It’s been more than 60 years since the United States defeated an enemy in a hot war involving a major commitment of American troops. Korea was a draw; Vietnam was a defeat; the First Gulf War did nothing more than evict Saddam from Kuwait; and the Second Gulf War is on-going.
In an important article in today’s OpinionJournal, Shelby Steele, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, observes that
There is something rather odd in the way America has come to fight its wars since World War II . . . Certainly since Vietnam, America has increasingly practiced a policy of minimalism and restraint in war. And now this unacknowledged policy, which always makes a space for the enemy, has us in another long and rather passionless war against a weak enemy.
While Steele doesn’t mention the growing confrontation with Iran, his explanation for the six-decade-long policy of “minimalism and restraint” provides a cogent perspective on how we—and, more generally, the West—are likely to deal with the threat of a nuclear Iran.
The origin of post-World War II minimalism in war, he avers, is “the world-wide collapse of white supremacy as a source of moral authority, political legitimacy and even sovereignty.” White supremecy was embodied in racism, colonialism and imperialism. Steele depicts their legacies this way:
Today, the white West—like Germany after the Nazi defeat—lives in a kind of secular penitence in which the slightest echo of past sins brings down withering condemnation. There is now a cloud over white skin where there once was unquestioned authority.
Minimalism is the West’s attempt to disassociate itself from its past sins. Iraq is a perfect example:
. . . when America—the greatest embodiment of Western power—goes to war in Third World Iraq, it must also labor to dissociate that action from the great Western sin of imperialism. Thus, in Iraq we are in two wars, one against an insurgency and another against the past—two fronts, two victories to win, one military, the other a victory of dissociation.
The collapse of white supremacy—and the resulting white guilt—introduced a new mechanism of power into the world: stigmatization with the evil of the Western past. And this stigmatization is power because it affects the terms of legitimacy for Western nations and for their actions in the world. In Iraq, America is fighting as much for the legitimacy of its war effort as for victory in war.
This explains the attitude of those who sometimes support military interventions on humanitarian grounds, but who always oppose interventions based on the national interest:
Because dissociation from the racist and imperialist stigma is so tied to legitimacy in this age of white guilt, America’s act of going to war can have legitimacy only if it seems to be an act of social work—something that uplifts and transforms the poor brown nation (thus dissociating us from the white exploitations of old).
White guilt transforms our Third World enemies into victims. Accordingly,
We must “understand” and pity our enemy even as we fight him. And, though Islamic extremism is one of the most pernicious forms of evil opportunism that has ever existed, we have felt compelled to fight it with an almost managerial minimalism that shows us to be beyond the passions of war—and thus well dissociated from the avariciousness of the white supremacist past.
Anti-Americanism is a derivative of white guilt:
Anti-Americanism, whether in Europe or on the American left, works by the mechanism of white guilt. It stigmatizes America with all the imperialistic and racist ugliness of the white Western past so that America becomes a kind of straw man, a construct of Western sin . . . Once the stigma is in place, one need only be anti-American in order to be “good,” in order to have an automatic moral legitimacy and power in relation to America . . . This formula is the most dependable source of power for today’s international left. Virtue and power by mere anti-Americanism. And it is all the more appealing since, unlike real virtues, it requires no sacrifice or effort—only outrage at every slight echo of the imperialist past.
Near the end of his thought-provoking article, Steele concludes that
America and the broader West are now going through a rather tender era, a time when Western societies have very little defense against the moral accusations that come from their own left wings and from those vast stretches of nonwhite humanity that were once so disregarded.
Iran, of course, was under the thumb of the West—first the Brits and then the Americans—for decades. With the virtual certainty that Russia and China will veto sanctions, much less military action, will white guilt prevent the United States, Britain, and France from forming a coalition of the willing with enough teeth to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons?
Very interesting post, Marc. Minimalism has become a fixture in our military and political stances. I’m trying to ponder how the Powell Doctrine relates to it. On the one hand, because of narrow parameters, the Powell Doctrine often leads to a craven, “no action” decision, therefore, minimalist in result. On the other hand, its recognition of overwhelming force runs contrary to a minimalist view.
“will white guilt prevent the United States, Britain, and France from forming a coalition of the willing with enough teeth to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons?” Ans: No coalition will be formed. No military action will be taken. Haven’t the CIA said: it’ll take another decade for the Iranians to have their nukes? Bury our heads in the sand, and pretend nothing is going to happen.
Keep in mind that no matter how bad we complain about the ‘left’ they are much less powerful here in America than in EUnuchstan. The best argument I’ve heard for why that is so, is that the two party system, which everyone loathes, prevents the nutjobs from getting real power. The two party system tends to the center.
I think this is just so much self-flagellation!
When you go to war, one of your first policy decisions is what you hope to gain from doing so. Properly viewed, we realized we were at war on Sept 11,2001. Afghanistan was our first campaign of the war, and Iraq was the second.
Our long term policy objectives must be to minimize future terrorist threats by implementing regime change and fostering democratic institutions in those countries that harbor or support terrorists. Contrary to popular opinion, this is not just some sort of fuzzy idealism but hardheaded pragmatism.
Democracy works! Check out the statistics at http://freedomspeace.blogspot.com/ to verify that liberal democracies do not make war on other democracies. Further, they do not commit democide (killing of ones own citizens for political purposes) and they do not have famines. They also have higher per capita incomes than comparable non-democratic nations.
You are right that the current war is on-going, and I suspect that it will continue until we have regime change in Iran, North Korea, and possibly Saudi Arabia, Syria, Somalia and Palestine.
This is not a TV war. It is not going to be over in time for the next commercial. It is a long term strategy that could easily take twenty years to complete, but if it is successful it may be more important than the so-called Cold War(which I suspect is not quite over). It is being exceptionally well fought for these objectives, considering that we are having to make things up as we go. Realize that no one has ever fought this kind of war in the past, and not for these objectives
My biggest fear is that the subversive Main Stream Media (MSM) will manage to undermine this effort as they did the war in Vietnam with their incessant drumbeat of defeatism and misinformation. We were NOT defeated in Vietnam! Check out the memoirs of Gen Giap if you don’t believe me. That war was lost in the MSM and in Congress, not on the field of battle. (John Kerry did his part to defeat us, too)
Vietnam is the only war that communism won against the US (so far), and it was won by a shadowy fifth column that infiltrated academia and all aspects of the media in the 50’s and 60’s. They probably do not pursue this ideology knowingly now, but the attitudes and perspectives remain, to the detriment of our country, and probably the world.
If this war is being fought for the “white man’s burden”, it is because white men just happened to be the first to develop the institutions that offer so much for the future of this planet. Think about it!
This bothers me:
“The collapse of white supremacy—and the resulting white guilt—introduced a new mechanism of power into the world: stigmatization with the evil of the Western past.”
Was/Is it the Germans, the French, the Italians, the Japanese, the Russians, the Chinese, the Swedes the Koreans, the Danes or the Canadians who feel guilty? I would suggest that a large part of the problem is our wealthy, tolerant, detached society is becoming too civilized. Those who MUST stand tall (read Americans, Australians, Israelis, Taiwanese) don’t get as easily sucked in.
Look at Britain vs. EUrope, America vs. Canada, Australia vs. NZ etcetera, one of each above can slack off and still feel safe. The other has no choice but to pick up the neighbors trash and remove his dog shiite.
Rob Farley, who knows a thing or sixty about military strategy and operations, doesn’t think much of this argument. See here and here. Food for thought.