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In
their relentless drive to begin the American conquest
of the Middle East, the War Party has lost all sense
of proportion. This administration and its supporters
have completely abandoned whatever sense of prudence
they may have once possessed and pulled out all the
stops in their campaign to justify their reckless course.
Their unforgivable irresponsibility
is underscored when one considers their non-response
to the horrific threats now emanating from the Bizarro-World
regime of North Korea. Faced with starvation, backed
up against the wall by a combination of its own insane
policies and those of its enemies in Washington, Pyongyang
is embarked on a road that can only end in conflagration
– a war that could go down in history as the worst,
the bloodiest ever. And yet George W. Bush's spokesman,
the other day, dismissed the gathering Eastasian storm
as "a
regional problem."
Yes, "a regional problem"
– if the nuclear obliteration of an entire region can
be so characterized.
Not that Washington is unaware of, or
indifferent to, the escalating crisis: the other day,
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld conceded what non-interventionists
have been saying since the end of the cold war – that
U.S. troops should
withdraw from the Korean peninsula. Was this because
he has suddenly been converted to a less aggressive,
more rational foreign policy? Unfortunately not, and
the response of our South Korean allies is a clue as
to why. The New York Times reports:
"Officials here said today that
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had ignored them
in suggesting realignment of American forces in Korea
and demanded that they stay where they are at least
until resolution of the North Korean nuclear issue."
So what's up with that? Haven't
the South Koreans and their newly-elected President,
Roh Moo Hyun, been complaining about the presence of
U.S. troops, who act more like an army of occupation
than a force that is supposed to be protecting the peninsula
from a North Korean invasion? Didn't the Democratic
Millenium Party come to power on the strength of a nationalist
resentment against the all-pervasive presence of the
Americans, who blocked the "sunshine policy"
of Roh's predecessor and rattled the North by including
them in the "axis of evil"? Shouldn't they
be dancing in the streets? In a word: no, and
here's why:
"'We agree it's a critical issue,'
said Song Young Gil, a National Assembly member from
Mr. Roh's Millennium Democratic Party. 'After the nuclear
crisis is solved, at that time we will consult on this
problem.' Mr. Song shared a view, increasingly heard
here, that any American proposal to move troops from
near the line with North Korea may mean that the United
States intends to attack North Korean nuclear facilities
against the wishes of the South Korean government. The
logic behind this thinking is that the United States
would want its troops out of harm's way in case North
Korean ground forces retaliated by striking across the
demilitarized zone.
"'American troops are something
like hostages to attack by North Korea,' said Mr. Song.
'Maybe this kind of action means some kind of signal
for a pre-emptive strike against North Korea.'"
Last week, George
W. Bush wouldn't rule out force as an option in
dealing with North Korea. A few days later, his Secretary
of Defense suggests its time to get U.S. troops out
of the line of fire on the peninsula, and, perhaps,
out
of Korea entirely.
In the context of the developing game
of nuclear chicken that is taking place on the Korean
peninsula, U.S. withdrawal does not mean a policy of
non-intervention: the North Koreans rightly read it
as a prelude to a period of heightened hostilities,
and quite possibly a preemptive strike. From the perspective
of the North Korean military, which has been in a state
of high alert since the beginning of the crisis, it
looks like the U.S. is clearing the decks for an all-out
attack.
For Rumsfeld to make such a statement
goes way beyond his ordinary blustering style: it dramatizes
why our war-maddened "leaders" cannot be entrusted
with power. That he said it without even bothering to
inform the South Koreans – who would be instantly vaporized
in a military confrontation between Washington and Pyongyang
– shows that it was meant as a provocation, pure and
simple, and a highly dangerous one at that.
Yes,
U.S. troops should leave Korea – they should have done
that many years ago. But this administration has now
ratcheted up the crisis atmosphere on the peninsula
to such a fever pitch that any precipitous American
action must be preceded by direct talks with Pyongyang
– and a mutual pledge of nonaggression. The Bush
administration has stubbornly refused to take this obvious
tack, because it misreads Pyongyang, misunderstands
what is happening in Korea, North and South, and is
misleading the American public when it comes to the
origins of the present crisis.
What
kind of "conservative" administration is it
that throws prudence to the winds and refuses to learn
from history? This kind: one wearing ideological blinders
so skewed that they cannot see what is happening right
in front of their eyes.
Just
as Marxian socialism imploded in Eastern Europe and
the former Soviet Union, so the same process – delayed
but not to be denied – is taking place in North Korea.
As the free market economist Ludwig von Mises pointed
out in the 1930s, socialism is doomed to fail due to
its inherent defects and the epistemological impossibility
of central planning. The North Koreans, like the
Soviets, the East Germans, and the Chinese, are faced
with "the impossibility of economic calculation
under socialism," as
Mises put it in Human Action:
"The paradox of 'planning' is
that it cannot plan, because of the absence of economic
calculation. What is called a planned economy is no
economy at all. It is just a system of groping about
in the dark. There is no question of a rational choice
of means for the best possible attainment of the ultimate
ends sought. What is called conscious planning is precisely
the elimination of conscious purposive action."
The post-Soviet socialist regimes have
had to make a choice: economic rapprochement with the
West, or complete economic and social isolation. It
wasn't Western missiles that liberated the peoples of
the former Soviet bloc, but the long arm of American
culture – the culture of prosperity – that reached out
and won the hearts and minds of a rising generation.
In the end, the Red Potemkin village dissolved like
a mirage, and the Berlin Wall fell – not to NATO tanks,
but to the siren song of modernity. Gorbachev saw what
was happening, and moved to co-opt it, but too late.
The Chinese, however, saw it coming early on, when Deng
Xiaoping took his country down what Maoist hard-liners
called "the
capitalist road." Even Vietnam
has followed this path, albeit reluctantly and haltingly,
but North Korea's response to the terminal crisis of
state socialism has been complete isolation – as befits
a land known as the Hermit
Kingdom.
This isolationist policy has ended with
the North Korean people literally eating
the bark off the trees. The crisis of state socialism
in North Korea has led, finally, to the complete breakdown
of the economy. Mass starvation can only lead to mass
insurrection, and Pyongyang has no choice but to break
out of its self-imposed exile – or else face the possibility
of winding up like East Germany. This newfound realism
led to increasing links with South Korea, the revival
of North-South negotiations, and, on June 12, 2000,
the inauguration of South Korea's "Sunshine
Policy" symbolized by the
meeting between Kim
Dae-jung and North Korean "Dear Leader"
Kim
Jong-il.
As
I pointed out in a
previous column, this process ground to a halt the
moment the Bushites took the White House. The South
Koreans were disabused
of the notion that the U.S. would ever allow reunification
of the peninsula, or that Washington would ever permit
Pyongyang a soft landing. The North Koreans, however,
pushed ahead with their break-out strategy, only this
time more aggressively. Instead of trying to get the
South's attention with words of reconciliation, they
turned to the power behind Seoul, the U.S., and demanded
direct negotiations. Washington unwisely turned its
back on Kim Jong-il, who then went ahead with his plan
to get Uncle Sam's attention by any means necessary.
When
the Bushites came to power, we were told that now "the
adults are in charge." But this administration
is more reckless than some street-corner juvenile delinquent
out to prove to the world that he's cool, and not just
when it comes to North Korea. The news the
U.S. had submitted forged "evidence" to the
UN that Iraq had been trying to obtain fissionable
material in Africa is shocking. Not that the U.S. government
couldn't conceive of such a plan, but because they must
have thought they were going to get away with it. Or,
maybe not: news accounts relate that this was a very
crude forgery, with obvious errors throughout, and easily
checkable.
This is reminiscent of something the
Soviets might have done to justify the invasion of,
say, Finland, or Poland, in the final days before the
outbreak of World War II. That the U.S. is now resorting
to such clumsy, lying propaganda is a disgrace. Was
it incompetence – or a deliberate act of contempt directed
not only at the UN, but at the idea that truth matters?
In either case, it is clear that the
adults are not in charge. The lunatics have taken
over the asylum. Behavior that, in the past, would have
gotten people ridden out of town on a rail, or at least
thrust to the margins, is now all the rage, and the
reckless policies of our political leaders are reflected
in the slash-and-burn tactics of their supporters.
A smear campaign of unprecedented proportions
has been directed at the anti-war movement, and, given
the players, that was not unexpected: after all, what
else could David Horowitz do for a living? But it was
a bit of a surprise to see that not even the Roman Catholic
Church is immune from this sort of thing. Glenn
Reynolds, of Instapundit fame, is now telling his readers
that the Pope is really David Duke in a cassock:
"The Vatican has consistently
taken the side of Palestinians, and Arab Muslims generally,
against Israel and Jews, to the point where I can't
really believe any excuses that it's not about anti-semitism.
(I think that there have been a few minor condemnations
of the increasing anti-semitism in Europe, though I
looked and couldn't find any.) Then there's this damning
picture. (Yeah, he's French, but he's also a Cardinal.)
Sorry – readers can defend this sort of thing if they
like. But to me it's just another sign that the Vatican – whose
retreat from anti-semitism was at any rate recent and
shallow – has no moral ground to stand on."
A
serious charge, prompted – by what? The meeting
of Cardinal Roger Etchegaray with Yassir Arafat in an
attempt to resolve the Israeli siege of the Church of
the Nativity in Bethlehem. Oddly, for an alleged "anti-semite,"
the Cardinal also met with Israeli President Moshe Katsav.
But Reynolds is too smart to fall for that strategem:
those of his readers who choose to "defend"
the Pope's inability to take orders directly from Ariel
Sharon are probably neo-Nazis. Or French.
Jesse
Walker took down Reynolds in the online edition
of Reason so effectively that I don't have to
bother doing it here. Thanks, Jesse: you're a pal. But
I just want to note that Knoxville, Tennessee, where
Professor Reynolds holds forth, has long been a center
of militant anti-Catholicism. When the Pope visited
America in 1999, pastor "Dr." Bob Bevington,
of Knoxville Baptist Tabernacle demanded to know, in
a full-page ad in the Knoxville News-Sentinel,
"What
Is The Pope Doing In America?" Answer: he "represents
enormous wealth and power," and came here to subjugate
the country to the dictates of Rome. Another
edition of the same basic hate message was promoted
all over the South by the same folks in 2001. In the
1920s, Tennessee was a bastion of the Ku Klux Klan – the
group was founded
in Pulaski – and anti-Catholic
sentiment played a key role in the state's municipal
elections. Sad to say, it isn't just in the rantings
of Professor Reynolds that this legacy lingers on. Ankerberg
Theological Institute in Nashville, Tennessee, produces
reams of anti-Catholic screeds. In one, "The Spiritual
Battle for Truth" – which can be downloaded for $2
– one Michael Grendon rants:
"Satan has been profoundly successful
in deceiving multitudes in the name of Christ because
his servants appear as ministers of righteousness. They
wear high priestly garments and religious collars and
carry boastful titles such as 'most reverend,' 'right
reverend,' 'his excellency' and 'Holy Father.'"
In
1990, when a meeting of Catholics was scheduled to convene
in Indianapolis, Indiana, a faction of Seventh-day Adventists
based
in Tennessee did a mass mailing of anti-Catholic
propaganda to homes in that city, enclosing pamphlets
describing the Pope as a "beast" and denouncing
the Church as a "pagan" institution.
Reynolds
is just carrying on what is a long tradition in his
part of the country. That the University of Tennessee
plays host to this latter-day Know
Nothing is hardly surprising. Old habits die hard.
What would be astonishing, however, is that anyone,
from this day forward, takes anything Professor Reynolds
has to say seriously.
MATT’S
HERE!
I
am very pleased to draw your attention to our new columnist,
Matthew Barganier, who debuts today [Monday] on Antiwar.com.
The first time I read a piece by him I was determined
that he would write for us on a weekly basis, and I’m
glad to report that my mission was a success. The
first edition of "Collateral Damage" is
everything I hoped it would be: witty, informed, loaded
with links – and lots of fun. So what’re
you waiting for? Click on the link and check him out….
–
Justin Raimondo
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