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Deleted ScenesDeleted Scene #23Chapter Six: The Global Transaction Strategy Section: You're Ruining My Military! Commentary: This twenty-third "deleted scene" was cut from page 301. It would have gone in right above the paragraph beginning, "We all should ask . . .." What it amounts to is my attempt to detail a logical list of boxes you might want to see checked off by circumstances before deciding to intervene militarily in any country. I offer some breakdown by category of situation. Why did Mark Warren cut this? I don't know, to be honest, other than perhaps it's a bit too much detail for the reader here and perhaps it mirrors a bit too much the material that follows later in the American Way of War section. I include it because I think it's reasonably good stuff worth remembering. Deleted Scene: Deciding When to Intervene Militarily[TEXT BEGINS] So America is faced with a real challenge: we are the world's Leviathan and our interests do extend the world over, but when and where to intervene? It is almost trite to say that America will intervene whenever an ally is attacked, because very few of our strong military allies face any significant threat from any other state. Outside of Israel in the Middle East, South Korea vis-à-vis North Korea, Taiwan versus China, and India versus Pakistan, there are no American allies facing serious external threats, now that Saddam Hussein's regime has been toppled. Israel does not need our help so much as a better neighborhood in which to live, which we are now forced to provide with our occupation of Iraq. South Korea likewise needs our protection less than Kim Jong Il's retirement or timely demise. As for Taiwan, its economic accommodation with the mainland vastly out-shadows the military threat posed by the People's Liberation Army. Time is on our side with that one. With India and Pakistan, there is both madness and MAD, leaving the U.S. to its peacemaker role. All of these situations are like dormant volcanoes. Yes, one could always blow up at a moment's notice, but life -- and the world -- have basically moved beyond these conflicts. None have exploded into state-based wars in over three decades. So if no allies truly need defending, but merely our reinforcement of the existential deterrence that already defines these enduring stand-offs, we are essentially left with the internal violence that plagues much of the Gap, the failed states that tend to attract dangerous transnational actors seeking sanctuary or freedom of action, and the usual humanitarian crises that beset such impoverished states. That is it. Will there be hard and fast rules on any of these situations? Not really, but we can speak of situations where a critical mass of characteristics can be found. With humanitarian situations, that is pretty easy to define: widespread suffering leading to catastrophic death totals and significant refugee flows. This decision is typically Core-wide, and usually is pursued in conjunction with the UN's formal blessing or institutional authority (i.e., a "mission"). With failed states, the old rule used to be, do not bother intervening until the humanitarian crisis is full blown, and otherwise ignore these situations. But with the global war on terrorism, we have come to understand that failed states are attractive refuges or transit points for dangerous transnational actors of all sorts, not just terrorists, primarily because their security rule sets are slim to almost non-existent. But do not look for the United States to intervene militarily in such states (e.g., Sudan, Somalia, Liberia, Pakistan) in a big way until such time as any of them rise to the top of the truly "rogue state" list. Failure alone does not get you on that list; you must be ruled by a leadership that seeks to flaunt security rule sets not just within the country, but outside as well. That means the leadership must be overtly challenging the Core's emerging security rule set, the most important one being -- at least in America's eyes -- selling the technology of weapons of mass destruction to other "bad states" or dangerous transnational actors. But since the proliferation of WMD technology often involves private-sector firms based in the Core, targeting such "bad" Gap states for regime change remains a hotly contested issue. In short, everybody wants to make a buck and not every major player in the Core shares America's definition of what constitutes a "rogue state." America has sought to codify that definition through its global war on terrorism and the enunciation of the strategy of preemption, but details remain unclear in the public's mind-not to mention our friends and allies around the world. Did we topple Saddam Hussein's regime because he had or sought WMD? Because he supported international terrorism over the years? Because he killed his own people in great numbers? Because he defied the UN all those years? Because he was a threat to his neighbors? The answer, of course, is not to pick any item from the list but merely to recognize that once you can compile a list about a particular regime, you have basically made your case. We invaded Iraq because all those things were true, not because any one of them was true in some absolute, "smoking gun" sort of way. Simply put, the regime was a repeat offender, wanted on multiple warrants, with a demonstrated willingness to commit new crimes in the future. When you have a regime like that cornered, you do not simply hang outside his hide-out, waiting for the next crime to unfold. Instead, you take him down at the time of your choosing, which is exactly what America finally did, along with a small host of like-minded states. What was amazing was how long that murdering tyrant successfully thumbed his nose at the world, not that America finally got so fed up that we took him out largely on our own. Does this sort of activity tend to smack of frontier justice? By definition, yes. To take down a Saddam Hussein is to cross globalization's frontier and enter the Gap. It involves the extension of rule sets by a coalition of the willing, or what we used to call a posse in the days of America's Wild West. But that is exactly what we face when we seek to extend the Core's security rule sets into the Gap -- a land beyond organized justice, a truly Hobbesian world, a security order in which might makes right until wrongs yield to law. [TEXT ENDS] |
Putnam, 2004 |
