Doing my customary web-trolling this morning, I came across this choice little nugget in The Corner. Here is the most illustrative excerpt (and apologies to NRO since it's the exact excerpt they chose as well),
The entire region will succumb and fall into the basket like a ripe fruit once the dust settles and the benefits begin to materialize and they will, have no doubt. The main thing is that this neo-imperialism is quite different from the old. Rather than aiming at subjugating and enslaving people it aims at freeing and raising their standard so that they may be eligible to join the family of civilized people. The tables are indeed turned (eloquent Lisa); almost every meaning is reversed. We should not be afraid of names. Occupation is liberation; Imperialism is benevolent; Resistance is sabotage and directed against the people and their livelihood and has no clear objective and no future; The Right is revolutionary and the Left is reactionary; The Conservatives of yesterday are the optimists who believe in the ability of eastern people for freedom and democracy and the Liberals and Leftists of yesterday are pessimistic and skeptical and even racist about it; and we could go on and on citing this remarkable reversal of things. The USA and Allies have two choices with not third to them: ignominious retreat and ensuing isolationism leaving the world at the mercy of the forces of darkness and reaction; or glorious triumph that would indeed inaugurate the American century of enlightenment and hope, and free the long suffering peoples of the “twilight zone” and bring enormous benefits both cultural and economic to everybody. The choice is yours, Oh, democratic people of America and the West.
It's something I have been noticing myself for some time now. I would not go so far as to say that Occupation and Imperialism are good things, but I cannot and never have completely dismissed them as outright bad. Even without the current world situation, one could go back to previous examples and find the plus to counteract the minus. Take the example of India. Had it not been for the British Raj, the peoples of India may never have formed a cohesive entity and had the current set up of the Indian subcontinent been a fragmented area, I dare say the issues facing their people would be ten times worse. British imperialism, for all its negative connotations also gave the world some positives. It is counterproductive to be manichean on anything really. Human beings are never simply good or bad. I read something else recently that gave strength to this, that the divide in the world is not between sinners and saints, but between repentant sinners and unrepentant sinners. You don't have to be religious to see that. Words are important, but we must be careful to not fall for code words blindly. Every situation deserves honest thought, and this blogger has hit the nail on the head with his post. That is all.
Comments