Tunisia: catch all

[Dayuhan]

Why have we not rushed a Marine Amphibious ship to the Med to simply sit, clearly visible on the horizon off of Tunis?

Why should we do any such thing? There's no genocide going on, nor any threatened, just a process of political change. There is absolutely nothing at this point to warrant external intervention.

Seems to me that going all 19th century and parking a gunboat off the coast would be completely counterproductive. There is not one person in Tunisia or the Arab world who would believe for a heartbeat that we were there on behalf of "the little guy". I don't think too many Americans would believe it. The universal assumption - no matter what we said - would be that big bad Uncle Sam was once again throwing his weight around to advance his own interests... and that, more than anything else, is what AQ thrives on.

The Tunisian "little guy" is not asking us to intervene. Nobody is asking us to intervene, or mediate, or facilitate, or anything else. What reason do we have to go pushing ourselves uninvited into other people's business? At least give them a chance to sort it out for themselves first. It is unbelievably presumptuous to think we could possibly know what the Tunisian populace wants or what is best for them, or that we would even consider pushing our presence uninvited into their process of political change. What right do we have to go walking into other countries and tell people there what we are or are not willing to tolerate?

There is likely to come a time when external influence is useful. An interim government will have to be pressured to hold elections; the elections will have to be monitored and assessed, and the various parties involved will have to be urged to accept the results. This may be an area where US leadership at the UN or other multilateral fora is called for, but unilateral intervention would be an absolute last resort.

Seems to me that our default response to internal instability in other countries should be to let the locals work things out for themselves. If we're asked to participate by parties with a credible claim to represent the populace or a portion thereof, the request should be considered. If influence or intervention is required it should multilateral efforts should always be preferred. Unilateral action or influence should be an absolute last resort, to be used when action is necessary and no other way is possible.

What we did not take into account was that the world had lost the tremendous balancing, and tempering effect of two superpowers waging a global competition for influence. One would wage a little UW, the other would counter. Most situations never got too out of control. Suddenly the Soviets weren't showing up, and then the Americans stopped showing up as well. Once everyone else realized this, those out of government who wanted power, or justice, or liberty started jockeying for position. Similarly those in government, many with no true writ of popular sovereignty, began ratcheting up the populace control measures.

This contention is I think almost horrifyingly backwards. There was no beneficial balancing during the Cold War: it was a devastatingly destructive time for the developing world. The Cold War was only cold if you were in Europe or the US and thinking nuclear: out on the periphery it was hot and continuous. The Cold War was fought by proxy, in the developing world, and the results were catastrophic. The end of that period hasn't eliminated violence in the developing world (nothing could), but it has drastically reduced it, and removed a major factor feeding it.

I can't think of any empirical measure that would suggest that violence and instability in the developing world have increased since the end of the Cold War. Quite the opposite. That entire line of argument needs to be either credibly supported or discarded.

It is a mix of message and presence. Sit down and work this out, Negotiate. If you can't negotiate, then the US or someone will come in and mediate. If you can't mediate, then the US or the UN or someone will come in and Arbitrate. Currently we tend to dictate. All of this is basic contract law, basic dispute resolution. The parties need to work out the terms, and there are always guidelines based on fundamental concepts of equity that set the parameters of such negotiations. It's the same way we enforce the rule of law at home. This is why we don't have gunfights at high noon in main street, or bigger and stronger people running roughshod over the smaller and weaker.

Enforcing the rule of law in our country is our right and our responsibility. Trying to enforce our concept of law in another country is imposition. We have no right whatsoever to tell the Tunisians how to resolve their internal conflicts.

There is a wide range of "acceptable" solutions; our problem is that we tend to neck it down to a narrow range of what is acceptable to us.

Isn't that exactly what you're advocating when you suggest that we "show up in such places and establish clear parameters as to the degree/nature of violence that is tolerable in such upheavals"?

Once a program is developed, then for example, the spokes people for the populace movement or the interim government in Tunisia could be requesting a neutral stand off security presence and a mediation team to come in and help move the process forward in a fashion that builds trust and helps avoid excess violence.

Is anyone requesting that?