This OpEd
from today’s Washington Post by a former counsel to the CIA echoes Wallerstein
in hinting at reinstating the draft and sharp tax increases so that “we do not
fail”, as Wallerstein predicted.
60s déjà vu, except this time the retired
Viet Vets are questioning government policy openly, as Zinni recently did. And they vote. Don’t know if the author intended to, but his mention of
Custer prompted me to wonder, has anyone heard Pres George Bush compared to
Gen. George Custer yet? - KWC
We Must Be Willing To Pay the Costs
By Jeffrey H. Smith, OpED, Monday,
September 15, 2003; Page A23 @ http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10038-2003Sep14.html
Late last month we buried another classmate. He now lies at West
Point with many classmates who were killed in Vietnam. The class of 1966 is now
beginning to die of natural causes, but early in our lives far too many of us
met violent deaths in Vietnam. Thirty-three members of our graduating class of
579 were killed in Vietnam -- the highest number of any West Point class. Now
one of our members, retired Gen. Wesley K. Clark, who recently has been sharply
critical of the administration's strategy in its latest conflict, is being
urged to run for president.
The West Point cemetery has been a military cemetery since the
Revolutionary War. It is a beautiful place, with a commanding view of the
Hudson River, old stone walls and an impressive number of giant oak, hickory,
chestnut and maple trees. Some of America's greatest heroes lie there. Most
made the ultimate sacrifice in pursuit of wise and just causes. But far too
many died in military follies or ruinous misadventures. Gen. George Custer, for
example, is buried there.
Regardless, they stepped forward and did their duty when called,
as have countless other young American men and women. There are now fresh graves at West Point and our other
national cemeteries. A new generation of U.S. soldiers, sailors, airmen and
Marines is meeting violent deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those of us too old to fight now debate
whether our national security strategy is sound. It is the duty of our generation, whether in or out of uniform, to make certain that the nation understands
the consequences and costs of its policies.
In our democracy the people must understand the nation's policies
and be committed to them. We must be willing to pay the costs necessary in
blood and treasure to see those policies through. If the policies are based on false premises, whether from
wishful thinking or bad intelligence, they will ultimately fail. Many believe the president misled the nation by overstating
Saddam Hussein's link to terrorism or the presence of weapons of mass
destruction in Iraq. Great concern also exists about whether
the administration truly understood the situation we would face in Iraq or was overly optimistic in its predictions that we would be welcomed as liberators
and could rapidly build a democratic Iraq.
No one should question our country's achievements in forcing the
Taliban out of Kabul or getting rid of Saddam Hussein's regime. At the same
time no one should question how difficult -- or how important -- it is to
achieve our mission in both countries. To the extent that the administration's
case for going to war does not withstand scrutiny, it undermines the
president's efforts to build support for the sacrifices necessary at home and
to obtain a commitment from our allies to provide troops and financial
assistance in Iraq. Leveling with the American people and our allies about the
costs that lie ahead in Afghanistan and Iraq is crucial in re-establishing
confidence in our policies. The president's Sept. 7 speech was a step in the right
direction, but much work and many risks lie ahead.
Congress should promptly approve the president's supplemental
request. But we must also look at the longer term. The budget the president is
preparing to submit to Congress for the coming fiscal year must adequately fund the U.S. armed
forces not only in Iraq and Afghanistan but also in Korea and other places around
the world where a strong U.S. presence is needed. There must be ample funding for other
aspects of nation-building essential to preventing Iraq and Afghanistan from
sliding into chaos and violence. We should also think hard about whether it is
necessary to increase the size of the armed services.
Independent budget analysts at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary
Assessments predict
that the president's long-term
defense plans could
increase the federal deficit by up to $1.08 trillion between fiscal 2004 and 2013. And that's before his recent request for
supplemental appropriations for Iraq. The growing deficit may at some point
pose a risk to national security if it grows out of control and the economy
continues to lag.
Consideration should also be given to some form of universal national
service -- including
reinstating the draft -- to ensure that we have adequate personnel to meet our
national security needs. Service in the Peace Corps or similar programs could
be an alternative to military service. It is folly to take this nation into
dangerous foreign missions -- however critical -- without making the
corresponding commitment to pay the price.
All of this will be costly. It may be necessary to increase taxes to pay for these
measures. But the failure to respond to these needs is even more costly in
dollars, lives and failed policies. This was
brought into sharp focus by recent remarks of retired Marine Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, former commander in chief for the region
that includes Iraq and Afghanistan. Zinni spoke for our generation of soldiers when, according to The Post, he said
that "our feelings and sensitivities were forged on the battlefields of
Vietnam, where we heard the garbage and the lies, and we saw the sacrifice …I
ask you, is it happening again?" We are in danger, he said, "of failing." We
cannot allow that to happen.
At our classmate's funeral, after taps had sounded and the volley
of rifle shots had faded, a small group of us stood under a magnificent old
locust tree. It was a gentle August morning; West Point rarely looked more
beautiful or more confident. Yet, as we stood there, the conversation turned to
Iraq and Wes Clark's potential candidacy. One of our classmates said, "We
are standing here, on the graves of our classmates killed in Vietnam, talking
seriously of another classmate being president of the United States." A
hushed moment followed, and then with choked voices several classmates said
almost in unison, "Tell Wes to go."
Whether he runs or not, the views that he, Gen. Zinni and others
have recently been expressing must be heeded. All of the men and women who now
rest in national cemeteries demand it.
The writer is a former general counsel of
the CIA.
Fernand
Braudel Center, Binghamton University
http://fbc.binghamton.edu/commentr.htm
Commentary No. 121, Sept. 15, 2003
"Bush in Big Trouble at Home"
President Bush has been in great trouble with most of the world for over a year
now, if not longer. But he has retained solid strength in the United States, up
to about three months ago. Now, it's slipping away, and very fast.
Let's start with the Establishment press. The Republicans like to refer to this
press as the "liberal press," suggesting that they are leftist wolves
in sheep's clothing. But the fact is that the Establishment press in the United
States is and always has been solidly centrist. For a year after 9/11, indeed
up until three months ago, this centrist press sounded like they simply took
the press releases from the White House and endorsed them. Now suddenly, this
is no longer true. Indeed far from true. One only needs to take a look at the
four main TV channels (CBS, NBC, CBS, and CNN) or read the main news magazines
(Time, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report) or the principal newspapers
(N.Y. Times, Washington Post, L.A. Times, Boston Globe). What one sees is
article after article - news stories, opinion pieces, editorials - quite
critical
of the Bush administration - of its policies in Iraq, or rather of its
"failures" in Iraq, and of its inability to counter the persistent
and growing recession and unemployment in the United States. Indeed these
articles are now so critical that they comment openly and negatively on what
the Bush people say.
The Bush administration got the U.S. into the war with scare tactics about Iraq
- weapons of mass destruction, rocket launchers, drone planes that could spread
biological weapons; and of course, close ties to Al-Qaeda. One by one, each of
these claims has come undone. No weapons have been found, nor rockets, nor
drone planes, nor ties to Al-Qaeda. And more and more intelligence people are
saying now that they told the Bush administration this long ago, long before
the invasion. This is so true that the Bush people stopped defending the
invasion on these grounds some two months ago. They found another argument. The
U.S. got rid of Saddam Hussein, for which the Iraqi people are eternally
grateful. And the Iraqis will now build an exemplary democratic state in the
Middle East. But the Iraqis seem to be expressing their gratitude by shooting
at American soldiers with some regularity.
The country is a physical and political mess. And if Iraq has become a beacon
to the democratic world, I must be living on another planet.
The most unbelievable picture, in terms of where the U.S. was even three months
ago, is what is happening in the Democratic Party - the meteoric rise of Howard
Dean. Howard Dean was a rather obscure governor of a small state, centrist in
his political options (at least in the past), who started with only one thing
going for him. He was an open critic of the invasion of Iraq. Up to three
months ago, there were only a handful of prominent Democratic opponents of the
war - Senators Byrd, Kennedy, Graham, Rep. Kucinich, and most of all, Howard
Dean. That was about it. Everyone else had jumped on Bush's patriotic
bandwagon, including the four major opponents of Dean for the Democratic
nomination - Lieberman, Kerry, Edwards, and Gephardt.
Dean's outspoken, very down to earth, persistent opposition to the Iraq war
(expressed not only before but also after it started) gained him a national
audience. And his smart use of the internet gave him a political grassroots
organization across the country and financial contributions that have outdone
his Democratic opponents. The press originally treated him as inconsequential,
then as interesting but marginal, then as interesting but sure to lose the
election to Bush if he won the nomination, to its present belief that not only
can he win the nomination but he has a good shot at beating Bush. His
Democratic opponents have responded to the Dean phenomenon by coming as close
to his position as they possibly can, given their past records and commitments.
The four major opponents are now saying that the invasion may have been
correct, but the aftermath was very badly planned.
This doesn't really persuade anyone. Just as Democratic voters don't seem to
want "Bush light" (which is what some commentators called Lieberman),
so they don't seem to want "Dean light" (which is what they are
calling Kerry, Edwards, and Gephardt now).
Even more interesting has been the reaction of the Republican political insiders.
Originally, they thought Dean would be the easiest Democrat to defeat. Now they
quite openly admit he might be the hardest. After all, there is already a
Republicans for Dean organization.
Finally, there are the ordinary voters, the ones who get polled regularly.
Bush's ratings have been steadily falling. Today, at best he has a bare
majority who think he's doing well. But more interesting is the latest poll
that shows that 64% of the American population believe that the Iraq invasion
has increased the likelihood of terrorist attacks. 77% believe that negative
attitudes toward the U.S. in the Islamic world have increased terrorist
recruiting. And 81% think that the true lesson of 9/11 is that the U.S. needs
to be more multilateral.
The Bush administration is inching its way back to trying to seem multilateral.
They are seeking a U.N. resolution, and are more or less pleading with other
countries to send in troops and money (let bygones be bygone, suggests
President Bush). But the U.S. still doesn't want to give up U.S. political and
military primacy in Iraq, which is no doubt the real price they must pay to get
support. The U.S. may get its U.N. resolution, or some diluted version of it.
But even so, the U.S. probably will get neither troops nor money from other
countries, anyway nothing significant. To be sure, after Bush's latest speech,
Romania promised another 50 soldiers. But that's so ridiculous that even the
Bush administration doesn't advertise it.
The first American voices for a full U.S. withdrawal from Iraq have started to
be heard. Their numbers will be growing and they may be shouting quite loudly
in the next three months, as the casualties continue to mount, the situation in
Israel/Palestine deteriorates still further, and unemployment continues to
mount in the U.S. The neo-cons are aware of this. They have begun to say that
the comparison is not with Vietnam, but with Somalia, where the U.S. withdrew
in disgrace and defeat. They are warning that, if the U.S. does not stand firm,
it will lose everything. In a sense they are right.
This is George Bush's unsolvable dilemma. If he stands firm, but resolves
nothing in Iraq, his likelihood of reelection will diminish radically and
rapidly. If, however, he doesn't stand firm, he will be ridiculed as someone
who talked big and couldn't stand the heat in the kitchen. His principal danger
is not losing the center, but losing his own firm supporters on the right. Many
of them are already unhappy that this administration has been one of the most spending
administrations in the history of the U.S. despite its rhetoric. The U.S.
deficit is approaching rapidly the half trillion dollar mark. Probably George
Bush's only way out would be to say to the American people: The U.S. needs to
stay in Iraq for five years at least. And for that, we need American
sacrifices. I am going to reinstitute the draft, and I am going to ask for
sharp tax increases to pay for this imperial policy.
This is in fact what someone like Sen. McCain would do. It might even work, at
least in terms of American backing for such a policy. But George Bush doesn't
have the guts to do it, and the people around him have many other agendas.
So, bye-bye George W. Bush. In ten years, we will look back and agree that no
president in the history of the United States did more to weaken the world
power and prestige of the United States. George W. Bush will have the record.
Immanuel Wallerstein
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