It is true that the war is not over simply because US public opinion has
passively soured on it, and only an executive order or congressional
resolution in the face of wider public protest can accomplish that. It is
also true that the most US political leaders -from hard right Republicans to
opportunist liberal Democrats - supported by elite policy makers like
Kissinger would prefer to stay the course and subdue the Iraqi resistance
because they fear the radicalizing effect of an American defeat. In fact,
fear of an inevitable US defeat is what underlay the reservations of the
foreign policy and security establishment about the invasion from the
beginning, and why it viewed the new Bush administration as naive and
adventurist. But now that the children have gone ahead and made a mess, the
adults feel they can't just walk away from it.
Nevertheless, you can't always get what you want. The domino theory is not
new - it has been the justification for every US intervention from the
Bolshevik Revolution on - and Kissinger's is simply the latest variant of
it. But at some point, if the conflict on balance becomes a losing one, a
deal must be struck with the enemy, the consequences be damned. That's the
case in both class and international conflicts, where the outcome is
predicated less on what the contending parties want than by the relationship
of forces which is largely outside their control.
Kissinger understands this as the architect of the Vietnam withdrawal and
the accomodation with China. He and others at this stage are evidently still
not fully convinced that the US has arrived at this turning point, and are
trying to persuade a faltering US public of that. But they are at the same
time entertaining the idea of an early withdrawal from Iraq, absent a turn
in their fortunes there, as the repeated leaks about a substantial American
drawdown of US forces before the congressional elections would seem to
indicate. They are waiting, and hoping against hope, that a new
constitution and popular elections in Iraq will split and take the stream
out of the insurgency before the combination of insurgent attacks and
American casualties, public protest at home, and the adverse effect on its
strategic interests elsewhere takes the steam out of the US will to remain
in Iraq. Just as in Vietnam.
MG
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ralph Johansen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Tuesday, August 16, 2005 11:08 PM
Subject: Re: [PEN-L] war is over
<It is worth noting that, two days before Rich’s column, the Washington
Post published an op-ed column by former Nixon secretary of state Henry
Kissinger, for decades one of the most ruthless and cynical strategists
for American imperialism. Kissinger wrote: “Because of the long reach of
the Islamist challenge, the outcome in Iraq will have an even deeper
significance than that in Vietnam. If a Taliban-type government or a
fundamentalist radical state were to emerge in Baghdad or any part of
Iraq, shock waves would ripple through the Islamic world. Radical forces
in Islamic countries or Islamic minorities in non-Islamic states would
be emboldened in their attacks on existing governments. The safety and
internal stability of all societies within reach of militant Islam would
be imperiled. This is why many opponents of the decision to start the
war agree with the proposition that a catastrophic outcome would have
grave global consequences—a fundamental difference from the Vietnam
debate.”
Kissinger’s last point is the most important: unlike Vietnam, where
there were deep divisions within the ruling elite over whether that war
was worth the cost, there is virtual unanimity today, among both leading
Republicans and Democrats, that American imperialism cannot afford to
lose in Iraq. There is no significant section of the Democratic
leadership that supports withdrawal from Iraq. On the contrary, the most
prominent spokesmen for the party on this issue, such as senators
Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, and Joseph Biden, are calling for more
troops and a more forceful effort to suppress the insurgency against the
US occupation.>
[Kissinger is couching his stentorian pronouncements about "global
consequences" in the context of Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations",
accurate enough in terms of elite perceptions, and of course without
mentioning US myopic distortions and geopolitical objectives; and while
Kissinger is right that this time, unlike with Viet Nam there is virtual
unanimity among our patriciate about the need to prevail in Iraq, still
the corporate media are not keeping this game in bounds recently, as
they chase the only news in the summer doldrums that is both credible
and newsworthy, as it happens in Crawford and in Baghdad.
And while we tend to discount the likelihood that public opinion in the
US, otherwise illusory in countless respects, can prevail in matters of
US foreign policy against the imperatives of ruling circles, still while
it is not sufficient in itself, in combination with the resistance among
the people being brutalized this has happened before and is obviously
the only hope. Note in that regard that Kissinger, ever the illusionist,
here still speaks of "the Vietnam debate". rj]
