القياسات
الفاسدة
بقلم:
جوناثان ألتر
نيوزوييك
ان حربي فيتنام والعراق
كلتاهما قد ابتدأتا من قبل قادة
متغطرسين وعاجزين وطائشين
كانوا غير قادرين على تغيير
الأمور عندما تغيرت الحقائق على
الأرض.
Phony
Analogies
Both
the
Vietnam
and
Iraq
wars were started and perpetuated by heedless, arrogant
leaders unwilling to change course when the facts on the
ground changed. But the similarities mostly end there.
By
Jonathan Alter
Newsweek
May
31, 2007
- President Bush thinks the
Vietnam
analogy for
Iraq
is wrong. Aside from the predictability of this (it’s
understandable that he doesn’t like his policy called
a “quagmire”), the president’s reasoning is
historically ignorant. Bush said last week that the
difference between
Vietnam
and
Iraq
is that the enemy in
Vietnam
didn’t want to follow us home. Of course during the
Vietnam War, President Lyndon Johnson repeatedly made
precisely that argument, comparing communists to
burglars who must be stopped when they are in the
neighborhood (in that case, Southeast Asia) before they
came up on the porch and into the kitchen.
This
argument was phony 40 years ago—the “domino
theory” of noncommunist countries toppling over proved
false—and it’s phony now. The idea that we’re
fighting “them” (whoever “they” might be) there
so we don’t have to fight them here is lousy logic,
now echoed by several GOP candidates for president.
Consider the true enemy—Al Qaeda in Iraq, which we
have good reason to want to smash in Anbar province even
as we disengage from the Sunni-Shiite civil war in
Baghdad. Bush’s reasoning blithely assumes that Al
Qaeda cannot walk and chew gum at the same time—cannot
fight in Anbar and plot attacks in the
United States
simultaneously. It also implies that the main
explanation for why we have not been hit in the five and
a half years since 9/11 isn’t better homeland
security, but the war in
Iraq
!
Come on.
The
Vietnam War and the Iraq War do have some things in
common. They were both started and perpetuated by
heedless, arrogant leaders unwilling to change course,
as Ronald Reagan did in
Lebanon
,
when the facts on the ground changed. They both
reflected poor understanding in
Washington
of local culture and
regional politics. They both featured the unconscionable
policy of throwing good young solders after good young
soldiers—signing the death warrants of our finest in
the name of foolish consistency or mindless fortitude.
But like most disparate historical events, they differ
in more profound ways than they resemble each other. The
Vietnam War was at root a struggle over nationalism. The
Vietnamese include some ancient tribes, but they are one
people, determined for centuries to rid their nation of
foreign powers. By contrast, the Iraq War is at bottom
tribal. Our problem there is the inverse of what it was
in
Vietnam
—that
the people have no fundamental sense of nationhood. They
are three peoples (Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish) who have
made it clear at the ballot box and in the streets that
they can’t live together.
Iraq
is not in danger of breaking up; it has already broken
up. That’s an entirely different challenge than we
faced in
Vietnam
.
Sensing
this reality, the new line out of the White House is
that
Iraq
is
Korea
.
As White House spokesman Tony Snow pointed out, we’ve
had U.S. troops in South Korea for 50 years (actually,
it’s 57) and the same might prove true in Iraq. Aside
from the fact that no one told us in 2002 and 2003 that
we were signing on to a half-century commitment (just a
slight omission, no?), the analogy is a poor one.
U.S.
troops are stationed in
South
Korea
at the explicit request of
the South Korean government and people. When President
Carter raised the possibility of pulling them out in
1977, American Gen. John K. Singlaub was not the only
one to object. South Koreans know that American forces
are the only thing standing between them and being
overrun by a million North Korean troops stationed just
over the border. Only now, more than 50 years after the
end of hostilities, is the formal state of war being
brought to a close. Aside from some demonstrators once
in a while, no one in
South
Korea
seriously wants our troops
to go, at least until the threat from the North recedes
and unification begins. Then we’ll be gone.
In
Iraq
,
by contrast, many polls show that about three quarters
of the Iraqi people favor us leaving. Even those Iraqis
who want us to help them fight Al Qaeda think we can do
so with strike forces from bases outside the country.
The idea of us spending hundreds of millions of dollars
establishing permanent bases inside
Iraq
(something that has received amazingly little publicity)
is repugnant to them. This is where a bit of residual
nationalism kicks in. Iraqis don’t like the idea of
foreigners permanently on their soil. No people—or
tribes—do.
Moreover,
all of that White House chatter about staying in
Iraq
for decades means that Bush has essentially given up on
democracy there. The Iraqi democracy of his dreams would
not stand for permanent bases, unless
Iran
or some other neighbor were poised to attack. Despite
warnings from Sen. Joe Lieberman and a few others, there
is no sign of that. Iranian mischief-making, yes.
Invasion, no. At least not at present.
So
why the move to permanent bases in
Iraq
?
For years, I have been reluctant to embrace the oil
theory of American policymaking in the
Middle East
.
I’ve subscribed to the notion that oil is only part of
a complex set of strategic, political and moral issues
animating American interests. I still believe that in
the short term. Bush and the few remaining supporters of
his policy are motivated by more than oil. They want to
avoid a failed state in the middle of a volatile region.
But
what does that aim have to do with permanent bases? The
only two reasons to station troops in the
Middle East
for half a century are protecting oil supplies
(reflecting a pessimistic view of energy independence)
outside the normal channels of trade and diplomacy, and
projecting raw military power. These are the imperial
aims of an empire. During the cold war, charges of
U.S.
imperialism in
Korea
and
Vietnam
were false. Those wars were about superpower struggles.
This time, the “I word" is not a left-wing
epithet but a straightforward description of policy
aims—yet another difference from those two older wars
in
Asia
.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18967769/site/newsweek/page/2/
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