In case you missed it, check out George Will’s attack on Robert Kagan in Newsweek. A lot has been said about the brewing Republican civil war between the deficit hawks and the big spenders or as David Brooks put it recently in the Times magazine, between an “old anti-statist governing philosophy” or “strong government” philosophy. The more interesting split happening right now and one that is more relevant to the War on Terror is over democracy and the use of force. It’s between the neoconservative realists (Will, Fukuyama) and the neoconservative optimists (Kagan, Kristol, Krauthammer). The struggle in Iraq has shaken the confidence of many of the hard-core, democracy-is-the-solution intellectuals, who now are casting doubt on America’s ability to transform dictatorships, or aspiring dictatorships in the case of Russia, into freedom-loving, pluralistic democracies. As Fred Hiatt described so eloquently in his latest Washington Post column, the state of democracy in the world is in trouble, its progress looking less and less inevitable. It is the optimists in the conservative movement who are sticking to the belief that American force and determination will carry the day. But their ranks are shrinking.
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has shaken the confidence of many of the hard-core, democracy-is-the-solution intellectuals,
The “transform Iraq into a democracy” argument is a Straussian lie. Nobody cares two pennies for Iraq’s government as long as it’s consistent with certain international interests.
If you remember…and it’s hard, since its all gone down the memory hole…the purpose of the Iraqi war was WMD, WMD, WMD. Not “democracy”.
I don’t believe for a second that nobody cares about freedom in Iraq. For starters, nobody would include me, and others I know who strongly support the spread of Democracy.
Nobody would theoretically also include those in Iraq who want freedom. Similarly those in Afghanistan who are risking their lives to vote, and those in Iran who risk their lives simply to say that they want Democracy.
But, beyond this do I believe that Bush, Wolfowitz, and others are simply using the politically expedient argument? You could argue that the desire for Democracy alone would not have been enough to justify this war. Why Iraq as opposed to other equally worthwhile countries? But that does not make the desire for Democracy any less so.
You could also argue that some do not care about Democracy in Iraq as much as they believe that creating Democracies will ultimately help the U.S. be safer. I think this differentiation is irrelevant.
So, I choose to believe what Bush and many others said in many speeches. Yes, WMD was a primary reason. It also got the most attention, and was the legal reason why the U.N. should have been taking action. But anyone who listened to what the President and others said, and delved beyond what made the evening news, heard a broader, bolder, and more optimistic message from the beginning. That message is to spread Democracy. Ultimately, this is our only hope for winning this war and world peace. In a world that is become more inter-connected, we cannot hope to keep ourselves safe and separate. Our personal safety, the environment, and the global economy, require a world in which just rule of law and individual property rights are ubiquitous.
Our personal best interests currently coincide with the most moral course. There is nothing cynical about wanting to pursue that course.