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Tuesday, Nov 24, 2009
When the government declares war on cancer or poverty or drugs it means the government is asking that new forces be mobilized to address the problem. It also means that the government cannot do a whole lot to solve it. When the government declares war on terrorism -- terrorism being a multinational, largely clandestine network of enemies -- it means that the government is giving itself permission to do what it wants. When it wants to intervene somewhere, it will. It will brook no limits on its power.
Sontag doesn't seem to understand that there is something called the Constitution of the United States. It mandates that the people of the United States get to pick their government. The Constitution is indeed a limit on the government's power. If and when the people of this country decide that they do not want their government to prosecute a war on terrorism, they will have every right to change their leaders. This fear of untrammeled American power is a paranoid fantasy. America has been the most reluctant and benign hegemon in world history.
The American suspicion of foreign "entanglements" is very old. But this administration has taken the radical position that all international treaties are potentially inimical to the interests of the United States -- since by signing a treaty on anything (whether environmental issues or the conduct of war and the treatment of prisoners) the United States is binding itself to obey conventions that might one day be invoked to limit America's freedom of action to do whatever the government thinks is in the country's interests. Indeed, that's what a treaty is: it limits the right of its signatories to complete freedom of action on the subject of the treaty. Up to now, it has not been the avowed position of any respectable nation-state that this is a reason for eschewing treaties.
It is by no means a new doctrine that nation-states can decide not to engage in treaties that they believe violate their own national self-interest. When such treaties could mean foreign powers trying American soldiers in courts run by Libyans, it is not exactly revolutionary to refrain from signing such agreements. As for Kyoto, Sontag seems to be unaware that it was never ratified by the Senate. We can't abrogate a treaty we never ratified.
Describing America's new foreign policy as actions undertaken in wartime is a powerful disincentive to having a mainstream debate about what is actually happening. This reluctance to ask questions was already apparent in the immediate aftermath of the attacks last Sept. 11. Those who objected to the jihad language used by the American government (good versus evil, civilization versus barbarism) were accused of condoning the attacks, or at least the legitimacy of the grievances behind the attacks.
Here we go again. Poor Sontag. No "mainstream debate." Just dozens of speeches, endless talk-shows, countless Op-Eds, blogs, and the New York Times turning itself into an 18th century factional broadsheet. Her real gripe is that people actually dared to criticize her monstrous callousness when she found reason to criticize America in the hours after the horror of 9/11. Her punishment? Being given the prime Op-Ed space in America a year later. Notice also that she describes the distinction between civilization and barbarism as "jihad language." When Islamist fanatics foment hatred of Jews, it's their culture. When America defends itself, it's "jihad."
Under the slogan United We Stand, the call to reflectiveness was equated with dissent, dissent with lack of patriotism. The indignation suited those who have taken charge of the Bush administration's foreign policy. The aversion to debate among the principal figures in the two parties continues to be apparent in the run-up to the commemorative ceremonies on the anniversary of the attacks -- ceremonies that are viewed as part of the continuing affirmation of American solidarity against the enemy. The comparison between Sept. 11, 2001, and Dec. 7, 1941, has never been far from mind. Once again, America was the object of a lethal surprise attack that cost many -- in this case, civilian -- lives, more than the number of soldiers and sailors who died at Pearl Harbor. However, I doubt that great commemorative ceremonies were felt to be needed to keep up morale and unite the country on Dec. 7, 1942. That was a real war, and one year later it was very much still going on.
This is a phantom war and therefore in need of an anniversary.
Does she really believe that the 3,000 victims of 9/11 are "phantoms"? Does she really believe that wanting to remember and recall them in an anniversary is entirely designed to foment war talk? As for her precedents, the Second World War was full of far more emphatic rallying cries, blatant propaganda and constant war speeches to keep up morale and rally the troops and the country throughout the years of conflict. When Churchill repeatedly commemorated and invoked Dunkirk during the Second World War, was he really doing so for "phantom" reasons -- or did he realize that every democracy at war needs to be rallied, supported and cajoled into vigilance?
