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May 5, 2003, Issue

A World of Possibilities
By John O'Sullivan

Bush needs to counterpose a vision of equal power and attractiveness to the "European idea" that animates his opponents. Both isolationism and the "global interventionism" advocated by some neoconservatives would further accelerate the Euro-nationalist trend. That leaves a revived Atlanticism, in which the U.S. would seek like-minded political allies throughout the Continent and seek to reshape the EU along free-market and pro-American lines. To take hold, such an Atlanticism would require a sense of crisis — and in Europe, this is now at hand. Economic, social, and demographic trends show Europe declining and America growing: By 2050 the U.S. economy will be almost three times the size of the current EU economy. Taken together, however, the U.S. and the EU would amount to almost 40 percent of world gross domestic product. In other words, Europe's clout is bound to diminish vis-à-vis the U.S. and every other region — unless it is part of a united West enjoying a global economic and political dominance.

The Great Sorting Out
By David Pryce-Jones

The eventual government of Iraq will have to be as genuinely representative as possible, not an exclusive Sunni or Shia or Kurd benefit system. But far from thinking this through and establishing a government-in-waiting, the State Department and the Pentagon are openly engaged in a wrestling match over their respective Iraqi candidates for office. The State Department hopes to rescue from retirement Adnan Pachachi, an 80-year-old former foreign minister. But he is a Sunni, and so his backers are set to repeat the British mistake of promoting someone from that minority without sufficient concern for everyone else. Among spokesmen for the Shia, the most articulate and forceful is Ahmad Chalabi, a member of a prominent family and secular in outlook, with a degree from MIT. Consistently supported by the Pentagon, he founded and now leads the Iraqi National Congress. According to some sources, people have never heard of him, asking "Ahmad who?" According to other sources, he is cheered in the streets.

The Road to Damascus
By Meyrav Wurmser

Why did Assad throw caution to the wind and decide to risk being America's next target? After all, soon after 9/11 he had cautiously cooperated with the U.S. by arresting a few members of an al-Qaeda affiliate terror group. He seemed, then, to understand the need to avoid America's wrath. The explanation is despair, and the nature of the ideology that motivates the regime. Despite the fact that relations between the Ba'athist regimes in Baghdad and Damascus were always strained, tyranny's collapse in Iraq threatens nobody in the Arab world more than the Ba'athists in Syria. What just transpired in Baghdad cannot be easily contained by even the most repressive security apparatus. The U.S. need not go to war with Damascus, unless Damascus chooses to make a violent last stand, either directly or by employing terrorism. We should, however, launch a war of ideas. Since Syria cannot avoid confronting the U.S., the U.S. can make its addiction to confrontation fatal.

President of the World
By Jay Nordlinger

Americans tend to view the U.N. as a curiosity, or as a nice idea, or as a nuisance to be borne. But to much of the planet, the U.N. is paramount, and Kofi Annan is president of the world — a "secular pope," as he has been called. Other nations, feeling especially weak in the era of one superpower, seek their influence in the collectivity at Turtle Bay. It is the secretary general's job to embody that collectivity. And in the perverse equality of the United Nations, Iraq can head the disarmament council, whenever its spot in the alphabet comes up. Libya is now in the chair of the U.N. human-rights commission — Quaddafi's Libya. Syria and Cuba are among the other Schweitzerian states that serve on it. The only nation that has something like pariah status in the U.N. is the only democracy in the Middle East — you know who. It is the only nation barred from serving on the Security Council.

Off the Air
By John J. Miller

On March 31, five Republican senators — Sam Brownback of Kansas, Norm Coleman of Minnesota, Jon Kyl and John McCain of Arizona, and Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania — sent a letter to the White House. Their concern was that the State Department had not released millions of dollars previously appropriated to the Iraqi National Congress, a union of opposition groups that hoped to operate a television station called TV Liberty, among other vital efforts. Two days later, the State Department released $4 million to the INC — some two weeks after the war had started. The failure to set up an opposition TV station is startling. After all, for the majority of Iraqi viewers, it was all Saddam, all the time. "If opposition TV had been beaming into Iraq from the first day, the cities would have fallen like dominoes," says Ali al-Ahmed of the Virginia-based Saudi Institute. "It would have shortened the fighting and saved lives."

How Cheap Is Your Manhood?
By John Derbyshire

To the degree that warrior envy is a species of regret for misspent youth, there is, pending the invention of a Time Machine, no real cure. If, however, you want to make some amends for your former neglect of the military aspect of citizenship, there are a number of things you can do. In the first place, you may still be able to enlist. The reserves and National Guard accept new enlistees and officers in their mid thirties. One of my e-mailers joined the Navy Reserve as a Petty Officer 2nd Class at age 34, and after 9/11 was mobilized for twelve months of active duty in the Far East. Even beyond the mid thirties, there are options for military service. In addition to the Army National Guard, Air National Guard, and Naval Militia, my own state has a fourth division: the New York Guard, which accepts recruits "in reasonably good health" of any age over 18. Other states have similar arrangements.

An Army That Drawls
By Dave Shiflett

War may be hell, but here in the South, there's a special appreciation for it, and for warriors. The largest pro-war rallies were said to be held in southern cities; by one account Houston's topped the chart with 10,000 celebrants. More to the point, many southerners assume they are considered first among equals when it comes time to draw the sabers. When it comes to war, and indeed all things military, they enjoy heightened respect. While the West is known for rugged individualists (save for California, which provides wine, women, and tap dancers), the Midwest for solid citizens, and the Northeast for industrialists, intellectuals, and ethnic sham artists, the South is the land of grunts and generals.

Don Rumsfeld, Radical For Our Time
By Victor Davis Hanson

No tactician has yet quite figured out the force-multiplying effect of quickly achieved air superiority, GPS-guided munitions, and on-the-ground spotters; but surely the destructive power of A-10 fighters, helicopters, and carrier- and land-based bombers that were in service to small Army tactical units was worth the equivalent of 1,000 tanks. Moreover, something strange is happening to the American soldier, almost as if current popular culture were being married to 19th-century notions of heroism and sacrifice. Arab-American Marines boast of liberating a Muslim city; women brag of flying three combat missions per day; and bearded, hippie-looking Green Berets on horses prefer the company of medieval tribesmen as they radio in bombs from billion-dollar Stealth bombers. The U.S. military is not so much insidious as postmodern. For someone who dresses so formally and insists on protocol, Donald Rumsfeld, it turns out, is actually quite a radical and has helped to turn our military into something that values efficacy and performance far more than habit, tradition, and procedure.

Analyze This
By Mark Helprin

In Washington last year one could hear a lot of loose talk from high-level defense officials about invading Iraq with 500 men. It seemed like a strange joke, or maybe a dream, until corroborating reports began to surface in the press, such as the Journal's "Some civilians in the Pentagon and the White House have argued that the job in Iraq could be accomplished with air strikes backed by several hundred special operations soldiers, working in conjunction with Iraqi opposition forces and defectors." This absurdity was reflective of the thought of the civilian officials who are now crowing victory. At least twice, General Franks, representing the uniformed services and what is derisively known as "the heavy Army," briefed the president and recommended a quarter of a million troops, and at least twice he was rebuffed. In August he was instructed to plan for between 50,000 and 80,000. Ultimately, the civilian officials reached a point of (problematic) sufficiency only because they were pushed to it.

The Teflon Secretary
By Ramesh Ponnuru

Our failure to win more allies has been blamed on President George W. Bush, on Vice President Dick Cheney, on defense secretary Don Rumsfeld, on second-tier officials such as Rumsfeld deputy Paul Wolfowitz, even on people entirely outside the government. But one person is escaping all blame for the administration's diplomatic failures: its top diplomat. Somehow, secretary of state Colin Powell always manages to come out smelling like a rose. He emerged as a national hero from the first Gulf War, even though, as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he had opposed showing force to deter Saddam Hussein from invading Kuwait — and then resisted the use of force to undo the dictator's conquest. He is likely to rise in public esteem again now, in the aftermath of another popular war he tried hard to prevent. But while Powell is getting the applause, it's the administration's hawks who are getting the policies they want. He may project an image of strength, but his influence is weak.

Books, Arts & Manners

Creation Story — George H. Nash . . . Right Face: Organizing the American Conservative Movement 1945-65, by Niels Bjerre-Poulsen

The Old Order — David Harsanyi . . . Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons for Global Power, by Niall Ferguson

Free Men, Free Markets — Arthur Herman . . . The Mind and the Market: Capitalism in Modern European Thought, by Jerry Z. Muller

Cults of Ignorance — M. D. Aeschliman . . . Getting It Wrong from the Beginning: Our Progressivist Inheritance from Herbert Spencer, John Dewey, and Jean Piaget, by Kieran Egan

Wonder Boy — Ross Douthat . . . Being America: Liberty, Commerce, and Violence in an American World, by Jedediah Purdy

Girls Gone Wild — Pia de Solenni . . . Why There Are No Good Men Left: The Romantic Plight of the New Single Woman, by Barbara Dafoe Whitehead

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