Negotiating With Enemies: Now The CW
Negotiating With Enemies: Now The CW
This part of President Obama’s Afghanistan speech deserves attention, if only because it’s one of so many things that conservatives used to condemn but now have become part of the conventional wisdom:
In a country with extreme poverty that has been at war for decades, there will also be no peace without reconciliation among former enemies. I have no illusions that this will be easy. In Iraq, we had success in reaching out to former adversaries to isolate and target al Qaeda. We must pursue a similar process in Afghanistan, while understanding that it is a very different country.
There is an uncompromising core of the Taliban. They must be met with force, and they must be defeated. But there are also those who have taken up arms because of coercion, or simply for a price. These Afghans must have the option to choose a different course. That is why we will work with local leaders, the Afghan government, and international partners to have a reconciliation process in every province. As their ranks dwindle, an enemy that has nothing to offer the Afghan people but terror and repression must be further isolated.
Compare this to Dick Cheney’s assertion (on behalf of President Bush) that “we don’t negotiate with evil; we defeat it,” in reference to North Korea — which, if you haven’t heard, is now threatening to test a new ballistic missile. In Iraq, not only did we negotiate with evil, we paid evil vast sums of money to change sides. And now we’re going to attempt something similar with Taliban elements in Afghanistan, as well as with Iran: Try various methods and inducements — some of which have been/will be derided by many conservatives as “appeasement” — to change the strategic calculations of some of our enemies in order to gain advantage against other, worse enemies.
As we continue to discuss and debate the way forward, in Afghanistan and elsewhere, it’s hugely important to remind people that this central insight — our enemies are not monolithic, they can be disaggregated — represents a resounding refutation of the neoconservative “war on terror” approach that characterized the Bush administration’s foreign policy in the years after 9/11. Clearly, there are terrorist networks that seek to do Americans harm, but they do not represent anything like a united “Islamofascist” front against the West, no “axis of evil” necessitating “with us or against us” ultimata. The fact that progressives have won this argument is, of course, small comfort when one considers the enormous costs incurred by the Bush administration in making our case.
2 Responses to “Negotiating With Enemies: Now The CW”
Register
RSSLogin
Topic Cloud
ArchivesBlog RollAbout Wonk RoomContact Us
Donate
There are also those who don’t like America’s heavy handed ways and use of drone fired summary execution.
March 27th, 2009 at 3:34 pmDrone fired has always had the potential to be a quicker path to peace in conflicts than shoulder-fired, car-fired, etc. If those who have been nurturing destabilization efforts are identified accurately enough, then we may at some point see a return to normalcy. We certainly could benefit from not having to use surge tactics to wrap up this neglected war, and the sooner we can end it and reach a peace at the bargaining table, the sooner that much more of the world can go on without fear, or the need to be in an arms race, or similar drains on prosperity. There will always be the Tim McVeighs, the Osama bin Ladens, the Mullah Omars, and we are right to try to identify them, capture and try them, and de-fund and incapacitate their efforts, as long as nobody is standing in line to take their place. If the security apparatus of the state in which they are taking refuge is so corrupt that they are tipping off targets to operations, then a true leader will take that into account and act appropriately. In matters of foreign policy, this has for some time resulted in extrajudicial executions — war — but we are a far cry in this administration from the million Iraqis that Bush wiped out. The best wars are the ones on the fastest and least deadly path to peace. We can’t just declare victory and leave yet, but if we can build the basic services that the struggling power structures in place must live with, then we will have achieved a somewhat more lasting peace. Health care, renewable energy, education: The peacemakers are blessed in part because it’s easier for them to remember what their job is.
March 27th, 2009 at 8:12 pm