Tom Friedman's Latest Declaration of War

Yesterday was a very exciting day in America. Our nation's most serious foreign policy expert, the "brilliant" Thomas Friedman of The New York Times, declared our latest new war:

The next American president will inherit many foreign policy challenges, but surely one of the biggest will be the cold war. Yes, the next president is going to be a cold-war president -- but this cold war is with Iran.

So congratulations to us.

After years of desperately searching, we've finally found our new Soviet Union.

Nay-saying opponents of the New War (those who Tom Friedman, in March of 2003, dismissed as "knee-jerk liberals and pacifists") may try to point out that Iran is a country whose defense spending is less than 1% of our own; spends less on its military than countries such as the Netherlands and Sweden; has never invaded another country in modern history, and could not possibly threaten us, but those are just small details. Iran is our new implacable foe in Tom Friedman's glorious, transcendent struggle -- which, in 2003, on NPR, he called "the beginning of World War III . . . the third great totalitarian challenge in the last, you know, 60 years," and which he today defines this way (featuring an amazingly disingenuous use of parenthesis):

That is the real umbrella story in the Middle East today -- the struggle for influence across the region, with America and its Sunni Arab allies (and Israel) versus Iran, Syria and their non-state allies, Hamas and Hezbollah. As the May 11 editorial in the Iranian daily Kayhan put it, "In the power struggle in the Middle East, there are only two sides: Iran and the U.S."

What's most striking about Friedman's formulation is that -- in the 2003 NPR interview -- this is what Friedman said about why 9/11 happened:

9/11 was really fed by three rivers of rage. One was about what we do -- what we, the United States, do, whether it's how we use resources, it's our support for a dictatorial Arab regime so they'll sell us cheap oil. It's our backing for Israel when it does the right thing and when it does the wrong thing. 9/11 is fed, in part, by what we do, OK. . . .

The second and hugely important river of rage feeding 9/11 was a real overpowering sense of humiliation. . . . The Arab Human Development Report told us last year that 22 Arab states, not a single one has a freely and fairly elected government. . . .

And the third river of rage is how much these people hate their own governments, governments that keep them voiceless and powerless and prevent them from achieving their full aspirations in a world where they know how everyone else is living.

So: 9/11, according to the 2003 Friedman, was caused by our backing of dictatorial Arab regimes, our unconditional support for Israel, our general interference in the Middle East, and the fact that Muslims aren't free. So what does Friedman want to do now? Have the U.S. wage a "cold war" (at least) for dominance in the Middle East alongside our best friends: the dictators and monarchs of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the Gulf States (plus, incidentally, Israel). In other words, Friedman now wants to do everything that he himself said is what caused 9/11 in the first place.

The British writer G.K. Chesterton, in his book Heretics, wrote:

It may be said with rough accuracy that there are three stages in the life of a strong people. First, it is a small power, and fights small powers. Then it is a great power, and fights great powers. Then it is a great power, and fights small powers, but pretends that they are great powers, in order to rekindle the ashes of its ancient emotion and vanity. After that, the next step is to become a small power itself.

It's hard to imagine a more concise and accurate explanation for what motivates the Tom Friedmans of the world and what that mentality is doing to the United States.

Then again, perhaps even more illustrative is this video clip of Friedman from the Charlie Rose Show in 2003 -- one of the most revealing (and most repellent) three minutes of commentary one can find. Friedman spent months before the invasion of Iraq continuously supporting and cheering it on based on righteous appeals to the transformational values of freedom and democracy. But once the invasion was complete, he unmasked himself, telling Rose that it the Iraq invasion was "unquestionably worth doing" because what we needed was to invade some Muslim country -- Iraq was just one of many that would have sufficed -- in order, using his words, to "take out a very big stick" and say: "Suck. On. This."



This same ugly mentality is very much in display as Tom Friedman and his comrades, who brought us the disgraceful debacle in Iraq, have now fixed their gaze on doing the same with Iran.

Comments

[kusalarhetoric]

Iran has a mutual defense treaty with China.

[cobraxus]

Then it is a great power, and fights small powers, but pretends that they are great powers, in order to rekindle the ashes of its ancient emotion and vanity. After that, the next step is to become a small power itself.
and so we famous-have since the days of Ronnie Reagan and his Air-Strike diplomacy against tiny nations to show the world how big and powerful we are.remember also that anyone who questioned the neocons and their contrived intelligense on Iraq were instantly accused of being anti-semetic.

[MajorKong]

If it wasn't so frightening I would be amused at the cognitive dissonance displayed by these people.

Iran is somehow a huge threat to our very existence but we can take them out with three days of air strikes.

They can't be a grave threat and a pushover at the same time.

[bentenrai]

This could never be like the Cold War. Iran doesn't have the military capabilities the soviets had to keep us at bay. The soviet had their scientists build some terrible weapons. We even picked up a lot of their ideas in building our current military tech and made them better, especially in aeronautics.

The reason why the F-15 has remained undefeated all these years in the sky, it's mostly due to a longer range radar. It could lock and shoot down up to 18 targets I believe before they could see it. In a dogfight though, I have my reservations in the American air supoeriority against a Sukhoi, unless it's an F-22.

The Avtomat Kalashnikov assault weapon, is the most durable war weapon to this day period. You can take it with you under the harshest conditions. Although it's less precise than an M-16, it outguns it in terms of killing efficiency.

That durability of materiel, although ideal, is counterproductive for the economy, because people buy only once and the hardware lasts for a lifetime, little or no upgrades needed. That's one of the main reasons why the USSR went belly up.

Iran is not likely to come close to the USSR.

[billsmile]

Maybe Judith Miller can clear all of this up for us.

[alexa07]

Thank you for your perceptive comments about Friedman's recent editorial. This morning, it was reprinted in my local newspaper, San Jose Mercury News, making me once again wonder if I really need to continue my subscription. I was horrified at Friedman's notions about Iran. Is this the way I want to start the day?
Regarding the Rose interview: At least it's easier to quit watching a particular TV program like Charlie Rose, when the host gets so wrapped up in the views of someone as dangerous as Friedman, & is so obsequious to him. Your pointed excerpt from the Rose interview of Friedman reveal horribly his sanctimonious approval of collective punishment, such ideas as conjure up the Hungarian Uprising of the 1950s or the WWII scenarios of Hitler or the Japanese runs at China. Collective punishment is savage, brutal & doesn't work! Ask the Palestinians & Lebanese! Please keep up your fine work regarding this blog.

[PoliticalAnimal]

Why is it that straight neoCONs are so obsessed with gay sex???

[bentenrai]

They are the only ones they fight against. They label all they hate "liberal", yet end up doing the most "liberal" of acts.

[AZM]

Does anyone take Tom Friedman seriously?
Whenever I see Tom Friedman any more, I think about that Bugs Bunny cartoon from long ago, the one in which Bugs Bunny is playing Christopher Columbus. He stands before the king and declares that the world is round. The king conks him on the head with a big mallet and shouts "the world, she is a flat, like a your head!".

[Hallucinocynic]

Friedman, who is an articulate writer and speaker, dwells within a world of simplistic cause and effect. Here he sets out to rationalize what was an illegal and, without question, ill-advised military exercise with a series of nebulous sign posts but - certainly, in hindsight - shoots himself in the foot. He demonstrates the lack of empathy evident in this administration's 'diplomatic' efforts. For someone who takes pride in his on the ground reporting from the mideast he really doesn't understand his adversary very well.

Concluding that we needed an invasion to demonstrate a show of force is indicative of old-school, carrot and club thinking.

Tom is just another acolyte for reactionary political policy.

[Rog49Thomas]

Feeling mortally threatened by a third world country - be it Grenada or Iran - says a lot a country's collective mental health and true greatness.

[pbfishtaco]

Do the Iranians use Freidman Units to measure time?

[lennix]

now this is scarry people like this will make us more unsafe then we already are

[dadw5boys]

It may all be about oil but it is the INDUSTRIAL / MILITARY COMPLEX that is making billions off of these coinflicts!

A "Cold War" with Iran is just STUPID!!!!!

I have had too many Professors in college who hail from Iran and met too many people from Iran who are just nicen descent, hard working people who only want the best for their fanilts and communities. They have no agenda nor want to shove their religion down our throats.

AMERICANS WAKE UP THEY SCARE YOU THEN USE THAT FEAR AGAINST YOU !!!!!!!

THEY MAKE BILLONS PROTECTING YOU FROM YOUR FEARS!!!!!

HUST LAW THEY MAKE MILLIONS FROM THE LAWS THEY PASS THAT LIMIT COMPETITION FOR BIG CORPORATIONS!!!!!!

THE OWN THIS GAME!!!!!!!!! DON'T PLAY THEIR GAME WALK AWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!

[realpolitic]

Part of this game of having constant enemies is to keep Republicans in power. If there is always someone to fear, like the former Soviets, then we should always be in some defensive posture and ready to elect Republicans who really just create more terrorists with their policies. It is a never-ending cycle. Fear plays on fear and then elect Republicans. They speak tough, but get us in a deeper ditch. We should make a loud statement in this election that we refuse to play along with the fearmongering.

[veracity]

Thanks for that catch, Glenn. it is long past time that Democrats and Americans realize just how central Joe Lieberman, the New York Times, and the Neo-Con agenda are to the near-self destruction of the Democratic Party in 2000, 2002, and 2004 (and almost 2006) elections.
And how, even winning the 2006 mid-terms, the Dem. leadership has been subservient to that Neo-Con agenda that is now both the international (more wars abroad) and domestic ("war on terror" surveillance, torture, suspension of habaes corpus, and other police-state powers) core of the RADICAL RIGHT-WING agenda.
Pat Buchanan may be going off the deep end lately, but like a major league hitter, you only need to hit 1 out of 3 to have a good batting average... and when Buchanan penned his "Nancy Pelosi the AIPAC Girl - Leaves IRAN WAR in Bush-Cheney's Hands" op-ed, he hit that ball right out of the park!
http://www.vdare.com/buchanan/070319_pelosi.htm
(Confirmation that Buchanan was not "off the deep end" on this one is proudly posted at AIPAC's own website, where Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Reid, and of course former Democrat Senator Lieberman happily followed Vice President Cheney's bombastic, "BOMB IRAN NOW!" speech at the AIPAC 2007 annual conference in Washington.)
http://www.aipac.org/2785_2859.asp

[PWMarvin]

Many democrats can't figure out why their leader have no backbone against the war party. The answer is obvious.

Both Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi spoke at the AIPAC convention. They are subverting the will of the majority of their party.

Patrick Buchanan has more wisdom on foreign policy than just about anyone out there. (domestic policy, not always so much).

[veracity]

Of course the NY Times have been ground-zero for both the Neo-Con ("more wars/more police state powers/tax-cuts for wealthy in-time-of-war") agenda for over a decade, "liberal media" pretenses notwithstanding. Not only does Friedman reveal his stripes as an uber-right-wing hawk; not only did the Times snear at Al Gore all through the summer of 2000, while giving Texas Gov. George W. Bush a huge "free pass" for his AWOL during Vietnam war record, his Texas busted budgets, his worst-in-nation pollution, and other legitimate issues that merited in-depth examinations, but of course for a full decade the Time's most prominent columnist was... WILLIAM SAFIRE, former NIXON speechwriter and unrepentent Nixon apologist.

It is a testament to the ability of even "modern" Americans to be influenced by propaganda, that a paper that, almost across the board on major issues, reflected the opinions of _Nixon speechwriter_ William Safire, was ever considered "liberal" in the first place!

And it is long past time for Democrats to stop heeling to the Safire/Friedman/Lieberman/NYT/Neo-Con/Radical-Right-Wing agenda.