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Prostitution of the pen and the dark side of the free market
Four years ago, the government of the French Republic took the lead in refusing to support the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq. The French, who had taken a very active and successful part in the first Iraq war, simply did not think that an invasion followed by the occupation of an Arab country was a good idea. That was their prerogative (see under "sovereign state").
(My position was that I loathed Saddam Hussein so much that anyone who wanted to drive him out was fine by me. I would even have supported an Iranian invasion. But I would not have started to insult people who disagreed.)
The idiot part of the American right suddenly made France the bout of all their hatred. Someone spotted a market opportunity, as Americans do (the French do that as well, but when the French do it, that's evil!) and prostituted a certain amount of historical knowledge in the search for a quick buck, producing some sort of tract which rewrote history with the claim that "France have always been our enemy, but they have concealed it under a pretence of friendship".
I would dismiss this intellectually contemptible and factually fraudulent thesis in as many words, and not even bother about it, were it not that one of the finest minds in my f-list seems to have been taken in by it. As it is, I want to ask how you imagine you can trace a consistent attitude of hatred, and what is more, of subtly disguised hatred, in a nation that has, since the foundation of the United States, experienced three royalist constitutions, five republican ones, two bonapartist ones, and one fascist tyranny, and completely boxed the compass in terms of attitudes, views, and alliances. This is the kind of things that rabid anti-Semites postulate about Jews - attitudes consistent across the centuries, constant vicious subtlety in carrying them out, hatred fertile in invention but completely barren of reason. The French ought to be proud: they have been promoted to the rank of Chosen People, next to that other target of unreasoning, blind, stupid, despicable hatred. In case anyone had any doubts, I regard Jew-bashing as a stain on the face of mankind.
No doubt the prostitute or prostitutes who set out on this bit of free enterprise got out of it what they wanted - money, admiting letters from ignorami and fanatics, and the odd spot on TV talk shows; rewards that serious historians get rather less often. But as we are still free people here, I want to use my own freedom of expression, rather less despicably than the prostitute or prostitutes concerned: first, by calling whoredom by its proper name; and second, by stating clearly that there shall be no pity here for such views. The historical slag or slags who sold their integrity for popular success will not be treated as anything but filth, and anyone who takes them seriously is warned that I will do what is in my power to restore them to sanity.
(My position was that I loathed Saddam Hussein so much that anyone who wanted to drive him out was fine by me. I would even have supported an Iranian invasion. But I would not have started to insult people who disagreed.)
The idiot part of the American right suddenly made France the bout of all their hatred. Someone spotted a market opportunity, as Americans do (the French do that as well, but when the French do it, that's evil!) and prostituted a certain amount of historical knowledge in the search for a quick buck, producing some sort of tract which rewrote history with the claim that "France have always been our enemy, but they have concealed it under a pretence of friendship".
I would dismiss this intellectually contemptible and factually fraudulent thesis in as many words, and not even bother about it, were it not that one of the finest minds in my f-list seems to have been taken in by it. As it is, I want to ask how you imagine you can trace a consistent attitude of hatred, and what is more, of subtly disguised hatred, in a nation that has, since the foundation of the United States, experienced three royalist constitutions, five republican ones, two bonapartist ones, and one fascist tyranny, and completely boxed the compass in terms of attitudes, views, and alliances. This is the kind of things that rabid anti-Semites postulate about Jews - attitudes consistent across the centuries, constant vicious subtlety in carrying them out, hatred fertile in invention but completely barren of reason. The French ought to be proud: they have been promoted to the rank of Chosen People, next to that other target of unreasoning, blind, stupid, despicable hatred. In case anyone had any doubts, I regard Jew-bashing as a stain on the face of mankind.
No doubt the prostitute or prostitutes who set out on this bit of free enterprise got out of it what they wanted - money, admiting letters from ignorami and fanatics, and the odd spot on TV talk shows; rewards that serious historians get rather less often. But as we are still free people here, I want to use my own freedom of expression, rather less despicably than the prostitute or prostitutes concerned: first, by calling whoredom by its proper name; and second, by stating clearly that there shall be no pity here for such views. The historical slag or slags who sold their integrity for popular success will not be treated as anything but filth, and anyone who takes them seriously is warned that I will do what is in my power to restore them to sanity.
Re: I'll leave you and <lj user = kulibali> to argue this out
If Rumsfeld's words were insulting, what were Chirac's, when he said that England, Poland, Denmark, Romania, Georgia, Czech Republic, Latvia, Albania, Lithuania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Estonia, Macedonia, Moldova, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Spain, Hungary, Norway, Portugal, Iceland, and, oh yes, Italy, "missed a good opportunity to sit down and shut up."
As an aside, you will note that much of my personal revulsion towards French hypocricy in foreign policy stems from their economic support of Charles Taylor in Liberia (which informs and supports my opinion of their stance on the Iraq war), a point I've raised here several times without response.
On the question of the forseen or actual difficulty of the invasion, indeed I will tell you flatly that you were wrong. Bush invaded Iraq as part of a multifaceted global military, economic and humanitarian strategy (again I suggest you read Kaplan's _Imperial Grunts_, to start), which has been elucidated time and again by him and his administration. As for Iraq in particular, there were 23 separate counts in Joint House Resolution 114, 17 UN Security Council resolutions, several of them authorizing military action, one broken treaty from 1991, and _six months_ of diplomatic wrangling with France, Germany, Russia & China. Hardly light-headed. Do you really think that Saddam would have stayed quiescent once the sanctions were down, given his history of repeatedly attacking his own citizens as well as his neighbors? You are concerned about American military "hostages"; what about the 30,000/year of his own people that Saddam killed, according to Human Rights Watch? Bush himself repeatedly said, in his 2003 State of the Union address and elsewhere, said that the road would be long and difficult.
As you will know, the US has some small prior experience with invading countries and imposing democracy on them. Just because the process has been difficult and fraught with error and difficulty so far does not mean the goal is not worth trying for! Don't make the perfect the enemy of the good.
The American occupation of Japan lasted almost 7 years, until April 28, 1952, and American troops are there to this day. The American, British and French occupation of West Germany lasted four to ten years, depending on your definitions, and American troops are there to this day. I'll bet you a (Canadian) dollar that the situation in Iraq will be much different in 2013 than it is today.
Re: I'll leave you and <lj user = kulibali> to argue this out
Re: I'll leave you and <lj user = kulibali> to argue this out
Not a single one of whose public opinions favoured intervention. This was strictly a matter of political leaderships following the Americans, and, in most countries that matter (the presence of Bulgaria or Moldova in the field does not offer anyone much of anything), being punished for this. The Tory Blur has been forced out of his seat by his own party, who fear disaster at the next elections because of the immense unpopularity of the war (not improved by the recent humiliating display in the face of Iran); Aznar and Berlusconi are gone; it is only in Poland, and strictly for internal reasons, that a more pro-American government is in the saddle. Indeed, this may be said of the war: that without it the odious and incompetent Prodi and Zapatero governments, with their viciously divisive policies, would never have reached power. They will probably - please God! - lose the next elections, but that will not make Iraq any more popular in Italy or Spain.