11/3 or 11/M but definately not 3/11! This is more than a question of US methods of dates and European ones. Europe (especially Spain)has lived with terrorism or threat of, for many decades. The reaction though sad and reflective was not bombastic as it was in the states. A few points of order:- You say: "to deny the strengths of one's own culture, political or otherwise is not healthy. To wish oneself absorbed into the impossibility of world culture is suicidal negation." On the contrary to boast about the strengths of ones own culture is a dangerous arrogance, if it has strengths then let it be, why shout about it? To critisise ones own culture is of supreme self-confidence and healthy for any democracy. Which is why Europeans just don't understand how Americans can boast about how wonderful and blessed the USA is, when it is so clearly and manifestly a flawed society of the first order. As for the 'impossibility of a world culture' well as you yourself have pointed out, Europeans feel themselves to be more citizens of the world. 40% of American Senators don't own a passport - what does that say about the population at large. If you think it is impossible, I suggest you get out more and see the world. I live in a city where there are dozerns of nationalities including Americans all happily mingling with each other and quite frankly becoming increasingly perplexed as to why there is 'supposed' to be so much differences between us. The European Union is not trying to 'isolate' the USA, America is doing that job well enough on its own. The EU was established to end war in Europe, in that respect it has been completely successful for the member states. Also, it would be lovely to believe that 20% of Frenchmen have given their 'hearts' to Le Pen, that would be nice and tidy, alas if only it were so simple, it ignores the idea of protest votes or disillusionment with Chirac. Since no Frenchman actually imagined that Le Pen would win, it stands to reason that many saw him as a safe protest candidate. A bit like Nader perhaps! "What the West is confronting now is an ill-structured agression in a world of heated nationalisms. We face Islamist terror structures which have symbiotic relationships with more permanent structures." Not sure if I understand this peice of hyperbole. Actually what the west is confronting is a plain and simple political problem. A multilateralist Kantian Europe is mirrored by a unilateralist Hobbsian USA. America in turn is still supporting its cleint states in the middle east which have ruthlessly suppressed the intellegensia and moderates, therefore the disillusioned poor turn to the one group of people promising change and action - the fundamentalists. Remove the grass-root support and the fundamentalists will sonn witter away to just a few crackpots. In the war on hearts and minds the west is loosing. "If and when the people of various European nations realize this, they will not turn to America but to their own Far Right. There will be a swift transition from the diplomatic ethos to the ethos of anger and hatred. The peoples of Europe will have no time for false community. Nationalisms will re-assert themselves, innocent immogrants will be murdered. Instability and conflict will reign." What else do you see in your crystal ball? I think western Europeans have attained I higher level of sophistication, thanks to the butchery of the last century, we don't want it again, we know better than anyone else how it happens and believe me its not worth it Message was edited by: Gyula

Ursa, I enjoyed your musings on the pathology of European (left) culture and its tumble toward isolationism. I think you highlight many of the most frustrating aspects of this downward spiral. As a rational being, I find it very difficult to take many of these viewpoints seriously, as they so fully defy common sense. "The manic joy following the election in Spain suggests a zeal which I believe to be, obscurantist. Short run reactions are definitionally myopic, but not necessarily tethered by zeal. I have read and heard suggestions that this is a watershed moment for not just Spain, but Europe as a whole -- that centripetal forces have been put into motion. The catalysts are Islamic Terrorists and the 'point de repere' is America or the 'American Empire'. The ethos described above was in place." This is maddening to many Americans, and it is the source of American retorts on envy, etc. Because rational thinking leads one to conclusions opposite to this European ethos, the non-European is left to grope for other explanations, such as envy or derangement. What I find most frustrating is the smug assuredness of the Euro left, vis a vis the UN debate before the war. This is based on the incorrect assumption that the French, Russian and German objections to the Iraq invasion resulted from morally sound motives. This is evidence of severe denial, or simple hypocrisy, and I have little patience for either. I sometimes hope that the isolationist European tendencies win out. I hear this sentiment more often now in the U.S. among well educated professional-types. I think Americans have had enough bashing and are mentally preparing themselves to write off Europeans for a lengthy period of time.

Ursa Respects on a well thought-out and insightful post. I agree that Gyula's reply seems to help prove your point. I sincerely hope that the trend toward European isolationism (or Europe's attempted isolation of America, whatever seems more apt -- I think both dynamics are at work) reverses itself sooner rather than later. But the Spanish elections would seem to indicate the opposite is taking place. I greatly fear that only some great catastrophe -- an attack on an even larger scale than 11/3 or 11/9 -- will serve to wake up those somnolent and self-satisfied Europeans who refuse to see the dangers involved in this trend.

Brolly, how dare you accuse me of trying to trick people or confuse them. I will not debase myself by attacking you personally. My little essay was a well considered attempt to promote dialogue and even add some new texture to arguments on these pages. I actually took some time to thoughtfully address issues of concern to me and to many others. You are alone in not understanding my writing and you as usual refuse to actually debate and argue about the content of what I have written. I've never tried to befriend you, this medium does not suit the purpose, but I have tried to be kind and respectful to you. Your intent to inhibit discussion by the casting of aspersions is becoming old. Your postings are on an endless loop and you seem to resent it when others are kind to one another or inject humour into the discussion. Open Democracy itself has an agenda, WHETHER IT WILL ADMIT IT OR NOT, that is consonant with Your own. There is also a humourlessness which seems congruent. Zeal has little time for either true kindness or HUMOR. Now unless you want to discuss my posting or reponses to it, why are you here ... DEFAMATION ... Message was edited by: ursa9 Message was edited by: ursa9

ursa9, I have discussed the various issues with you and others but I take exception to your condescension. I don't like the negativism you are always putting forward with regard to the further development of the European Union. We are not all so stupid as you imply and we don't all live in a dream world of ever increasing European harmony. Living in England gives me sufficient experience of how difficult a time lies ahead of further European integration. Little Englanders abound and particularly among the large working class. What some of us do believe is that a unipolar world is exremely dangerous and this is undoubtedly a central aim of the neoconservative Bush administration. Many of us think that the bipolar world that existed at the time of the Cold War, frightening as it was at times, can now be seen in retrospect to have offered more security than we are likely to have with a single superpower that makes its own rules. Some of us also think that one of the biggest contributors to the prospect of terrorism is the US's (and other Western powers and this includes Russia) cynical manipulation of the Middle Eastern countries over the last century. I will not catalogue the 'crimes' as you should be familiar with them. We are now paying the price. The Israel/Palestine problem is probably the single biggest factor in the terrorists resolve to punish the West. You have a neoconservative and Likud style view of the problem and I have never seen you address the issue. For you, any reference to neoconservatives and Israel, is taken to be anti-semitic. It is impossible to debate this issue when you DEFAME me in this way. You use your knowledge of French history as a WMD in your argumentation. You imply that some of us do not have perspective and cannot see the complexity of the issues we speak of. This is a form of arrogance that is bound to incur hostility. I find that your arguments, while giving the impression of depth, are actually deficient as they omit reference to underlying economic causes and agendas and also hardly take account of what others feel and think. I am not now referring to myself but to the people that inhabit the parts of the world which the noeconservatives want to reorder to their own design. These people are set on creating capitalist , free market systems which meets with their particular ideological fixation. The world is a far more complicated place than Paul Wolfowitz's subjective analysis leads him to believe. Surely the lesson of the failure of Marxism, another elaborate intellectual's creed that was meant to free the world from its continuing conflicts and suffering, should tell you that nostrums that are so far reaching in their aim, are bound to fail. Human nature will not be encapsulated by grand designs. Napoleon was another example of this type of thinking. Democracy US style is extremely flawed in some of our views and is not the apotheosis that some on this thead hype it up to be. Message was edited by: brolly2_1

fdbjr, the US has virtual veto powers over the IMF and World Bank, so actually nothing happens without the US giving the greenlight to it. The new Spanish government is more ammendable to changing its position regarding voting rights in the new European constitution, the Poles have said that they will follow suit rather than be isolated and the UK never really cared anyway. The Irish presidency is speculating on trying to sign the constitution by June!! How things have changed....

Fdbjr, [“The 'I' in IMF stands for what - do you know? (I'll give you a hint, dear lad - the first two syllables are 'Inter-'). And The WORLD (sic)Bank is chartered under what organization? Over the years, the actions of these entities has caused the US as much anguish as any other.”] I will give you a dictionary definition of VIRTUAL, as you are obviously having some difficulty with understanding this word in the present context. ‘That is such for practical purposes but not in name’. I hope this helps. Otherwise I would suggest that you have a learning problem and should see an educational psychologist. The only ‘anguish’ that these organizations – World Bank and IMF – cause the US is when it don’t get 100% of its own way. [“As I pointed out to you in the other thread, Bremer's Order 39 is not binding on the new Iraqi government. I further pointed out that any other policy would in effect amount to the imposition of aa tax by the interim authority which it is not empowered to do. You were reduced to sputtering incoherence, as well you should be.”] I have already dealt with this nonsensical statement elsewhere in response to you. I will now remind you of what I said. Pay attention this time please and hopefully you will not go on repeating this sort of claptrap. Order No. 39 allows foreign investors to buy up to 100% of Iraqi industries and enterprises and to export up to 100% of profit made. This Order has been made by a member of an occupying power, who has had no mandate whatsoever to dispose of Iraqi assets. The nonsensical part of your statement, is that the Order can be reversed by an elected Iraqi government. Most significant industry in Iraq is state owned. In the time between the proposed election and that could be many months from now, it is most likely that the best industries and enterprises will have been cherry picked by overseas investors and /or ex-patriot Iraqis like Ahmed Chalabi and his cohorts, that are closely connected to the Pentagon and the current Bush administration. These people either already have the funds necessary or can easily raise them. A new government would have to choose between renationalizing what has been sold off or for leaving it the hands that have taken it over. If the new government wanted to get foreign investment for enterprises that IT chose to privatize in part or in full, it could hardly start to renationalize those that had been sold off, without completely destroying confidence in its intention of honouring commitments. So the practicality of repossessing industries that are sold off before any mandate has been received, is simply not available or could only be done at a price that will strike a major negative blow to its perception in the world’s capital markets. Not a good start , don’t you think? The 200 firms that you said in your post elsewhere, that had already been bought by IRAQIS, as indicating that the privatization is benefiting them, is another nonsense because it the same sort of CRONE CAPITALISM that we saw in Russia in the early nineties, when the circle around Yeltsin and the existing top industry managers easily raised the capital to buy up the controlling interests of the industries and enterprises. Who do you think has the financial muscle or connection for raising money, the average Iraqi in the street or the ex-patriots with the right connections. Surely this is an indicator of a right wing US administration that has set its own ideologically based economic agenda for the Iraqi people and has no genuine interest any form of democracy that is based on what the Iraqi people might decide – if ever given a proper chance. Have you heard of the Russian oligarch’s. The relatively small number of people who have made vast fortunes (Billions of Dollars) from getting their hands on the nation’s assets. Why do you think President Putin is now so popular. It is because he is attempting to take back from the oligarchs, that which was stolen from the people. It is as popularist move that has overwhelming support. [“A poll today shows the majority of Iraqi's believing they are better off now, a year later, and more concerned with possible sectarian warfare than anything else. To be sure, they understandably want US troops gone as soon a spossible. The US shares that goal.”] It is obvious that Iraqis would say they are better off today than a year ago, when they were sitting around and waiting for ‘SHOCK AND AWE’ bombings to start. After many years of sanctions, imposed by the UN mainly under pressure from the UK and US, any small improvement in the ability to get hold of consumer goods would get this sort of response. However you have left out some important results of the Poll and I have posted them for your education below: [“The poll question that the media have most focused on is also the most vague one: "compared to a year ago, I mean before the war in spring 2003 [sic], are things overall in your life [better or worse]?". Although it is true that 35% replied with "somewhat better" to this question, 36% said it was "about the same" or "somewhat worse". Considering that one of the worst dictators the world has seen in modern times was still ruler of Iraq a year ago, these should be astonishing figures to those who expect gratitude from Iraqis. It seems the majority of respondents think the occupation is at best only "somewhat better" or "about the same" as the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein. Seen in this light the brave face that the liberal media have tried to put on this starts to melt away. A basic examination of the rest of the poll tells us even more about the imperialist ideology of Western media, considering the figures they have chosen not to discuss. "The US government's favoured son Ahmed Chalabi had no support at all, while Saddam Hussein remains one of the six most popular politicians in the country. Former CIA man Ahmed Chalabi accruing a mere 0.2 of a percent worth of trust. Most respondents (59%) still oppose the presence of the occupying forces, with 15% saying that they should leave the country immediately and 17% accepting armed attacks on "coalition" troops. Thirty percent even said that the immediate departure of coalition forces would be "very effective" as regards the security of the country, although 35% think that they should stay until an Iraqi government is in place. An overwhelming 42% of respondents said they had "no confidence at all" in the US and UK occupying forces, with 24% saying "not very much" and only 25% expressing any sort confidence at all in the occupiers. Whatever arrangements are made for self determination in Iraq, we should not delude ourselves that the current occupiers are trusted by the population, for reasons which by now should be too obvious to point out. Nor should we delude ourselves that the Western media are anything other than deeply indoctrinated in the service of great power. ]

OK, Its, been a while since I've seen the statistics, but I believe there are 100 votes in the World Bank, the United States has 18 votes, in order for a new initiative to be passed, it must have 86 votes. The US alone has the ability to block any progressive initiatives. As I said, virtual veto powers.

>>"With all the hyperbolic anti-Americanism of various forms that I have read on these pages...I am growing concerned for the future of Britain, Ireland and Continental Western Europe." How nice of you. I'm sure they appreciate the fact that you can spare a few moments from your "dreams of empire" to voice your concerns. I hope they listen attentively. >>"There is an assertion that 'globalism' ; a decrease of social distance between the peoples of the world, must have a salutary affect on international relations. There is a pacifistic sensibility which inheres in this. There is a benefit of the doubt attitude toward peoples and ideas emerging from non-western cultures -- not just tolerance, but embracement of exoticism. Of course there is an assumption that there is or will be a European ethos that will transcend nations and put centuries of conflict in the past; this after an historically short period of good relations. There is an over-identification with struggling peoples in the world that obscures transgressions." I think what he's suggesting is that Europeans are trying to act civilized...for a change! I can see why this might bother him. >>"There are suggestions that Europe will form a sort of bloc that will strengthen it and dissociate it from the reckless policies of an out of control and arrogant America." Well, that would certainly be a step forward in my view...but I think it's rather too soon to say if that will actually happen. European politics are far more complex than the semi-literate corporate-auctions that take place here in America. Those people over there actually think politics has something to do (at least vaguely) with principles. Can you even imagine France electing a "Richard Nixon" or Germany a "Lyndon Johnson"? A "George Bush" wouldn't even be allowed to graduate high school in Europe, much less be considered for public office. I don't mean to suggest that Europe does not have a generous supply of knaves of its own...they certainly do. Indeed, all too many of them can be found bending the knee at the throne in the Oval Office. But can you honestly blame almost any literate European who, reading of the corrupt banalities of American "politics", responds with disgust and contempt? Or, sometimes, laughter? I can imagine many of them saying to themselves: These are the people who propose to "save western civilization"? In that case, it's all over! >>"The term 'War on Terror' seems absurd..." Not only seems, is! It has exactly the same status as "the war on drugs" or "the war on sin". It is an open-ended license for the American Empire to do anything it wants, anywhere it wants, anytime it wants, to anybody it wants to. It's a "war" that will never end until the empire falls. >>"I have been reluctant to invoke the term 'appeasement' because it is used too often, however this might be the time to bring it forth." Again. >>"The civilisation and cultures of the West seem in decline. Many within like to talk about world civilization as one talks about world music. Pride in or identification with nations and civilization is presented as haughty and anachronistic." Is that Spengler or Chamberlain you're trying to evoke? I never could keep those jerks straight. In any event, if some Europeans are rejecting the shallow satisfactions of "national identity" or "national pride", then good for them! May their numbers increase! American pride is nauseating, of course, to anyone familiar with American actions on the world stage. One might as well "identify" with Genghis Khan or Attila the Hun. >>"Ironically it is Western Culture which gives birth to the tendency to diminish its value and importance." Yes, it was a good "invention"...and thus prepared the way for transcending itself. No other culture has ever really done that before. I think what you're looking for here is a medieval version of "western culture"...just as insular and arrogant as all the other cultures of that era. The renaissance was a big mistake...and the enlightenment was a disaster. (!) >>"...a narcissistic love of the exotic..." Oxymoron. The version of "western culture" that you appear to desire is narcissistic...in love with itself. To be willing to consider the "exotic" as worth considering is, in my view, a mark of civilized behavior. I'd certainly agree that "just because" something is "exotic", that doesn't "make" it "better". Every cultural artifact should be examined on its own merits -- and one of those "merits" is that "it's new and different". Humans like "new and different". Except for conservatives and reactionaries, of course. >>"To wish oneself absorbed into the impossibility of world culture is suicidal negation." To decree, ex cathedra, that "world culture" is "an impossibility" seems to deny the last couple of centuries of world history...and the trends that it seems to forecast. In a rather stumbling and halting fashion, we do seem to be "on our way" to a "world culture"...though it's not at all clear what artifacts will survive and what will be discarded. I have my list, of course. >>"We have taken a Rousseauian turn into a dead end; grinning all the way." And what do you do when you've turned into a "dead end"? Go back! Sometimes people will mindlessly repeat the cliché "you can't turn the clock back". But that's not really true, you know. What you can't do is stop the clock. You can easily start it running backwards...but then it keeps on running backwards. A great many older Germans who supported Hitler in 1932 just wanted the clock turned back to 1913...and they got that for a little while. But the clock kept running backwards...to eras far worse and far bloodier and far more savage than they had ever imagined possible. Forward or backwards, the clock is always running. >>"Many Europeans in their quest for community and safety are calmly and gladly building structures to create peace and security. They whistle as they build their own 'Cask of Amontillado.' They feel they are isolating America and building themselves up. Alas, they are burying themselves in a crypt." To be "isolated" from America = "isolation from the world". That's genuine hyperbole. Europe trades massively with the United States...there is no question of an European "autarky" here. What's really twisting your underpants is the fear that Europe will increasingly refuse any "international cover" for American imperial ambitions. Leaving you alone on the world stage, proclaiming "might is right". Never knowing when the audience may grow disgusted and start throwing things. >>"The invasion of Iraq was not an attack on terrorists. It was an attack or intervention into a part of the world which is increasingly chaotic." If memory serves me, that was the German rationale for occupying both Austria and Czechoslovakia. Maybe it would be a good idea to retire that word "appeasement" after all. People might get "the wrong idea". >>"France is not safe. Germany is not safe. England is not safe. America is not safe." Yes, enemies are everywhere. Before retiring this evening, don't forget to check under your bed for mullahs. >>"If and when the people of various European nations realize this, they will not turn to America but to their own Far Right." Or, maybe, Far Left! And you think you have problems now? :D A site about communist ideas: http://www.redstar2000papers.vze.com

David, In your reflective attempt at meliorization, I am afraid you've suggested my own views to be narrowly gagued and put them simply on an opposite pole to someone's thought that is to say the least wanting. You then enoble yourself with the suggestion that you are more well considered; not belonging to a camp and of course, as always, the nice diplomat. You also suggest that Americans do not consider European points of view. I know this to be false. And you know that many Americans suggest what you consider a 'European' perspective to be as well their own. As there is no dicriminatiing perspective of 'America' there is none of Europe. Do all Brits share one point of view. Are there differences between Spaniards, Danes, Hungarians, Germans, French, Italians etc ..... When you return, perhaps you will attempt to transcend the role of the leveller and reveal the mettle that is surely there. I would also suggest that you try to understand my 'Conservatism' . Like most conservatisms it is not ideological and does not resist change; only reckless over-rationalized change. I am no Republican and would not be a present day Tory. Nor am I a contrarion or a meliorist. Just something to chew on.

David, I truly wish you a pleasant trip. My impatience is with the looseness of language in general. It is not enough in tnis particular venue to suggest well I only meant, or I was using this or that term in a genearal way when the terms rhemselves invoke automatic feelings and prejudices. I also would think that educated people who comment on politics should develop a clear understanding of the nature of ideology or what sometimes passes as ideology -- fascism -- before they use the terms. So I would suggest as a primer, Karl Mannheim's Ideology and Utopia and then look at his bibliography. Also Eugen Weber's little reader, ' Varieties of Fascism' ... Weber was my teacher and he has since altered some of his perspectives. These kinds of studies can have practical usage. When trying to reshape or redirect a party suchas Labour one must ask how the political system might be altered if the idea became practice. Will the ideological spectrum become altered in such a way that intent of the idea will not correspond to the outcome ...... Message was edited by: ursa9

Ursa9 An important subject and an interesting consideration from you. I confess to finding at times something from you to be so enmeshed (ensorcelled) in the thickets of your learning that specific insights result more readily than broad and embracing ones. From that perspective it is not unexpected that I find you to have come forward with a significantly blinkered view. It centers on two points. First, you assume that a Hobbesian War of All against All, which has defined the European past, will continue to define Europe for the foreseeable future. By implication here, and more explicitly elsewhere, it has been a particular point of yours that notions of international cooperativity amount to utopian nonsense. Pangloss redux. A waste of time! Second, you adduce a specific reason a return Hobbes might be in Europe’s immediate future: the onslaught of Islamist Terrorism, encouraged in this historical moment by Spanish appeasement. Devastations inflicted by the terrorists will drive the nations of Europe into the embrace of ancient and reflexively hostile nationalisms. Frightened we become creatures of our fears and not our hopes. 1 Conflict as basic model for interaction between societies is certainly reasonable, and readily defensible from much historical evidence. But to accept the model as anything like the whole story, or even beyond that, the only story which might reasonably be contemplated, hardly gibes with the quite obvious reality that we are social creatures. We live in mutually interactive, mutually supportive, societies. From that one might propose that the unfolding of human history could just as easily be understood in terms of mutating structures of co-operation, as opposed to mutating scenarios of conflict. Robert Wright, among others, has considered the story of human development from a perspective of co-operatively. [Robert Wright: The Logic of Human Destiny] I will present something of my own "take" on the matter here. The first model for human social organization was the tribe. Arguably the first invention of this fully sentient species was a conscious, articulated basis for co-operation: the wisdom of the ancestors, the laws and customs of the tribe. By this, disparate individuals were yoked together into cooperative enterprises of sufficient size as to allow for a healthy genetic diversity. But of course, tribes were relentlessly, almost reflexively, conflictual. By far the greater portion of humanity's time on this planet was spent in tribes. Whatever their virtues and defects, they worked. We survived. Between five and ten thousand years ago, with the advent of large scale domesticated agriculture, tribal societies mutated into what we understand today as nation states. These were more "permanent" entities, tied to specific landed boundaries by their very nature. Their great virtue was an assured supply of food over time for a great number of people. They required certain control over good land, temporal as well as social stability, and a supply of labor constantly on the land to work it. They were far more intensively and extensively organized than their tribal predecessors, and, in general, they overwhelmed tribal opposition. These new entities manifested a far higher level of cooperation than the human race had ever seen, and they were certainly more "successful". In a relatively brief period of time, this kind of societal organization swept around the world, taking charge of almost all the most advantageous and easily accessible habitats on the planet. In the process they gave rise to all the arts and graces of civilization we pride ourselves on to this day. All this, Wright, myself, and others would point out, a result - direct, or unintended - of ever increasing cooperation. But yes(!), nation states remained relentlessly, endlessly conflictual. Nation states would war against one another until one would gain the ascendancy. If that one was very good, not simply in military prowess, but in the ability to organize and order their conquests, the ultimate form of this new reality would emerge: an Imperium. The great ones, the Chinese dynasties, the Roman Empire, a sequence of Islamic hegemonies ending with the Ottoman Turks, would then provide great areas existing in cooperative good order over an extended period of time. As they did so, they would encompass any number of (otherwise reflexively conflicting) parochial entities, be they nations or tribes. All empires ultimately decline and disintegrate, but they last over many generations, and become as much, or more consequential a fact about the human condition than the war of all against all they eventually revert to. A question to consider: What made/makes the great ones great? Be patient! Therefore Ursa9, Europe, lacking an imperial hegemon, would seem to be heading for what you contend - a reversion, dispite the now quite manifest benefits of cooperation - to the war of all against all. No hegemon, then war. And any more hopeful possibility is ephemeral nonsense. Nonetheless, I contend there are two jokers in the pack. Both new, one very Bad, and one like Pandora's box. The bad one is obvious, Weapons of Mass Destruction. Until the advent of Gunpowder, we fought with sticks and stones and blades, distinguished principally by superior organization in the effort of one party in regard to the other. The damage we could do was fairly limited, and only marginally subject to the consequences of intemperate and ill-considered action. Conflict in the age of gunpowder, and its immediate explosive antecedents, gradually evolved until, at the beginning of the 20th century, we were poised to experience its full consequences. And we did. In WWI, what was intended as a lightening strike by Germany for a place on the world imperial stage became lost in the killing fields of the Western Front. War by modern artillery, poison gas, machine gun and barbed wire proved to be nothing more or less than industrially efficient slaughter, and Europe remorselessly, seemingly helplessly, fed its young men into the maw of the slaughterhouse for four years. The result shaped the remainder of the century, setting up, among many other things, WWII. WWII ended with the dawn of the nuclear age, and possibilities for instantaneous devastation far, FAR greater than anything chemical explosives could provide. John Kennedy enshrined this in his observation that humanity now found itself under a “nuclear sword of Damocles” whose slender thread might be cut at any moment by “accident, miscalculation or madness”. From Kennedy’s observation forward we have added chemical munitions of far greater lethality than the poison gas of WWI, and biological weapons whose potential holds a nightmare rivaling, or even exceeding, a nuclear exchange. A reflexive tendency to conflict opens, all too credibly, to disasters well beyond nearly all that might be reasonably, or even plausibly, at stake. Do we accept that we are so yoked to the irrationalities of suspicion and reflexive hostility that we cannot change? At the very least, we must entertain the possibility that the course the United States, Europe, the former Soviet Union and China followed over the last fifty years was a rational, and substantive response to a genuine understanding of the dangers posed by modern weaponry. Europe thus has one very good reason for pursuing cooperativity absent any fixation on itself as being “from Venus”. Then there is the second joker in the pack. It is all the potentiality which lies in modern science and technology, and all that our creative energies can make of it. The first joker in our pack is, in fact, one child of this. But there are other progeny, and Mass Prosperity in the developed world is one of them, and the developed world’s turn to democracy is another. [Positive as the latter two may seem, they also inevitably open the door to great and de-stabilizing change. “May you live in interesting times” the Chinese curse goes, and the Pandora’s box aspect of the second joker stands revealed.] The modern democratic societies of the developed world are prosperous beyond all previous human experiance. One of the fundamental reasons for conflict between nations (or tribes) is the simple rational one that there isn’t enough to go around, and peoples must compete for what there is. Broader cooperation and superior organization proved in some measure to provide a solution. The greatest achievements along those lines in the past were realized by the historic hegemons. The modern world, however, is prosperous to a degree and depth that beggars the imagination. The richness of opportunity opened broadly to the people of the developed world (courtesy of modern science and technology) is a palpable reality they have experienced uninterrupted for nearly five decades. Most individuals in those societies find a world in which they can earn enough to allow them to marry, raise a family, educate their children and retire with a measure of comfort and security. Within that framework most engage in Jefferson’s “pursuit of happiness.” They readily understand better things to do with their lives than to fight wars. That is another solid reason Europe may see a concrete reason for cooperativity, beyond some vague predilection for a millenarian multiculturalism. Prosperity may not last of course. But there is incontestably a long history to the steady growth of prosperity in the developed world, extending back into the nineteenth century, and out ever more and more broadly throughout the societies of the developed world. The greater danger would be a severe depression, and that, it seems to me offers the greatest likelihood for a return to hostility between modern societies, as opposed to an “inevitable” return to a Hobbesian state (because human beings can do no other!). Absent a depression, and absent a hegemon, I see quite solid reasons for cooperativity to grow, rather than diminish, in the Europe of the future. 2. You propose, however, there is a reason our Hobbesian natures will reassert themselves. The Islamist Terrorist assault which Europe, lost in a cultural miasma, is trying to deny or appease. That is the second of what I see as your blinkered conclusions. There are, on tactical grounds, other plausible and defensible reasons Europe may continue to pursue cooperativity as its fundamental mode for engagement with Islamist terrorism. It isn’t infatuation with “nice, nice” that will animate them. It is the nature of the threat itself. That was the subject of my long (alas too long!) post: “Enemies: Real and Imagined” on the American Power and the World string. If we allow ourselves to take what the terrorists say, and the bogeyman our fears can make of it, as the basis for our policy, then we concede to them a power their actual abilities do not now encompass. A power they can scarcely achieve unless we bestow it on them by inept and inadequate responses. It is precisely to that point that the Spanish election can, quite reasonably, be seen to have addressed itself. That conclusion is certainly in line with the actual nuanced position taken by the Spanish Prime Minister elect. He proposed to remove Spanish troops from the occupation forces only if the situation did not change in regard Iraq's political reality. If principle authority passed to a combination of Iraqi and United Nations hands, he specifically allowed he would reconsider. He indicated that the war in Iraq, as a tactic ( a priority), was to be questioned – and that shunning a more multilateral approach was a path Spain had followed for too long. That it was time for Spain return to a position its continental neighbors had taken, and all of their peoples massively shared. That position was not appeasement, but a different emphasis in tactics, and a more effective distribution of resources and efforts. In this, it is Bush, far more than the Europeans (old and new) who have taken “my way or the highway” for a stance. Can Spain’s actions be seen as a terrorist "success" in warning peoples away from courses terrorists oppose. Yes! Can it be seen as appeasement? Yes! But what makes it necessarily wise to persist in a foolish course, or tactic (preventive war), simply because to do so harries our enemies. Our obligation, in the end, is to pursue such courses as are likely to achieve the ends we require, not simply to tick off our enemies or avoid what might monentarily encourage them. Ursa9, are you not guilty of blind acceptance that appeasement is some ultimate mistake to be avoided at all costs? It is an all too common viewpoint, and it is dangerous, as a historian should know (1). Is it further possible that the future shocks of terrorist attacks can inspire the reaction you fear? Yes! But don’t you have to concede the impact of those shocks is diminished, if not entirely contained, when they emerge from a consciously chosen strategy which accepts such risks as the inevitable give and take of a shadowy war against a mad and isolatable enemy? (A construction of the threat Europeans see to be the case, and is manifestly to all our advantages to impose on the situation.) (1)The tragic dance of diplomacy which led to the devastation of WWI – over some damn fool thing in the Balkans, and which extended the tragedy by seeking to apply that wisdom to a new situation where it was not wisdom but folly, defines a message we all need to take to heart. Make your policy first and foremost on the best understandings you can come to about what you actually face, and only then consider the oft times transfixing lesson’s of the past: “lest one good custom should corrupt the world”. Ursa9, I have proposed that Europe is following a course of broad cooperativity for perfectly sound reasons which do not define either a heedless cultural infatuation or a feckless disregard for real dangers. Are the outcomes you propose possible? Yes. Are they likely? I see no compelling case which supports that. I have adduced here that compelling forces are at work in this reality which support broad and beneficial cooperativity among nations, even without a “great hegemon” to drive and shape it. Cooperation becomes voluntary and negotiated (often with difficulty), rather than compelled. That, however may be a strength. I left a matter hanging earlier. What made the great Imperial hegemons great? I will argue that, far more than their competitors, they opened ways for the talent and ability in their societies to emerge with effect. The broad spread of an equitable body of Roman law, the extension of Roman citizenship, the cultivation of a ethical and professionally competent Confucian bureaucracy, and to a lesser extent, the inherent egalitarianism (at least for men) of Islamic civilization, allowed governance to draw more consistently on genuine talent and ability. This becomes infinitely more consequential in the modern world, where creative energy becomes of consequence not only in governance but in developing all the potentials opened by science and technology. That, I have suggested is something of a Pandora’s Box, but the box incontestably holds great riches. We need to learn to manage our engagement well. As I have written elsewhere, we have seldom had a more urgent task, or more golden an opportunity. Message was edited by: ronr327

ursa9 said: ["There is an organicism to this that might, given wise policy decisions, be more stabilizing than internationalism or globalism."] Surely the problem with the above statement, which is so typical of conclusions after historic ramblings through time, is that it is not possible to know if the decisions have been 'wise' or not until a long timeafter they are taken. In fact, even then, historians can argue the toss in one direction or another about what can be concluded. In fact, in a strict sense, ursa9's trawl through history of the development of man's sense of his self and his relationship to his community and its significance for him,at which ever level - tribe, village, region, nation, etc.,does not lead to any firm conclusion but to a vague and conditional statement, as quoted above. When reading this type of posting I am reminded of a book by Karl Marx called 'The Poverty of Philosophy'. There is an analogy in that historians have a professional bias for thinking that their study and disicipline enables them to discern trends that will be useful to policy makers on social, economic and politcal matters. For me this is a nice pass time with nothing more to commend it other than it is an intellectual exercise that suffers from an almost complete lack of riguor due to the nature of the subject matter and the instrument that they must use - words! Message was edited by: brolly2_1 Message was edited by: brolly2_1 Message was edited by: brolly2_1