I missed this piece by Gene Healey at the time, but it’s well worth a read. Healey a libertarian points out that the neocons don’t merely support lots of particular wars, they are pro-war on principle. Tim Lambert made the same point a while back.
Along the same lines, Spencer Ackerman at The New Republic on the Right’s Vietnam syndrome
John Quiggin 
Healey says that Iraq is the biggest foreign policy disaster in 30 years, thereby putting 9/11 out the back door and out of sight.
The foreign policy distaster was being aware of the potential for 9/11 then allowing 9/11 to happen.
Gene Healey’s perceptive piece on the neo-cons and their love of war and conflict,reminds one of those people in 1914 who welcomed the outbreak of war,and saw it as a way of enriching the lives of nations and people
.Look up the poems of Rupert Brooke just before his death(though he died in Greece of gastro ,,,hardly the stuff of Glory !) !)
Mussoline,Billy Hughes,D”Annunzio,Hitler(the young Hitler) all saw those first days of war rather as the neo-cons see it.
Leeden,who is in fact a writer on Mussolini,and a rather admiring one at that,.. and is the principal advicate of an attack on Iran,among the neo-cons.,is a perfect example.. Google up his names(Michael Leeden)and see the result.
In one regard I disagree with Healey…it may be “politically correct” NOT to remark on that largely Jewish/Likudnik element,but the truth is that the neo=cons are made up a host of right wng Jewish -American intellectuals,Leedon,Pearle,the Kristols,father and son.David Wurmers and David Feeth.,Elliot Abrahms.
Their critics in the US conservative ranks now include Pat Bushanan,General Tommy Franks,Karen Kwiatkowski and a host of other..not people on the Left…who see the neo-cons/Likudniks, as being prepared to sacrifice US interests to those if Israel…on every occasion
.
Nothing else motivites then like the needs of Israel,and the disasters that engulf the USA are largely of their making….Gore VidaL has called them”Israel’s Fifth Column”,,,a world war two reference to traitors ,which doesn’t please them at all ,apt though it is
The disaster in Lebanon,and the war in Iraq worry the neo-cons mightily because Hizbollah showed that Israel might not be unbeatable..and what does that portend for its’ future…so the attack on Iran which they crave,might be egually disasterous!!.
Is this a neocon position? Americans since the time of Woodrow Wilson have embraced a brand of democratic idealism that has often led them to war. The idealism – for example that democracy should replace ugly Islamic fundamentalism – seems fine as an ideal. Its just that pursuing it militarily – which politicians of all persuasion in the US favour – creates new uglinesses.
I think the world would be a better place if nations pursued democracy as an ideal so I agree with the values. But despite the good intentions in places like Iraq I think the outcomes raise doubts about intentions.
Rog,
At current rates it will take 12-18 months before the number of American dead in Iraq overtakes the numbers lost in 9/11. The financial costs, and the numbers of wounded, are already far higher. Of course it is a tricky calculation whether a military death equals a civilian death.
Nevertheless, from the American perspective, Iraq has cost more than not preventing 9/11. Of course if a stable and democratic Iraq emerged from the process those costs might be judged worth it. But since that almost certainly won’t happen I think Iraq has top billing as the disaster of the tri-decade.
“But despite the good intentions in places like Iraq I think the outcomes raise doubts about intentions.”
I never was a supporter of the war, but I don’t think the decision to fight can be criticised on this basis.
You can never deduce intentions from outcomes.
The only means to adduce unstated intentions is to scrutinise methods.
When there is a clear mismatch between stated intentions and methods, then it is legitimate to suspect unstated intentions.
1. The fact that Iraq is a large producer of oil causes suspicion, but allows no conclusion.
2. The fact that the only Iraqi facilities defended after the fall of Saddam were connected with oil deepens that suspicion, but again is not conclusive.
3. The fact that the US imposed a constitution on Iraq that singled oil out makes the suspicion still deeper.
4. The fact that just over a week ago the Senate unanimously passed a resolution withdrawing funding from Bush’s efforts to impose US control over Iraqi oil suggests that there are many close to government who have their own suspicions about Bush’s intentions as well. But again, this isn’t conclusive.
No, as it stands, I have to plump for:
5. The neocons were such an ignorant and arrogant pack of coots they couldn’t frame an intelligent intention. What we see here isn’t conspiracy, at least not one truly worthy of that dark designation. What we have here is a stuff-up of truly Texas proportions.
We have now shifted from a neocon conspiracy to a texan oil man conspiracy to a lack of conspiracy.
I have a simple hypothesis which I have found useful in understanding neo-cons.
Hypothesis: Every neo-con wants to be Winston Churchill.
Just before WWII Churchill was a pretty washed up politician who had little prospect of ever again holding high office. He was unpopular with just about everyone including his own party. He was viewed as a war monger, which was a particularly unpopular thing in the wake of WWI. He was constantly going on about the Nazi threat and advocating re-armament when the whole country was sick of war. Of course he turned out to be right.
To my mind the easiest way to understand a neo-con’s position on any issue is to imagine a perso who has read Winston Churchill’s “The Second World War”. Then imagine that perso is trying to live out a semi-fantasy version of it in the present day with themselves, or people they support in the role of Winston Churchill.
Its why neo-cons want Islamic Fundamentalism to be the new fascism, hence the Islamofascist label. They want to be right about it being a threat to civilisation while everyone else just doesn’t get it. Its why they have a long history of overstating threats to the US. Its not just with Islam. They did the same with the soviets. Their overestimates of soviet capabilities during the 70s/80s turned out to be laughable.
Oh, and its why they are always pro-war. Can’t be Winston Churchill if you’re not pro-war.
what swios says.
In fact the right want the laughably and idiotically named ‘war on terror’ to be the cold war redux. Howard’s Q50 speech was a perfect ilustrastion of the themes and thinking (if you can all it that). The gwot has now become totally detached from any reality based assessment of practical policies, and has entered the realm of rhetorical flim flam.
I suspect that there is a fair bit of panic about as to what to do next, and while people are trying to figure out what to do, we are all being treated to mood music-you know like when the movies used to break down, and you’d get some music to quieten things, while the projectionists tried to fix the film.
The other thing I think must be panicking people a bit, is the fact that it is quite clear that absolute majorities in both the UK and Australia, and now the US simply don’t beleive a word that is being said about any of it, except that a terrorist attack must be repelled. Hence the pathetic and now quite counterproductive attempt to label dissenters on the gwot theme as well as opponents of the Iraq war, as soft left totalitarian, liberty hating traitors. Problem is, it is not a ‘soft left’ position so much as it has turned out to be a majority commonsense position. Woops!
I suspect that there is a fair bit of panic about as to what to do next, and while people are trying to figure out what to do, we are all being treated to mood music-you know like when the movies used to break down, and you’d get some music to quieten things, while the projectionists tried to fix the film.
Nice analogy. The calm before the storm.
The above few comments are not representative of mainstream, or commonsense opinion.
The same sort of stuff was being bleated all over just prior to the Bali bombings, about how over the top Downer et al were with terror warnings.
As soon as the Sari Club was blown up, it was “why weren’t we warned”.
stephenl –
The number of dead from Sept 11 attacks according to the 9/11 commission report was 2973 (plus 24 missing presumed dead and not including the 19 hijackers). The number of dead from the COW currently stands at 2976 according to icasualities as of today.
The number of Americans killed is just about equal (2738 and 2739 respectatively).
Didn’t the Howard government come out with “They wouldn’t be singling out Australians ! ” after the horror Bali bombing event .
Australians do not like to “children overboarded ” on a continual basis.
The American press appears to be doing a better job in giving the full story of the war in Iraq .
It is not “equal”, 2973 plus 2976 = 5949.
“I missed this piece by Gene Healey at the time, but it’s well worth a read. Healey a libertarian points out that the neocons don’t merely support lots of particular wars, they are pro-war on principle.”
Crap.
The leftists have gotten the United States into four major wars in the last one hundred years (WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam), at a cost of roughly 500,000 American dead (and millions of enemy dead, including civilians, killed by our military).
The rightists have NEVER gotten the United States into a majoi war…never.
“But the current squawking also strikes me as a useful reminder of how very, very important war is in the neoconservative vision. It is as central to that vision as peace is to the classical liberal vision.”–Healy
Peace might be important to the classical liberal (i.e. right wing) vision, but it sure isn’t important to the vision of modern liberals (i.e. left wingers) like Woody WIlson, FDR, Harry Truman, Jack Kennedy, or LBJ.
Those guys are the real warmongers, not guys like Cal Coolidge, or Ron Reagan.
Military actions should always be the last resort. But they must be an option. In the case of islamic fascism, it’s a problem the whole world faces, much like nazism. In fact, most islamic fascism has been targeted at non-US interests. Same was true of nazism. It would be preferable for everyone to work together to fight problems like islamic fascism but not everyone fought nazism either. Just because someone isn’t willing to fight it does not mean that those of us who do want to fight it cannot do so.
“Americans since the time of Woodrow Wilson have embraced a brand of democratic idealism that has often led them to war.”
Rubbish, Harry. During the Cold War, for example, the US propped up or put in power any dictator they thought would serve their national interest even if it meant crushing democracy. Examples include Afghanistan and Chile.
What dictator did the US propr up in Afghanistan?
“the US propped up or put in power any dictator they thought would serve their national interest”
Just like every other country on planet Earth.
Eisenhower got the US into Vietnam, not Kennedy. However, I agree on one point: the only US president to have had the sense to get out before they got stuck in the mud was Clinton. Kennedy, LBJ, etc, simply thought that politically they couldn’t afford to lose a war. Both sides have generally gone along with the principle that war is the best way to promote US global interests. Until it’s too late.
I’m reading Nineteen eighty-four at the moment. Although we only have a touch of totalitarianism in this country, there are spooky parallels with the contemporary geo-political situation:
“The enemy of the moment always represented absolute evil, and it followed that any past or future agreement with him was impossible.”
In his final speech Eisenhower warned against the “military-industrial complex”.
Eisenhower sent US troops to Vietnam?
milano803, I meant to say Iran, where the USA and Britain was involved in the 1953 overthrow of Mohammed Mossadegh’s democratic government. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Mossadegh
Your link blames the British
Rog –
What I meant was the number of dead American Service persons has just over taken the number of American Citizens killed in the 9/11 attacks. There were some 200 + people also killed in the 911 attacks who were not American citizens, just as there are 200 or so troops from other countries have died.
Yesterday, another 5 Americans were killed in Iraq which means another 5 tragedies for 5 more families.
Should the US have stopped fighting Japan when the number of American casualties exceeded that of Pearl Harbor?
In trying to reach a numerical decision about the ‘biggest foreign policy disaster in 30 years’, don’t Iraqi casualties count?
Another archetypal neocon is Mark Steyn, who cemented his war monger credentials in August by advocating that Israel attack Syria. His version of giving war a chance is ‘creative instability in the Middle East’. In its most general form, the rationale is this:
The leftists have gotten the United States into four major wars in the last one hundred years (WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam)”
Well there you go. A righty distancing himself from “the greatest generation”.
“Eisenhower got the US into Vietnam, not Kennedy.”
Hogwash.
‘Well there you go. A righty distancing himself from “the greatest generationâ€?.’
Not at all. Just pointing out the left’s (at least the American left’s) penchant for warmaking.
Dave Surls,
Eisenhower made a commitment to support the French war effort in Indochina in 1950 – especially with tanks and aircraft. From then on the US supplied the majority of French armaments and, following the French loss at Dien Bien Phu, intervened directly to prevent a settlement at Geneva in 1954 as well as having their own man Ngo Dinh Diem installed as president to replace the discredited (pro-French) emperor Bao Dai. Edward Lansdale was moved from the philippines where he had organised a successful campaign against the US’s WW2 allies, the Hukbalahap, to Saigon where he tried the same stuff against the Viet Minh. Eisenhower was also involved in a discussion with the Joint Chiefs of Staff about whether the US should nuke Hanoi – fortunately he opposed the course that was being urged on him by the military. Kennedy inherited a situation in which the US was already deeply involved militarily – all he did was escalate the commitment.
One could also, of course, mention the overthrow of the democratically elected Guatemalan government in the early 1950s, the installation of Arbenz in Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, the Iran Contra business and the invasion of Grenada under Reagan. But I’m not defending the Democrats – both sides are only too willing to go to war.
“Eisenhower made a commitment to support the French war effort in Indochina in 1950 – especially with tanks and aircraft. From then on the US supplied the majority of French armaments…”
That is incorrect. The first American troops (advisors) to go Vietnam and the first American arms shipments to the French were sent by President Truman. Eisenhower didn’t take office until 1953.
Sorry, but Vietnam was the liberal Democrat’s baby all the way.
I stand corrected. But I do object to the term ‘liberal’ being associated with imperial ventures.
Eisenhower was surely in power by the time Diem was installed in 1955. Lansdale went there in 1953. Eisenhower was also responsible for Guatemala and initiated, shortly before he left office, the incredibly stupid plan that culminated in the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba. Eisenhower was also in power when the US overthrew the democratically elected government of Arbenz in Guatemala (in my previous comment I got the latter mixed up with Somoza the Nicaraguan dictator that the US consistently intervened to support).
It was LBJ who presided over the invasion of Dominican Republic. Nixon who had half a million Cambodians killed by bombs, Reagan who invaded Grenada, McKinley who invaded the first Philippine Republic in 1898 and grabbed Cuba from Spain… really, who cares which party they came from?
“…really, who cares which party they came from?”
I suppose that would depend on whether you were interested in supporting the political party that got half a million Americans killed in various foreign wars…or the one that didn’t.
“Giving war a chance”
I think it’s pretty obvious which side of the political spectrum has been more willing to give it a chance…and it ain’t the right side.
When speaking of disasters one should not omit the wars between and within Muslim nations; post 1950 some 13million have perished in conflicts in Algeria, Sudan, Afghanistan, Somalia, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen, Chechnya, Jordan, Chad, Kosovo, Tajikistan, Syria, Iran and Turkey.
As an example the invasion by Pakistan of Bangladesh in 1971 and subsequent war resulted in an estimated 1.5million fatalities.
The war between France and Algeria (1954-62) resulted in deaths estimated between 350,000 and 1 million.
This year,,is the 50th anniversary of the infamous British-French-Israeli attack on Egypt,which ended in disaster for the culprits,and had to do with the perfectly reasonable Egyptian desire to own the Suez Canal.
Britain and France couldn’t imagine a world where they didn’t dominate the Canal..and Egypt for that matter,and the French wanted to stop Nasser,the new and charasmatic Egyptian leader,who openly assisted the restive Algerians,who would eventually throw the French out of Algeria.
Israel provided a trigger,invading Egypt…giving the other two powers the “excuse”to “protect” the Canal by invading the area.
Israel was keen to destroy Nasser,and anyway,it’s has never seen a war in the Middle East ,of which it disapproved.
However Eishenhower…in the middle of a Presidential election,disapproved,and with Soviet pressure as well,the UK-French operation was stopped, and it all ended badly for the agressors.
The Egyptians expelled the Europeans who had long run the Canal,and thought themselves indespensible…only to have the Russians come in an do the task.
The French lost Algeria anyway,and Anthony Eden,the British P,M was doomed…just like Blair,and was gone within a year.
On of Eden Minister.Anthony Nutting,resigned in protest and wrote a telling exposure of the whole conspiracy called “No End of a Lesson”.
It’s a interesting read . Oddly the US had a quite constructive role in the crisis,and later JFK and Nasser had a long correspondence on the crisis.
On suspects that wouldn’t be possible now. I suspect Bush is functionally illerate,and the Zionists in the White House wouldn’t let him anyway.!
After Eden, Britain abandoned the “East of Suez” policy and never again got involved in such a disaster until Blair’s pride and folly dragged them into Iraq.
In Egypt,thousands of Egyptian civilians were killed ,by French and Briti”surgical” strikes on Egyptian cities in the Canal Zone.
As they were only Arabs it didn’t trouble Western Opinion too much…and our very own Robert Menzies made a “cameo”appearance(always the faithful lapdog of London !) being sent by his British masters to sound out Nasser,who gave him short shrift.
He said of Menzies that he was a “bullying,blustering Bushman!”‘..not too bad a description…as least the first two words!