Some more quotations

This time from some comments by Charles Freeman, formerly Assistant Secretary of Defense and ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

To many now in power in Washington and in much of the country, it is perilously unpatriotic to ask why we were struck on 9/11 or who we're fighting or whether attempting forcibly to pacify various parts of the realm of Islam will reduce the number of our enemies or increase them.

How can we win a war with an enemy so ill-understood that we must invent a nonexistent ideology of "Islamofascism" for it? And how can a war with no clear objectives ever accomplish its mission and end?

As force protection becomes our major preoccupation, we find we must pacify the countries we occupy so that we can continue to station troops in them to fight the terrorists our occupation is creating.

Rather than consider the possibility that the witless application to foreign societies of military pressure, no matter how immense and irresistible it may be, is more likely to generate resistance than to make states of them, we prefer to blame the inhabitants of these societies for their ingratitude and internal divisions. So we threaten to withdraw our political and economic support from them, while piling on more American troops. Asked when our soldiers may be able to declare their mission accomplished and to leave Iraq and Afghanistan, our Commander-in-Chief replies that this is a policy question that the generals in the field should decide, and that he's not going to decide for them. Think about that for a minute. Since when are generals responsible for making policy decisions? They are conditioned to focus on implementing policy and to avoid making it. Whatever happened to civilian control of the military or "the buck stops here?" Why should our military be left to hold the bag in this way?

In most countries, politicians now see public spats with the United States as the easiest way to rally their people and enhance their prestige. The result is the progressive displacement of our previously indispensable influence and leadership in more and more areas of the world.

Sagging demand for our leadership may be a good thing to the extent it relieves us of the burdens of our much-proclaimed status as the sole remaining superpower. But we're clearly bothered by being seen as less relevant. Our answer to this seems to be to build an even more powerful military. Some of you will recall newspaper reports that our defense spending is only about 3.6 percent of GDP, reflecting a defense budget of only – I emphasize – only $499.4 billion. But a lot of defense-related spending is outside the Defense Department's budget. This fiscal year we will actually spend at least $934.9 billion (or about 6.8 percent of our GDP) on our military. Outside DoD, the Department of Energy will spend $16.6 billion on nuclear weapons. The State Department will disburse $25.3 billion in foreign military assistance. We will spend $69.1 billion on defense-related homeland security programs and $69.8 billion for treatment of wounded veterans. The Treasury will spend $38.5 billion on unfunded military retirements. We will pay $206.7 billion in interest on war debt. Other bits and pieces, including satellite launches, will add another $8.5 billion. Altogether, I repeat, that's about $935 billion. But there's no sign that all this military spending – though it is vastly more than the rest of the world combined – and the power projection capabilities it buys are regaining international leadership for us.

These regional powers distrust our purposes, fear our militarism, and reject our leadership. Distrust drives them to reaffirm the principles of international law we have now abandoned. Fear drives them to pursue the development or acquisition of weapons with which to deter the policies of preemptive attack and forcible regime change we now espouse.

But what are we for? Whatever happened to American optimism and idealism? To be able to lead the world again we must once again exemplify aspirations for a higher standard of freedom and justice at home and abroad. We cannot compel – but must persuade – others to work with us. And to lead a team, we must rediscover how to be a team player.

We face perplexing choices in every region of the world. But the policies that have brought discredit upon us center on one region – the Middle East. To restore our reputation we must correct these policies. And the problem of terrorism that now bedevils us has its origins in one region – the Middle East. To end this terrorism we must address the issues in the region that give rise to it.

Principal among these is the brutal oppression of the Palestinians by an Israeli occupation that is about to mark its fortieth anniversary and shows no sign of ending. Arab identification with Palestinian suffering, once variable in its intensity, is now total. American identification with Israeli policy has also become total. Those in the region and beyond it who detest Israeli behavior, which is to say almost everyone, now naturally extend their loathing to Americans. This has had the effect of universalizing anti-Americanism, legitimizing radical Islamism, and gaining Iran a foothold among Sunni as well as Shiite Arabs. For its part, Israel no longer even pretends to seek peace with the Palestinians; it strives instead to pacify them. Palestinian retaliation against this policy is as likely to be directed against Israel's American backers as against Israel itself. Under the circumstances, such retaliation – whatever form it takes – will have the support or at least the sympathy of most people in the region and many outside it. This makes the long-term escalation of terrorism against the United States a certainty, not a matter of conjecture.

The Palestine problem cannot be solved by the use of force; it requires much more than the diplomacy-free foreign policy we have practiced since 9/11. Israel is not only not managing this problem; it is severely aggravating it. Denial born of political correctness will not cure this fact. Israel has shown – not surprisingly – that, if we offer nothing but unquestioning support and political protection for whatever it does, it will feel no incentive to pay attention to either our interests or our advice. Hamas is showing that if we offer it nothing but unreasoning hostility and condemnation, it will only stiffen its position and seek allies among our enemies. In both cases, we forfeit our influence for no gain.

There will be no negotiation between Israelis and Palestinians, no peace, and no reconciliation between them – and there will be no reduction in anti-American terrorism – until we have the courage to act on our interests. These are not the same as those of any party in the region, including Israel, and we must talk with all parties, whatever we think of them or their means of struggle. Refusal to reason with those whose actions threaten injury to oneself, one's friends, and one's interests is foolish, feckless, and self-defeating. That is why we it is past time for an active and honest discussion with both Israel and the government Palestinians have elected, which – in an irony that escapes few abroad – is the only democratically elected government in the Arab world.

But to restore our reputation in the region and the world, given all that has happened, and to eliminate terrorism against Americans, it is no longer enough just to go through the motions of trying to make peace between Israelis and Arabs. We must succeed in actually doing so. Nothing should be a more urgent task for American diplomacy.