Some of you have reported finding that every now and then one of your comments isn’t posting, even though there’s no apparent reason for it. I believe this is due to some rather restrictive settings on my spam filter at the moment, and that it should be a temporary problem. I hope to correct it soon by making the captcha mechanism more functional in eliminating the spam, and then the spam filter can be made less restrictive. Apologies in the interim to everyone who’s encountered any difficulty.
Pelosi, Santos: love that “dialogue” with Iran!
Judith Weiss of Kesher Talk has a theory: Nancy Pelosi is a Karl Rove mole.
Why not? If she’d been invented by the opposition, she couldn’t be doing more to hurt her party.
And, as an aside, I’m getting very sick of that word “dialogue” used by Nancy and company and so many others (follow the link to see what I’m referring to). It’s one of those words that have become popular partly from the influence of therapy: the idea that talking is the royal path to the solution of conflict. “Dialogue” and “communication” are seen as panaceas, and it has become an article of faith that they are virtually always a good thing.
But even therapists must acknowledge that there are times when talking does no good, when therapy is inappropriate, and when the tools of the trade (“the talking cure”) not only don’t work but can be harmful. But Pelosi and Lantos and so many others seem to think of dialogue as something magical and universally appropriate:
…however objectionable, unfair, and inaccurate many of [Ahmadinejad’s] statements are, it is important that we have a dialogue with him.
Why? Why is it important? In order to feel that we are peaceful and good people? In order to empower him to think that we are fools? In order to allow him to buy time while he develops his nuclear weaponry? In order to give him greater prestige in the eyes of the world? In order to afford him propaganda opportunities and photo ops?
Lantos and Pelosi don’t seem to feel the need to explain the value of dialogue; it is felt to be self-evident. But it is not.
The original meaning of the word is “a conversation.” But it has taken on a special meaning in the peace movement: it’s been reified as a good in and of itself.
Here’s a definition of dialogue in that sense, by David Somm:
…a new kind of mind begins to come into being which is based on the development of a common meaning”¦People are no longer primarily in opposition, nor can they be said to be interacting, rather they are participating in this pool of common meaning, which is capable of constant development and change.
Commonality and cooperation rather than opposition is a goal of dialogue, and some element of these must be present in the first place in order to even conduct a dialogue in the sense it’s used here. But these things are not present in a “dialogue” with a group such as the leaders of Iran.
Even Pelosi and Lantos, who so badly want to dialogue with Iran’s leaders, describe them as “repulsive” and “outside the circle of human behavior.” So, does Somm’s definition of “dialogue” apply to them? Can it apply to them?
The bottom line is that to have a dialogue the parties must speak the same language—and I don’t mean the sort of language that can be easily handled by interpreters.
And as the sun slowly sets on the British Navy: the concept of honor
It shouldn’t come as a surprise, I suppose, that the British hostages were given the right by the Ministry of Defense to sell their stories to the tabloids. Society has been heading in that direction for a long time.
The real surprise is that there was a resulting public hue and cry, resulting in that permission being rescinded until further notice, although it doesn’t affect the two such deals known to have been already made.
Liam Fox, the British shadow defence secretary, was critical of the former hostages:
One of the great things about our armed forces is their professionalism and dignity. Many people who shared the anxiety of the hostages’ abduction will feel that selling their stories is somewhat undignified and falls below the very high standards we have come to expect from our servicemen and women.
Ya think?
Of course, it’s unrealistic to expect all members of the military to be immune to the lure of lucre; they are human, after all. But surely, in the past, the Ministry of Defence wouldn’t have given carte blanche to the impulse to sell stories such as these.
It’s the institutional decline of standards that’s especially troubling. If this is what’s going on at the top, why is it any surprise that, as retired colonel Bob Stewart is quoted as saying:
The sailors and marines held in Iran have been so compliant and have already said so much that they have caused excruciating embarrassment to many people in [Britain].
I don’t think I’m just being nostalgic when I say that the vaunted British tradition of “dignity” of which Mr. Fox speaks used to be more commonplace. Dignity is not only an old military tradition; it was formerly more prevalent in civilian life, as well. “Honor” is another way to put it, and the concept includes caring how one appears in the eyes of others (external perceptions)—and, more importantly, an emphasis on the importance of acting so as to preserve one’s internal feeling of self-respect.
Self-respect seems to have morphed into that newer goal, self-esteem. And self-esteem isn’t anchored in the reality of one’s behavior; it’s often seen as everyone’s birthright no matter what said person might actually be doing to earn it.
I don’t think I’m being too hard on the hostages, either. It’s one thing to give in and falsely confess under duress, fear, and threat of torture; especially when, as in the case of these particular hostages, a person has received no special training in how to behave—and resist—if captured.
But, what’s their excuse now?
The good news is that the outrage in Britain over their present behavior seems to have sparked a call for a Naval Board of Inquiry to investigate how their capture could have happened so easily in the first place. An ounce of prevention would be worth more than a pound of cure. Maybe that sun will end up rising again.
Only The Shadow (Sy Hersh) knows. Or doesn’t know. Or something like that.
I’ve written before about journalist Seymour Hersh, whose work presently appears mainly in The New Yorker.
Mr. “hardly ever met a source he was willing to name” Hersh (I’m quoting myself, by the way) has recently expanded his oeuvre by giving this interview on Iranian radio (hat tip: Pajamas Media).
Not to be outdone by the globe-trotting Nancy Pelosi, Hersh has tried to be as helpful as possible to the Iranians. But that strangely vacant rambling quality I’ve noted before in his writing—work I believe would never find a home in the ordinarily well-written pages of the New Yorker if it weren’t for his reputation as the long-ago breaker of the My Lai story—is in evidence in the interview, as well.
Read it. Hersh’s expression of bafflement is the interview’s most salient characteristic. The general message is “I haven’t a clue what’s going on, but that’s not going to stop me from talking about it.”
The interview isn’t long, but in it Hersh says many different times, in many different ways, that he simply doesn’t know anything about what the White House thinks it will do, or why. The most he can say is that there are contingency plans, as though contingency plans for almost every possibility aren’t the duty of the Pentagon.
Hersh’s phenomenal cluelessness doesn’t stop him from offering a few pearls, to wit:
…we are doing more than targeting Iran where inside your country. There are a lot of aggressive activities by the United States. I think we and the Israelis, I have written this, have contacts with Baluchis and the Iranian Kurds all of whom in some cases are happy with the government or in opposition to the government and we are also setting our troops across the border. So there is a lot of aggression by the United States right now on Iran and what happens next nobody knows. So far, Iran has been very quiet….
Perhaps what we are doing is for Israel and oil but I don’t think this president believes that he really thinks his mission is to spread democracy in the Middle East, even though, you could argue that Iran is probably the most democratic country. The elections there certainly indicate people vote what the way they believe….
Sure they do, Seymour, sure they do—and I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn you might want to buy.
So, what is this predilection for treating enemies as though they are friends? Is it a case of “if I play nicely, they will, too?” Or is it just an advanced case of Bush-hatred and Bush-blame? Those are the kindest spins I can put on Hersh’s latest caper.
Diving into Hersh’s earlier interviews is an interesting expedition. There’s the murky thinking (he’s especially poor on constitutional issues–here, for example, in an interview with the UK’s Socialist Worker, he indicates an almost breathtaking lack of understanding of both the Constitution and the Geneva Conventions). And how’s this for specious moral-equivalence comparisons:
My Lai told us that the we don’t fight wars any better than the “nips” and the “krauts”.
Of course. Note how he manages not only to slander the vast majority of US servicemen and women, but how he works in self-aggrandizement in the process: it was Seymour Hersh’s big story, My Lai, that did the great service of telling us that we are no better than the Germans and the Japanese in World War II. No mention of differences of scale or degree, of course (and see this for my take on My Lai).
I’m sure Mr. Hersh’s antipathy to this White House’s policy is multi-determined. As he says in the Iran interview, he “has an opposition to the government” (I assume he meant this administration, but one wonders whether it wasn’t a Freudian slip). But the following extra-added motivation for Bush-hatred—revenge—caught my eye in that Worker interview:
But Bush and his people don’t react enough. Most of the time they just ignore me.
I read the transcripts of the Pentagon’s briefings. The first year of Rumsfeld was a real love-in. Someone would say, “Sy Hersh is at it again” and there would be laughter.
Perhaps Sy is determined to get the last laugh.
Jew-killing: for some, a top priority
One of the hallmarks of rabid Jew-hatred is its irrationality.
Another one of its hallmarks is the appearance of elements of rationality within it. The Jews are hated for reasons, after all: they are too rich, they are too smart, they are too arrogant. Or, they are too poor, they are too stupid, they are too servile. Or….
But this isn’t an attempt to explain the persistence and virulence of anti-Semitism. That would take a book, not a post. Or many, many books, which I think have all been written (here’s the intro to one of them). This is an attempt to describe some of the irrational, dangerous, and extreme ways Jew-hatred works.
Hitler’s anti-Semitism was basic, early, and relentless. Some think it was not a side effect of his drive to go to war but rather one of the main goals of the war itself. The Jews were the inherent enemy of the good, as Hitler saw it, and part of that good was the hegemony of the Aryan [sic] race.
It didn’t matter to Hitler that vast resources, energy, and labor were engaged in hunting down the Jews of Europe wherever they might be and exterminating them, energy that might better be served in winning the war. That may have been because killing the Jews was winning the war in his eyes; if not the whole of it, then at least a vital part of it.
The Jews of Germany never constituted the lion’s share of those Hitler was after; they numbered less than 1% of Germany’s population—although a highly visible and professionally successful one (see this post). Moreover, when Hitler rose to power, he created such dreadful conditions for the Jews of Germany that over 50% had managed to emigrate from that country before World War II began, despite the fact that many other nations had closed their doors to them.
No, ridding Germany of Jews was not the point of Hitler’s Final Solution; ridding Europe of Jews was. And in this Hitler was remarkably successful, as it turns out.
By any rational standard, the Holocaust was counterproductive to German war efforts, except to unite the people against a common enemy. But the Nazis had plenty of common enemies; it’s not at all clear that anti-Semitism was necessary even for unity. Still, Nazi anti-Semitism was so powerfully driven that Jew-killing and Jew-hatred were uppermost in Hitler’s mind to the bitter end, when all was clearly lost. His Political Testament was written shortly before his suicide; in it he offers his chilling swan song, the final words of which are:
Above all I charge the leaders of the nation and those under them to scrupulous observance of the laws of race and to merciless opposition to the universal poisoner of all peoples, international Jewry.
Perhaps he knew the torch would be taken up, and in this he was not incorrect. The perennial popularity of anti-Semitism has been demonstrated time and again by recent events in Europe, the Arab world—and of course Iran.
Many refuse to take Iran’s open, oft-stated, and virulent anti-Semitism seriously. Oh, it’s only anti-Zionism, and reasonable anti-Zionism at that (see the linked post for connections to Munich and the 30s).
Holocaust denial is a linchpin of the mullahs’ modus operandi, and it’s no accident. It’s also no accident that Ahmadinejad is usually careful to couch his threats in the oh-so-politically correct language of anti-Zionism rather than anti-Semitism.
Yes, it’s possible to criticize Israel and not be anti-Semitic. But the nature of so very much anti-Zionist rhetoric—including, of course, the fact that Israel is held to different standards than every other country on earth—gives away the anti-Semitic underpinnings of over-the-top anti-Zionist statements such as Ahmadinejad’s (and see this for a quick discussion of anti-Semitism and it’s relation to anti-Zionism).
The extremity of Iran’s anti-Zionism is part of its bid to gain influence in the Muslim world; after all, it’s a popular stance. But, as with Hitler, it’s not merely a strategic device; the depth of the passion behind it seems sincere. Arguments that Iran would irrationally be signing its own death warrant to attack Israel with any nuclear weapons it might develop, and that therefore this cannot be its goal, are no more valid that arguments about the lack of rationality of the Nazi Holocaust.
In both cases, the goal of Jew-killing is considered to be worth substantial sacrifice, as “moderate” leader Rafsanjani said in late 2001. When he stated that a nuclear-armed Iran (and the Muslim world) would only sustain “damages” from war with Israel whereas the latter would be annihilated, he was positing a cost-benefit calculus that he showed he considered it worth the price.
The real threat Israel poses to Iran, or even to the Arab world, is miniscule, about as large as the threat the Jews posed to Germany. But it would be way too much to ask that logic would prevail; that’s not how human nature seems to work—either now, or then. Or perhaps ever.
[NOTE: I am using the phrase “anti-Semitism” in its traditional and time-honored meaning of “Jew-hatred.” And yes, I know that Arabs are Semites, but the word was coined to mean hatred of Jews and that is what it still means. Sadly enough, the sentiment hasn’t gone out of style.]
Happy Easter!
Happy Easter! Hope it’s as beautiful where you are as it has been where I am.
Cliff walks east and west
I was in San Francisco for a week, and never before have I seen such an uninterrupted stretch of beautiful weather in a city known for fog and cold even in summer.
It’s spring, and the blooming flowers were out—some of them familiar (California poppies and broom and magnolias), some of them unfamiliar (that purple bush and the blue bush and those little lavender thingees).
I stayed at the home of friends who live near cliff walks and classic views of the Golden Gate Bridge. There’s a lookout and a walkway along rocky ledges, strands of eucalyptus and twisted cypress trees, mansions overlooking the precipitous drops to China Beach below and the mirage-like green and brown mountains across the way.
It’s a scene I know well, having been there many times before. But it never fails to awe and surprise, especially the scenic overlooks right before and after the bridge, areas so crowded with cars on nice weekends that it’s impossible to park. The tourists (and I suppose I’m one of them) all want to take photos of themselves in front of the bridge looming so close behind, with Alcatraz a peaceful-seeming island in the nearby bay, and the city gleaming in the background like a magical Oz on a hill—not emerald, but white and shimmering in the very special light that seems to bathe everything here.
I live in a place with islands and cliff walks and a bridge, too. But it has a fraction of the population and tourists, the Atlantic Ocean rather than the Pacific, and four extreme seasons rather than San Francisco’s relative mildness.
And yet, as I explore the San Francisco version, there’s something intensely familiar about it. It’s not that it looks the same, not really. But somehow it feels the same. The birds swoop down, the vistas entice, the waves crash, the views to the opposite shore and then out to the open ocean beckon with an air of excitement and wonder, and the air has that freshness and sweet fragrance that can only be found at the ocean in spring.
I could be home, walking the cliffs that are about a minute from my own house. A cliff walk is a cliff walk is a cliff walk, as it turns out, and one could do worse than travel three thousand miles from one to the other, variations on a single theme.
And for the home audience….
In my post yesterday I talked about the propaganda value the hostages had for Iran:
As I’ve written before, [the propaganda of the event] is a winning situation for the Iranians, both for internal consumption and external. They are made to look first strong and then magnanimous, and the Brits are made to look weak and impotent.
Some in the comments section wondered what I meant; they didn’t see the Iranians as looking strong. I was talking about the following, which Amir Taheri has kindly described and put into historic perspective for us in detail in the Times Online today, to wit:
The seizure of hostages is based on an ancient tradition first practised by early Islamic conquerors. The Arab general Saad Abi Waqqas realised that Muslim fighters were awestruck by the Byzantine soldiers in the early stages of Islamic conquests in the 7th century. He solved the problem by putting captured Byzantine soldiers on show to demonstrate that the “Infidel” were fragile men, not mythical giants…..
[Ahmadinejad] showed that his regime could heighten tension any time. He told his Revolutionary Guards not to be unnerved by the talk of war with the “Infidel”. He enhanced his popularity among Arabs, who now regard him as heir to Nasser, and his dream of wiping Israel off the map. He also used the incident as a smokescreen for a purge of dissidents within the Establishment, putting several prominent figures on trial for “damaging state security”.
Taheri mentions that a similar stratagem was tried last September on American forces near the Iraqi border, but they fought back and were not captured. Interesting. If at first you don’t succeed, try try…on a better target.
Sticks and warships will break my will?
Well, Kenneth Timmerman seems to think that the stick for the Iranians was the USS Nimitz “steaming” towards the Persian Gulf.
“Steaming” is a bit of an anachronism, but you get the idea. Timmerman’s sources for inside info about the workings of the Iranian government are unnamed, and I have no idea whether they are trustworthy or not. So, make of it what you will. But the scenario sketched is a plausible one.
[ADDENDUM: Charles Krauthammer excoriates the useless EU and Security Council. He points out that these institutions have made it more difficult, not less, to get together to solve such matters, by appearing useful (and necessary) when they are actually worse than useless. So, once again, it’s up to the US—and don’t expect a lot of thanks for it.]
Negotiations and that big stick
The commenter known as “unknown blogger” wrote in the previous thread:
“Impotent.” “Weak.” “They must have cut a deal.” [quoting those who criticize the Blair government’s public handling of the affair].
Tsk, tsk. Such a tremendous amount of disappointment around here that this thing was resolved without the typical neo-con diplomatic skill set, namely tough posturing and threats of attack.
Unknown blogger or UB—generally a worthy opponent, by the way, and often the impetus for provocative and informative discussions—is making some fundamental errors here, I believe.
Perhaps UB is correct about a small subset of people; I wouldn’t doubt it. But I think he (unknown? are you a “he?”) demonstrates a misunderstanding of much of the criticism of Blair and the British Navy, as well as a mischaracterization of the neocon mindset and the process of diplomatic negotiations itself.
Much of the anger on the right wasn’t just about the negotiations, but rather the fact that the sailors were left unprotected and vulnerable to this sort of abduction in the first place. After all, it’s not as though the possibility hadn’t been rehearsed through a similar (although somewhat less serious) incident in 2004. It’s not as though there weren’t recent warnings that more of the same might be forthcoming. The “impotence” and “weakness” refers at least in part to the fact that these sailors were left defenseless, showing a lack of preparedness on the part of the British government and the Navy.
For sailors to avoid being sitting ducks it’s not actually necessary for them to fire a shot. It’s just necessary that the Iranians—or whomever the potential enemy might be—need to know that they are able to, and that the rules of engagement allow them to. It’s somewhat analogous to having an effective burglar alarm or bodyguard—it’s not that it makes an attack impossible, but it does make it less likely, because of the perpetrator’s knowledge of the strong possibility of serious and immediate consequences.
So, part of the outrage—and one I share, by the way—is that the hands of the Navy had been tied so tightly by restrictive rules of engagement that they were easily able to be exploited for whatever purpose the Iranians had in mind.
That brings us to the next point. What purpose did the Iranians have in mind? I’m no mind reader, but it’s clear that this incident played out on several levels at once. First, there was the sailors and their fate, and the already-mentioned way they were allowed to be vulnerable to seizure. Next, there was the public posturing, both for the Western public and leaders, and for the locals and the rest of the Arab and Muslm world. And third, there were the hidden goings-on about which we can only speculate, and which may represent a great deal more of the tale than we know.
The first level is the one on which we can pretty much all agree: it is a wonderful thing to see the hostages return. But my position is that, unless the rules of engagement are changed significantly and those changes are communicated in some way to the Iranians (either publicly or privately), then the Brits run the risk of future incidents of this type or of related ones, in which the sensitivity with which troops are forced to operate is used against them for propaganda value.
Which leads us to the second level, that of propaganda. As I’ve written before, this is a winning situation for the Iranians, both for internal consumption and external. They are made to look first strong and then magnanimous, and the Brits are made to look weak and impotent (yes, UB, just as the others have said). In the end, the incident itself is made to look as though talk has triumphed and won the day. See, folks? All we have to do is be nice to one another and it’ll all work out; no need to listen to anyone who says otherwise.
Which brings us to the third level: what may have gone on behind the scenes. I don’t pretend to be privy to that one, either, but one thing of which I’m virtually sure is that there was a behind-the-scenes. And in this case I’d wager it was where the real back-and-forth that led to the release lay.
It is a valid question—actually, a vital one, although unanswerable at this point—to ask whether the backstory involved a deal, a threat, or both. Because if it was a deal rather than a threat, than the Iranians have learned something else about the West, and that is that kidnapping and blackmail and other such techniques work, at least with the Blair government. This is information they will store away for the future, of that you can be sure.
There’s another way in which behind-the-scenes maneuvering may play out to the Iranians’ advantage, and that is on the propaganda level. If, for example, a threat was involved, but it was not heard by the world, then the Iranians still get to look brave and the West craven.
Make no mistake about it, such a perception would be worth a great deal to the Iranians, even if it’s a mistaken one on the part of the world.
Another related perception that comes from the hidden nature of whatever negotiations and/or threats went on is the perception that, as UB himself has stated:
…this thing was resolved without the typical neo-con diplomatic skill set [sic], namely tough posturing and threats of attack.
Whether or not this is actually the case, the perception is that it was. If UB had revised his sentence to take out the phrase “neocon diplomatic skill set” (I’ll get to that point in a minute), and added the word “public” before the phrase “tough posturing and threats of attack,” then I would agree with his description of how it was indeed resolved.
Because the truth is—and UB himself, as an intelligent person, must know this—we only get to see what goes on in public. None of us has any idea what sort of threats may have gone on in private, but from my experience of negotiations and bargaining, it seems only logical that there were some.
That brings us to my last point, UB’s characterization of the “typical neocon skill set.” I’ve written many times before on this blog about similar mischaracterizations of neocon thought; if interested, just go to the right sidebar and read some of my posts under the “neocons” category. And that’s just a sample.
So for now I’ll just say that neocons aren’t interested in threats per se. They are interested in furthering the spread of liberal democracy (funny word that “liberal,” isn’t it?) around the world, and in doing so by peaceful means if possible. There is no neocon rulebook on hostage negotiations, except that they be done with an eye to the messages they convey to the world at large, and that communicating weakness is not a good thing.
Perhaps UB is confusing neocons with Jacksonians, definitely not the same animal, although there can be some overlap. Jacksonians want action rather than words. They probably would have handled the hostage crisis by making sure the sailors weren’t left in such a vulnerable position by extraordinarily restrictive rules of engagement. Once the crisis had begun, however, Jacksonians would probably have advocated less talk (including threats) and more action—for example, a rescue attempt, or even a bombing raid.
Understand that diplomacy has many levels, and only one of them—the blandest, blankest, and most incomplete—is its public face. Threats are definitely a necessary part of diplomacy (except among friendly countries); in the famous words of Teddy Roosevelt: walk softly and carry a big stick.
Part of the size and heft of that stick is the perception that one might just use it if pressed, and that it’s in the enemy’s best interests to make sure it doesn’t come to that.
The British hostages: catch and release
[NOTE: I’ve got an exceptionally busy day today, and so this will be briefer than usual, despite the importance of the news.]
The British hostages have been freed (or are in the process of being freed) by Iran.
This is excellent news in human terms. In political terms, it depends on what cost—if any—was paid for their freedom. In other words, was it the result of a deal or a threat?
Or, alternatively, was it the result of Ahmadinejad simply pardoning them out of “humanitarian considerations,” as he’s quoted as saying in the above article [/sarcasm].
In propaganda terms, the Iranians may have gotten everything they wanted—the humiliation of Britain, the British Navy, and the sailors—and have no reason to continue to hold them further if there’s any chance the ante will be upped.
In strategic terms, they may have learned what they wanted to find out: that they could get away with this and more, without real consequences.
Or perhaps they learned nothing of the sort. I’ve been hoping that all sorts of things were going on beneath the radar of which we knew nothing, and that the public face we were shown was only the tip of a much more formidable iceberg on the part of Britain and the West. Perhaps the iceberg also included a bit of “persuasion” from Iran’s Arab “friends” Syria and Qatar. Iran may be a little bit too much of a loose cannon, and getting a bit too big for its britches (pardon the mixed metaphor), for their liking,
I have a deep respect for the mullahs’ knowledge of how propaganda works, and to my way of thinking they won this particular PR skirmish, big time. I hope they lose the war.
Sanity Squad podcast: the theater of negotiations
The Sanity Squad has another podcast up at Pajamas, this time on the topic of negotiating from strength. Join Siggy, Shrink, Dr. Sanity, and me for a discussion of the perplexing decline of the Western spine.
[Lyricist extraordinaire Dr. Sanity, by the way, has kindly taken me up on a parody based on an earworm that was squirming around my brain—or wherever it is that earworms squirm.]