Rule Set Shift in the Ivory Tower
As the GWOT moves forward the states engaged in destroying terror will be forced to adapt the realities of this new kind of warfare. The NSA surveillance debate, the Patriot Act, the advent of state sponsored assasination, the redefining of sovereignty and failed states etc are all examples of this transition.
The rule set shift is being shaped and slowed by friction caused by the various forces Marc Schulman discusses here.
Most interesting to me was an article he cited where Pulitzer Prize winning author and professor of history Joseph Ellis (author of Founding Brothers) makes a profound mistake.
He argues –
My first question: where does Sept. 11 rank in the grand sweep of American history as a threat to national security? By my calculations it does not make the top tier of the list, which requires the threat to pose a serious challenge to the survival of the American republic.
Here is my version of the top tier: the War for Independence, where defeat meant no United States of America; the War of 1812, when the national capital was burned to the ground; the Civil War, which threatened the survival of the Union; World War II, which represented a totalitarian threat to democracy and capitalism; the cold war, most specifically the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, which made nuclear annihilation a distinct possibility.
Apparently the opening shots of a long term conflict designed to destroy the legitimacy of the American nation state does not qualify as a “serious challenge”.
The ivory tower has repeatedly shown an inability to understand and process this idea; with the noteable exceptions of Phillip Bobbit and Martin van Creveld of course.
-Shlok
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Feb 1, 2006
My second question is this: What does history tell us about our earlier responses to traumatic events?
My list of precedents for the Patriot Act and government wiretapping of American citizens would include the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798, which allowed the federal government to close newspapers and deport foreigners during the “quasi-war” with France; the denial of habeas corpus during the Civil War, which permitted the pre-emptive arrest of suspected Southern sympathizers; the Red Scare of 1919, which emboldened the attorney general to round up leftist critics in the wake of the Russian Revolution; the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, which was justified on the grounds that their ancestry made them potential threats to national security; the McCarthy scare of the early 1950’s, which used cold war anxieties to pursue a witch hunt against putative Communists in government, universities and the film industry.
In retrospect, none of these domestic responses to perceived national security threats looks justifiable. Every history textbook I know describes them as lamentable, excessive, even embarrassing. Some very distinguished American presidents, including John Adams, Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt, succumbed to quite genuine and widespread popular fears. No historian or biographer has argued that these were their finest hours.
I agree that Ellis is wrong about the significance of 9/11, but he is right on when it comes to our sometimes excessive responses to national crises. In fact, I think the fact that most of these responses, which as he points out were “excessive and lamentable” happened as a result of these crises, argues against the notion that September 11 does not rise to the same level.
In the debate on wiretapping, and executive power to wage war, we always need to be mindful that the President is not above the law and if war is necessary, he must do so only under the constitutional authority given to him as commander in chief. With regard to the possibility of violating civil liberties we as Americans must have a national debate regarding how much power to grant the President (as commander in chief) and if we agree that he needs this pwoer, then it is up to Congress to grant it to him.
Feb 3, 2006
You’re right –
The lag between excessive security measures and their correction is a major factor in the decline of the nation state.
Two steps left, one step right has been the mentality of the government. That won’t cut it when non state actors are providing the same services (more efficiently) without excessive alienation of subgroups.