Questioning the new "Bush Doctrine."

[riff]

I found this highly interesting:

Insight Cover: Rationale must precede a response
Moral, practical issues must be resolved prior to further retaliation.
Posted on June 16, 2002

Get the bad guys before they get us.

That, in essence, is the new Bush Doctrine, which is starting to make a profound change in America's military posture toward the rest of the world. The president used slightly more elegant language in his West Point speech June 1, but his message was equally as blunt: "In the world we have entered, the only path to safety is the path of action. And this nation will act."

His words have an exhilarating ring. And there is no doubt Sept. 11 requires rethinking what forces really threaten this country and how to respond to them. But translating the new doctrine into actual policy raises enormous questions, moral as well as practical.

The president has a tendency to use his popularity as a weapon, intimidating his critics and questioning their judgment, even their patriotism. But that should not happen. The issues are too important.

The first issue is President George W. Bush's justification for altering the two-part doctrine that has guided military strategy for more than half a century. One part was containment, halting Communist expansion in countries like Turkey and Nicaragua. The second was deterrence, scaring off enemies through the threat of massive retaliation.

The president certainly has a point when he says deterrence "means nothing against shadowy terrorist networks with no nation or citizens to defend." The failure to capture Osama bin Laden or root out the al-Qaida networks clearly demonstrates our troops are facing a more elusive foe than, say, Soviet armored divisions based in Poland.

Deterrence was based on a second idea as well: America and its allies were battling a rational foe, one that would weigh the costs and benefits of a first strike and shrink from certain devastation. But as the president noted, those who fly airliners into skyscrapers are "mad terrorists and tyrants" who won't necessarily respond to conventional threats.

But there's a third, unspoken assumption behind the Bush doctrine. These terrorists and tyrants are stronger than the Soviets in one sense but weaker in another. Washington can risk a preemptive strike against Kabul or Baghdad because they don't have missiles that can reach American shores.

That weakness can be destabilizing, tempting the White House into actions it never would take against a better-armed foe, such as Russia or even China. Massive retaliation always worked both ways. It was "mutually assured destruction" that kept the peace - their fear of us and our fear of them. Now that whole balance has been thrown off.

Just because the tyrants and terrorists don't have missiles does not mean they are powerless. So here's the danger: Could preemptive strikes provoke more attacks against us using more sinister weapons? Yes, Sept. 11 was a tragic event, but it largely was a symbolic one, as most terrorist acts are. Do we risk escalating this battle into a full-scale war, where the aim of our foes is inflicting maximum casualties?

The second big issue is not theoretical but practical. Preemptive strikes, as the Israelis well know, require extremely detailed intelligence. Unless we hire the Mossad (the Israeli CIA) to scope out the targets, there is little reason to believe our intelligence services are up to the job.

Even with good intelligence, exterminating terrorists and tyrants can be extremely costly in terms of casualties. Are Americans willing to pay that price, particularly when military actions are based on suspicions and threats, not actual attacks?

What about the possible fallout from raiding stockpiles of biological, chemical or nuclear weapons? Our technology is good but hardly perfect - just ask the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. A mistake can cause countless civilian deaths.

And what about our allies in Europe and the Muslim world? Do they accept the Bush doctrine? That's not at all clear. After Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld outlined a more preemptive posture at a NATO meeting in Brussels, the alliance's Secretary General George Robertson grumbled: "We do not go out looking for problems to solve."

Finally there is the moral issue. First strikes have never been part of the American code of honor. Pearl Harbor was branded a "day of infamy" in part because it was an unprovoked sneak attack. Bush talks constantly about "moral clarity" in foreign policy, but does he risk clouding that clarity by obliterating foes that have not attacked us first?

We don't know the answers to these questions, but we do know they have to be asked.

Cokie Roberts and Steven V. Roberts are syndicated columnists based in Washington, D.C. Write them at United Media Services, 200 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10016.

I pray.

And I pray that America knows what the fuck she is getting into.

 

[riff]

Well. I THOUGHT it was interesting, anyway.

 

[TWB]

It is very interesting. And Right On, I think.

It is very important for us to question when we use the force that we have developed, and to remember that with our power comes an awesome (and I don't mean that in a valley girl kind of way) awesome responsibility not to misuse it.

Our history is replete with international abuse of power, some examples cited by the Roberts'. Covert activities, first strikes, etc. are wrought with dangers. Even the most experienced persons might not be able to see the ramifications of their actions. The Bush administration is even less likely to, in my opinion, because they don't appear to think ahead very far.

I think the abolition of the ABM treaty is a good example of that.

Nice post riff.

 

[cybergirly]

It worries me when they start talking "first strike" when dealing with another country for an enemy that's pretty clear. But when dealing with individuals, or groups of individuals that becomes pretty sketchy. Are we talking "first strike" or out and out assination? Where do we draw the line? Morally whats right? And should morals come into play? Who gets to decide this?

I'm with you riff, I hope America knows what the fuck she's doing.

 

[TWB]

More Reason to Question Policy Competence

Karl, Karl, Karl.

All this time, we've been hearing about what a big brain you are, how you have the pulse of every constituency, from Baptist Hispanics in rural areas to suburban moms who watch 15 hours a week of the Lifetime channel, at your clever fingertips.

We've heard about your disquisitions on American history, like your contention that William McKinley was really smarter than his political boss, Mark Hanna.

But now, tragically, we discover you're just another PowerPoint pinhead with a color-coded chart.

A megalomaniac marooned in the banality of demography.

The White House was in a swivet over the Case of the Slipped Disk, as CNN dubbed it — one of several odd slip-ups lately by the formerly disciplined and tight-lipped Bush administration.

Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper, first reported the too-good-to-be-true story of a Democratic Senate staffer happening upon a computer disk dropped on a street corner by a White House intern — can't the White House recruit any discreet interns? — containing a confidential analysis of the 2002 election by Karl Rove and the White House political director Kenneth Mehlman.

With Karen Hughes leaving, Mr. Rove is giddily spreading his wings in the West Wing. As chief of staff Andy Card told Ron Suskind in the new Esquire, Karen and Karl had a moderate and conservative "beauty and the beast" routine going.

Now we will be treated to the beast, unleashed.

The strategist from Texas has been nicknamed "Boy Genius" by the president and aggrandizes himself as "The Honorable Karl C. Rove" in the lost-and- found slide show.

If you think the secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood are lame, check out the secrets of the Yo-Yo Brotherhood.

The Rove doctrine is simple in the extreme: "Maintain Base." The base he lists sounds like a lyric from "Oklahoma!" — "Farmers, Ranchers, Coal & Steel." Even before we learned Mr. Rove's deepest, darkest secrets, we had already cottoned on to the fact that looser standards on coal dust and higher steel tariffs were campaign initiatives.

"Identify Issue Synergies," the White House political team exhorts. What on earth is an issue synergy? Is that the intersection between Enron and Halliburton?

"Maintain a positive issue environment," they instruct. Not a positive global environment, of course, just a positive issue environment. In midterm elections, they intone, "Presidents' standing matters." No kidding.

Karl urges Republicans to "Focus on War." Milking that war again. And "Promote Compassion Agenda." Not compassion itself, mind you, just the trompe l'oeil agenda.

Karl predicts that the Democrats will "question the President's Middle East Strategy."

The Democrats might do that if they can ever figure out what the president's Middle East strategy is.

The politico also thinks the Democrats will pound the G.O.P. with "the Budget, Tax Cuts and Enron for Class Warfare." Why must the Democrats always pester the Haves with that Have-Not piffle?

In his "Summary of Recent Data," Karl happily reports: "No evidence that Enron attacks, POTUS political activity or economy has significantly impacted the President's rating."

A predictable insight into the Rove world view. He worries about Enron as a potential political attack rather than an economic calamity in which thousands of people lost their shirts and their jobs.

And the phrase "POTUS political activity" is an acknowledgment that despite the strenuous public attempts of aides to mythologize W. as someone who always does the right thing, rather than the calculated thing, this president, like the one he succeeded, can put pragmatism over principle.

Mr. Rove sanguinely refers to the deeply jittery economy as "recovering," making it sound like a movie star at a Malibu rehab center.

The maps and charts bear the stamp of the chief political adviser's "Office of Strategic Inititatives." The name sounds uncomfortably close to the Office of Strategic Influence, the shadowy department in the Pentagon that was going to plant deliberately false stories in the foreign press — before word leaked out and Rummy was forced to shut it.

Since our tax dollars are paying for this stuff, next time they lose something, let's hope it's a bit more sophisticated.


Maureen Dowd

 

[cybergirly]

Makes me wonder if they are so careless with something so important to the administration as re-election strategies, how careful are they with the important stuff? Like say defense plans?

 

[Azwed]

RollCall(the newspaper of capitol hill) is supposed to have all of the stuff from that disk on their website somewhere. I have looked for it and can't find it so maybe they took it down already.


I tried to comment on this way earlier Riff and my internet died


I really don't know what to say about it though. I can't answer any of those questions because no one has ever done anything like this before and anyone who says they can answer those questions is lying.

 

[RisiaSkye]

What frightens me most of all is that the final call is up to a certifiable moron.

I mean, I know that the post-9/11 war made GW Bush (aka the Shrub) a genius in some circles, but to me he's still the same idiot he always was. Now, he's just an idiot savvy enough to ride the tide of patriotism and panic.

 

[Sillyman]

And now for the wisdom of cartoons:

Bugs Bunny(dressed as Teddy Roosevelt): I speak softly, but I carry a big stick!

Yosemite Sam: Oh yeah? WELL I SPEAK LOOOOUD, AND CARRY AN EVEN BIIIIGGER STICK!

 

[riff]

I am glad yall read this. It's nice to know that I am not alone.

Please register to vote and then VOTE.

 

[Azwed]

I am glad yall read this. It's nice to know that I am not alone.

Please register to vote and then VOTE.

I hope you pound that into the kids you teach. You should get a stamp made up with that on it and stamp everything they turn with it.

 

[riff]

I try, but the majority of them would rather play Counterstrike.

 

[Laurel]

I think anyone who questions the President of the United States is a certified pinko commie scum who should be thrown in the slammer without a trial & sodomized by large bald dudes with tattoos for the remainder of their miserable lives.

Unless, of course, the President's name starts with a "C" and ends with an "linton". Then it's okay.

 

[riff]

Laurel.......

~snicker~

 

[Laurel]

Aw, I'm just joshin'. About the sodomy part, anyhow.

 

[RisiaSkye]

Aw, I'm just joshin'. About the sodomy part, anyhow.

Dammit. And that was my favorite part, too.

 

[teddybear4play]

I have no problem with first strikes against terrorist groups. Why the hell should we sit around and wait until they do something to us before we attack them?

Whatever you might think about Bush and his "axis of evil," his main point was dead-on: ""The United States of America will not permit the world's most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most destructive weapons."

This shows a pretty obvious clarity. Why anyone doesn't get this is beyond me.

TB4p

 

[Azwed]

I try, but the majority of them would rather play Counterstrike.

CS rocks but uhhh you should still get that stamp.

 

[riff]

CS rocks but uhhh you should still get that stamp.

Hmmmm... I don't use much paper. Everything is on-line. I will hammer them with e-mail sig lines and the like.

 

[Laurel]

Dammit. And that was my favorite part, too.

Tease.



*drool*

 

[RisiaSkye]

Tease.



*drool*

Well, in lieu of the now-defunct sodomy, I've resurrected the strap-on avatar.

drool away, dear heart.

 

[Azwed]

Hmmmm... I don't use much paper. Everything is on-line. I will hammer them with e-mail sig lines and the like.

Ahh yeah i forgot about that damn networking such and such.

 

[SINthysist]

So Riff, first strike is a perfectly acceptable methodology for our enemies, but we must always play forestall or retreat-attack...

I think that you have to openly say that you will strike in order to keep all your options open and complicate you enemies strategy.

I am more concerned about Bill Clinton running around this weekend claiming that while he was president, he prevented attacks like 9-11. The implication being again from the left that Bush allowed this tragedy to happen. (It is the same strategy, the strategy of the big lie, repeated often, in as many ways and venues as possible.)

I guess that's because of his first-strike policy towards tent cities and abandoned aspirin factories within sovereign nations...

It's a sword that cuts both ways.

 

[riff]

It's a problem S.

I hear what you are saying and I do believe in a strong defense.

But I do not trust the people running the show right now and I do suspect there is a measure of using the "invisible enemy" as a ploy for "Let's not make any big changes in 2004."

But the moral clarity part of it. If America wants to set an example for the world to follow- an honorable example- then we had better be damned certain that we know what we are doing and have PROOF that we are in immediate danger.

America has plenty weapons of mass destruction and plenty of Americans would love to use them. So might makes right?

The more we dance at the strings of terrorist threats, the more like the terrorists we become. That bothers me.

 

[Bob Peale]

I found this highly interesting:




I pray.

And I pray that America knows what the fuck she is getting into.

Riff,

I read this whole damn thing and nowhere was there any mention of female genetalia!

You got some 'splainin' to to do!