RoR: Forum

Ok, Ed, now I feel I have a better idea of how you are thinking. I think you prefer to be clever than to make a cogent point sometimes. Oh, I also forgot to address your issue with war vs. peace. I meant that I would, for example, say that the Iraq war was over when the Iraqi government fell and Saddam was run out/captured. Basically, Iraq as the nation had been ceased to exist. This was accomplished with few casualties. However, when I speak of the peace I speak of the aftermath, of what happens after the war.

The history of warfare shows that this very neglected area is just as important as the war itself, sometimes more so. For example, the military victory in WW I led to WW II - not a very good waging of the "peace" at all. In contrast, the winning of WW II had a little of both. In the West, we won the Peace and won Western Europe and Japan as allies rather than enemies, to the benefit of every side. On the other hand, the threat of Communism was minimized too much during the war and caused a great deal of trouble later, some of which may have been better prepared for ahead of time.

As to your latest point, let me think about it and get back to you. I think that once you start to go from individuals and deal with large numbers of people from a political, economic, diplomatic, and self-defense perspective, things start getting hairy and more and more complex. Individualism we can all agree on (at least here), but how is it dealt with in the larger perspective without succumbing (as you say I am) to collectivism? We are probably again, way off-topic by now.

Post 61

Friday, July 15, 2005 - 10:43am

Kurt,
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I meant that I would, for example, say that the Iraq war was over when the Iraqi government fell and Saddam was run out/captured.� Basically, Iraq as the nation had been ceased to exist.� This was accomplished with few casualties.� However, when I speak of the peace I speak of the aftermath, of what happens after the war.
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Kurt, I now see your perspective more clearly. Your very conception of war involves nation-building -- but that's not what war is, and that's not even what it should be. You view war from an altruistic welfare perspective -- as that which is done for the good of all. I view war from the perspective of justice, not welfare.

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The history of warfare shows that this very neglected area is just as important as the war itself, sometimes more so.� For example, the military victory in WW I led to WW II - not a very good waging of the "peace" at all.� In contrast, the winning of WW II had a little of both.
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"Waging of peace" is a contradiction in terms -- we don't hit others over the head with the mallet of peace, we volunteer to trade with them for mutual benefit. If they decline, then we find others who will trade with us (we don't force them to trade; "forced trade" is another contradiction in terms).

What you call for is a command economy -- projected onto other nations. Command economies don't work -- even though they can survive for awhile (slowly destroying value that was built under free trading), they are not productive of value. They are a dead end. Forcing the world to trade won't work to our interests, it's social engineering -- it doesn't work at home, and it won't work abroad.

Ed

Post 62

Friday, July 15, 2005 - 12:43pm

Ed, I don't think you get it, really. The concept of "waging the peace" is a metaphor contrasting the needs of "waging war" - which is as you describe it, that then asks what is policy going to be following the war? Do we patch up relations? Do we create a more amicable political and security structure? If we don't, and we spent all that effort on a war, the victory is squandered because someone else will come along and take over and they may well be our enemies.

examples - after WW II, by maintaining a military presence and working with europe to rebuild and the establishment of NATO, the hard-won war of "justice" against the Nazis (and Japan in the Far East) created an ally and a way to contain Communist aggression.

If it had been up to you, Ed, would you have just left and said "hey, do whatever you want to"? - well my guess is all of Europe would have been swallowed up by the Commies.

Getting to the end, in no way whatsoever have I advocated a command economy! I never spoke about "forcing" the world to trade. In the current situation, the idea is that having deposed 2 dangerous states - Afghanistan, then Iraq, there is no question that to simply leave would be to allow new dictators and terrorists to reign supreme there, to our detriment. That is not a "command economy" - we did this in Japan and Germany and they are not command economies. I am not trying to say the situation is exactly the same, but it is analagous, because in the absense of restructuring the same threat will keep popping up over and over again.

You seem to think that you can fight a war and totally ignore everything else. Wars don't start nor do they end independent of everything else, and the "Powell Doctrine" of withdrawal was a clear failure because it left a threat that we had to go back and smack down yet again.

Post 63

Friday, July 15, 2005 - 8:22pm

Kurt,

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... what�is policy going to be�following the war?� Do we patch up relations?� Do we create a more amicable political and security structure?� If we don't, and we spent all that effort on a war, the victory is squandered because someone else will come along and take over and they may well�be our enemies.
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Kurt, for someone like me (someone who thinks like I do), this answer just doesn't cut it. At bottom, it is a just a rationaLIZED justification for nation-building. That's what you are "selling" Kurt -- nation-building. Now, don't get me wrong, you are a damn fine salesman (one of the best I've ever encountered). But I'm not a nation-builder, and my tax dollars are going to nation-building, and that's wrong, and I'm not gonna' shut up about it -- and that oughtta' be the end of it.

Imagine this self-same policy at home: Child protection services is called on an abusive father -- he's incarcerated, she files for a divorce. FBI agents follow his wife around town, hell-bent on making sure the new man in her life is a good man -- one who'll take good care of the kids and her. The government takes a personal stake in her life -- the government thinks that either: it is in possession of a greater good than her, or it has superior recognition of greater goods than her. That's what you're saying we ought to do -- do the thinking for other nations.

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If it had been up to you, Ed, would you have just left and said "hey, do whatever you want to"? - well my guess is all of Europe would have been swallowed up by the Commies.
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I would've just left, that's for sure. Nature needs to take its course -- that's how folks learn virtue, by experience, NOT BY FORCE. To be sure, I would've by then started a self-replenishing, free-market fund -- much like my TRUE-ANSWER national lottery -- aimed at the execution of any and every communist leader exerting influence.

The US is the strongest. We do have the economic and military power to undertake perpetual assassinations of each and every key, anti-life leader in this world. What we DON'T have the economic and military power to do, is to be the world's nanny -- setting up hundreds and hundreds of tax-sustained military bases housing thousands upon thousands of tax-sustained soldiers.

Now, let me ask a question, Kurt:
Was post-war success in Japan primarily due to post-war welfare to Japan -- or was it due to free-market mechanics in Japan (the Japanese adoption of a better way of doing things)?

I suspect we have different answers to this question -- and that these different answers underlie our difference of opinion on how to spend US taxpayer's dollars.

Ed

Post 64

Friday, July 15, 2005 - 8:26pm

Kurt, a relevant afterthought:

If US interventionism in post-war Germany is what "saved" them -- then why the big difference between former East Germany and West Germany? I'm assuming we gave aid to the country as a whole -- how does that square with differential results within the country?

You may already know my answer: aid is inherently destructive. But I really want to hear yours ...

Ed

Post 65

Monday, July 18, 2005 - 4:42pm

Ed, the aid provided from the US didn't go to East Germany, but you are conflating government aid to other governments (which should be limited or non-existant) with private investment and security - for instance, the US Army stayed there to maintain order, establish bases both for forward defense of the US as well as from potential enemies, rebuilt the military and police, created diplomatic ties to the new government including NATO alliance. All of these are not to be categorized as "government aid" like Live Aid, but rather cooperative establishment of a working state from the ruins of fascism. After all, we still needed a military anyway, so why not keep them where they are needed most to begin with? Without the security in place, anarchy or an opposing power will assume the vacuum thus created.

Post 66

Monday, July 18, 2005 - 11:35pm