I have liked Shelby Steele ever since his book The Content of Our Character came out back in the nineties.
I had to pass on this excellent opinion piece by Steele, from today’s Wall Street Journal.
Anyone with even a casual interest in U.S. History will appreciate the insight that Steele draws from our military experiences since WWII.
His premise is that White Guilt causes us to wage war only at a level tolerable to our enemies. The subtitle of the piece asks the question "Why is America so delicate with the enemy?".
His exploration of the meaning of the term "white guilt" alone makes the article a worthy read.
Our enemies see our restraint as weakness and they are correct, in a sense. From our perspective, we may see it as self-imposed weakness that comes from strength. Our enemies don’t feel they have the luxury of moderating their war efforts. We apparently do.
I think many Iraq war critics fail to grasp what a tricky job it is to make war against a weaker and poorer nation, even if the job needs doing. The truth is that we could squash Iraq like a bug. We could carpet bomb their cities into oblivion and set up whatever kind of government we durn well pleased, but we don’t. If we had no scruples, we could easily make the insurgency impossible. We could pour three times the current number of troops into Iraq (as Colin Powell has suggested). The fact that we don’t is a topic worthy of serious investigation, and Steele does an admirable job.
Steele sees the same White Guilt induced paralysis throughout the West. He also sees it in our seeming inability to take any kind of intelligible position on immigration.
Not that White Guilt in itself doesn’t have its place. We should rightly feel shame at some of our national sins; slavery, wanton destruction of native populations, the headlong rush into hedonistic materialism following the industrial revolution. It was likely our own imperiaslism, exported to Japan, that came back to us in WWII.
We have laboriously overcome some of these national sins. We are yet paying penance for others, and some we are still actively engaged in (that would be the hedonism thing).
Clear sighted commentary like this, from Shelby Steele and others, helps us to put things into perspective and move on, completing our penance for past sins, and leaving us free to tackle our current ones.
Everyone should read this.
I’m reminded of Mark Twain’s “War Prayer.”
“O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle — be Thou near them! With them — in spirit — we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it — for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.
(*After a pause.*) “Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits!”
“The truth is that we could squash Iraq like a bug. We could carpet bomb their cities into oblivion and set up whatever kind of government we durn well pleased…”
You mean like the way we bombed Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Cong “back into the Stone Age?” Thank you, General LeMay.
“We could pour three times the current number of troops into Iraq …”
Just like 500,000 + troops that we had in Vietnam in 1968? Yeah, that worked out well too.
“If we had no scruples, we could easily make the insurgency impossible.”
“Easily,” huh? Well by all means, please do the American people a favor, Tim, and offer your suggestions to our military leaders. You can reach the Pentagon by calling 703-545-6700. I am sure they will be oh-so-thrilled to receive unqualified advice from yet another civilian, “armchair General.”
Let me take a wild guess here, Tim. You, just like Shelby Steele, didn’t serve in the military, right? I think it warrants mention to point out that Shelby Steele was 22 when he graduated college in 1968, the height of the Vietnam war. Given his hawkish views today, you would think that he fought alongside other brave Americans who were taking the fight to our enemy in Vietnam. Not a chance. In typical chickenhawk fashion, Shelby Steele went to grad school and then beyond when he finished college. Apparently he couldn’t get a draft deferment quick enough.
Chickenhawk n. A person enthusiastic about war, provided someone else fights it; particularly when that enthusiasm is undimmed by personal experience with war; most emphatically when that lack of experience came in spite of ample opportunity in that person’s youth.
While I think the article makes valid points, I disagree with the tenor of it.
I think the problem is less guilt over sins of the past then the lack of guilt in this country over the sins of the present. Sins like contraception, anti-family policies and attitudes, greed, materialism, lack of charity, etc…which are all connected in a national web of sin that has constricted the souls of young men and women in this country.
Rather than focusing on ridding ourselves of guilt so we can win wars, we should focus on ridding ourselves of these sins as a country so we are better equipped to save souls (including those of our enemies).
I don’t think military victory in Iraq defeats Islamic Extremism, as I believe Steele suggests. I think the spread of the Faith does that. Yes, creating a democracy can make it easier for the Faith to spread, but what I sense in this campaign is a blind faith that democracy as an idea will triumph by virtue of itself, not by virtue of its connection to a spiritual tradition (from which it has been unmoored to a large extent in this country anyway). His kingdom is not of this world.
Yes, bigotry is no longer acceptable in American society (at least some forms of it, anti-Catholic bigotry seems to be alive and well, and there’s plenty of anti-Latino sentiment where I live). But prejudice is very subtle psychologically, and subconcious attitudes are often present despite a sense of good will, as social psychology experiments have shown. So I’m suspicious of an “all is now well” sentiment – that is, that we “have achieved a truly remarkable moral transformation” as a culture. I just don’t see it. People in my home town still participate in the exploitation of the sweat and labor of immigrants, and still bristle at the poor people coming into the community through the creation of low-income housing. I wish they would feel guilty.
No Chickenhawk-
The Vietnam War was lost by politicians, not by generals, and for precisely the reasons that Steele outlines.
I am not giving military advice. What I said was, “IF we had no scruples…” we could put a practical end to the insurgency. Maybe “easily” was an overstatement, but we could take the insurgency down to a level of irrelevancy.
So I take it your military experiences transformed you into a pacifist?
To No ChickenHawk Here,
I think you totally miss the point of how we fought Vietnam, and in so doing miss Mr Steele’s point.
The US purposely decided to not invade North Vietnam with overwhelming force. Had we done so, we clearly could have occupied Hanoi and cut off the head of the North Vietnamese support fot the Vietcong. Whether the insurgency would have continued, no one can say, but the parallel situation would be asking what will happen to the Iraqi situation when we capture/kill Al-Zarqauri.
The problem with going into North Vietnam full force is that it could have easily turned the Cold War hot, creating a Nuclear Holocaust in Europe. The Soviet Union was the real enemy at the time and could have used the ‘Oppression of the Vietnamese people’ as the tipping point to start rolling the tanks.
That’s not to say that we did everything the right way in Vietnam and Iraq; we obviously didn’t. Considering that we could have made them uninhabitable, the US has clearly shown constraint.
That doesn’t mean I agree with Mr Steele’s analysis. There are many more contextual elements requiring consideration when analyzing why a country chooses a certain strategy. Currently in Iraq, we have chosen to not go the route of the Romans due to sensibilities (International Relations, economics, environment, etc) much larger than our collective guilt. After all, look how successful the ‘guiltless’ Romans were in wiping out the Christians.
Why should we wish we had no scruples?
Isn’t that the difference between the proportionate destruction that Catholic “just war” theory would seem to envision, and wanton destruction that goes beyond what that theory would allow?
An interesting book I read recently about the allied invasion of Europe made the interesting point that the soldiers of all the countries considered the German to be the best fighter, and the American the worst. The German, Nazi or not, was so dedicated to his “craft” that he would fight on against hopeless odds and in situations that would routine make the Americans turn and run. It enabled the Germans to fight “above their weight” time after time. Meanwhile, the American troops were nearly always more concerned about minimizing their own casualties, leading to a timid fighting style in which they didn’t take advantage of the situations offered.
In this context, reading this, one starts forming the idea that the Americans sure were a bunch of wusses. But the author stops that thought short with this observation: Americans were not professional soldiers — they were ordinary folks. Our country didn’t have a militaristic zeal of the sort that motivated the German.
And isn’t that a *good” thing? To fight when you have to, reluctantly, seems more inhernetly Christian than being too gung-ho. And that despite our country’s other, distinctly non-Christian, faults.
I would suggest CH’s response to TJ as an great example of how one can TOTALLY miss the points he claims to be responding to, but then, there are so many examples of that in blogsphere that i think, why bother.
I thought it was a weak op-ed. Outside of the South and college universities, most White Americans never thought of themselves as “White,” just the European ethnic groups of their ancestors.
But I’m wondering if the military action in Serbia could support an even grimmer thesis. Yes, it was presented with some of the typical multi-culti “Lets stop evil White Europeans from slaughtering Muslims.”
Yet when Orthodox Easter came, we didn’t pussy-foot around like we do with the Muslims in Ramadan. We kept bombing fellow Christians on their most holy day of the year. There’s a nasty “Anything but Christianity” strain among our ruling class which racial concerns often overshadow. Call it “Crusader guilt.”
Oh, the book was “Armageddon: The Battle for
Germany, 1944-45.” It is an excellent read, authored by Max Hastings (he also wrote a book about the D-Day invasion called “Overlord.”
The most basic problem with Steele’s premise (and it’s only one of several) is that it strains the limits of credulity for anyone to argue that President Bush, of all people, is hampered by white guilt. I mean, come on!
Shelby’s no fool, he stayed in school!
“So I take it your military experiences transformed you into a pacifist?”
What I learned, Tim, was to take the unqualified opinions of others with a grain of salt, particularly when the person offering the opinion in question has no experience with that of which he speaks, and particularly when he is calling for someone other than himself to pay, in blood, the price for that which he advocates. Tell me again, General Tim, how “easily” the Iraqi insurgency and/or Iraqi suicide bombers can be defeated–with or without “scruples.”
Please take me at my word when I say that I am a practicing, orthodox and devout Catholic. That said, I would sooner listen to Jimmy Swaggart, an anti-Catholic bigot if there ever was one, lecture me on merits of The Catechism of the Catholic Church than I would be inclined to give any weight to the opinions of chickenhawks such as Shelby Steele or yourself. That is particularly the case when Steele and/or you ramble on with respect to any matter involving the US military, the challenges our military may face, and the price those honorable men and women may be called upon to pay. There is, after all, a slight, albeit remote, chance that Swaggart actually picked up and read a copy of The Catechism. By contrast, you and Mr. Steele will, thankfully, never know the horrors of combat, or even peace-time military service, your false (civilian) bravado notwithstanding. In short, it is real easy for you, a civilian with no military experience and with, seemingly, little at risk, to sit behind your computer monitor and talk tough. You are writing a check that someone other than yourself will have to pay.
Incidentally, where was Karl Keating in 1968? Oh yeah, he was getting that math degree in sunny California. If I remember correctly, it was law school (and yet another student deferment) immediately thereafter. Silly me. Where does Mr. Keating stand on the war on Iraq? Where does he stand on what Jimmy Akin, another war hero, calls “the impending war with Iran?”
As many Generals have said, in order to win war, you must pound your enemy, like we did after WWII into submission. Tim J is exactly correct as we let the politicians fight our wars now and much of it has to do with the White mans guilt and colonialism, though I dont recall anyone feeling sorry for the Germans when Dresden was burning and thousand of young German children were burnt to death
No Chickenhawk-
You’re saying that only former soldiers are qualified to set national policy on the use of military force?
Like John Kerry? So any imbecile with a war wound is more qualified to set foreign policy than our own heads of state?
That sounds like the dissenter who told me that the Pope had no business writing about birth control, since he was a man, and celibate to boot.
BTW, what was the nature of your military service?
Tim –
Please, don’t even try to argue rationally with someone who uses the absolutely idiotic “chickenhawk” term. The true cowards are those who use that phrase to shut up anyone who has not served in the military, as though military experience were some sort of pre-requisite for forming an opinion on the war.
If you’ve noticed, the commenter hasn’t even offered any valid criticisms – he’s just mouthed the stupid chickenhaw bs as though that settles the argument.
Tim, I’m an Air Force veteran with over 1000 hours flying B-52s. You are correct in your comments, and Paul Zummo is correct in his assessment of NCH.
WRY-
I agree that we should have scruples. that is the point. I think we SHOULD let our scruples interfere with the mere cold calculus of war.
Steele is simply trying to explain why we don’t, in fact, make war in the way that we could.
People who holler for a quick and complete victory (and who act as if the very existence of an insurgency proves that our leaders are inept) don’t realize what they are asking. Do they really think we should move through Iraq the way General Sherman marched to the sea?
Heck, we’re actually BUILDING a bunch of new stuff over there… schools, power plants, hospitals… partly (as Steele points out) to demonstrate to the world that we repudiate our imperialist heritage.
I have no problem with that, but it does make it slow going. Unfortunately the Iraq war has outlasted the attention span of our ADHD nation, just when patience is called for.
“You’re saying that only former soldiers are qualified to set national policy on the use of military force?”
You forgot to mention currently-serving Soldiers, Sailors, Marines and Airmen. I am particularly fond of them and their opinions as well.
In case you missed it, what I am saying Tim/chickenhawk, is that your opinions on just how “easy” it is to accomplish ANY military objective are worthless and not at all worthy of the space those opinions occupy–even in seemingly unlimited cyberspace. I would sooner have a butcher perform surgery on me than I would be inclined to give ANY consideration to your opinions on the military matters that you have, heretofore, spoken of. At the very least, a butcher has actually touched a knife, which is a lot more than you could ever hope to say of, say, an M-16.
“Like John Kerry?”
I didn’t vote for the man. Truth be told, I don’t like the man. I certainly don’t share his politics. That said, I respect him. I wouldn’t spit in the face of his sacrifice either, particularly to advance a political point on a web site. You, one who has never done even so much as one push-up in boot camp in the service of our Republic, ought to be ashamed of yourself to question the service and/or patriotism of anyone, much less a combat veteran. John Kerry “was there.” He placed his life at risk and took responsibility for the lives of those young men that he commanded, which is much more than will ever be said for yourself. Snicker if you want, but they don’t hand out Purple Hearts with oak leaf clusters to cowards. You, a tough-talking, wannabe Rambo hiding behind his computer monitor, could never hope to be half the man that John Kerry was and is.
BTW, what was the nature of your military service?
Who are you, Tim, to question anyone, particularly when you ignore the questions posed to you?
Anonimity is a sign of gutlessness.
I’ll echo Tim’s question: “What was the nature of your military service?”
That’s what I thought.
“Anonimity [sic] is a sign of gutlessness.”
“I’ll echo Tim’s question: What was the nature of your military service?”
I am a combat veteran.
I suspect you wouldn’t know combat and the horrors that it entails if combat were to fall upon you, Bill912. How many combat veterans do you know that walk around asking for a parade for what they did for you, your freedom, and for the sake of our Republic?
What’s the next question, Bill? Why not question Tim Jones, a not-so-brave chickenhawk, as to why he was so unwilling to do even a single push-up in support of the defense of the nation that he, now, claims to love? Why didn’t he (or Keating or Akin or Arnold, et al) act to defend the United States when he or she was in his/her late teens or early twenties? Would you have us believe that he/she couldn’t fit into his/her schedule “one weekend a month and two weeks during the summer” each year–even to defend America? (A Reservist schedule) Why are these fat, bloated, warmongering, middle-aged malcontents oh-so-quick to point how others should, now, be willing to die for the very freedom that they, themselves, offered nothing but their tax dollars to defend?
Why is Chickenhawk Tim Jones (Akin, Keating, Arnold, etc.),now, all too willing to commit the youth of America to die for the liberty that he or she enjoys when he/she himself wasn’t willing to do ANYTHING to defend that very same liberty? More importantly, who is Tim Jones to question anyone? Quite frankly, he isn’t fit to tie my boots.
“That’s what I thought.”
Hey, chickenhawk, thinking is something you do well. Accordingly, you shouldn’t do it often.
Well this descended very quickly into ad hominem. I still want someone to address my points…
“Why are these fat, bloated, warmongering, middle-aged malcontents oh-so-quick to point how others should, now, be willing to die for the very freedom that they, themselves, offered nothing but their tax dollars to defend?”
Well, who can argue with logic like that? If you believe it, Combat Veteran, it must be true.
Ryan-
I don’t think Steele was saying (andf I KNOW I wasn’t) that we need to conquer our guilt so that we can more effectively pummel our enemies. He was just reasoning out the causes behind our apparent restraint in recent wars, including Iraq. He’s not saying its a bad thing, just taking note of it.
I agree that we need to repent of our sins simply because they need repenting of. We have poisoned our culture, and the culture is poisoning us back. The only way to begin to break that cycle is for each INDIVIDUAL to come to grips with his/her own PERSONAL sins.
I agree that victory (or democracy) in Iraq will not, itself, defeat terrorism, but it does offer some hope of a less dysfunctional region. What if Muslims all over the world had as an example a country where their Muslim brothers lived relatively free and contented lives in an open, pluralistic society? Would they want that, too?
If so, it’s a good thing to strive for. If not, there is no cure for their disease.
Since anonimity is a sign of gutlessness, I doubt this anonymous guy is a combat veteran.
“Since anonimity is a sign of gutlessness, I doubt this anonymous guy is a combat veteran.”
You got a fax number, Bill912, where we can exchange copies of each others DD-214’s? You do what that is don’t you? You up for a challenge with this Marine, Bill?
You do “know” what this is…typo
“Well, who can argue with logic like that?”
I didn’t expect that you would argue with much, Tim, even from the safety of the Internet. In true punk fashion, you would toss salad without a fight. Tell us again, “General Tim,” how “easily” you would defeat America’s enemies.
“Tell us again, “General Tim,” how “easily” you would defeat America’s enemies.”
Well, speaking personally, I’d annex the Sudetenland.
“Well, speaking personally, I’d annex the Sudetenland.”
LOL…wiseass. It is tough not to like you, Tim, even when you are obnoxious and dead wrong.
A word of advice, my friend: The next time one of your political positions calls for the possible, much less certain, death of even one of my beloved Marines, be sure to begin and/or end your post with the proper respect. Might I suggest you throw in a “Semper Fi!” every couple of paragraphs or so. God knows, we deserved it!!
Semper Fi!
(See how easy that was?)
You know, that’s the funny thing. I can honestly tell you that NOBODY has more respect for service members than I do.
I was born in Norfolk, Virginia, when my Dad was stationed there.
Chickenhawk, what is the point of fighting and dying for the freedom of democracy, freedom of speech, and freedom of religion if you only use that experience as a classist excuse to denigrate people who do not share your experiences?
Your whinging undermines the whole idea of going to war to defend this nation.
Just as Christians are to selflessly devote their lives to God and become His tools, so too are soldiers tools for the state. If you do not like that inescapable dynamic, then you should not have joined in the first place. (You can always quit when your enlistment runs out.)
Last I checked, this was a free country and not a military dictatorship. If you want to share your opinions, fine, but you resorted to name-calling from your first post. After that, no one here will take you seriously.
Personally, I do not care if you fought on the very shores of Tripoli. It still does not give you the right to discount other people’s ideas just because their personal experiences are different from yours — just because they are not you.
I know entire companies that think you are full of it. Who died and made YOU the infallible pope of military might? Your relativist criticism can be reflected right back at you. Why don’t YOU call the Pentagon and tell them how to run the war — I am sure they would be happy to hear advice from an E-nothing grunt like yourself.
How could you wax so superior when the very military you serve is designed to isolate grumpy gusses like yourself from the important people who make the decisions? You want maybe to be King of the Marines now?
Who else serves as a convenient vent for your battlefield rage? So you had a couple of bad days at the war, that does not give you license to relive some anti-authority fantasy with a hapless citizen who is not even remotely involved in the formulation of military strategy.
Tim J is a CITIZEN of the United States. Military Code DEMANDS that any citizen who salutes a uniformed member must have his salute returned. It is a sign of respect and reminder of what members fight for.
A real warrior would apologize for his misdirected aggression. Do not let your experiences turn you inward on yourself and fester your agony — turning you into the type of person who is so unpleasant, their very existence is like a bad smell just walked into the room.