The Internet: A Portal to Violent Islamist Extremism

[tequila]

Can you imagine the response if Bush set up internment camps for Arabs and/or Muslims like FDR did in WWII? Can you imagine suspending Habeas Corpus like Lincoln did?

Those things are generally regarded as horrific mistakes that did not help the war effort.

If you want to embrace bin Laden's or the Islamist blogger's argument that this is really a war between the United States and all Muslims, then by all means go ahead. Don't expect everyone to agree with you, and don't expect those who disagree to respond well when you brand them as traitors or subversives.

[Schmedlap]

Those things are generally regarded as horrific mistakes that did not help the war effort.

If you want to embrace bin Laden's or the Islamist blogger's argument that this is really a war between the United States and all Muslims, then by all means go ahead. Don't expect everyone to agree with you, and don't expect those who disagree to respond well when you brand them as traitors or subversives.

I was speaking to the change in society, not to the effectiveness of the policies. The number of valor awards from the 442nd pretty much puts any debate on that issue to bed.

[tequila]

I was speaking to the change in society, not to the effectiveness of the policies. The number of valor awards from the 442nd pretty much puts any debate on that issue to bed.

If you're talking about social cohesion, that tends to vary throughout history, generally based on economic conditions. I'd argue that the Civil War era which you cited before was a time of extremely low social cohesion, so much so that the Union itself split apart and significant portions of the population in both North & South were actively disloyal or aggressively nonparticipatory in the war itself. The WWII era had a much higher degree of social cohesion, but that was also a function of the industrial economy and its subsidiary, national conscription.

The WWII era was not more virtuous than today. It was vastly less egalitarian and unequal politically, saw violent and aggressive disenfranchisement of large segments of the American population, and from a purely military standpoint oversaw enormous incompetence and disasters which were either covered up or disregarded in the name of national morale (Market Garden, Pearl Harbor, the fall of the Philippines, Hurtgen Forest, the failure of Army commanders at Omaha to take advice from Pacific theater veterans, much of the Italian campaign, etc. etc.) IMO we need to stop looking at the past in sepia tone and understand it for what it really was - that's the only way to gain both understanding and lessons for the future.

[Schmedlap]

I'd argue that the Civil War era which you cited before was a time of extremely low social cohesion, so much so that the Union itself split apart and significant portions of the population in both North & South were actively disloyal or aggressively nonparticipatory in the war itself. The WWII era had a much higher degree of social cohesion, but that was also a function of the industrial economy and its subsidiary, national conscription.

The WWII era was not more virtuous than today. It was vastly less egalitarian and unequal politically, saw violent and aggressive disenfranchisement of large segments of the American population, and from a purely military standpoint oversaw enormous incompetence and disasters which were either covered up or disregarded in the name of national morale...

I agree with everything quoted above, though I suspect that if we both begin from this starting point, we will arrive at different conclusions. In the WWII era, many Americans did not see themselves as part of civil society. They wanted to be included and in this quest they endured injustices that few of us would tolerate today, being shunned due to their ethnicity or other unjust reasons. Today, an equal or larger proportion of America is unconcerned with membership, with some actively rejecting civil society.

If one does not care one way or the other about inclusion in civil society, then it is difficult for that person to place much importance on the outcome of battles that the society enters into (in other words, “militant Islamists hate America, not me”). He is susceptible to being persuaded to support or not support the battle for reasons that are disconnected from the benefits of success or the costs of failure (In other words, this argument can sound logical: “lots of teens with no other economic opportunities in life than to join the Army are dying in Iraq, therefore we should end this war”).

If one actively rejects and opposes the society around him, then that person is likely to seek to rally opposition to the battle. His most logical audience, aside from peers, is those who have the least interest in the benefits of winning, such as the personality above.

The (thankfully) modal American personality sees himself as a member of civil society, sees that he has a shared stake in the outcome of a battle, and is susceptible to persuasive arguments connected to the benefits of success or costs of failure or inaction. And there are still those among us today who are not members of civil society (residents, aspiring immigrants, etc) but who seek inclusion into society and hold the sense of a shared stake in the outcome of our battles.

Among those who see themselves as members of civil society or aspire to be part of it, I think that you will be hard-pressed to find many who oppose continuing our efforts in Iraq unless they think that failure is inevitable or that there is almost no benefit to succeeding. Contrast this with the rhetoric of the most vocal among those who reject or abstain from our civil society: Bush lied, Cheney is an evil oil baron, 4,000 dead, thousands of Iraqis are being raped and slaughtered by a handful of troops, we’re to blame for al-Qaeda’s actions, et cetera. There is not much evidence that they are concerned with the outcome and its implications for our nation. They are simply offended by the use of force in our national interest and horrified at human suffering, oblivious to the context in which it occurs.

And, just to clarify ahead of time, I do not expect everyone to agree with me, nor would I seek to persuade them by calling them names. I’m pondering the situation, not recommending a course of action. The former must precede the latter. Most of my peers prefer to discuss football and their upcoming PCS, so this forum is a more logical place to have my views challenged so that I can refine or reject them. Hopefully that doesn’t sound like I’m trying to be cute or coy – I do recognize that nutjobs pop up in open forums and purposely “disrupt”, “flame”, or spout extreme views that they have no intention of changing, regardless of the evidence against them. I present my views so that others may pick them apart or validate them.

[Ken White]

While I might quibble around the edges a tiny bit and would add that most Americans are considerably more concerned with US success than they are about the factors cited by those opposed to this war (many to any war...), I think he has it mostly correct.

Errors are made in all wars, tequila cites a few from World War II. There were many more, some more egregious and / or damaging than those named -- Palau comes to mind -- but anything involving humans is highly subject to error and often for very base reasons. That is not going to change. Far more regrettably, a tendency to fail to learn from past mistakes also seems to be a human foible...

I would add that with respect to current operations, there have been errors aplenty -- strategic, operational and tactical -- in high places and one of the most important is the abject failure of this administration to outline its case for Iraq. This is the worst Admin for getting its message out in my memory.

I believe that the errors made in WW II and those made today do not negate the necessity of participation in either war.

[bourbon]

Posts

You argue there is a disconnect between parts of our nation and civil society. However, we currently have an all-volunteer, professional military, which is in stark contrast to the traditional American way of war. Historically we rapidly stand up forces in times of need through conscription, and just as rapidly stand them down when the crisis ends. Standing armies in the United States have been historically small and insignificant, for our Founding Fathers warned us of the danger they bring. This is how we do it. This is our system.

I think you make some very good points, but is it right to be critical of portions of our nation when we have deviated so far from our historical norm?

[Ken White]

all volunteer professional military; conscription was used briefly only in the Civil War and World War I.

It was reimposed for World War II; intended to be for the war period only. The world was irrevocably changed by WW II and we had become a global power so, for the very first time, the draft was reinstituted in peacetime (1948) after the war and that effectively gave us a quite large standing Army from 1950 until 1973, running about .004 of the population for most of that period with spikes for Korea and Viet Nam (only about seven out of 24) .

From 1973 until 1991, that figure was about .003 -- with no draft.

Compare that to 1930. A 165K Army (including the Army Air Corps) equated to about .0014 of the population. Today with vastly more responsibility it's only about .0017 (with about as many aircraft as has the Air force). That is not a significantly greater number and it doesn't approach the 1950-1991 figure.

I suggest that the deviation in strength and processes is not great and that the real and very significant deviation is the transformation from an inward looking growing nation to a major power with global responsibilities. Given that major change in focus and responsibility -- wanted or not, we have it -- the actual change is miniscule and unavoidable.

The internal US societal changes are, I believe, a different issue that have little bearing on the size and structure of the Army.

[marct]

Hi Ken,

The internal US societal changes are, I believe, a different issue that have little bearing on the size and structure of the Army.

I'm not sure that I would agree with you on this. I have a suspicion that the social changes and, more importantly, the disjuncture between stated political ideologies and the "lived experience" of many Americans, is having a major effect on the size and structure of the Army. As a case in point, the issue of junior officer retention and the use of cash bonuses seems to point to a significant problem.

A few of my more radical, left wing friends and colleagues have made an interesting argument that is, IMHO, somewhat germane to this issue: they argue that, for the past 70+ years, the Management Society has been, basically, attempting to "domesticate" the average American. While I think they are definitely over the top in their rhetoric and their more than somewhat paranoid conspiracy theories, they does raise some interesting observations.

First, North American culture has been shifted significantly from a somewhat balanced point of individual freedoms and responsibilities to one where individual "rights" dominate. Second, and again obver the same period (roughly 1910 to the present if we go back to the Taylorite model), we have seen an increasing acquiescence to the power of "experts" to define how things should be run. Third, we have seen a systematic stripping away of many of the "traditional" systems of meaning (often religious, but also nationalistic) and their replacement with commercialized versions (i.e. and individual gets meaning not from acting within a transcendent system but from buying things and "constructing" their "own" identities).

I think that this trend has had an effect on the Army and, probably more on the USMC, since they still operate with an "older" form of "meaning" and identity construction. As a result, I think that you see the military attracting people who have a more "conservative" (please not the small "c") attitude towards rights and responsibilities, and this is where I see the disjuncture between the military and the rest of civil society showing up.

I'm tossing this out really as a discussion point rather than something I could prove .

Marc

[Schmedlap]

I think you make some very good points, but is it right to be critical of portions of our nation when we have deviated so far from our historical norm?

I'm not sure why the point about historical norms is significant to what I addressed.

My opinion is that many Americans have rejected our civil society, but have exploited the benefits of that society to exert disproportionate influence over debates concerning our national interests. I think that I am right to view this situation as a bad thing, regardless of the historical norms in question. Public debate should not be dominated by citizens who reject the civil society whose interests are at stake.

Just for clarification: this is not to assert that those who oppose our efforts in Iraq are, by definition, anti- or un-American. It is simply my observation that the people who are the most vocal, active, and energetic opponents of the war, who are driving the information campaign to prematurely end operations in Iraq, are doing so because they actively reject our society and they are offended by the application of our national power.