Foggy Bottom and Chocolate Makers
Thu September 4th, 2003 23:04 MSTThe Foggy Bottom folks at the State Department have at least one spokesman who gets things right. Richard Boucher:
In unusually blunt language that drew surprised gasps from reporters, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher scoffed at Belgium, France, Germany and Luxembourg for continuing to support the proposal that they first introduced at a mini-summit in April.
He described the April meeting as one between “four countries that got together and had a little bitty summit” and then referred to them collectively as “the chocolate makers.”
Ha! Sounds pretty accurate to me! LOL
Jim
Of those nations, only Belgium is well-known for chocolate; Germany is somewhat known for its chocolate cake, but less known for its chocolate (as far as I know, though its chocolate is pretty good– as is its beer). France is a culinary center, and though I’m sure it probably makes excellent chocolate, its not really known for its chocolate. Luxembourg is not known for its chocolate, or for much else at all, I’m afraid.
Let’s judge these proposals on their merits, rather than name-calling (which may satisfy jingoistic impulses, but otherwise accomplishes little, and doesn’t speak well of anyone doing the name-calling).
To be honest, it would probably be in the United States’ own national interest if these Europeans seriously DID form some sort of autonomous military arrangement that was NOT dependent on the United States for logistic and tactical support (the way NATO is). Such a force might be useful for conflicts WE might otherwise be dragged into (such as in former colonies of… the chocolate makers… or in unfashinable parts of Europe, like the Balkans, where we find American forces now bogged down).
Its a lot more likely that such a Euro-force would actually be helpful to our interests– making the Europeans spend some money on their own military for a change! For a variety of reasons, despite the Europeans OWN jingoistic notions, such a force would not likely be a “competitor” to us, as the perfect record of no two democratic nations ever having gone to war against each other will remain intact.
Well, I think a good sense of humor and some amount of poking is actually a good thing. Calling them the chocolate countries may piss them off, but it may also wake them up.
And I can testify from much on-the-scene experience that there is excellent chocolate in France, wherever it comes from.
I think the idea of a Euro-Force is dangerous, because Europe as an entity (as opposed to the individual countries) is not anything I like to add power to. It is undemocratic, controlled by an unelected statist elite, and very unrealistic in its world view. I would rather that they provide troops to us but that we maintain massive superiority in capability. Or as someone (Disraeli?) said, nations have allies, not friends.
The Europeans did and do a good job of helping in Afghanistan. It’s only in Iraq where they flipped out - the French and Russians for corrupt reasons, and the population in general because they don’t understand the war on terrorism. They live in a little bubble where they imagine that the governments will just take care of all problems by somehow cooperating and sending out blue helmets. The left-wing post-modern internationalist elite in the media, academia and governments feed them propaganda and buy them off with unsustainable social programs.
I do think we should yank our forces out of the Balkans if the Europeans don’t help in Iraq. If they are not going to help us as allies, we shouldn’t help them. Leaving them with that quagmire (remember, Clinton promised only a 1 year US presence) may wake them up a bit. BTW, the ironic thing in the Balkans is that our forces are protecting Muslims!
Oh, btw, democratic nations have in fact gone to war with each other, although I don’t have the examples handy. Europe isn’t going to go to war with us (until the demographics turn France into an Islamic “republic” in 30 or 40 years), but Europe (as represented by the EU and current governments) is in the thrall of some very bad and dangerous ideas about internationalism that shouldn’t be encouraged.
The US has a much more sophisticated strategy than that. 15 or 20 years ago we would have been chosing sides, allying with despots.
Bush knows that doesn’t work, so we are using a combination of violence, threats, and diplomacy to cause fundamental change.
Israel happens to be an ally. It is also, with the exception of its ally Turkey, the only thing close to a decent government with reasonable values in the reason.
The idea of an “honest power broker” is itself silly, as it presumes equal merit on each side of a debate. In fact, the middle east is full of despots and cultures where hatred of American and Israel is used to distract the population from the failures of their own leaders.
Our approach is right: try to fix the middle east. If it doesn’t work, we will be hit again and again until we get so riled up that we will either occupy or destroy every inch of the middle east and the population on it, whom we will deradicalize the same way we did in Japan after WW-II, except this time there will be a lot fewer survivors for us to do it to. In WW-II, there were less than ten deaths in the United States. In this war, there have been around 3000 alread, and half the country is still asleep or running off in silly directions (UN, Europe),
This kind arrogant rhetoric will not deradicalize anyone. It will antagonize them and turn ordinairy people into killers. The middle east is not Japan. The same approach there will not work in the middle east. The people the cultures the values are entirely different. Your violence wins you little friends