Well, the two wars provide a nice test of your theory, as in one there was direct US military involvement, and in the other, the kind of diplomatic, economic and political pressure you presumably would prefer.

Do you think your theory passes that test?

soru

prevent = By the Bosnian war I was referring to the U.S. bombing of Serbia over Kosovo, not the Serbian invasion of Bosnia earlier.

I think there could be a place for humanitarian intervention, but one would have to build multilateral institutions or beef up the U.N. to handle it, in the hands of an individual nation it just becomes an excuse for a different sort of agenda.

There’s always a place for genuine self defense as well, but there’s no evidence that multlateral institutions are going to prevent us from doing that. E.g. we easily and quickly got approval for the Afghanistan war.

Is your definition of ‘prevent’ ‘avoid involvement in?’

Yes, to avoid military involvement. There are other forms of involvement, other than killing people. Even if you have the best intentions (which is never the case), vigilanteism is illegal, immoral and on the great scale of things counter-productive.

Is your definition of ‘prevent’ ‘avoid involvement in?’

I’d be interested in the definition of ‘moral’ you are using too, if you can explain it.

soru

The most important thing to do in foreign policy right now is challenge policies that call for us to engage in unilateral U.S. military action all over the world. That’s for good realist and moral reasons both. It’s fine if that prevents e.g. a Bosnian war along with an Iraq war, in the long run the consequences of a new American reluctance to engage in military adventuring will be good for both America and the world. So this liberal is very happy indeed to make common cause with foreign policy realists.

And if the word ‘democracy’ means whatever you want it to mean, then, obviously, you live not in a ‘putative democracy’ but rather in some Orwell’s Oceania.

I don’t see why we have to “pretend every third world ally of the US” is either democratic or non. It does, however, help not to kid ourselves about how “allies” propped up solely by external force of arms are perceived, and why, and the degree to which it’s possible to legitimate such “allies” through elections. Yes, yes, yes, Iraq Is Not Vietnam, but the questions related to it once again have a way of bringing that bad old war to mind…

And claiming Iraq is not a democracy is going to start sounding as hollow as claims that the US was intent on stealing Iraq’s oil.

I think your characterization of both terms in this argument is backwards.

That is one way around the dilemma. Heck the Chomskyites like to call the US a putative democracy. And it quite clearly works as a solution for a number of folks.

But I don’t think that would work for Henry and a number of other people. Probably not for a majority on the left. Pretending that every third world ally of the US is by definition non-Democratic is probably an unconvincing way out of the dilemma.

And claiming Iraq is not a democracy is going to start sounding as hollow as claims that the US was intent on stealing Iraq’s oil.

So for the majority the problem will remain.

Sebastian,

Doctor Slack beat me to it. That was naive.

That creates a unique opposition among the ranks of Jeffersonian libertarians and Hamiltonian realists. Oh, and also some residual “continental realists” who Mead dismisses as Europeans.

Mead documents how these various factions have formed and broken coalitions in the past. Thus, don’t be surprised if Bush can’t hold either the Wilsonians or the Jacksonians. Ordinarily, you lose the Jacksonians if the mission looks too much like charity work, or if elites don’t approve enough fighting power to satiate the “win at all costs” crowd. Likewise, Bush could lose the Wilsonians if the multilateralists prevail within that school.

Of course, the opposition will eventually divide as well because the Jeffersonians are used to aligning with the Wilsonians and fundamentally distrust the elitist Hamiltonians.

The current marriages of convenience will not last, so there’s not much to worry about within the left (which was similarly divided over Kosovo—peacenik Jeffersonians versus Wilsonian humanitarians).

Ummm, okay. Care to elaborate?

BigMac: When a democratically elected government asks for assistance against a group of thugs looking to impose a tyranny upon their fellow citizens via armed conflict, how do you say no my progressive foreign policy principles prevent me from helping you?

When various groups of thugs look to use your “assistance” as a means of carving out fiefdoms under the cover of “democratic elections” held in a warzone with mostly anonymous candidates, how do you say yes my progressive foreign policies require me to help you? Or, for that matter, yes my “realist” foreign policy principles dictate that helping you is in my interest?

True he would create a society and a set of laws that we would find highly disagreeable but the respect for core human rights and democratic rule of law is what is critical?

And you are confident Sistani represents this… why exactly? And suppose the Sunnis and the Kurds reject living under the society and set of laws that he represents – how do you say no my progressive foreign policy principles require you to accede to this without taking up arms?

Sounds like a Catch-22 situation, right? That’s because it is. This is why a cross-spectrum antiwar movement came to exist in the first place.

Sebastian: Right, better one million thrown into the desert in the Sudan where it can’t remotely be blamed on the US than than ten thousand killed by anti-US insurgents where it can.

Hmmm, can you think of any reason there weren’t any US troops available to show leadership in a genuinely humanitarian cause in Sudan, forcing a resort to poorly-equipped African troops instead? It seems to me there were a bunch of them tied down in a self-made quagmire somewhere nearby…

Right, better one million thrown into the desert in the Sudan where it can’t remotely be blamed on the US than than ten thousand killed by anti-US insurgents where it can.

A somewhat plausible argument. And the only one so far.

Every movement will have it’s share of nice and not nice people. What is the litmus test? 50.0001% nice? 99.9999% nice? 2/3s nice? What about the Kurds? Etc. We end up with isolationism as the principle.

I think the key is a wide spread commitment to some core set of human rights and respect for a constitutional democracy as an institution shown by Sistani.

True he would create a society and a set of laws that we would find highly disagreeable but the respect for core human rights and democratic rule of law is what is critical? Not only are these things extremely valuable on their own, they will allow for a broad based furtherance of other progressive values.

Without some progressive principle the field has been conceded to the realists. That’s it the parameters of the debate have been set. In the future any appeals to inviolate(or naything approaching inviolate) progressive principles will ring hollow.

This isn’t left vs right. It’s simply the realists and pragmatists on each supposed “side” stating the obvious.

I know I don’t agree with Pat Buchanan on most things, but we can both “tell shit from shinola,” to resurrect an ancient phrase.
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