The problem with Afghanistan is the same as the problem with Iraq. That is that there are only a few influential Americans who are willing to live there. Which is why we live in an improper empire.
Neither GWBush and much less so BHObama are suited to be Emperor of America. Nor are they nearly as corrupt as those who sold Rome down the river before the era of Ceasar. But all warring states face similar problems when their armies are far afield and the reality of war is something that can be manipulated on the homefront.
In my current reading of Roman history, I have found no phrase so compelling as "Jugurtha in chains". The story is basically that of a young general by the name of Gaius Marius who, following the command of his superior captured the arch-enemy of Rome, this cat named Jugurtha. Now Jugurtha was famous for having basically hung out with Roman armies and learning their tactics, then turning against Rome, not unlike a certain Osama bin Laden. And like Osama, Jugurtha got powerful and famous by saying such things as urbem venalem et mature perituram, si emptorem invenerit, which rougly translated means you Americans all smell like Bernie Madoff to me.
But Jugurtha doesn't get to send podcasts to the ancient equivalent of Al Jazeera for long, because he has the crap beaten out of his armies by Gaius Marius. Marius returns to Rome with Jugurtha in chains and after this perp walk, gets a ticker tape parade. Now imagine for a moment that Gaius Marius changed his name to David Petraeus. Do you think he could get elected President? Well I'd say the odds are stupendously high that he would. And so Marius ended up 'elected' president of Rome seven times in a row. Which brings us to the subject at hand. Does violence ever solve anything?
Hell yes.
There's another story whose origins I can't recall about a young student who said that in class to a notorious history professor. The professor doesn't beg to differ, he cites historical fact until the student begs for mercy. But then sometimes he's gentle and merely says 'Tell that to the Cathaginians'. Students of Roman history would know that a bald headed master orator name Cato used to say at the end of his every speech in the Roman Senate: "Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam." Which again roughly translated means 'Beat Notre Dame'. Now if you know anything about USC football, you know that basically this happens every time. And so during the multiple Punic Wars between Rome and Carthage, when the Romans were down, Cato reminded them time and time again that this must be a fight to the finish.
You don't have to be much of a scholar to know that the great library at Alexandria was burned to the ground and much of the knowledge of antiquity lost. There are all kinds of things we might have known about the ancients that remain mysteries except the Carthaginians were wiped of the face of the planet, and their little dogs too. And so there is that historical fact that tends to nag the thoughtful who support the sentimental tactic of non-violence. Sometimes you can't just talk your way to safety.
Which still leaves us with the question of empire and other interesting matters. So let me weave one more story in. Last week, I sat incredulous in a debate about whether or not we could win in Afghanistan against the Taliban or in South Central Los Angeles against the Crips. My interlocutors seemed absolutely convinced that both were unwinnable. As in physically impossible. Huh? What? Destroy one crackhouse they said, and another one just pops up in its place. We can't possibly win in Afghanistan, nobody has ever done so. Given them the benefit of the doubt, what I percieve them to be suggesting is that we American really don't want to take over Afghanistan or South Central. We really could, but it's not worth it essentially for the same reasons. Such places are not useful. There are no spoils worth taking, no loot worth looting. There is nothing you can give your soldiers except pride, and armies don't travel on their egos. There's nothing to bring back to the homefront - no oil, no gold, no land, only.. Jugurtha in chains.
That being the case we have to admit that violence is good for something. It may or may not take a village to raise a child, but it takes an army to bring the enemy to heel. Faced with the dilemma of how much the scalp of bin Laden is worth, we have a president mincing words and trying to determine if our war is properly located in Afghanistan or in Pakistan. And, after all, is the Taliban worth destroying? Moreover is Pakistan or Afghanistan worth destroying?
It is a question that will not be answered in the next four years unless we have an incredible streak of luck, because what America hasn't done in any respect for the past 8 years is destroy. We've pecked and punished and occasionally pulverized this or that town, but we haven't waged much more than a politically defined series of coordinated skirmishes. The very idea that America is dithering over the size of a 'surge' should tell you everything you need to know. If you are a student of history which I'm trying to be, I think you would find that the old USA is fighting fair, and that is the exception rather than the rule of warfare. What I mean explicitly is that we are not out to conquer and destroy. Iraq has seen perhaps 3 entire weeks of shock and awe, then six years of counterinsurgency & system administration.
The distance between quagmire and indecision is a short one. But the distance between victory and defeat is very broad. GWBush gave Americans a very clear definition of victory, and he repeated and refined it so many times and so many ways that it is almost impossible for BHObama to define it otherwise. Bush didn't produce that victory but we understood the terms. Now we have no terms that are broadly understood except a vague longing for the sort of 'victory' that people imply cannot be won by violence. And yet America remains at war. Why? And how do we win? When?
BHObama talks as if his coming to power is all the world needs to know that America can be peaceable. That makes perfect sense if you are not facing American armies every day, for example if you live in Oslo. A change in attitude is all you need if you're not involved in the violence. But does anyone believe that such a change in attitude will bring Jihadists to heel, especially if we are out to bring their leader home in chains? The Jihadis have nothing to bargain with except their honor and their lives. There is nothing they possess in their nations that we want, not land, not loot worth fighting a war of conquest. All we want the head of their leader and the guts of their organizations. Have we been negotiating all this time? No. We've been using short loads of violence.
If I were in the army, I'd hate my fire being set to lukewarm in the face of enemy bullets and bombs. If I were in the White House, I'd hate my policy remaining on lukewarm in the face of the potential successor who actually does the capturing of bin Laden. Violence does solve problems and it's going to be hard as hell to suggest otherwise whether our armies come back dead without bin Laden, or alive with him.
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