arguably say the same about Scandinavia). Ditto Chile. China right now is authoritarian and capitalist, as was the American South prior to the Civil Rights revolution.

Mark said...

PG,

Tito seems to have avoided killing, enslaving, and doing horrible things to people much better Tito and the former Yugoslavia is an interesting example. The best book I've read (so far) on remembrance of things done wrong was by Miroslav Volf in The End of Memory. The personal harm Mr Volf was working through was torture in Tito's Yugoslavia.

Slavoj Zizek a prominent modern Leninist/Marxist/Lacanian philosopher on Communism remarks that Lenin is to Marx for Communism and Communist theory as Jesus Christ is to St. Paul for Christianity. Lenin's theory of Communism always entails class warfare and, well, enslavement and authoritarian methods (such as the Terror) and lots of other horrible things.


As Zizek is who he is, I took that statement as accurate. Do you disagree? Why? If you do disagree, why is your authority to be more valued (by me) than Zizek's in this?

What do I think we should "do about China"? Whatever we can to defuse and walk them away from Communism with minimal damage and in a minimum of time would be my first thoughts.

I don't think we should "stop worrying" about rights abuses in authoritarian regimes. All I said was that rights abuses and worse are necessary and implicitly part of Communism. The conclusion that implies an acceptance of non-Communist abuses is yours, not mine. In part it's perhaps because you're hung up on David's incorrect and somewhat abusive claim that I'm promoting a point of view that makes aligned-with-America equal to "Good".

David,
Mr Collier notes that economically speaking if a nation has higher than a given percentage (10% I think) of their GDP from "rent" income (natural resources like oil) that net sustainable economic growth is greater for authoritarian regimes than democratic and highlights some of the reasons why. If, as might be the case for the very poor nations of the world, economic growth is the most important thing ... perhaps your position on authoritarian governments needs to be examined.

David Schraub said...

Mark: Simply put, if you're going to ask me to take seriously that you distinguish between "aligned with America" and "bad", you have to drop your defense of America's overthrow of Allende's government in Chile -- a democratically elected entity that had given no indication that it would do anything wrong, that was replaced by a thuggish dictator who tortured and "disappeared" thousands. There is simply no supporting such brutality (especially since Chile was not economically backwards at the time). Democratic socialism (as we can see in, say, Scandinavia) can be broadly respectful of human rights. So we might say that Sweden's democratic socialism (by virtue of being democratic) is not Leninist, but the same could be said for Chile electing Allende, whose socialism was also of the democratic variety.

The question over whether we should support democratization or economic growth first (or whether we can do both at the same time) is quite the hot one, with scholars arguing both sides. I'm skeptical of the economics-first position, both because I think democracy is an intrinsic right of all humankind, and because I've seen little indication that economic growth necessarily leads to future political liberalization (see China, which has walked itself away from communism quite nicely and now is just a regular capitalist dictatorship), which leads to a situation with all the worst elements of autocracy (no rights, state-sanctioned violence, suppression of minorities and dissidents) and capitalism (cronyism, massive income disparities, environmental catastrophes).

Mark said...

David,
I'm not sufficiently aware of the details of Chile/Allende to argue either way. I was just putting forth the likely reasoning that things were done, and noting it wasn't necessarily as bad as you paint it. The indications of a genuine Leninist/Marxist government may have present or it may have been socialism calling itself Marxism. If it was not the former, then I'd agree that it was a mistake.

On growth vs democracy ... China is a particularly irrelevant example in this case. China does not have any significant rent income so the argument what would allow the most economic growth there is democracy. Collier's claim regarding autocracy vs democracy is that the former is more conducive to growth in the presence of large rent incomes, i..e, not China. China would benefit from democracy economically.

schiller1979 said...

David, a couple of comments on what's already been said:

Do you see any criteria that would justify intervention in Darfur, that would not have justified intervention in reaction to mass deaths in, e.g., North Korea in recent years, or China in Mao Zedong's heyday?

I find interesting the question of whether China can continue indefinitely as a capitalist dictatorship. They've done so for 30 years, so that structure appears to have staying power. But private businesses and private wealth constitute alternative centers of power, which tend to be dangerous to a dictatorial regime, e.g., the Roman Catholic Church in Poland. Does that mean that the Beijing regime is doomed to eventual collapse, which just hasn't happened yet? Or (somewhat the same question posed in a different way) will the Chinese economy get to a stage where it will stagnate without democracy? There has been spectacular growth from a very low base, but can it fully catch up with the developed countries, without introducing democracy?

I realize I'm jumping into this conversation at a late stage, so if these questions have already been addressed, I apologize.

PG said...

Mark,

The personal harm Mr Volf was working through was torture in Tito's Yugoslavia.

Page 6 of the book you cite states, "I was never physically tortured." I haven't read the whole book, but it seems odd that the author would say that so early on if in fact he was tortured. He even lists on page 7, "No prolonged isolation, no sleep deprivation, no starvation, no painful body positions, no physical assault or sexual mistreatment."

According to the Bush Administration, prolonged isolation, sleep deprivation and painful body positions don't even count as torture. We're in some sad days if America treats people worse than the regimes you're saying the U.S. should have acted against. It certainly illustrates the concern liberals have expressed about losing moral authority, since it's hard to say we must have the resolve to fight an evil if we ourselves are perpetrating worse acts.

Are you saying that Tito wasn't a "real" Communist? Obviously he wasn't a Soviet or a Stalinist -- Stalin kept trying to assassinate him. You seem to be trying to dice up what it means to be a Communist so as to make it fit your .

private businesses and private wealth constitute alternative centers of power, which tend to be dangerous to a dictatorial regime, e.g., the Roman Catholic Church in Poland.

Given how supportive Chinese students in the U.S. are of China's repression of Tibet -- and that these students are products of the Chinese middle and upper classes -- I would say that the standard theory may fail where the alternative centers of power believe they owe their existence to the regime. The Roman Catholic Church in Poland predated the dictatorship, whereas economic growth in China is a product of the regime. Indeed, laissez faire capitalism often does better under China's brand of communism than under democratic governments; Hong Kong had extensive worker protections when it was under the British, which are now being withdrawn by the Chinese government. The people in Hong Kong liked having those protections, so they protest the change, but China is committed to efficiency.

The contrast between India and China is instructive as to the difference made between a liberal democracy's economic liberalization and that of an authoritarian regime. China choked off its population explosion with forced abortions and sterilizations, and prevents the poor from leaving rural areas for the cities; India's population has continued to grow and has free movement, freaking out sheltered Westerners with the sight of street children. I think India's freedom is beneficial economically inasmuch as it fuels entrepeneurial spirit, though that won't fully flower until the useless bureaucracy is reduced. In short, China can do things that a democratic polity (in its short-sighted selfishness) won't tolerate.

schiller1979 said...

Indeed, laissez faire capitalism often does better under China's brand of communism than under democratic governments

Are you describing the current environment in China as laissez faire? We tend to think of it that way, because China in 2008 is so much closer to that than China in 1978. But my impression (someone can correct me if I'm wrong on this) is that the Chinese economy is still heavily regulated, even though little if anything remains of the command economy structure of Mao. And one implication of that is that at least some democratic countries (e.g., the U.S.) are still more laissez faire than China.

PG said...

My example explicitly compared the British capitalism in Hong Kong, which has strong worker protections, with Chinese capitalism, which has less protection. The relaxed Chinese attitude toward intellectual property also is arguable more laissez faire than the U.S. regime because there is much less legal intervention.

I agree that China's economy still has state controlled elements; my point is that in other areas, there is less government regulation than in democratic countries. Some forms of regulation actually are democratically preferred to laissez faire -- that's how democratic nations like the U.S. began to have minimum wage, maximum hour, health, safety and environmental regulations. It is in these respects that China's government actually ignores what might be a democratic preference for more state action.

schiller1979 said...

Perhaps we need to get away from the language "laissez faire". We can instead discuss the political environment that is conducive to economic growth which, as I see it, is a combination of economic freedom and the rule of law. That inclues such elements as enforceable contracts, protection of intellectual property, and the right to set prices free of government interference.

It sounds as though we probably disagree on that, at least to some degree. I agree that government needs to provide environmental protection, in order to force polluters to pay the full social costs of their actions. However, I oppose minimum wage laws, because they are harmful to the poor. A government-imposed minimum wage can have only two possible effects: 1) if it's below the market entry-level wage level, it has no effect, and 2) if it's above the market entry-level wage level, it will increase unemployment among those with the lowest productivity.