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August 12, 2003
USS Clueless
[Ed: This is a borderline article. It could be on the main blog but it is really an article review.]
Steven Den Beste has an interesting article entitled: Gulliver Unbound where he discusses a presentation given by Josef Joffe on behalf of 'The Center for Independent Studies'. As an aside the CIS was mentioned in today's papers and the description notes: "Non-partisan but right-wing. Philosophy of free-market economics and individual choice. Socially conservative policies on welfare, poverty and family."
Joffe was comparing America to Gulliver in the land of Lilliput. Joffe frankly discusses the options for the Lilliputians to tie down the giant and coexist with it (her in this case, him in the original story). Steven disagrees that there can be some form of balance in the soft-power and that the US is very aware of this.
Overall the article is very cohesive and very well written but (and you just knew there would be a but) I come away from reading it with a sense of dissatisfaction and unbalance. The first concern relates to the various fears involved. Of course Europe fears an American dominated world. No one wants to lose power. America also fears being tied down by all the little ropes and controls that Europe wants to impose. What is not addressed is that Europe has had many experiences of "bad" leaders and I think that some of the fear of America is not America as she is now but America as she could be in the wrong hands. Steven mentions the fact that America does not want to "rule the world" but it is not inconceivable that a future president might want to do exactly that. There are no safeguards to protect people from their own stupidity and history has taught that eventually the mobs will vote for bread, circuses and protection.
The other nagging question relates to the ambivalent attitude of America towards this so called "soft-power". If she understands the soft power, then why bother trying to recruit allies prior to Iraq. I don;t know what deal was done between the British and the Americans but for Australia's participation, we were offered free-trade (which is good for us but not good for the US and that is why the US uses tariffs to control Australian imports). True, the offer has not materialized but the key question is why was the offer made at all? Surely the US with all that "unbeatable" soft power could have just proceeded. Steven makes it quite clear that America does not need world approval and will in fact ignore world opinion when it contradicts her own intentions. In this case, the war against Iraq did not require the UN. Nor did it require allies or military assistance.
I think the truth of the matter is that Joffe may have identified the key with the concept that America "will recognize that it is better to be somewhat weaker but liked and unchallenged than to be stronger but faced with strong opposition". In this case the use of allies helps to show that America is not acting alone (even though she could have done so) because it is seen as being a cooperative venture between the giant and the midgets rather than as the giant versus the midgets. In this sense, the antipathy towards Britain and Australia from France makes a lot of sense because as Joffe point out, the French were effectively the ring leaders of the group trying to (if I can confuse the metaphors a bit further) bell the cat.
Posted by Ozguru at August 12, 2003 04:08 PM
