I would not have supported the war only to rescue the Iraqi people, but I would be ashamed of myself if I were surprised that the Iraqi's were gratefull for being rescued.

David:

Would you have at least supported lifting the sanctions so we weren't helping Saddam to kill them?

Chafee may not be conservative, but he knows what he saw in Iraq. It doesn't take too much to realize that what the hard left and the mainstream media are pushing is old and smelly.

David:

Would you have at least supported lifting the sanctions so we weren't helping Saddam to kill them?

I would have supported going in any time in the last ten years, but not just to rescue the Iraqis. There's no question that, between invasion and the sanctions regime, invasion was the more humane alternative.

Since it was our sanctions regime didn't we have some heightened obligation?

One of the achievements of the first Bush Administration was getting the Security Council to provide that the sanctions would remain until lifted by the SC, thereby giving us and the British a veto over lifting them. This was a tactical victory but a strategic loss, because, as you suggest, it puts the moral blame for the sanctions on us.

But to analyze it, we really need to go back all the way to the beginning. In 1917, the Bolsheviks hijacked the Russian Revolution and decided that they could impose Marxism on a pre-industrial economy. Skipping forward a little bit, the Cold War ends with the collapse of Communism in eastern Europe, leaving the US the sole superpower engaged in international affairs.

Iraq invades Kuwait and the US decides to oppose the invasion. This is done for a bunch of reasons: we don't like the Ba'athists; Kuwait has a lot of oil; the Saudis are nervous that they're next; and we're looking for a opening to remake international relations. The Bush Administration decides to use the invasion to put together a coalition, as much for the sake of having a coalition as for military purposes and to avoid trouble with the Islamic street. The problem is that a coalition can be put together to push Iraq out of Kuwait, but not to depose the regime. Similarly, UN authorization can be gained to reverse the invasion (lots of countrys are nervous about their neighbors and would like to think they could get help from the UN) but not against the regime (lots of countrys, including permanent members of the Security Council, are very committed to preventing interference in their internal affairs).

The Bush Administration agrees to this condition. It will not invade Iraq or directly overthrow the Iraqi regime. It is likely that the Administration thought that this was a moot point and that, having been fatally weakened by the coalition, the regime would fall. This is the best possible explanation for our butchering the Iraqi army on the Highway of Death as it was on its way out of Kuwait.

The Iraqi's leave Kuwait, the people revolt and the Bushies discover just how much our coalition don't want a "destabilized" Iraq. The sanctions are put in place until Iraq complies with its agreements ending the war or until the regime falls, which the Administration thought would be quick.

So, to answer your question, the sanctions were a victory for American diplomacy, the victory was Pyrric, and we would have been much better off going in without the UN. If that didn't happen, the Clinton Administration, in 93 or 94, should have forced the issue, going in alone if we couldn't get the UN to act. Nonetheless, the person morally responsible for the suffering of Iraqis under the sanctions (which, though considerable, was certainly less than the Regime or the left claimed) was Saddam Hussein.

So how much human suffering is required before you'd intervene somewhere? Considered in light of how easy it was to get rid of Maurice Bishop, Manuel Noriega, the Taliban, Saddam?

Intervene? What does that mean? I wouldn't invade anywhere just to alleviate human suffering.

Why not?

For these reasons.

Very good, but why then does Cain need God's protection if such internecine disputes are supposed to not concern any of us?

" 8 Cain said to his brother Abel, "Let us go out to the field."b And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and killed him. 9Then the LORD said to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" He said, "I do not know; am I my brother's keeper?" 10And the LORD said, "What have you done? Listen; your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground! 11And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. 12When you till the ground, it will no longer yield to you its strength; you will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth." 13Cain said to the LORD, "My punishment is greater than I can bear! 14Today you have driven me away from the soil, and I shall be hidden from your face; I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and anyone who meets me may kill me." 15Then the LORD said to him, "Not so!c Whoever kills Cain will suffer a sevenfold vengeance." And the LORD put a mark on Cain, so that no one who came upon him would kill him."

Cain is punished for killing his brother, not for failing to invade in order to save his brother. The end of the verse seems more to the point. It is not up to us to punish even Saddam.

"Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord."

Where Cain is concerned, thus the mark. But the mark is necessary to stop all other men from exacting justice for Abel. I'm not suggesting we should be punished for not saving Abel, but don't we have a responsibility to punish Can, barring God's intervention? Or should we not punish crime either?

Or should we not punish crime either?

This gets to the precise difference between us on this matter. Crime is a national concept. We are, all together, members of a society and citizens of a government. We have agreed, corporately, to a mechanism for establishing what is criminal behavior and what is not. We have agreed, corporately, to procedures for punishing crimes. We have agreed, corporately, to the enforcement of our laws upon that minority that violate them. All in all, we are surprisingly successful in limiting criminal behavior and promoting obedience to the law.

If one of us transgresses our law, I am all for the enforcement of the law and punishment of the criminal, under the procedures we have established -- even though, personally, I disagree with some of those laws, some of those punishments and some of those procedures.

I am more willing than most to allow people to come into the country if they abide by the rules and become part of the community (I am so tempted to say "communion", but I won't) and I'd even be willling, under very particular circumstances, to extend the borders. But this regime ends at our borders, as it must if it is to be meaningful.

Now, your position, I take it, is that Saddam, or other brutal dictators oppressing their people, are criminals and we should act as the police. I can only understand this as a metaphor. There is no international community akin to our national community, no generally accepted laws or procedures or punishments.

Without this infrastructure and without, most importantly, the mutual understanding that allows the punishment of crime within our nation, there can be no crime, no trial and no punishment as they exist domestically. There can only be war and victory. If we are to go to war, we should only go to war for our own purposes and for our own benefit, though as Americans we believe that our wars also benefit those of our enemies who survive our victory.

So, back to Cain and Abel. Cain is not his brother's keeper, but he is his own master. He is punished for his act in killing his brother, not for having failed to save his brother. But he is not killed nor, having been punished by G-d, are other men allowed to exact vengeance. What are we do learn from this? First, that we are not responsible for Cain, either. We are not his keeper. Second, the rule against double jeopardy, I suppose. Third, though it is not the orthodox lesson, is that we should not punish just out of a desire for vengeance: we are not G-d's righteous arm striking down sinners.

I agree the traditional rule has been that you can do whatever you want to your own people so long as you stay within your own borders. But that is no longer true is it? We routinely topple regimes now just because we don't like them--to the ones mentioned earlier you can add Nicaragua, Serbia, etc.--not because of anything they've done abroad or, especially silly, because they pose a threat to us. We do in practice hold foreign leaders to our own standards, though it's somewhat piecemeal. Why not do so more systematically?

Given your reading of Cain and Abel on what basis can we punish crime?

OJ:

What worries me about your formulations is your tendency to argue that we have an abstract obligation to make punitive war against outlaw regimes. We have no such obligation in the abstract.

The Just War doctrine, as it has been traditionally understood across the centuries of Western Civilization, has always allowed for the possibility that punitive war, under certain circumstances, is just. There are indeed times when to restore the right of order of nations, or to secure future peace, it is necessary to punish gangster nations. But -- and here is the crucial point -- this will always fall within the prudential judgment of secular leaders.

Perhaps I misread you, but it appears that you are moving toward an elimination of the role of prudence. That would be a perilous innovation; a innovation akin to the efforts of the Left to make Just War a doctrine of self-immolation.

No, we must do as Western nations and Western leaders have always done: think deeply on our tradition, on our circumstances, and apply prudence to each threat; that we might honorably discharge the responsibilities we carry.

Paul:

Yes we are obligated, but I quite specifically included prudence. There's no obligation to sacrifice a great deal of life or treasure in such wars, with a coequal or at least dangerous power. But where we can alleviate suffering with virtually no negative consequences (as in every action of the past thirty years), why would we not be morally obligated to do so?

Given your reading of Cain and Abel on what basis can we punish crime?

What else can we do?

Somewhat more seriously, though less truthfully, we can punish crime because the Bible doesnt' end after Cain kills Abel. There's a lot of stuff that comes afterward, including much that makes clear that G-d intends that we enforce the law. In particular, there are the Noahic Laws, the seven laws to be followed by the gentiles, which includes the positive direction to establish Courts of Law. None of the seven laws, and none of the Commandments to the Jews, for that matter, instruct us to go out among the nations smiting the tyrant. Rather, from time to time, various prophets -- Abraham and Jonah come to mind -- are sent out to tell certain named peoples to shape up or face G-d's wrath, but it's never suggested that the punishment should come from anywhere but G-d.

OJ -- Is there a situation in which you would invade, but I would not? What would you have done in Kosovo?

(Although this is an oversimplification, assume that my concern is coextensive with risk to our soldiers. In other words, I have no problem indirectly destabilizing nasty governments simply for their own people's benefit. My concern is not risking American lives without a concrete American interest, so Nicaragua isn't a problem for me.)

Kosovo is a good test case. Another is North Korea. I answer no in both cases, as a prudential judgment: the first because, whatever the suffering inflicted by the Serbs, it was against our interests in a profound way (though few realized it at the time) to side with Muslims against Christians; the second because war against the North Koreans, whose military is huge, and whose special forces have proven their ghastly talents, would be far too costly. Let South Korea fight that war.

Paul:

One can reasonably make a religious case that we in the Anglosphere ARE obligated to help others.
It merely involves widening the circle of whom to think of as tribesmembers.
At one time, the tribe was a few hundred, at most; Now, most acknowledge all citizens of their country belong to the tribe.
If one further sees all humans as being part of the tribe, then one has some responsibility to see that they are taught how to survive and prosper, and also to see that they behave themselves.

From the beginning of the USA until '89, it wasn't clear that monarchy, fascism, or communism wasn't as good as, or superior to, democratic capitalism.
WW I, WW II, and the Cold War whittled down the viable alternatives.
Thus, the Anglosphere can, in good conscience, resume trying to civilize the wogs.

Less cynically, if you stumbled on to the secret of wealth, why not tell your brother ?
If your brother was addicted to crack, wouldn't you put him in rehab, even over his protestations ?

David:

I'd not have done anything in Kosovo--the Serbs are on our side.

I would however, at this moment, remove Castro, Mugabe, and Kim Jong-il, one way or another.

Michael and OJ:

I want to be clear that I am talking here about a military intervention, that is, a war. I agree that we ough to work to remove these other thugs, that there is some moral claim which imposes itself upon us.

To use the terminology of Just War against, the removal of, say, Kim Jong-Il is a just cause, but prudence tells me it is not one to be vindicated by a recourse to war.

David:

To sharpen my flaccid point, at least a bit: Why are we obligated to dispense justice among ourselves but not among others? And, if we believe that All Men are Created equal" and endowed with rights, can our sense of justice survive our bashfulness about defending those rights universally?

David:
Excellent discussion.

BTW, as a Civil Religionist, I think your use of "communion" would have been completely appropriate.

As a Civil Religionist, may I take Mr. Guinn to be an admirer of Rousseau?

Michael -- Doesn't your mention of the Anglosphere undercut your case? Assuming that you don't believe that the mere speaking of English is a sufficient distinguishing characteristinc to make "them" into "us", what is it about the English speaking nations that does bring us together? And mustn't tribal membership be a two-way street? It seems to me that OJ is really arguing for a very muscular charity, which, like all charity, is likely to be resented by the recipient.

We do share the secret of our riches with our poorer brethren. They sneer at it and call it arrogance and cultural imperialism. If you have to use an army to stick your brother in rehab, rehab won't work.

Paul -- There's no need to be insulting.

I do not mean to insult. (I assume you are refering to my question about Rousseau.) In fact, though it probably comes as a surprise, I admire Rousseau as well. He is generally misunderstood -- or "understood" too quickly and left unread. There have been few shrewd minds in political philosophy; and, though we should not follow Rousseau where he leads, it is important to realize that Rousseau is not friend of the modern Left.

Castro, Mugabe, and Kim Jong-il:

The easy one first. I would not do anything about Mugabe. The situation in southern Africa is too volatile; American intervention is likely to be resented throughout the region; and we have no pressing national interest to be furthered through military means.

Kim Jong-il. I probably wouldn't do anything. Although we do have serious national security interests on the Penninsula and in Asia generally, they are not seperate from the interests of Korea and Japan. This is, then, a good opportunity to let other nations take the lead role. Why should we be more solicitous of the North Korean people than the South Koreans are? In particular, we would be doing them no favors by overthrowing the regime in the North. The only exception to this is that, because the North is such a committed proliferator, if we had very reliable intelligence about the location of their WMD's, I might authorize a raid to take them out.

I can probably be convinced that Castro should be taken out, though not immediately. Cuba is in the hemisphere, close to our shores and likely to be a real drain on us when the regime finally collapses. Since the USSR fell, the only real reason not to go in has been out of respect for the feelings of the Canadians and the Europeans. The problem is that the Cuban military will probably fight and won't necessarily be a pushover if we're not willing to bomb for a good long time first. (Although we do need a new Vieques.) So, what's your prudential limit: 5,000 casualties, 10,000 casualties, 25,000?

Societies and individuals have a responsibility to both themselves and to the society they belong. The people in an oppressed nation must take full responsibility for the situation they find themselves in. The US playing global cop will not solve the deep cultural issues that allow these nations to be dominated by one man or group of men. All human beings have one thing in common, we all learn the hard way. If the free nations banded together and freed all the oppressed people of the world it would not accomplish much in the long run. Within 100 years the same people, living in the same area, would be going thru the same problems. That is why Iraq is going to be much more difficult than anyone ever thought. The west simply has no clue how rotten to the core the societies of the oppressed people live in because a) they did not care and b) these societies have been closed off to the western influence for centuries. Until the minds of these individuals are re-shaped out of the old and into the new we are in for a long, and I mean long, struggle. The only time the US should intervene when our way of life and security are threatened.

David:

No one resents being liberated--they do mind when we stay there and make them fight the external enemy with us.

We're a better people than the South Koreans.

I'm not particular about how many Castroites die in the action. Why not wait until their next big Party conclave and MOAB the meeting?

BJW:

Nonsense. The Czecks and Poles and many others love freedom just as much as we, but overthrowing oppressors has proven harder than we'd like to think it should be. It'd be great if we could just blame the victims, but we can't.

BJW -- Nicely said. I agree with all that, except that you give the "west" too much credit. Parts of the west are rotten to the core, too.

No one resents being liberated--they do mind when we stay there and make them fight the external enemy with us. Your absolutely right. My concern in with the rest of the region and the possibility of a domino effect. My main point, though, which I was not straight-forward enough about, is that there is just nothing in it for us.

We're a better people than the South Koreans. Well, maybe. But even so, we're not eager to welcome 22 million destitute refugees into our nation. I'm not sure how moral or pure it is to force the South Koreans to do so.

I'm not particular about how many Castroites die in the action. Why not wait until their next big Party conclave and MOAB the meeting? I wasn't talking about Cuban casualties. Cuba is not Iraq. We would take serious casualties putting Castro and the regime down. Would a decapitation stroke work? Maybe. But voluntary military adventures are only worth doing if their worth doing at something approaching the worst-case scenario.

David:

Perhaps you define "us" too narrowly?

Should North Korea remain permanently under the Kims then?

C'mon, you can't take the Cuban military seriously. The militaries of these totalitarian regimes--with the exception of the Nazis, who were German first--always turn out to be paper tigers.

Perhaps you define "us" too narrowly?

Yes. Yes. Exactly. Hallelujah!

"Us" stops at the border; wogs start at Rock Island.

Should North Korea remain permanently under the Kims then? I don't think that is the alternative.

C'mon, you can't take the Cuban military seriously. Actually, I don't know anything about the Cuban military, except that it did a decent job in Africa, it's run by Fidel's brother and fewer of its pilots defect that one might expect.

David:

North Korea: Well, when the regime falls, by whatever means, the people are heading South.

Cuba: The planes wouldn't make it here.

Wogs: So how far does our disinterest extend? Suppose the Arab majority starts slaughtering the Jews of Israel in a few years? Suppose China decides to depopulate Hong Kong? Suppose the Sunni try taking Iraq back from the Shi'a? etc., etc., etc. Do we have no obligations to any non-American citizens? And, if not, why do we when they're attacked by a foreign power? Or should we not mind if North Korea nukes South or China attacks Taiwan or everyone attacks Israel?

OJ --

I am not an isolationist and this might be the only place I could be accused of it. I have no problem with the exercise of US power in the world, I have no problem with the charitable use of US wealth in the world. Sending relief to Iran is the right thing -- the American thing -- to do even if, as I believe, it doesn't buy us any gratitude from the Mullahs. Compared to most of the country, I have a hair-trigger for use of the military. We should have gone to war after the first WTC bombing, after the Dhahran bombing, and after the Cole bombing.

I even think we were right to go to war in WWII, unlike others I could name. I just think that the responsibility of the government of the United States is to the people of the United States. Full stop. Any action, no matter how humane or how life-affirming or moral, also has to be justified by reference to the common interests of American citizens. Given that I think that anyone who can make it here can be an American citizen, I don't feel at all bad about this.

That is a sufficient reason for me to believe that we shouldn't go to war except when our own national benefit offsets the cost in lives and treasure.

Separate from that but also sufficient is the constantly repeated lesson of history that mankind cannot foresee all the results of its actions. We don't really know what the result would be if we went into Zimbabwe or NoKo or Cuba. Again, without immediate benefits for ourselves, the risk is not worth running.

Also sufficient is the related recognition that training the peoples of the world that, if things get bad enough, the Americans will take care of it, is a dangerous lesson to teach. There is a heuristic value to our international disengagement, even if we don't really mean it.

So, to specifics: Suppose the Arab majority starts slaughtering the Jews of Israel in a few years? As opposed to the last few years? Why shouldn't we go in now and decimate the Palestinians? You've answered this yourself: why should we be more hardline than the Israelis, which is what I'm saying about Korea.

Suppose China decides to depopulate Hong Kong? We should probably go in. We have a significant national interest in the continued existence of Hong Kong. Note, however, that the British, the most American of the non-Americans, abandoned Hong Kong because they felt that, against the Chinese, they could not prevail.

Suppose the Sunni try taking Iraq back from the Shi'a? That's one of the reasons we'll have bases there: to move in hard and fast.

Do we have no obligations to any non-American citizens? Only those we voluntarily accept.

And, if not, why do we when they're attacked by a foreign power? Lots of countries are attacked by foreign powers and we do nothing, or we side with the attacker.

Or should we not mind if North Korea nukes South or China attacks Taiwan or everyone attacks Israel? Its tempting to say that it's always in our interest to defend democracies against tyrannies. I'll have to think about that. In these instances: South Korea should be able to handle North Korea without us. I have no problem selling them or, if necessary, giving them supplies with which to do so. Taiwan is an important ally. Give them everything they need. As for Israel, what would be new about that. Nixon almost acted in '73, and otherwise we've kept well out of it when everyone attacked Israel.

By the way, you seem to think that Israel is more of an issue for me than for other Americans, or than other allies would be? What have I ever said to give you that impression?

It it as least half a myth to imagine that everybody wants to be "liberated," whatever that means, and an entire myth that they want to be like us.

Most people in the world have cultural and moral systems that are not much like ours but which they like fine. It is hard to see why anyone would have an obligation to impose something he likes on someone who doesn't like it; but if you buy that argument, then it's might-makes-right and devil takes the hindmost.

Besides, although it might be pretty easy to lop off the heads of this regime or that -- Kermit Roosevelt did so in Iran -- what you get next is not always or even usually desirable, even by our idiosyncratic definitions.

The reason we cannot, as a practical matter, charge in here and there to make the world safe for democracy is -- besides the fact that most of the world doesn't give a fig for democracy -- that you need infantry and we don't have any.

David's long skein of events leading the pulling our punch in Gulf War I is plausible, but way too complicated. Bush I didn't keep going because he had to use borrowed infantry and the lenders were not going to Baghdad, period.

I cannot prove it, but it is my opinion that Clinton, a smart man, pursued his weak foreign policy at least in part because he had seen what a useless instrument his military was for what is laughably called "nation building."

David:

Because you're Jewish. I, for instance, would want to attack the Irish if they moved against Protestant Northern Ireland.

Christianity is more important than America.

Judaism is my religion; America is my tribe. Fortunately, neither of us is likely to be forced to choose between our religion and our tribe.

My congressman is among those who went to Iraq and no doubt is counted among those who came back persuaded.

Barely chastened would be more like it. He reminds me of a story in the WSJ about fake low-fat doughnuts. The felon (doing 15 months, compare that with, say, manslaughter) who sold the hi-fat doughnuts was turned in to the FDA by his customers who "complained . . . about how tasty his products were."

Harry -- We had more infantry then than we have now. I would also have more sympathy for this argument if we weren't keeping a bunch of troops in Europe and Asia for no particular reason.

"Most people in the world have cultural and moral systems that are not much like ours but which they like fine."

Harry, I guess it depends on who you ask. The wealthy Saudi prince with 20 wives would agree with you, but what do you think wives 7 through 20 would say about it? Or what about the village merchant's son who can't marry because there aren't enough women to go around for men of little means like him?

People tend to "like fine" their cultures because it is all they know, and because they generally have an identity and standing in that society that is stable, if humble. But the follow-on question that is always implied, if not expressed, is "compared to what? What else can I have?"

That is the killer question for every traditional society. It is the question that the defenders of those societies cannot allow to be asked, or answered. Unfortunately for them, 24 hour satellite TV has already provided answers to questions that peoples of those societies didn't even know they could ask.

I would not underestimate how much they want to be like us.

David, you will recall that we deployed 7 armored and no infantry divisions in Gulf I.

I'm with you on the forward deployments, but most of them were not infantry (none in Europe).

Robert, you make a good point. I was raised to believe that everyone wanted to be like us. Then I met some people who are not like us and do not want to be like us. And not all are No. 4 wives (the limit for a Muslim, not 20).

Lee-Kuan Yew, hardly oppressed by any standards (Oxford education, head of state) led quite a number of non-Americans (some really despicable, like Malaysia's Muhathir) in explicitly rejecting our individualism etc. Their message resonated deeply in their societies.

I'm an individualist myself, but there are lots of people who are not.

It is not up to us to tell people they are miserable. If they are, they'll know.

This is a very interesting debate to me, and as a non-American I make no pretence that my views are worth anything much, since it is uniquely American problem. So feel free to ignore them.

America has always fascinated me because it has provided an answer to the question: what kind of society would you build if you could start all over again from scratch? For better or worse, we have ended up with the USA.

Now you find yourselves confronted with a new question: what should you do if you alone have the power to solve other people's problems?

In Britain we also face this question on a much smaller scale: we've sent our boys tramping off to Kosovo and the Middle East. But since we chucked away the empire there has never been the same pressure on us to be a global policeman. It is of course the USA's question, and the USA will answer it.

Once thing seems clear to me however - David's statement: "I just think that the responsibility of the government of the United States is to the people of the United States. Full stop" can no longer be meaningfully uttered in the way it could have, say, before WWII.

The world has shrunk, and it’s the USA wot shrunk it.

Brit:

One is also mindful that one of the glories of the British Empire was that it stopped the slave trade.

Harry:

How nmuch infantry did we need in Grenada, Nicaragua, Afghanistan I, Libya?

Harry -- I might want to argue that armor is no longer cavalry (if it ever really was) but has become infantry in US military doctrine. Let me think about that a little. Certainly, we use armor to take ground, not simply to break through the line to wreak havoc on the enemy's interior.

Brit -- Would you mind fleshing out your argument a bit? My argument is not for isolationism, or for ignoring the realities of America's place in the world, but rather that freeing a foreign people, no matter how oppressed, is neither a necessary nor sufficient reason for US military action. Instead, a concrete strategic benefit to the US is both necessary and sufficient. By concrete, I mean more tangible than the warm feeling of being a liberator or the (theoretical) benefit of making the world love us, though freeing an oppressed people is a nice bonus (and maybe a make weight argument). In other words, I would not have sent the military to Somalia and probably not to Kosovo.

David -

I don't have an argument about where you draw the lines for necessary and sufficient conditions for military intervention...just more questions.

But I would make the observation that the US has been the major factor in driving globalisation... and globalisation means that the US has interests and responsibilities in places that many of its citizens couldn't point to on a map.

It is increasingly difficult to justifiably say of any nation or its people: 'they have nothing to do with us; its their problem.'

Reasons for this include: business interests, global media, international organisations, the internet...

If it is just as easy to pick up the phone and donate 10 dollars to an orphanage in Zambia as it is to put it in the charity box at your local church ...where do your moral imperatives lie?

John Donne said 'no man is an island'.
Perhaps no island is even an island anymore!

Just a general observation...

Harry,
All good points, my main argument is that you can't look at a culture or nation as a whole and say yes-or-no that they want to be like us. Global trade and communications will continue to dissolve the cultural glue that holds traditional societies together. Some will mourn the old ways and resist, mostly the priviledged and religious conservatives, while many will yearn for change.

I am not for forcing American values or culture on anyone. But I think that we will see more countries where a growing desire for American style democracy and freedoms, as well as culture, percolates to a point where, as with Iraq, people are positively primed for an American occupation. Not that we would oblige them in all circumstances, I do agree with David that our interests must be involved in some way.

All us free marketers probably think that, given a level shot and in the long run, people will evolve toward the more attractive features of our system.

But that does not mean they yearn for freedom in the abstract. My ancestors (in, say, the 8th century) did not yearn for freedom. They sold themselves into slavery in exchange for protection.

Orrin's arguments about order first and all that are fine as far as they go, but they don't go that far.

The Japanese are probably the best test case. They adopted baseball even before we conquered them. They have a very strange attitude toward the US -- love/hate hardly begins to describe it -- but they have gone a very long way toward adopting our ways.

Except, as Reischauer kept emphasizing, the one Orrin thinks is central -- they are not Christians (about 2%) and show no sign whatever of converting.

David. Our 4th "infantry" division has more tanks than any three World War II armored divisions.

I am not concerned about our ability to knock over any organized force. It is the ability to administer and govern and to deal with unorganized resistance that creates the problem. Our tanks are not very useful in Iraq right now and hardly ever fire a shot.

The last third of Clausewitz's "On War," the part about the war of outposts, described the dilemma in great detail. Technology really has not changed any of his principles.