:: Some thoughts... ::

:: Thursday, October 17, 2002 ::

On War


Prussian General Carl Von Clausewitz chose this phrase as his title for his treatise on warfare. The treatise was published in the years after his death and has risen to become one of the seminal works on the making of war. Von Clausewitz argued that war was an extension of politics. In his experience this may have been true, but war in this day and age especially, cannot be seen in that light. For a more in depth refutation of Von Clausewitz, I would direct you to John Keegan’s, “A History of Warfare.” A few years back in a Political Science class I was taking we were asked to write a paper on whether the post Cold War world was more secure. My premise was that the world had a choice between tribalism and the nation-state. The United States is the preeminent example of the nation-state. A country like Serbia is a good example of a tribal state. A nation-state is defined by a collective ideology, or set of ideas. It is not bound by common blood or necessarily heritage. The nation-state, in the form of the United States, has developed a set of “myths” and stories that seek to teach and pass on its essential character. The tribal state relies on a deep set of history and to an almost primeval tribal allegiance. The form of government is entirely essential to the definition of a nation-state, while the government is merely place on the top of the tribal state. In other words, it can almost be said that the government defines the nation-state, while the “tribe” defines a tribal state. Von Clausewitz came of age at the dawn of imperialism. Imperialist states are distinct from nation-states but also very similar. In both blood is not a factor in the geographical extension of the state, but in fact a ruling class is based on blood. In other words, an imperial state relies on a “kernel” of tribal devotion that is integrated into the central power of the state. The Austro-Hungarian Empire or Russia of today, are both good examples of an imperial state. Von Clausewitz in looking through the lens of imperial states saw war as a means to extend the power of the state. In other words, war became an extension of politics. Politics and trade in this era were conducted to expand the glory of the imperial state and the ruling kernel. By this war was just another avenue for the expression of imperial state power. Von Clausewitz also missed one of the most important lessons of the French Revolution, a turn to primeval tribalism. In modern times we call this nationalism, but in the Pre-WW I European sense, it really was tribalism. Germany was born out of the womb of the concept of tribalism. This, I believe, is the modern world we are facing. We are facing a world that is in conflict between the model of the nation-state as embodied by the United States and the nascent European state and two models of old. The models of old are the theological model and the tribal state. In most cases, the concepts of the tribal and religious affiliation are deeply intertwined. The theological model, brings an old concept into modern light. The Arabs from Mecca and Medina invented this concept. They represented neither a technologically superior or numerically superior civilization to the ones they made war against, yet they were successful. The Arabs did not bring any innovations in tactics, economy or weapons, yet they still prevailed. It did help that their enemies were not a cohesive whole, but I think their success can be traced to the concept of holy war. Holy war takes Napoleon’s maxim, “The moral is to the physical as three is to one,” to a higher level. Holy warriors win the test of the wills that has been the western way of warfare since the time of the Greeks. Modern warfare since the beginning of the Greek city-states has developed the idea of face to face combat. The side that prevails is the side that drives the other from the field of battle. A survey of history would confirm this idea of war. It is a determined test of wills. In Vietnam, America lost because it did not have the stomach to actually fight the war. The Soviets lost in Afghanistan for the same reason. It is the same concept that gives the modern “holy warriors” of osama bin laden their strength. They seek not a contest of arms, but a contest of wills. Bin laden made the bet that the United States did not have the stomach for a fight. He made this bet, not out of expediency but out of reason. The 10 years after the first Gulf War, when the US was attacked it did not respond in a determined manner. The cohort of militant-fascist Islam took this as a sign that the US had grown drunk on her power and weak in her success. Boldness, followed more boldness, the signs were there but it would have taken a wary eye to see them. It was easy to dismiss the attacks that were thwarted as flashes in the pan, and unconnected to any greater purpose. Americans had seen Jews, Japanese, Europeans and others attacked by terrorists, yet Americans were mostly spared. True, in 1979 and 1983 Americans were attacked and again in 1986 but this was not on American soil. American soil for whatever reason, had obtained a sacred aura. In 1993, militant/fascist Islamic terrorists sought to take down the World Trade Center via a truck bomb. That should have been a wake up call, but it wasn’t. On September 11, 2001, they slaughtered 3,000 people in finishing the job they had begun 8 years before. America finally took notice it the most monstrous atrocity committed by a single act on American soil. I think the best way to understand things now, is that the western way of life, the evolution of thought and organization that has been going on for at least the last 2000 years is under attack. It is a conflict of civilizations, not of politics. The militant-fascist Islamic “warriors” that seek our harm are not seeking an empire or a place to call home. It is not a war for political gain, but a war to impose values, to create a theological state. It is a war of wills. The armies that seek to destroy our way of life, believe America and the West will fold like the Soviets folded in Afghanistan. In the end they believe that the West will view its blood more precious than freedom. The model of the nation-state seeks the goodness in the individual and gives the individual freedom to believe, work and act largely as the individual chooses. Without getting a philosophical debate about the limits or breadth of freedoms we enjoy, by any comparison, a life in the United States is certainly freer by any definition than a life in the fantasies of the bin ladenites. There is a difference. In the twilight of the 1990’s Western intellectualism drifted into a zone of post-modernism that lacked a moral grounding. There was not an absolute but a relative. This was foolish and foolhardy for it is easy to see on all grounds that freedom is essential. Freedom does not necessarily mean democracy, but democracy is its ultimate extension in the modern world. Is democracy perfect? By no means can it be called that. It is a collection of imperfections (people). In that collection the differences are ironed out and something better can be achieved because all have a voice. Again, this is a simplified argument and there are those who would argue that such and such group has been “disenfranchised” and the like. I simply would answer that there is no better alternative.
Some argue that by fighting back the US and the West might create a clash of civilizations. This is said in a hushed tone, as if it were something wrong or to be feared. Make no mistake we are already in a clash of civilizations, a clash between a theological and tribal form of organization and the concept of the nation-state. It is a clash of ideas, values and histories. In sum, the bin ladenites have bet that the West will trade peace and security for freedom. They have bet that the West is a “paper” tiger lacking the will and the strength to maintain the fight. They are betting that they will prevail like their predecessors from Mecca and Medina did 1300 years before. The question is what will be the answers to these questions. The Western way of thought has followed the arguments of Von Clausewitz that war is an extension of politics. It is an expression of purpose, an instrument for gain. Indeed, that is why the arguments spring up that essentially say give them what they demand. Let them have Israel, get American troops off their holy land, and stop supporting the dictators they so detest. If we let them have these things they will stop. That is the argument and it is wrong. The “appeasers” misunderstand the nature of the war that is being waged. It is not an extension of politics but a much older type of war. It is a war of theology and tribe. It is a type of war that the West hasn’t seen for hundreds of years. The question remains which idea of civilization will triumph…

:: Nathan 3:18 PM [+] ::
...