Blogging 101: When you think of it, write it. Otherwise someone else will write it for you.
While I was out at work today, Matthew Yglesias was apparently reading my mind. Or something.
Ah, the "lessons of history." Reader C.B. reminds me that "One of the huge mistakes that the democracies made with regard to Hitler was that they refused to take seriously what he said... until it was too late." In turn, "We dare not do that again-- especially when we are talking about nuclear weapons that can be packed in suitcase or stuck on the end of a Katuysha rocket." Interestingly, I was just reading (via Robert Farley) this great monograph by Jeffrey Record of the Army War College about the West's pre-war approach to Hitler and the abuse of the lessons thereby learned by subsequent American presidents.
At any rate, it's certainly the case that the leaders of the United States, Britain, and France erred in their estimates of Hitler's strategic ambitions. It's also certainly the case that, in retrospect, we can see that Hitler outlined those ambitions in advance, in Mein Kampf and elsewhere. People have, however, a terrible habit of overinterpreting these data points. In particular, they want to propose that the 1930s teach us the lesson that we should always take foreign leaders at their word.Except, of course, that nobody actually thinks we should take that lesson away. I hope I won't rob anyone of their innocence by making this observation, but politicians lie. In particular, along with telling the truth about his strategic ambitions, Hitler lied about his strategic ambitions. One reason people underestimated their scope was that Hitler put some time into trying to deceive people. He said different things at different times. Similarly, you don't hear the people arguing that we need to take Ahmadenijad's public statements more seriously arguing that we need to take his public protestations that Iran's nuclear program is for civilian purposes more seriously.
So the "lesson" people want to draw from the 1930s isn't that we should take people's statements more seriously. Rather, the "lesson" they've learned is that we should always adopt the most alarmist possible interpretation of every given situation. But, of course, they never put it that way. Why don't they? Well, because when you put it that way it sounds like a stupid lesson. Which, obviously, it is. If you want to draw lessons from history, you need to really look at history as a whole. Have countries, as a general matter, been well served by adopting maximally alarmist interpretations of events abroad? I don't think that's a remotely justifiable view. If anything, history teaches the reverse lesson.
And while he was at it, he decided to do a brilliant "I call bullshit" post as well. Take a look. If this is him "stepping outside the "sensible" zone" with his "commentary," he needs to do it far, far more often. Brilliant conclusion:
So, here's Iran. Outgunned by its two leading religio-ideological antagonists, Israel and Saudi Arabia, in the region. One immediate neighbor is Pakistan, with a larger population base and a nuclear arsenal. Another immediate neighbor, Afghanistan, is occupied by soldiers under the command of an American president who has spurned peace offers and threatened to overthrow the Iranian government. A second immediate neighbor, Iraq, is occupied by a larger number of soldiers from the same country. The Iranian military's equipment is outdated and essentially incapable of mounting offensive operations. So Iran is trying to build nuclear weapons and missiles to deliver them. Under the circumstances, wouldn't you? Don't you think a little deterrence capability would serve the country well under those circumstances?
When will this nonsense stop?
Today on Fresh Air, for example, conservative "thinker" Michael Ledeen of the American Enterprise institute claimed that war with Iran isn't just inevitable, its already happening. Worse, he claimed we've been "at war" with them since 1979, even though most of us don't realize it. When pressed by Terry to defend his definition of war, he treated the question as if the answer was so self evident it needn't be answered. But excuse me... if most people don't realize it, doesn't that by definition mean it is not self evident?
More than anything, what amazes me about the last six years is that we as a people seem to have forgotten entirely a little thing we used to call "The Cold War." I realize that our current president doesn't seem to remember it - he's admitted as much himself. But how is it possible that we have all collectively forgotten?
For decades we faced down an enemy that posed an existential threat not just to ourselves, but through our face-off, to the entire planet as well. They were as hostile to our way of life as one can imagine. And yet we faced them down without ever directly engaging in open warfare.
That was a threat. And yes, this too is a threat. But there are orders of magnitude difference between the two of them. Why is that so hard for people to remember?
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