A Jacksonian Debate

I'm still recovering, but am doing some reading in my spare time on what was for me, back in 1999, a revelation: Walter Russell Mead's essay in The National Interest entitled "The Jacksonian Tradition." I will have more to say on this matter as my health slowly returns, but for the meantime I'd like to present this short excerpt and invite debate. Mead writes of Jacksonians that:

For the first Jacksonian rule of war is that wars must be fought with all available force. The use of limited force is deeply repugnant. Jacksonians see war as a switch that is either "on" or "off." They do not like the idea of violence on a dimmer switch. Either the stakes are important enough to fight for--in which case you should fight with everything you have--or they are not, in which case you should mind your own business and stay home. To engage in a limited war is one of the costliest political decisions an American president can make--neither Truman nor Johnson survived it.

The second key concept in Jacksonian thought about war is that the strategic and tactical objective of American forces is to impose our will on the enemy with as few American casualties as possible. The Jacksonian code of military honor does not turn war into sport. It is a deadly and earnest business. This is not the chivalry of a medieval joust, or of the orderly battlefields of eighteenth-century Europe. One does not take risks with soldiers' lives to give a "fair fight." Some sectors of opinion in the United States and abroad were both shocked and appalled during the Gulf and Kosovo wars over the way in which American forces attacked the enemy from the air without engaging in much ground combat. The "turkey shoot" quality of the closing moments of the war against Iraq created a particularly painful impression. Jacksonians dismiss such thoughts out of hand. It is the obvious duty of American leaders to crush the forces arrayed against us as quickly, thoroughly and professionally as possible.

Jacksonian opinion takes a broad view of the permissible targets in war. Again reflecting a very old cultural heritage, Jacksonians believe that the enemy's will to fight is a legitimate target of war, even if this involves American forces in attacks on civilian lives, establishments and property. The colonial wars, the Revolution and the Indian wars all give ample evidence of this view, and General William Tecumseh Sherman's March to the Sea showed the degree to which the targeting of civilian morale through systematic violence and destruction could, to widespread popular applause, become an acknowledged warfighting strategy, even when fighting one's own rebellious kindred.

Probably as a result of frontier warfare, Jacksonian opinion came to believe that it was breaking the spirit of the enemy nation, rather than the fighting power of the enemy's armies, that was the chief object of warfare. It was not enough to defeat a tribe in battle; one had to "pacify" the tribe, to convince it utterly that resistance was and always would be futile and destructive. For this to happen, the war had to go to the enemy's home. The villages had to be burned, food supplies destroyed, civilians had to be killed. From the tiniest child to the most revered of the elderly sages, everyone in the enemy nation had to understand that further armed resistance to the will of the American people--whatever that might be--was simply not an option.

With the development of air power and, later, of nuclear weapons, this long-standing cultural acceptance of civilian targeting assumed new importance. Wilsonians and Jeffersonians protested even at the time against the deliberate terror bombing of civilian targets in the Second World War. Since 1945 there has been much agonized review of the American decision to use atomic bombs against Hiroshima and Nagasaki. None of this hand wringing has made the slightest impression on the Jacksonian view that the bombings were self-evidently justified and right. During both the Vietnam and Korean conflicts, there were serious proposals in Jacksonian quarters to use nuclear weapons--why else have them? The only reason Jacksonian opinion has ever accepted not to use nuclear weapons is the prospect of retaliation.

Jacksonians also have strong ideas about how wars should end. "There is no substitute for victory", as General MacArthur said, and the only sure sign of victory is the "unconditional surrender" of enemy forces. Just as Jacksonian opinion resents limits on American weapons and tactics, it also resents stopping short of victory. Unconditional surrender is not always a literal and absolute demand. The Confederate surrenders in 1865 included generous provisions for the losing armies. The Japanese were assured after the Potsdam Declaration that, while the United States insisted on unconditional surrender and acceptance of the terms, they could keep the "emperor system" after the war. However, there is only so much give in the idea: all resistance must cease; U.S. forces must make an unopposed entry into and occupation of the surrendering country; the political objectives of the war must be conceded in toto.

When in the later stages of World War II the Joint Chiefs of Staff discussed the prospect of an invasion of Kyushu, the southernmost of the major Japanese home islands, Admiral William Leahy projected 268,000 Americans would be killed or wounded out of an invasion force of 766,000.[8] The invasion of the chief island of Honshu, tentatively planned for the spring of 1946, would have been significantly worse. While projected casualty figures like these led a number of American officials to argue for modification of the unconditional surrender formula, Secretary of State James M. Byrnes told Truman that he would be "crucified" if he retreated from this formula--one that received a standing ovation when Truman repeated it to Congress in his first address as president. Truman agreed--wisely. His efforts to wage limited war in Korea cost him re-election in 1952. Similarly, Lyndon Johnson's inability to fight unlimited war for unconditional surrender in Vietnam cost him the presidency in 1968; Jimmy Carter's inability to resolve the Iranian hostage crisis with a clear-cut victory destroyed any hope he had of winning the 1980 election; and George Bush's refusal to insist on an unconditional surrender in Iraq may have contributed to his defeat in the 1992 presidential election. For American presidents, MacArthur is right: there is no substitute for victory.

RESOLVED: That the Jacksonian approach described above is the only way to victory in the War on Terror, meaning that the immediate and full war mobilization of the United States should be ordered, war should be declared on the leading states supporting Jihadism-including Saudi Arabia, Iran and Syria-and merciless, unrelenting war should be waged on their homelands until the Arab world begs for peace or until eradicated.

Agree or disagree? Let the debate begin.

Max Journal, No. 1

I am recovering steadily and want to express my heartfelt gratitude to those who took the time to leave me good wishes in the comments or sent me an email or two. It meant a lot to me at a time when I was feeling very, very low.

I've managed to limp into work today, where the hard-working partners have been denied my billable hours for some time now, leaving me wondering if I have a future in the private practice of law. (Answer: probably not). I'm still having a hard time putting two sentences together, so I hope you'll excuse this unusually personal post and request for help.

You see, I have a problem. Stuff that no one else seems particularly upset about really, really has a profound impact on me. So, naturally, I'm wondering if I'm crazy.

Take, for example, my twice-daily ride on the Max train. This is about an hour's length, each way, from the suburbs of Portland to the city center.

This is what happened on today's ride:

1) I was sat next to at Elmonica by an older and a middle-aged hispanic woman. They argued about domestic stuff, loudly, in Spanish, all the way to Goose Hollow. The argument included two cell phone calls to some guy for proof to back up their points. When we got in the tunnel, and the background noise increased, they simply began yelling.

2) Shortly after leaving Orenco, a young man with a bulky black coat, shaved head and sideways baseball cap started yelling. What he was yelling was unintelligible, but it was some warcry of some sort. He bagan to pace the center of the train, in that gansta-walk, looking at everyone in the face who happened to look up to see what all the yelling was about. He had headphones around his neck and was carrying an unlit cigarette as if it was lit. He finally sat down, sprawled in the center section, over three seats. No one said anything or risked looking at him.

3) The next stop, around Willow Creek, a very pretty and "look at my body"-dressed young woman gets on and sits down in the middle section. The thug dude sits up and leans toward her, glaring at her. She notices, freezes and stares straight ahead. At the next stop, she scurries off the train. No one says anything at all.

4) I am distracted by my book around that time by the sound of loud rap music coming from head phones. I lean a bit and look down the train. Sitting by himself at the other end of the train is a thirty-something year old man with huge headphones on. He is literally dancing in his seat. On a crowded train, there are three empty seats around him; no one wants to interrupt his dancing, it seems.

5) Around Beaverton, these two older guys across from the thug guy decide to engage the dude in conversation for some insane reason. Thug dude rewards them with the Complete Story Of How I Was So Fucked Up The Other Night I Took A Swing At a Fucking Cop Who Was Beating My Fucking Friend and It Sucks Cuz They Got All The Fucking Power.

6) At Sunset, an obviously Muslim man gets on. He sits across from me and gives me a funny look when I look up. I figure it's my imagination.

7) At Library, Muslim dude sees another Muslim dude get on train. They know each other. Big smile. He says, "Salaam! Osama Bin Laden! How you doing?" They both laugh. They go to a corner where there are two chairs together and start talking together in Arabic.

So, my question is: Is it me that has a problem? Should I not be angered by any of this? Is all this normal and I just have to figure out how to deal with it? I really would like your honest opinion on this.

On the one hand, I have hope because the people I meet online, both in the Blogosphere and in online gaming, seem intelligent, sensitive, reasonable, responsible people. On the other hand, in the public sphere, I see nothing of the sort.

There I see nothing but dysfunction, thuggery and bland acceptance of this as modern life. Is there no opposition?

Is no one else angry?

Viral Meningitis

NS is very sick, but is recovering. Regular posts will resume when he gets better. Now that a proper diagnosis has been made, he has the proper medicines he needs, as well as Vicidin, which is really helping his mood.

Back soon.