The War Obligation: Afghanistan

As the nation’s attention is passionately riveted to the death rattles of Pelobama Care, some of America’s main business goes unattended.

Several months after being informed of General McChrystal requirements, two months after the general went public to force a response (thereby risking his career), the President has not said if he had made up his mind about what to do in Afghanistan. The argument that he was awaiting the results of the Afghan elections does not hold water anymore. No, Afghanistan is not Switzerland. Yes, it’s a pity there was so much cheating. But, there is no doubt that the winner was really the winner. The runner up Abdallah Abdallah never said otherwise, I think. In the UK, or in Germany, or in Italy, the winner would have gone on to form a government, even without 50% plus one votes.

In the current issue of the Weekly Standard (Nov. 9 2009), Donnelly and Sullivan opine that the President is going to announce an option McChrystal “lite,” 20,000 additional troops instead of the 40,000 requested. That falls short of everyone’s wish. There is mounting pressure from a segment of what is usually defined as the conservative side to leave Afghanistan altogether. Not all of the pressure proceeds from childish petulant desire to do to Obama what the Left did to Bush. Opposition emanating from my Libertarians friends, led by the Independent Institute, is principled, coherent, based on moral convictions, and thoroughly blind, in my opinion. Fortunately, most libertarians (like me) are not Libertarians. Here is a summary of what’s at stake.

The people threatening to take over the Afghanistan are the same people who sheltered the 9/11 assassins. I am not making this up. They are not hiding it. They are the same Taliban movement that was reduced to next to nothing by the flash-quick combined NATO, Northern Alliance victory in 2001. That was the price they paid for refusing to turn over for trial the Al Quaida Arabs responsible for 9/11. By the way, the invasion of Taliban Afghanistan was authorized by the UN and still is. (I don’t care much myself about this fact. I mention this for those of you who are concerned about the fiction of international law.)

There are four additive reasons for Americans to want the Taliban defeated. They are separate and perhaps of unequal importance but they point toward the same US policy. First, there is no reason to believe the Taliban leadership has learned any lesson from its removal from power. It sheltered the criminals who killed 3,000 American civilians even after they had no excuse to not know what happened. They hate kuffar, infidels, and they care nothing about international principles of justice or of peace. There is no reason why they would stop any future attempt to plan one, two, three, four, five, six, or more 9/11, on us, or on our partners. The potential victims are not all in the West. Note that predominantly Muslim countries struggling to become or to remain democratic such as Lebanon, Jordan, Kuwait, and Turkey make especially attractive targets.

I am not just imagining things. 9/11 was superbly planned, superbly executed and must have cost little more then $500,00. There are more 9//11 where it came from, given a place where the plotting can be relatively well sheltered from intrusion. Afghanistan remains a prime location for such activities because of its geographic inaccessibility and because of its very backwardness.

Let the Taliban take over again and hunch your shoulders! I am not referring only to unacceptable loss of life but to the economic devastation that would follow multiple attacks of the same type as 9/11.

The second reason Americans should want to defeat the Taliban is that newly democratic Pakistan has finally shaken itself out of its impotent torpor. Finally, it’s going with some vigor after its own home-grown violent jihadists, including some who call themselves “Taliban.” Nevertheless, there is little reason to doubt that the average Pakistani sees the military action as more of America’s fight than his own. It does not matter how deluded a view that is. It would not be the first time that the most likely victims of a crime are the most blind to it. After all, most German Jews seem to have made no attempt to flee Nazi Germany, even after seeing SA lowlife marched past them singing something like” “I smile when I see Jewish blood.”

It cannot be said enough that Pakistan possesses nuclear weapons. Even barring a full violent jihadist take-over, there is grave danger in any sort of political accommodation with jihadists, even of their physical proximity to the weapons. After all, how difficult would it be for a powerful Islamist politician to get two of his grand-nephews on the female side hired as night janitors in a nuclear arsenal? Hint: Pakistan is part of the Indian sub- continent where family pull matters. (Why the female line? Think it through.)

If the US is seen as faltering in Afghanistan, a large segment of Pakistani political opinion will ask itself why Pakistan should do what the vastly richer and more populous US is unwilling to commit to. A coalition government with Taliban or some other Islamist elements will be next. The dream of every two-bit violent jihadist, including American ones, to get his hands on dirty bomb material will come very close to being realized. A single dirty bomb exploding in a major American city would have the capacity to set back the world economy by many years through a chain reaction. The Islamist terrorists know this. They are insane, not stupid.

The third reason to beat the Taliban is they they are a morally obscene group. When they were in power, they executed “adulterous” women during soccer game intermissions. Guess what “adulterous” means under sharia ? They denied male-administered medical care to women in a country with no female doctors and they kept little girls from school. In the middle-run, the product would have been this demented thing: self-genocide through the dying off of many women. Today, in parts of the country they rule, they throw acid in little girls’ faces to discourage them from going to school. Perhaps worse of all, the Taliban outlawed music. (That’s a good enough reason to kill them, in my book.) I am well aware of the serious arguments against the US acting as the world’s sheriff. (I don’t buy them but that’s another story.) Yet, once in a while, a country’s self-interest and common decency happen to coincide. This is one such opportunity. We should not waste it.

The fourth reason is that the many potential and actual enemies of Americans are watching our every move. Every time President Obama demonstrates weakness, they take a step forward. The enemies include several terrorist groups, of course, Iran, North Korea, and Russia and China if they get a chance. Russia is just a hoodlum country that will grab what it can. The Chinese leadership probably does not want our destruction but it’s ill-informed and prone to miscalculation. If we falter on Afghanistan, they will reach out for a piece of us. Most of our vacillating NATO allies are the way they have been for a long time, as they were under the Soviet threat. They have no stomach for a fight unless we push and pull and, above all, set an example of bravery.

(Note: I know I have not dealt with our casualties or with civilian casualties resulting from our actions. Both matter, obviously.)

In the meantime, my Libertarians friends develop principled arguments against continued US and NATO military action to repel the Taliban that are all about propriety, and also about property. I have no doubt that war increases the importance of government, its dominion over civil society. As a libertarian (with a small “l), I hate it, of course. But a broad terrorist attack would increase the influence of government even faster, more deeply, and more irreversibly. I am not about to join the Libertarian Party because of its blindness regarding defense. The Libertarian arguments, I would buy if I were reasonably sure my house is not about to be set on fire. Moral principles are here to help people live good lives, in every sense of the word. They do not exist to excuse passivity. Passivity in the face of evil is the greatest evil of all.

PS An Army psychiatrist, a major, murdered 12 people at Fort Hood, Texas, today. It seems he was having career trouble. All the same, I wish he did not have an Arab, Muslim name. It makes keeping things in perspective difficult.

CORRECTION: I WROTE IN A PREVIOUS COLUMN ( “THE A.A. PRESIDENT,” POSTED 10/07/09 ) THAT I DOUBTED PRESIDENT OBAMA HAD EVER PASSED THE BAR EXAM ANYWHERE ANY TIME. A FRIEND OF MINE, A GOOD LAWYER I HAVE KNOWN FOR A LONG TIME AND WHOSE UTTERANCES I TRUST SAID OTHERWISE. MY ATTORNEY FRIEND TOLD ME THAT THE FACT THAT BARACK OBAMA HAD BEEN ADMITTED TO PRACTICE BEFORE THE ILLINOIS SUPREME COURT PROVED THAT HE HAD PASSED THE BAR. THAT HE WAS SO ADMITTED CAN BE FOUND ON THE SITE OF THE ILLINOIS BAR ASSOCIATION. I ACCEPT MY FRIEND’S JUDGMENT IN THIS RESPECT. I AM STILL PUZZLED ABOUT WHY THE REAL ACHIEVEMENT OF PASSING THE BAR EXAM – WHICH CAN PRESUMABLY NOT BE EASED BY AFFIRMATIVE ACTION CONSIDERATIONS – IS NOT MENTIONED ON THE PRESIDENT’S WIKIPEDIA ENTRY. MR OBAMA ‘S LIST OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS IS SHORT AND THIN; THE BAR EXAM SHOULD BE THERE TO THICKEN IT. PERHAPS ONE OF THE PRESIDENT’S SUPPORTERS WILL DO THE JOB. I AM WATCHING.

Sixtieth Anniversary of the People’s Republic; Obama’s String of Victories.

To celebrate our country’s birthday, we fly the flag, we put on fireworks (only in some places, not in my town of Santa Cruz where the authorities are afraid the sand of the beach might catch on fire!) Mostly, we eat grilled meat saturated with saturated fat to mark this anniversary. The red Chinese also do fireworks (really good ones). They also march 10,000 people under arms. That’s a basic difference.

The parade of heavy weapons and tanks took place on Tienanmen Square, the same place where brave unarmed young people were crushed by tanks twenty years ago.

The Chinese Communist Party is the most successful mafia in the history of the world. It has succeeded in raising the Chinese from abject poverty to moderate poverty while maintaining its corrupt, totalitarian rule. It now ranks 133 out of 229 countries in GDP per capita, right behind Albania. Its GDP/capita of $6,000 is almost one fifth that of Taiwan, all Chinese, and less than one eighth that of Singapore, which is 90% Chinese. You might say, the Chinese are prosperous everywhere in the world except under Communist rule.

(Figures from CIA World Factbook on-line 10/1/09.)

What corrupt rule? I don’t mean small time business grease like la mordita in Mexico, or other small bribes. I mean real horrors. The Weekly Standard published a long article several month ago about the execution of imprisoned regime opponents for the purpose of selling their organs. Normally, I don’t pay attention to this sort of stories. I think of them as urban legends. One thing caught my attention in this case: Several reports of thorough medical examinations given to young healthy prisoners and never followed by treatment of any sort, a sort of blood-curdling inventory. Furthermore, I don’t discount the Weekly Standard. It’s a very serious periodicals that checks its facts thoroughly. (Report is in the Nov. 24^th 2008 issue).

The UN urged the Chinese government to look into it. You bet!

Speaking of inventory: Almost nine months since the inauguration. Soon the Obama presidency gestation will be over. Here is an informal inventory. Tell me where I am wrong.

Here is his most successful initiative: “Cash for Clunkers.” It’s successful because the money allocated was actually spent and spent quickly. Let me give you the ethical summary of this achievement:

The President took money from my wife, who cannot afford a new car of any sort, to give it to people who could afford to put down $20,000, but maybe not $25,000. Those are very happy with the transaction; no kidding? Also fairly happy are car dealers, whose function is increasingly questionable because of the Internet. (Sorry, I call them as I see them.)

Even happier are GM workers, high-school graduates with 1940 skills, who earn $ 30 an hour (according to UAW, $75 according to Republican Congressional critics) and large fringe benefits, making cars Americans don’t want in large numbers. Unhappy, are the people who would have bought the used cars sent to be destroyed. Many of those people are undoubtedly among the poorest Americans. I wonder how many lost their jobs because they couldn’t find a used car in their price range.

“Cash for clunkers” was clearly a transfer of income. It transferred income from the poor to the moderately well-off.

I don’t hate liberals because of their misguided economic ideas; I only deplore those and I try to combat them. Hypocrisy is hard to forgive though, even if it’s rooted only in stubborn disregard for basic facts and for elementary logic.

On the domestic economic front, three things did not happen:

The stimulus package did not work. It wasn’t supposed to. You can’t reduce unemployment next month by building a rail line between Disneyland and Las Vegas the permits for which will take five, six, or five years. Federal employment is growing though.

Foreclosures have hardly slowed down.

The so-called “public option” on health care reform has vanished, for practical purposes. The final bill will have something called “public option,” no doubt. It will have nothing in common with the program the President wanted as a Trojan Horse to turn American health care into a single payer.

Digression: A couple of days ago, the French Ministry of Health announced the size of the unfunded cost of the French single-payer system. It’s expected to be about $700 per man, woman and child. (Le Figaro10/02/09.) That’s not the total cost but the amount for which money will have to be found elsewhere. Look at it this way: on the average, in 2010, a French family of four will spending $2,800 more on health care than the national budget allows.

In foreign affairs, same progress. As far as Afghanistan is concerned, the President is pausing to ruminate about the strategy he chose himself by appointing a general who is its foremost exponent. That’s about the “war of necessity” he said we had to win.

He wants to revert to waging war with long range missiles. It’s the unworkable wimp’s option of course. That’s the opinion of all who study counterinsurgency.

On October 1^st, the President made a moving speech on the result of negotiations with the Islamic Republic of Iran regarding its unlawful nuclear program. He said he told Iran, “Allow inspection, or else.” The “else” was left to the mullahs’ imagination. They must be crapping their pants. Those are the same mullahs who smile benignly when the president they hand-picked tells the world he wants to annihilate a neighbor.

Oops! I almost forgot: “Cap and Trade” is dormant and Guantanamo will stay open. I like the latter; it’s he best solution but that’s not what he told those who voted or him.

Some of the President’s supporters are beginning to say, “Give him time.” Point well taken but the Republicans were not the ones who told him to rush, to triple the federal deficit in nine months, nor to direct the largest tax increase since the Korean War (Boston.com – The Boston Globe 9/2/09). No conservative demanded that he cram a 1,000-page plan to recast 15% of the economy in a couple of weeks (health care reform). (Data: The NYT on June 19^th said 885 pages. I am just guessing it had grown to more than 1,000 by August.)

It’s also true that the President inherited a big economic crisis, that the bulk o the crisis was not of his making. Well, we hired him to drive the truck, not to change the wheels. When your motor starts burning, you don’t rush to take out the jack. Rigidity of purpose is nearly a crime for a senior executive. Don’t implement costly programs when the economy is much worse than you expected. Got it?

I think it’s fair to take people at their word. When I tell my wife I will paint the living room, that’s how she judges me. That’s one reason I am careful not to announce that I will paint the whole house in one day. President Obama declared he would do X,Y, and Z. He has not done any, has not even come close. If I had voted for him, I would be displeased.

With all this, I still don’t think the man is evil though I am more and more inclined to see him as a puppet. Conservatives who describe the President as evil are losing track of the obvious. He is a handsome man with a good diction who had never achieved anything in his life besides get elected. He can’t even select literate speech-writers. Here is what he said recently disdainfully a propos of his critics on Iran:

“Some invoked the picture of Hiro Ito signing the articles of capitulation.”

Mr President: It’s not “invoke” it’s “evoke,” and Emperor Hiro Hito did not sign the articles of capitulation. He was cowering in his palace.

That’s two mistakes in one sentence, worse than George Bush!

The President shows himself to be a fool. He will fall. I fear what comes next. Some of his followers are fascists, the real thing. Who will come after they throw him under the bus because he is unable to deliver even with majorities in both houses?

I have an exit plan for the President though. Actually, he found it himself in Copenhagen.

It’s true that he did not get the Olympics Games for Chicago. That’s the easiest failure to excuse. One, Rio was hard to beat. Brazilians are more fun than Chicagoans anytime. (I, for one, don’t want to see any Chicagoans in a string bathing suit.) Two, he was up against another political machine, the International Olympic Committee. It’s a machine as corrupt as Chicago’s but he had not had time to learn its ways.

In spite of this failure, I think President Obama would make a good international relations representative for the Greater Chicago Chamber of Commerce. He speaks well from a text if the text is well written. He looks better in a suit than just about any other public figures. He looks “multicultural.” I don’t know what that means but I know it’s a good thing.