The right and freedom
As I explain
here
and
here,
I am a libertarian or a classic (18th century) liberal.
I agree with liberals on things like
domestic civil liberties,
free speech, free private life,
freedom of sexuality
and freedom of religion
(and freedom from religion).
But I agree with conservatives on things like the economy,
crime
and foreign policy.
Liberals lead to freedom at home,
but are disastrous abroad.
Only
conservatives
understand how the world as a whole works
- that the world is full of folly and brutality,
that the west is imperfect but the best there is,
that it must now and always be defended against its enemies.
The right has the best record on freedom
Having destroyed
the Nazis, Mussolini, Imperial Japan, the Soviets,
Milosevic, the Taliban and Saddam,
America and its "right-wing" supporters are,
it seems to me,
the greatest defenders of freedom in practice
in this world.
Conservatives defended our world against Nazi and Soviet tyranny.
And now conservatives are
defending us against Islamic fascist tyranny.
Every liberal should support them.
I do not deny that
the defence of the west has involved crimes,
the worst of these by far being the bombing of civilians in WW2,
and the collaboration with Russia in WW2.
But
the fundamental points remain,
that the left will not support,
that:
(a) the west is the best part of planet earth
- everywhere else is worse,
and:
(b) the west does
need to be strongly defended.
SR-71 Blackbird strategic reconnaissance aircraft.
Public domain image from
here.
More
here.
See
full size.
I
agree that crimes have been committed in
the defence of the west, notably:
- In World War 2 (the War on Fascism):
- The bombing of civilians in WW2.
- The "realpolitik" (not idealistic) collaboration with
Soviet Russia in WW2.
Note that this is a crime that the left supported.
This help to Russia even included
assistance with the running of the gulags.
- The sending of 4 million POWs and displaced persons back to Russia
(many for execution) after WW2.
- Allowing Russia occupy
Eastern Europe and part of Germany after WW2.
- The West made up for this somewhat
by containing the Soviets
and ultimately bringing down the Soviet regime in 1989.
- In World War 3 (the War on Communism):
- The bombing of civilians in Cambodia
in the Vietnam War.
- The abandoning of South Vietnam
to the communist butchers
after 1973.
Note that this is a crime that the left supported.
South Vietnam fell to the butchers in 1975.
- The abandoning of Cambodia
to the communist butchers
after 1973.
Note that this is a crime that the left supported.
Cambodia fell to the butchers in 1975.
- "Realpolitik" (not idealistic) support for
right-wing tyrannies like
Pinochet
and
El Salvador
in the Cold War.
The US made up for this everywhere by
making the right-wing tyrannies it once supported
move to democracy,
once the communist threat was defeated.
South and Central America
are the most notable successes
of this policy.
- "Realpolitik" (not idealistic) support for
the Islamists
fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan.
The US made up for this by
bringing down the Islamist regime in 2001.
- America's treachery in the
Suez Crisis of 1956
in standing with the anti-semitic tyranny of
Egypt
against the democracies of Britain, France and Israel.
America feared war with the Soviet Union,
but its behaviour was still disgraceful.
- In World War 4 (the War on Islamism):
- "Realpolitik" (not idealistic) support for
Saddam's Iraq
against Islamic fundamentalist Iran.
The US made up for this by bringing down Saddam's regime in 2003.
France and Germany never made up for their support of Saddam,
which continued until his downfall in 2003,
and even to some extent beyond.
- "Realpolitik" (not idealistic)
support (and
foreign aid)
for unfree Islamic states like
Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Egypt
and Pakistan today.
- "Realpolitik" (not idealistic)
support for other unfree states
that have been useful in the war,
such as
Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan,
and the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan.
- As part of the "peace process" environment,
America
and the EU
sending money
(and even weapons)
to the Palestinian Authority
"police" and "security forces",
funding the UNRWA,
and
supporting Fatah against Hamas.
Note these are crimes that the left supports.
My idea of an ethical foreign policy
is to
only ever be allies with free countries.
But I do have sympathy for the politicians, who are often
faced with horrible choices.
I accept that to defend the west without any alliances
with unfree regimes
often seems impossible.
Unfree regimes (notably Pakistan
and Kuwait)
were essential to the wars on
Afghanistan and Iraq, for example.
Should their help have been rejected?
I accept that it is easier to be an idealist than a politician.
- Rudolph J. Rummel
-
The World's Champion Villain, by Randall Hoven, February 20, 2007
- List of 20th century democides
points out the obvious
- that America is largely irrelevant to the story
of 20th century democide.
- Allied war crimes during World War II
-
Don't Judge a Nation by Its Friends
(judge it by its enemies)
- Andrew E. Busch considers the problem of alliances with unfree
regimes for the sake of a greater goal.
He correctly points out that the alliance with Russia in WW2
was by far the worst of these.
- The Continuation War, 1941-44
shows where realpolitik leads.
The democracies of the US and UK support the vile tyranny of the Soviet Union
to help them defeat Nazi Germany.
The democracy of Finland supports the vile tyranny of Nazi Germany
to help it defeat the Soviet Union.
As a result, democratic states end up at war with each other.
- Victor Davis Hanson, December 10, 2007,
lists some of the intelligence failures, strategic errors,
tactical errors
and realpolitik alliances
of American military history.
The Iraq War has been better than average so far.
- He notes how humans once accepted error:
"Yet until the defeat in Vietnam, there was a sort of tragic acceptance of military error as inherent in war. Ours was once a largely rural population, inured to natural disaster and resigned to human shortcoming. ... the common desire for victory usually overcame perpetual finger-pointing and serial despair.
...
Again, what loses wars are not the inevitable mistakes, but the failure to correct them in time and the defeatism and depression (because errors occurred at all) that we allow to paralyze us."
- He also points out how we rarely dwell on our enemies' mistakes:
"the enemy, being less introspective and self-critical, was even more prone to military error than we - and less likely to innovate and correct.
...
There is no need to document the stupendous strategic and tactical blunders that led to Saddam's ignominious defeat. But in his wake (and after his demise), the supposedly sophisticated jihadists have made just as many mistakes. In a self-proclaimed war of Islamic liberation, al-Qaeda in Iraq has mutilated, butchered, and terrorized a once largely sympathetic population. As a result they have nearly pulled off the impossible: a formerly receptive Sunni tribal community has turned against Sunni Muslim jihadists, and joined with American infidels, sometimes alongside the troops of a Shiite-led government."
- As always, Hanson provides hope.
He says we cannot see the wood for the trees:
"The Iraq war and the larger struggle against the anti-American jihadists can still be won - and won with a resulting positive assessment of our overall efforts by future historians who will be far less harsh on us than we are now on ourselves."
- Power
by Bill Whittle
- on how America is not perfect.
Just better than the alternatives
in this imperfect human world.
For example, European
or UN
leadership
would clearly lead to a worse world than American leadership.
-
I never claim America is perfect.
Just that it is the best.
-
Disgrace:
US aid helps Lebanon arrest Israeli intelligence cell, May 2009.
The Israelis were gathering intel on Hezbollah.
Hezbollah hate America and have slaughtered hundreds of Americans.
And yet American aid helped Hezbollah against Israel.
The brave Israeli agents face torture and death.
This disgrace - this treason against the West - happened on Obama's watch.
Comment:
"There aren't a lot of things that make me feel ashamed to be an American, even for a second, but this sort of betrayal of America's friends is very high on that very short list."
- French foreign policy
- I don't include in the list above
the long list of tyrannies that France has supported -
from Hutu Rwanda
to Saddam's Iraq
to genocidal Sudan
to communist China
to the thug Mugabe
- since I do not regard France as in any way a "leader" of the west.
- I am defending the American-led west.
I do not offer any defence of French foreign policy,
since it is not defensible.
- In fact, I am generally opposed to French power.
France is a perfectly nice place domestically,
but its foreign policy
is irresponsible and amoral,
and I am hostile to any increase in French power in the world.
I would like to see France lose its UN Security Council seat, for example.
Worse than Pinochet, El Salvador, Saddam, the Afghan Mujahideen,
Suharto, Marcos,
Saudi Arabia or Pakistan.
This is
the worst example of
realpolitik in the history of the West
- the alliance with the Soviets in WW2.
US government poster, 1942.
Public domain image from
here.
"The Cairo and Teheran Conferences ... gave me my first opportunity to meet the Generalissimo, Chiang Kai-shek, and Marshal Stalin - and to sit down at the table with these unconquerable men
... I met in the Generalissimo a man of great vision, great courage, and a remarkably keen understanding of the
problems of today ... Today we and the Republic of China are closer together than ever before in deep friendship and in unity of purpose.
....
After the Cairo Conference, Mr. Churchill and I went by airplane to Teheran. There we met with Marshal Stalin.
...
I may say that I "got along fine" with Marshal Stalin. He is a man who combines a tremendous, relentless determination with a stalwart good humor. I believe he is truly representative of the heart and soul of Russia; and I believe that we are going to get along very well with him and the Russian people
....
Britain, Russia, China, and the United States and their allies represent more than three-quarters of the total population of the earth. ... those four powers must be united with and cooperate with all the freedom-loving peoples of Europe, and Asia, and Africa, and the Americas.
The rights of every Nation, large or small, must be respected and guarded as jealously as are the rights of every individual within our own Republic.
The doctrine that the strong shall dominate the weak is the doctrine of our enemies - and we reject it."
-
FDR's disgusting "Fireside Chat", 24 December 1943.
He talks as if the democidal tyrants
Chiang Kai-shek of China
and Stalin of Russia
share the same vision of the world as the democracies do.
Does he really believe this?
He talks as if he does.
American foreign policy is
still
today often in conflict
with American values of democracy and freedom.
Not its support of the democracy of
Israel,
which is perfectly right and proper.
Rather its support
of unfree states like
Saudi Arabia, Egypt
and Pakistan,
that share no common values with the west,
and where human rights do not exist.
These regimes should be dumped by the US
at the earliest possible opportunity.
- The Real Roots of Arab Anti-Americanism
by Barry Rubin
- discusses America's long history of support for
the Arab Islamic world,
which has yielded it nothing but hatred.
America needs to change its policy,
and become a much more aggressive force for
democracy and change in the Middle East.
-
America's long history of thwarting Israeli interests
- America has not been loyal enough to Israel.
-
The End of Appeasement
by Max Boot
- America needs to assert itself.
-
Statistics of US foreign aid to enemies of the US
- This aid to countries like Egypt
must stop now.
-
Not to mention the appalling amount of money the US
gives to the UN.
-
Our Not-So-Wise Experts:
A litany of past failure
by Victor Davis Hanson, April 15, 2005
- lists all the failed policies of the past:
- Policy #1: Realism (Bush senior)
- Policy #2: Punitivism (Clinton)
- Policy #3: Bribery (Clinton)
- Policy #4: "Let Them Be"
The new policy - the policy of actively
trying to change the Middle East,
and end tyranny and spread democracy
- is the last resort, the only one that hasn't been tried,
the only one that will actually work:
".. too often we discuss the present risky policy without thought of what preceded it
or what might have substituted for it. Have we forgotten that the messy business of democracy
was the successor, not the precursor, to a litany of other failed prescriptions?
...
After the failures of all our present critics, this new policy of promoting American values
is our last, best hope. And the president will be rewarded long after he leaves office
by the verdict of history for nobly sticking to it when few others, friend or foe, would."
- Yes, well. It's early days yet,
and Bush still has realpolitik alliances with
tyrannies like Saudi Arabia.
Bush has made a good start, but we need to see
Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan becoming free democracies soon,
if this war is ever to end.
-
The Bush Doctrine's Next Test, May 2005
- Victor Davis Hanson
on
Egypt, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia.
He says now is the moment:
"change is inevitable in any case,
and there may be only a brief window to ensure that it is democratic and stays that way".
- Ralph Peters
shows how to criticise policy
while still being pro-West:
- Peters is as gung-ho and idealistic
a supporter of Bush's war as you will get,
and what he criticises America for is what I criticise it for
- its appalling "realpolitik" history of support for
Arab tyrants.
-
Our True Enemies
- "Until the recent war against Saddam's regime, we never stood up for freedom in the Arab world."
-
Bush's speech of 2003
indicates that he gets it
(or at least, that the debate is raging
in his administration).
-
Michael Ledeen
also does a good line in scepticism and caution.
He is gung-ho in favour of the war on Islamism,
but worries that we are not serious enough.
-
Our Moment of Vainglory
worries that the diplomats are going to turn military victory
into defeat - by allowing the establishment of
"friendly tyrannies" in Iraq and Afghanistan.
If so, the war will only be postponed, not ended.
- Cox and Forkum blog
also does a good line in scepticism,
and thinks the US has not got remotely serious enough
with Islamist and communist states.
They also refuse to be happy with
Iraq and Afghanistan until these countries
become free societies.
- "Our SOB"
- Cox and Forkum fed up with the realpolitik
support for the tyrant of Uzbekistan,
just because he is useful in the War on Islamism.
- Capitalism magazine
also shows how to criticise the Bush administration
while still remaining clearly onside
and pro-War-on-Islamism.
Indeed, they criticise the Bush administration
for caring too much what Europe and the UN think.
The main debate on the right, among the pro-West critics above,
is whether it is acceptable if regime change leads to simply a leader
chosen by the
majority (the narrow definition of "democracy"),
or leads to an actual
free society (the broader definition of "democracy").
Stop aid to Egypt
Free young Egyptian hero
Abdel Kareem Nabil!
He was jailed in Feb 2007 by the unfree state of
Egypt
for criticism of
Islam
and criticism of Egypt's unelected dictator
Mubarak,
both of which should be perfectly legal.
Despite the above issues,
America,
the oldest democracy in the world,
is the country in the world best suited to hold power,
and every lover of freedom
should support America at a time like this.
-
In America and Britain, democracy is old.
In Europe, democracy is new.
- The new power blocs of the world
-
What's So Great About America
by Dinesh D'Souza
- "America is the greatest, freest, and most decent society in existence.
It is an oasis of goodness in a desert of cynicism and barbarism.
[It is] the
last, best hope for the world."
- I agree - and I, like D'Souza, am not American.
-
My only criticism
is he does not seem to acknowledge that
the American life can be lived to some extent throughout
the west.
For example almost everything he praises exists in Ireland too.
- Project for the New American Century
- America, not the UN, should lead the world.
-
National Interest and Global Responsibility
(also here)
by Robert Kagan and William Kristol, 2000.
The prophetic, pre-9/11, neo-con text on the need for American
dominance of the world.
-
Decline Is a Choice: The New Liberalism and the end of American ascendancy by Charles Krauthammer, 19 Oct 2009, on how the world will be a more dangerous place if, under Obama, America withdraws from its current role:
- "We are the rarest of geopolitical phenomena: the accidental hegemon and, given our history of isolationism and lack of instinctive imperial ambition, the reluctant hegemon - and now, after a near-decade of strenuous post-9/11 exertion, more reluctant than ever.
Which leads to my second proposition: Facing the choice of whether to maintain our dominance or to gradually, deliberately, willingly, and indeed relievedly give it up, we are currently on a course towards the latter. The current liberal ascendancy in the United States - controlling the executive and both houses of Congress, dominating the media and elite culture - has set us on a course for decline. And this is true for both foreign and domestic policies."
- "Growth provides the sinews of dominance - the ability to maintain a large military establishment capable of projecting power to all corners of the earth. The Europeans, rich and developed, have almost no such capacity. They made the choice long ago to devote their resources to a vast welfare state. Their expenditures on defense are minimal, as are their consequent military capacities. They rely on the U.S. Navy for open seas and on the U.S. Air Force for airlift. ... The United States can do all of this because we spend infinitely more on defense - more than the next nine countries combined.
Those are the conditions today. But they are not static or permanent. ... The express agenda of the New Liberalism is a vast expansion of social services .. that will necessarily, as in Europe, take away from defense spending."
- "The temptation to abdicate has always been strong in America.
... So why not? Why not choose ease and bask in the adulation of the world as we serially renounce, withdraw, and concede?
Because, while globalization has produced in some the illusion that human nature has changed, it has not. The international arena remains a Hobbesian state of nature in which countries naturally strive for power. If we voluntarily renounce much of ours, others will not follow suit. They will fill the vacuum. Inevitably, an inversion of power relations will occur.
Do we really want to live under unknown, untested, shifting multipolarity?"
-
"Decline is a choice. More than a choice, a temptation. How to resist it?
First, accept our role as hegemon. And reject those who deny its essential benignity. There is a reason that we are the only hegemon in modern history to have not immediately catalyzed the creation of a massive counter-hegemonic alliance - as occurred, for example, against Napoleonic France and Nazi Germany. There is a reason so many countries of the Pacific Rim and the Middle East and Eastern Europe and Latin America welcome our presence as balancer of power and guarantor of their freedom.
And that reason is simple: We are as benign a hegemon as the world has ever seen."
Name the country that has done more good than America
It is true that America has committed
crimes,
but can you name
any country in world history
that has done more
good than America?
I cannot.
- Why America is Great
by Daniel J. Flynn
-
"What country in the history of the world
boasts such an impressive record of bettering the lot of all of humanity?"
Name that country,
if it's not America.
- Victor Davis Hanson
- "Kurds and Shiites support us for obvious reasons
- no other government on the planet
would risk its sons and daughters to give them the right of one man/one vote."
If there is any other country on earth which will give the
Kurds freedom, then
name that country.
-
America's Remarkable Goodness: What the Critics Refuse to Acknowledge
by John Perazzo
- America is not perfect. Only better than the others.
- "America's track record is quite
demonstrably the most awe-inspiring model
of benevolence in the recorded
history of mankind."
If you disagree,
name the country
whose record is better.
-
Pew Survey, July 2007.
When asked to name their home country's most reliable allies in the world:
- The US was the no.1 choice in:
UK, Canada,
Israel, Japan, South Korea, South Africa, India, Kuwait,
Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Chile,
Ghana, Kenya, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Uganda, Mali, Tanzania.
- The US was the no.2 choice in:
Germany, Italy, Czech Republic, Poland, Morocco, Ivory Coast, Senegal.
- The US was the no.3 choice in:
France, Bangladesh, Malaysia.
- And remember, not all countries were polled.
- The US itself viewed the UK as its no.1 ally in the world.
Far ahead of Canada and Germany.
-
6 word mottos to define America.
Ones I like:
- Always Saving Europe From German Invasion
- Keeping the world safe without thanks
- Piss us off, we'll bomb you
- You send rhetoric, we send Marines
- 1 Billion liberated since 1942
- Friends or Enemies, It's Your Choice
- America - we subsidize your sorry asses
- Let me into your country, now
- That hot girl who ignores you
The
Statue of Liberty,
for generations a beacon of hope
to the oppressed peoples of the world,
that here, at last, was a land where they could be
free.
Photo by Bjorn Ruwald, 2004.
See
terms of use.
From
here.
- Above I said that America is "the oldest democracy in the world".
What I mean is that it is the oldest real democracy
that is continuous (unbroken).
-
Britain has an older continuous tradition,
but wasn't a real democracy before America.
It was the
proto-democracy that
inspired America.
- Chronology of Modern Democracy
- Combining the charts of
Samuel P. Huntington
and
Francis Fukuyama
gives the world's 10 oldest continuous democracies as:
- Late 18th cent:
USA
- Early 19th cent:
UK,
Switzerland
- Late 19th cent:
Sweden,
Canada
- Early 20th cent:
Australia, New Zealand,
Ireland,
Finland,
Iceland
- Today, all 10 of these countries are ranked the maximum "Free"
in political freedom by
Freedom House.
- All 10 are ranked the maximum "Free"
in economic freedom by
The Heritage Foundation.
- All 10 are in the
top 25 richest countries on earth.
- 5 of these 10 countries are strong military
defenders of the West.
The other 5 are neutral.
-
5 of these 10 countries
led the defeat of
the 3 greatest killers that were defeated in the 20th century
- the Nazis,
Axis Japan,
and the Soviet Union.
- Today, in the Islamist War,
all 10 of these countries are either in the
"Axis of Good"
or are neutral.
- Truly, these are good candidates for the best 10 countries in the world.
"To Kill An American".
America is not a place. It is an
idea.
This is why non-Americans like me can get so excited about it.
Whereas so many countries represent some ethnic or tribal identity, which leaves non-members utterly cold.
Where this excellent short video perhaps goes wrong is in failing to understand
that those who want to kill Americans
(such as fascists, communists and Islamists)
know
precisely that America is an idea,
and they
hate that idea.
Islamists, for example, absolutely
hate the idea of freedom of religion.
Hosted at
Metacafe.
"And in some small corner of this vast
country, out in Nevada or Idaho or these places I've
never been to but always wanted to go
- I know out there, there's a guy getting on with his
life, perfectly happily, minding his own business,
saying to you, the political leaders of this country,
"Why me, and why us, and why America?"
And the
only answer is because destiny put you in this place
in history in this moment in time, and the task is
yours to do. And our job - my nation, that watched
you grow, that you fought alongside and now fights
alongside you, that takes enormous pride in our
alliance and great affection in our common bond -
our job is to be there
with you."
-
Tony Blair's address to Congress
after the toppling of Saddam, July 2003,
on why
America has the thankless task
of saving the world
(and why everybody else in the West should support them).
"I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism."
- The unimpressive President Obama,
Apr 2009,
when asked whether he believes in American exceptionalism.
Well I am not American, and let me reply.
I am Irish, and I do not believe in Irish exceptionalism.
Ireland has proven again and again (WW2, Cold War, Israel)
that while it is a perfectly nice democracy,
it has no political leadership (or even moral leadership) role to play in the West.
I do believe in American exceptionalism, even if Obama doesn't.
America has proven again and again that it is the primary defender of the West
and of human freedom.
We all look to America for leadership, and we hope that President Obama is not as bad
as his awful rhetoric makes him out to be.
Return to
The modern right.
Since 1995.
