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Good Versus Evil Isn’t A Strategy
by Madeleine AlbrightThe Bush administration’s newly unveiled National Security Strategy might well be subtitled “The Irony of Iran.” Three years after the invasion of Iraq and the invention of the phrase “axis of evil,” the administration now highlights the threat posed by Iran — whose radical government has been vastly strengthened by the invasion of Iraq. This is more tragedy than strategy, and it reflects the Manichean approach this administration has taken to the world.
It is sometimes convenient, for purposes of rhetorical effect, for national leaders to talk of a globe neatly divided into good and bad. It is quite another, however, to base the policies of the world’s most powerful nation upon that fiction. The administration’s penchant for painting its perceived adversaries with the same sweeping brush has led to a series of unintended consequences.
The top leaders in the new Iraq — chosen in elections that George W. Bush called “a magic moment in the history of liberty” — are friends of Iran. When the U.S. invaded Iraq, Bush may have thought he was striking a blow for good over evil, but the forces unleashed were considerably more complex.
The administration is now divided between those who understand this complexity and those who do not. On one side, there are ideologues, such as the vice president, who apparently see Iraq as a useful precedent for Iran. Meanwhile, officials on the front lines in Iraq know they cannot succeed in assembling a workable government in that country without the tacit blessing of Iran; hence, last week’s long-overdue announcement of plans for a U.S.-Iranian dialogue on Iraq — a dialogue that if properly executed might also lead to progress on other issues.
You know. That map pretty much sums things up. Try as I might, I cannot find anything inconsistant, thought it is very simplified. Unfortunately, most kids coming up in our “World Class” schools and colleges are so much more concerned about feelings and diversity that they couldn’t point out particular countries on a map if they tried.
Albright is a bit off base with her “theology”. If you discount Good and Evil, then by what standard do you make desicions? Eventually, you find yourself arguing small points for long periods of time, yet doing nothing, like the Treants of LOTR.
But what do I know, Albright and Clinton did such a good job with Kosovo and North Korea(blatent sarcasm)…
Nukeculer winter here we come!
In short. King George the Worst, The Great Uniter, Emperor of all the Americas, Supreme Ruler of the Middle Eastern Territories, and Leader of the Free World and the Ort Cloud, blew it. His policies are based upon idealoguous ideas that are proving all too uncomfortable to implement.
The problem is that Dubya cannot handle complex concepts. He cannot handle nuance or subtlety. Unfortunately for us the world just ain’t that simple. We need leaders who see all the grey levels and are not fixed on just good or bad. We are way past the point where we can classify people and countries by whether they are wearing “black” or “white” hats. This man’s simplistic and narrow world view has gotten us into enough trouble already. Dubya maybe a good guy to have in your fraternity but he isn’t leader of the free world material.
Albright not an expert on international affairs? A career diplomat, PhD from Columbia, former Sec-State and ambassador the the UN doesn’t rate an opinion? I would like to see your bleeding list of experts.
Christopher–read the original article again. Albright actually understands the situation–good for her! Our allies in Iraq (with the exception of the Kurds) are mostly Shiites, the same as Iran. They are religious allies, and therefore are political allies. Now if she could only get Dubya and his cohorts to understand…
Bush and company only care about keeping power and benefiting their small group of Saudi backed buddies. Anything thing else is window dressing. This gives them way too much credit.
Why complexificate things more than necessary? The map looks accurate.
As if Albright has credibility. She actually made a speech saying that America has to preprare for the day when It’s not the most powerful nation on Earth. Any administration&legislature that allows that to happen shuold be shot for treason. The number one job of all our leader to ensure no one becomes more powerful than America. Better to have the Earth destroyed than have that happen.
Bush is far from perfect but in addition to everything else he could start eating people live on television and he’d still be an immeasurably better President than Kerry or Gore would have been.
Chris – I wouldn’t use Good vs. Evil as a standard for making political decisions. Good and evil are human concepts and can differ depending on what side you’re on. Your definition is likely very different than a terrorist’s (or, in their minds, freedom fighters).
If you don’t use Good and Evil, on what basis do you make decisions? How do you define Right and Wrong? On what basis do you define right? Theologically? Evolutionary? Might? Genetically? Politically?
I’m merely saying that there must be a basis on which to make decisions. Yes, the world is more complicated than Good vs. Evil, Black vs. White. But, Decisions must be made, and you cannot sit around and look at all sides all day long. Nothing would ever get done.
Perhaps we should just build the walls and close the borders. Lock ourselves into our little isolationist world, becuase, obviously, we do things to better ourselves and hurt others all too often. If we can’t get oil, or fruit, or sugar, or steel, or whatever we may need, tough.
You can’t have it both ways, you cannot say the U.S., or Bush, or U.S. Corporations are evil, you complain about policy based on Good and Evil. It’s a lot more complicated than that.
The problem when you oversimplify the world is that you don’t understand it and you make dumb mistakes, like going into a war in Iraq. You cannot look at a complex situation like the middle east in simplistic terms and make a good decision. Dubya is way over his head and we are paying for it.
The biggest problem with many neo-conseratives — including Bush — is that everything is EITHER good or evil, black or white. “you’re either for us or against us, ” etc.
The world is just not that simp
More angry liberals not making sense. Good job guys.
While the map is over simplistic, it does make a point: The world can be broken down into only a few groups: True friends, friends, and enemies.
It’s easier than that. You can classify it as places like the US and places that suck.
What I’d really like to see on that map are more red dots.
Its not that we don’t make sense, its that you are too dumb to understand us.
” True friends, friends, and enemies.”
yo james,
good choice of words — that is how it is supposed to be — good and evil have nothing to do with survival.
but, calling your enemies makes it more conscionable for you to kill them (if not by your own hands, then by your vote)
if you think about the fact that there are millions of people in the middle east who love their children too, you might hesitate when it comes time to pull the trigger.
the shark stays at the top of the food chain by dividing everything into “food” and “not food” and not stopping to ask why.
that’s all
Alex, way to go back to the fifth grade for that comeback. Of course, that was only a year ago for you, right?
Todd, I think the idea of trying to divide everything into good vs. evil is a waste of time. However, the idea that there are a thousand shades of gray is an equal waste of time. There are a finite number of catagories our neighbors around the world fall in to.
You’re right that using a label makes killing, even killing the innocent, easy. I don’t think our government acts without thinking about this, and I think we all understand the end game: If you hit us, we’ll hit you back harder.
Albright had said “we think the price is worth it” when asked about the half million Iraqi children dead from sanctions. She admitted it was a hard choice, but now she just wants to bash Bush all the time. If the Bush team was so black and white, don’t you think they’d have invaded Iran years ago when it was clear they were supporting fighters in Iraq?
I don’t think we’ve bombed Hainan island, southwest of Hong Kong.
Though our reconn plane did an emergency landing there in spring of 2001. Who remembers that “crisis” now?
I think that dot should be 1/2 an inch to the left, over Hanoi.
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How much does the average person need to know about the rest of the world. How much do they actually know. In ANY country?
Consider if we made maps this simple, just as a part of the lesson plan, the average “Jay walking” person might actually remember stuff about the world. (While this may apply to this president, Presidents should be held to a higher standard.)
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Invading Iraq was a “Yes” or “No” issue. A simple evil vs. good view, versus all the understanding in the world, would both boil down to a tough decision.
Bush’s real problem is with the execution. Not adapting. Stifling debate. Picking arrogant people who made bad decisions, and then continuing to stand by them.
But good leaders make decisions as much on gut as on careful, lengthy analysis. In the end, (Alex,) you’re just griping because his gut and analysis disagreed with yours.
There is so much hay to be made about the bad execution of the war. As a strategic matter, Democrats should just drop the invasion question, and concentrate on the incompetence. Otherwise, the “morality” of the MoveOn crowd is going to shoot the Demos in the foot, AGAIN.
T.C. Moore makes the best point posted that I have seen so far about the problems Bush has caused. I did think that this was hilarious coming from Madeline Albright who has absolutely no credibility on foreign affairs issues after what has arised in the last couple of years.
First was her overwhelmening support of North Korea after Kim Jong put on that big party in Albright’s honor. She was bragging about that party for years. Next was her criminal actions in against the Serbs during the Kosovo war in 1999. If you don’t believe me look up a book called “Media Cleansing” by Peter Brock. The Clinton administration along with most of the European countries falsified the evidence of why we had to attack Serbia and the actions of the Serbs in the war while they refused to report the actions by the KLA against Serbiana police and civilians. Don’t forget that none of the “peace groups” said a thing about the NATO bombing civilians, so-called dual use sites, and every bridge on the river Danube was destroyed. Lastly Albright is currently a lobbyist in Washington and had very questionable relations with DP World during the debacle.
Don’t forget that Albright as a child was saved from the Holocaust by Serb partisans that helped her stay alive and later escape to America. Later in life she payed back those same people by bombing them to help get Monica off the front page.
actually, the world view is not that simplistic. “good” and “evil” are entirely defined by the country’s attitude towards the US. a human-rights paradise like Saudi Arabia is “good” because their government pretends in public to like us. however, a similarly tyrannical state like Cuba is “evil” because Castro doesn’t bother. The religious tyrants of Iran must be opposed with every fiber of our being, but the religious tyrants of Afghanistan or Pakistan just get a little tut-tutting once in a while, because we need their help in hunting down OBL.
this is not simplistic, but rather cold-blooded realpolitik. dress it up in manichean colors to get Americans’ blood going, but it is really biz as usual. Kissinger once said that US foreign policy _has_ to have a moralizing gloss, else we lose interest. same-same.
Also you can thank Albright for turning Kosovo into a more violent place then it was before NATO attacked. Interpol in Western Europe reports that Kosovo has turned into a narco clearinghouse. Not to mention the base it has become for Islamic terrorists training camps and staging area for future attacks. Kosovo now features widespread violence against Christians and non-Muslims including burning of churches, homes, holy sites, and historical sites all thanks to Madeleine Albright.
Just saw that Madeleine Albright said on “Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer” (October 21, 2001) that “I have always believed that Saddam Hussein is part of a major evil aspect in the world.” If you don’t believe that do a Nexis search.
Me
You are still an a**hole. And it isn’t funny how that never changes.
J.S. Scongilli
You must be good friend with Me.
I suppose mass graves of executed Kosovos were all invented by the “western Media”. You read one book by some nut case and think all the world should become holocaust deniers. Are you really trying to convince us that Serbia’s ethnic cleansing of Kosovo was Albright’s fault. Well, I give you credit, You haven’t blamed Clinton.
Just saw that Madeleine Albright said on “Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer” (October 21, 2001)
51/2 years ago hardly rates as recent history. Maybe your reflexes are as slow as your brain. I don’t enjoy flaming people but your asinine posts require calling you out. Post the link to Albright’s comment.
I predict there will be a WMD catastophre somewhere in the U.S. in 2007 and the Bush team will blame it on Iran. That will give them WAR with Iran they have been dying for and keep the Replublicans in power in the 2008 elections. I figure there will be somewhere in the 10,000 to 100,000 American casualty range.
In Bush’s black-and-white “You are either for us or against us” world view, i wonder how Russia now fits considering they actively collaborated against us in the Iraq invasion.
Bush has professed his affection for “Heckofajob Vladdy” and has pretty much allowed him to re-install ‘Totalitarianism LITE” with only token verbal objections.
But now, this! Is Putin for us or against us? Is Russia, these days, black or white?
Albright is no dummy, but she dosen’t hold a candle to Rice. I remember reading a comment from a Democratic Senator that if Albright had listened to her father as well as Rice had there may not have had to be an Iraq war.
J.C……I’m a conservative dude, but Kosovo, Bosnia and Serbia were all screwed up before Albright and Clinton got there. I tend to think that 200 to 400,000 dead is actually worse than narco gangs.
Clinton was not a good President as far as I am concerned, but the things that happened in the balkens were not of his doing.
Iraq is a mess, and a lot of the blame has to go on Bush, not, in my opinion for going into Iraq, but for not realizing that plans and reality just weren’t meshing, or allowing himself to be convinced things weren’t as bad as they were/are. His natural tendency to find people he trusts and stick by them has led us to where we are. It’s an admirable trait in a friend, but, as we are seeing, a disaster in a President at war.
There are many, many good things going on in a large majority of Iraq, but in the main cities, where the western press is located now, is where the insurgants concentrate thier efforts, for maximum coverage.
The press is partly to blame for Americans at home becoming frustrated. They almost jumped for joy when they thought we had a civil war about to break out. But, except for the first 8 days after the Mosque bombing, the number of Iraqi deaths aren’t much higher than they have been for the past 11 months. But every death is once again reported like it’s the end of the world as we know it.
We will either hold on and be fairly successful, or we will end up walking away from Iraq like we did Vietnam.
That would be a catastrophe for this country.
>>Alex, way to go back to the fifth grade for that comeback. Of course, that
>>was only a year ago for you, right?
Way to call the kettle black, James Hill. As I scroll back up to the comment Alex was responding to, I see that he was replying in a remedial way; your 3rd-grade taunt about “more liberals not making sense” was as juvenile as any I’ve seen here. Except for your followup comment, which would do any kindergartener proud. What’s next, “I’m rubber, you’re glue”??
If there’s one thing NO ONE has ever accused neocons of, it’s being intellectual giants.
Under the reign of War Hero Bush, America has, in the eyes of the world, truly become a nation of morons.