THERE'S JUST ONE HITCH....
I just was perusing the contents of Slate.com's homepage, and ran into the following headline:
"Wowie Zahawie: Sorry everyone, but Iraq did go uranium shopping in Niger.
Christopher Hitchens, fighting words, April 10, 2006, 4:43 PM ET."
Hitchens, whether he can hold his liquor or not, is a man of some intelligence, and he knows it. The problem with many intelligent people is that they put this intelligence in the service of singularly unintelligent enterprises.
Hitchens has engaged in such an enterprise for three years running. The enterprise: insist that we need more, more, more troops in Iraq, more international support for our adventure, more recognition of the fact that Saddam was REAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALLY bad, and more recognition of the "fact" that the media is responsible for our (well, I guess he would call it a non-failure, which raises a credibility question) "failure" in Iraq. The man's evident bloodlust can be summed up best by a recent article in which he described how the "international community" (to whom Saddam was not a threat, just like he wasn't one to us) should have responded to Colin Powell's now infamous U.N. speech. The title of the article? "My Perfect War." How charming.
Hitchens is also understandably very touchy about having the "chickenhawk" label thrown at him. Indeed, he is so riled up by the fact that some people with military experience who are (relatively) well versed in mid-East politics have dared to suggest that people who have neither the experience nor the verse are engaged in "illegitimate, reductive" argumentation. He would know, given his propensity to mock, vilify and ridicule, undistinctively, EVERYONE who is against the war in Iraq, regardless of the reasons these people have for the opposition. Behold the perils of projection.
Hitchens got his gut in such an uproar one day that he wrote an article called "Don't you "Son" Me!" One point of the article: just because you've never experienced combat, or have not seen a loved one off to combat, does not mean you are not capable of making intelligent pronoucements on or about a war. Reasonable enough. But Hitchens can't leave it at that, of course. He says that pretty much all people who have seen combat/have sent people off to war have the mentality that leads them to think their opinions on war and peace are necessarily superior to Hitchens'; Hitchens believes these people believe the opinions of people like him (who have never served in any war, and who would not serve in any war) are WORTHLESS.
The argument has a seductive appeal to it, until you realize it's a straw man. Those retired (and active) generals you see on TV who are fighting on the front lines (or who have done so previously) are not as a whole (maybe a few of them are) saying that "civilians" cannot speak intelligently on Iraq; rather, these people are responding to the neoconservatives' sucessful three-ear succesful campaign of hectoring that has somehow managed to convince people that the generals' opinions are irrelevant - precisely because the generals are generals! The generals are merely trying to say, I think, "Look, we have the right to speak about this war too, and for all of you people who've never served and never would serve to just tear into us isn't fair. For you to question our patriotism because we have served, or are serving, our country, in a manner with which you are dissatisfied, is improper." The generals haven't even, in large, made the perfectly legitimate argument that goes along the lines of "Hey - I have the experience - you think maybe I can speak at least as intelligently on this subject as you can?" and they certainly haven't suggested that "civilians" are not capable of offering intelligent critique. I think they are simply fed up with the Hitchens types projecting their own feelings of machismo inadequacy when the Hitchens types say, "Anything you can do, I can do better."
An example of Hitchens' logic: he notes that thousands of people have asked why Bush's daughters have not signed up to serve in Iraq (Hitchens' answer: "It's a volunteer army"). He then says Bush's "making his daughters serve" (which according to him is not possible, so I guess he means "encouraging them to volunteer, with the result being that they do) would constitute a ridiculous PR stunt; after all, Napoleon, stung by the criticisms that he was a warmonger who would not ask his own family to make the same sacrifice he asked his military to make, ended up sending a son ill-fit for the task, who died rather clumsily and ingloriously on the battlefield. Hitchens' conclusion (which presumes that the Bush daughters are any more inept than the average soldier; we don't know this): Presidents asking their children to serve in a war -the mere act of asking - is dumb (so, to Hitchens, is a Presidential act of going directly on television to ask for new recruits. If Bush did this, he'd get new recruits because for him, the asking would constitute an act of humility in a sea of blustery rhetoric).
Here's what I think: what if the daughters did go, after being given the same military training as any other recruit? You know what would happen? Either they would die very soon, or, eventually when Dumbya asks them, "How are things going?", they'd reply - possibly honestly. In either case, the message that war has consequences - a message this President does not grasp - would be driven home - indeed, it would be driven home in the most blunt manner possible. This is why leaders of countries don't encourage their children to volunteer - so that the leaders' ignorance of the awfulness, and in this case, futility, of war, remains intact, pure. If the twins did go, contrary to what Hitchens thinks, the country would not interpret it as a PR stunt. At least one person would say, "Hey, Bush believes in this war so much he's willing to persuade his own daughter to go. I used to think that he was a hypocrite in that he'd never adhere to the rule that says never ask someone to do something that you or someone very close to you wouldn't - but now my opinion has changed. If Bush believes in the war so much that his own daughters can now be potentially sacrificed, maybe I'll sign up too, because I finally have a sign from him that genuinely suggests this war is important."
Back to "Wowie Zahawie" - in this article, Hitchens contends that, despite the yellowcake forgery, independent evidence or circumstantial evidence exists - or may exist - that shows that Iraq was trying to buy yellowcake. Well, stop the presses! Even though he has no proof that a sale was even close to being consummated, no proof that Iraq had the wherewithall to DO something with this uranium so as to create a WMD, no proof that it intended to use the possible sale of the yellowcake against the U.S., for him, the "proof" that Iraq intended to buy the yellowcake justifies the war. But in his mind, the war was justified despite the absence of WMDs, an Al-Qaeda Saddam link, etc. In other words, as far as he's concerned, even if Iraq didn't intend to buy the yellowcake, so what? (If it did, nothing would have happened). The war was still justified. How many more instances of irrelevant (to him, and to us) information need he give us, when his entire contention is that it is irrelevant why we went to war?
The answer is that there are some people like Hitchens who have the mentality of the Roman legion armies of old (Hitchens probably knows much about such armies, perhaps or precisely because he never would have served in one while his countrymen did). These armies were of the following belief: "We have lost battles, but we never lost wars, because we never allowed a war to end until we had won it." Hitchens' logic is actually even more sick: he will not even admit battle defeat. However, just like the Romans, he is waging a war - the war in his case consisting of proving to himself that his bloodlust is proper - and he will not allow this war to end until he has won it - not with weapons, of course, but hollow, irrelevant, meaningless words.
He can conduct this war all he wants, but I humbly suggest that it might be time for him to start doing so privately.
"Wowie Zahawie: Sorry everyone, but Iraq did go uranium shopping in Niger.
Christopher Hitchens, fighting words, April 10, 2006, 4:43 PM ET."
Hitchens, whether he can hold his liquor or not, is a man of some intelligence, and he knows it. The problem with many intelligent people is that they put this intelligence in the service of singularly unintelligent enterprises.
Hitchens has engaged in such an enterprise for three years running. The enterprise: insist that we need more, more, more troops in Iraq, more international support for our adventure, more recognition of the fact that Saddam was REAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALLY bad, and more recognition of the "fact" that the media is responsible for our (well, I guess he would call it a non-failure, which raises a credibility question) "failure" in Iraq. The man's evident bloodlust can be summed up best by a recent article in which he described how the "international community" (to whom Saddam was not a threat, just like he wasn't one to us) should have responded to Colin Powell's now infamous U.N. speech. The title of the article? "My Perfect War." How charming.
Hitchens is also understandably very touchy about having the "chickenhawk" label thrown at him. Indeed, he is so riled up by the fact that some people with military experience who are (relatively) well versed in mid-East politics have dared to suggest that people who have neither the experience nor the verse are engaged in "illegitimate, reductive" argumentation. He would know, given his propensity to mock, vilify and ridicule, undistinctively, EVERYONE who is against the war in Iraq, regardless of the reasons these people have for the opposition. Behold the perils of projection.
Hitchens got his gut in such an uproar one day that he wrote an article called "Don't you "Son" Me!" One point of the article: just because you've never experienced combat, or have not seen a loved one off to combat, does not mean you are not capable of making intelligent pronoucements on or about a war. Reasonable enough. But Hitchens can't leave it at that, of course. He says that pretty much all people who have seen combat/have sent people off to war have the mentality that leads them to think their opinions on war and peace are necessarily superior to Hitchens'; Hitchens believes these people believe the opinions of people like him (who have never served in any war, and who would not serve in any war) are WORTHLESS.
The argument has a seductive appeal to it, until you realize it's a straw man. Those retired (and active) generals you see on TV who are fighting on the front lines (or who have done so previously) are not as a whole (maybe a few of them are) saying that "civilians" cannot speak intelligently on Iraq; rather, these people are responding to the neoconservatives' sucessful three-ear succesful campaign of hectoring that has somehow managed to convince people that the generals' opinions are irrelevant - precisely because the generals are generals! The generals are merely trying to say, I think, "Look, we have the right to speak about this war too, and for all of you people who've never served and never would serve to just tear into us isn't fair. For you to question our patriotism because we have served, or are serving, our country, in a manner with which you are dissatisfied, is improper." The generals haven't even, in large, made the perfectly legitimate argument that goes along the lines of "Hey - I have the experience - you think maybe I can speak at least as intelligently on this subject as you can?" and they certainly haven't suggested that "civilians" are not capable of offering intelligent critique. I think they are simply fed up with the Hitchens types projecting their own feelings of machismo inadequacy when the Hitchens types say, "Anything you can do, I can do better."
An example of Hitchens' logic: he notes that thousands of people have asked why Bush's daughters have not signed up to serve in Iraq (Hitchens' answer: "It's a volunteer army"). He then says Bush's "making his daughters serve" (which according to him is not possible, so I guess he means "encouraging them to volunteer, with the result being that they do) would constitute a ridiculous PR stunt; after all, Napoleon, stung by the criticisms that he was a warmonger who would not ask his own family to make the same sacrifice he asked his military to make, ended up sending a son ill-fit for the task, who died rather clumsily and ingloriously on the battlefield. Hitchens' conclusion (which presumes that the Bush daughters are any more inept than the average soldier; we don't know this): Presidents asking their children to serve in a war -the mere act of asking - is dumb (so, to Hitchens, is a Presidential act of going directly on television to ask for new recruits. If Bush did this, he'd get new recruits because for him, the asking would constitute an act of humility in a sea of blustery rhetoric).
Here's what I think: what if the daughters did go, after being given the same military training as any other recruit? You know what would happen? Either they would die very soon, or, eventually when Dumbya asks them, "How are things going?", they'd reply - possibly honestly. In either case, the message that war has consequences - a message this President does not grasp - would be driven home - indeed, it would be driven home in the most blunt manner possible. This is why leaders of countries don't encourage their children to volunteer - so that the leaders' ignorance of the awfulness, and in this case, futility, of war, remains intact, pure. If the twins did go, contrary to what Hitchens thinks, the country would not interpret it as a PR stunt. At least one person would say, "Hey, Bush believes in this war so much he's willing to persuade his own daughter to go. I used to think that he was a hypocrite in that he'd never adhere to the rule that says never ask someone to do something that you or someone very close to you wouldn't - but now my opinion has changed. If Bush believes in the war so much that his own daughters can now be potentially sacrificed, maybe I'll sign up too, because I finally have a sign from him that genuinely suggests this war is important."
Back to "Wowie Zahawie" - in this article, Hitchens contends that, despite the yellowcake forgery, independent evidence or circumstantial evidence exists - or may exist - that shows that Iraq was trying to buy yellowcake. Well, stop the presses! Even though he has no proof that a sale was even close to being consummated, no proof that Iraq had the wherewithall to DO something with this uranium so as to create a WMD, no proof that it intended to use the possible sale of the yellowcake against the U.S., for him, the "proof" that Iraq intended to buy the yellowcake justifies the war. But in his mind, the war was justified despite the absence of WMDs, an Al-Qaeda Saddam link, etc. In other words, as far as he's concerned, even if Iraq didn't intend to buy the yellowcake, so what? (If it did, nothing would have happened). The war was still justified. How many more instances of irrelevant (to him, and to us) information need he give us, when his entire contention is that it is irrelevant why we went to war?
The answer is that there are some people like Hitchens who have the mentality of the Roman legion armies of old (Hitchens probably knows much about such armies, perhaps or precisely because he never would have served in one while his countrymen did). These armies were of the following belief: "We have lost battles, but we never lost wars, because we never allowed a war to end until we had won it." Hitchens' logic is actually even more sick: he will not even admit battle defeat. However, just like the Romans, he is waging a war - the war in his case consisting of proving to himself that his bloodlust is proper - and he will not allow this war to end until he has won it - not with weapons, of course, but hollow, irrelevant, meaningless words.
He can conduct this war all he wants, but I humbly suggest that it might be time for him to start doing so privately.
posted by EnterCenter at 9:42 AM
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