Column: Succeeding in Alienating the Islamic World
From what I could gather, we’re fighting a whole lot of people on a whole lot of untold flanks. It was as though Mr. Bush had heard one too many episodes of The Shadow, who always knew, of course, where evil lurked. But not all of us are up to the Shadow’s mystical powers -- and I must say, we’re getting plenty scared. Early on we didn’t like the idea of going into -- or over -- Afghanistan with guns blazing and bombs going pop. Bush’s decision to do so has left the United States with little room for escape from the catastrophic appearance of taking on Islam itself. The decision was, I believe, a big, big mistake. More thoughtful means of quietly tracking and garroting the murderous blighters were preferable.
But now we’re there and we had best figure out how to accomplish something -- anything -- and then get the hell out and stay the hell out before all of Islam decides America is up to greater no good than Osama bin Laden. The alternative risks a genuine world war. Amidst the True Grit of Thursday night, the president said “the truth of the matter is, in order to fully defend America, we must defeat the evildoers where they hide. We must round them up and we must bring them to justice. And that’s exactly what we’re doing in Afghanistan.” If so, we must be beaming them up from 10,000 feet, because that’s as close as we’re getting to them. If a decisive deployment against the Taliban defensive line protecting the evildoers in that misogynistic wasteland is truly inevitable, then let’s get it over with and scram.
Still, after the brawl and further loss of innocents, the deeper problem will remain: What then? What then after another attack on American civilians? What then after identifying extensive terrorist cells in Iraq, Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia, and perhaps several other sovereign nations? What then?
11The president said “we must rid the world of terrorists so our children and grandchildren can grow up in freedom. It is essential. It is now our time to act.” He added “we’re going to slowly but surely tighten the net on terrorists wherever they live. And it’s essential to do so now.” While he’s in the process of protecting our children and grandchildren from terrorism now, has he given thought to the children and grandchildren of today’s terrorists? Millions of Islamic youngsters are being indoctrinated with virulent anti-Western hatred and told they’re the second line of attack. So what of them? And what of their children? And their children’s children?
We’re not faced with one living cesspool of insanity that, at some point believed to be crushed, will be at an end. We’re faced with a twisted world view of how to effect change that will span generations and increase in intensity -- not decrease -- as we go about merely amputating its appendages. Only a fundamental reappraisal of America’s relationship to the world will prompt a reciprocal reappraisal. For this to happen, a sizable dose of White House creativity is sorely needed. Specious analogies to Vietnam have lessened the legitimacy of accurate ones, nevertheless we must recall the Vietnamese experience in at least one major respect. Our best and brightest tried everything except freeing themselves from self-imposed restraints of ideological thought and deed. They bungled in understanding Vietnam and thus in resolving Vietnam. The nationalists just dug in, took costly guerrilla potshots, and waited for us to collapse.
We may be stuck with the same deplorable fate or worse, given the pronounced transition in White House strategy from patient pursuit to remedial militarism. The bad moon is rising. As the New York Times reported to no one’s surprise October 13, the war hawks -- who initially advocated a shotgun approach that would have included Iraq -- have finally outweighed Colin Powell. The Times wrote that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld “is content to serve as executor of a more limited policy focusing, for now, on Afghanistan. But in public statements and private councils, Mr. Rumsfeld argues forcefully that the war on terrorism must span the globe and will last for years.” The president echoed this frightful forecast Thursday night when he said “we will also bring to justice the host governments that sponsor them, that house them and feed them.” In other words, we have no strategy prefaced by the word “exit.”
Aside from Bush’s wacky assertion that September 11 proved the sound reasoning behind his missile defense system, his most troubling comment Thursday was that “I’m amazed that there’s such misunderstanding of what our country is about that people would hate us. I am -- like most Americans, I just can’t believe it because I know how good we are.” Those on-the-surface innocuous words were, in reality, the granddaddy of all jaw-droppers thus far into his administration. They demonstrated an utter presidential ignorance of world history and our past and present wrongs in abetting cruel, oppressive, undemocratic governments throughout the world, which have in turn generated an indigenous, malignant hatred of the United States.
None of that could ever justify the madness committed against Americans on September 11. Nothing ever will. But Bush’s public befuddlement revealed his absolute inability to view the world through empathetic eyes -- which likewise explains his inability to understand why all needy Americans don’t love others living on easy street. To this president, one is forced to conclude, the homeless, the underemployed, the underpaid, the uninsured, the underfed, and all the other domestic voices of discontent simply have a “misunderstanding of what our country is about.” They and so much of the world.
The president favorably impressed most of the public and quite a few editorialists last Thursday with his folksy “grit” and rehabilitated syntax. He impressed others, I am sincerely sorry to write, in a far different way. He came across as out of touch with reality.
P. M. Carpenter is a writer, student of history, and professional artist. His artwork site is: http://www.geocities.com/pmcarpen2000