highthief

Originally posted by wonderwench:

As the thread got closed before I could ask for more clarification on this position, here is are the words of one poster. I realize we may be slightly out of context here but this response and prior comment suggests that the MAIN IF NOT ONLY reason France opposed war with Iraq was because some French business would gain from the status quo prior to the war (And not because France may have been opposed to war in general, felt that intrusion by the west would hurt more than help, or felt that the decision was one that should be made by the UN and not individual nations) , along with some petty desire to hurt the US, and that the ONLY IF NOT MAIN reason the US went to war was because Saddam was a direct threat to the US (and not because US companies like Haliburton stood to gain tremendously from US takeover, or for reasons of revenge, or oil, or anything else).

The statement seems to ascribe a greater natural morality to the United States - as if you are more evolved or moral than the rest of us. Do people actually believe this to be true?

onetime2

Personally, I don't agree with wonderwench's statements fully nor do I think your characterization of them is entirely spot on but...

Here are my feelings. Wonderwench is correct in the assertion that France has been relegated to the back woods of international importance (at least in comparison to the role they've played in the several hundred years prior to 1950 or so). Their strategy appears to be to create a sphere of influence in the world through the EU and exert heavy influence over the EU through close relations with Germany. Iraq was a unique opportunity to exert some power on a worldwide scale. They have little ability to exert economic or military power around the world but, with their key presence on the UN security council they are offered some opportunities to flex some muscles. There were certainly economic interests in Iraq and they were important to both France and Germany, of greater import however is pushing themselves into the stage of world politics when possible. Through these efforts they can exert more power within the EU and have a larger voice on the world stage.

As far as why the US went into Iraq, I've said it before and I guess I'll say it again. The reasons stated were a minor part of the real reason. The US has developed a reputation as a paper tiger who will turn tail and run when bloodied even slightly. Further, the lack of response to terrorist attacks over the last 30 years has allowed terror groups (and their state sponsors and allies) to operate with little fear of repercussion. Saddam Hussein's defiance of the UN sanctions (largely thought of as US imposed) for more than a decade contributed to this reputation and encouraged others to ignore US warnings. Removal of the Taliban and Saddam in the face of mounting US deaths signal a change of policy and proof that there will be consequences to direct attacks on our citizens/military and the perceived threats represented by the possession of wmds (or the posturing which implies such programs).

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apeman

hmmm ... France is however, a nuclear power

i think they usually side with Germany because they tend to agree; but obviously together they have a lot of power within the EU

another point - in Europe we've been having wars a lot longer than the States and so we generally don't like them... we are also generally more cynical I should think, so less inclined to believe politicians of any persuasion

French business interests? next someone will be suggesting that it's all about oil

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Aborted

I wouldn't describe France as redundant either politically or economically, but having your country flattened twice in 25 years, as they did in the first half of the 20th century, is going to leave some lasting scars, so I think they can be forgiven for being merely a shadow of what they once were.

The US, meanwhile, would do well to learn from their example, and rather than create all kinds of creative and insulting labels for the French, perhaps take a long hard look at the inspiration and implementation of their foreign policy and try to work out where their critics are coming from. After all, it is largely down to them that America was able to become independant in the first place .

highthief

Thanks for the replies. I'm curious as to the POV of people who feel France did what it did due to business reasons or for reasons of spiting the US, what about other traditional US allies who - for the first time - didn't back the US play.

Take Canada for instance - few business ties to Iraq, no "former world power exhibiting jealousy", etc. Canada felt that the war, udner the circumstances, was unjustified plain and simple and the majority of Canadians backed the government on that call.

Why MUST the French motives (or the German or whoever) be the result of some sinister feelings or plot, while the motives of other nations like Canada are accepted as "well, their electorate didn't want war, so they didn't go to war" and that's OK?

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ubertuber

onetime2 - good analysis. That'll give me some more stuff to think about and chase down. Thanks!

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ARTelevision

Real politics is not some sinister motives or plot. The only reason nations have ever done anything in history is because it was perceived to be in their self interest.

A reading of wonderwench's statement only shows that she states real politics as the basis for both countries' decisions. Understanding how the world works is about understanding how and why history is a record of perceived national self interests.

I have no interest in morality whan it comes to nation states. I know others do. This reflects my own way of looking at the world. To me discussing morality in this context is useless.

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roachboy

the above quote (the citation of which began the thread) is not an analysis.
among other problems, it demonstrates a simple-minded view of france, of international politics, of history and of the americans.

the first claim has been effectively debunked.
it was false from the outset, evidently so for anyone who looked. but for those who did not, it must be difficult to watch what has been happening to the bush rationale for war--it has been dismantled step by step. a new element in this process will be found in the senate's final 911 commission report:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/12/politics/12panel.html

and on the uk side another element:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theissues/...259391,00.html
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/...259148,00.html

as for the second:
regarding the international position of france, i agree in general with onetime.
and i think that the american right has nothing of interest to say about the eu because they cannot get out of thier reliance on nation-states as the starting point for thinking.

regarding the history of "imperial powers":
underpinning: either the colonial order is still operational, in which case it follows that the americans are a colonial power. if that is true, then maybe the position would make sense, but not in the way the poster would imagine.
or:
if the colonial order is not still relevant, the logic of claim creates problems--for example, it is almost impossible to move from it to any coherent analysis of neo-colonialism (colonialism vs. neo-colonialilsm: direct territorial domination replaced by indirect domination of economies, currencies, etc.--the symbolic shift is easy to locate---1960---neocolonialism entails a very different kind of power, a diffusion, a privatization--the old order is irrelevant analytically within it, an object of nostalgia for a simpler world---and right history is nothing other than nostalgia for simpler times.....)

the colonial system as reference point somehow persists in conservative diplomatic history, which is the most methodologically backward of genres. i would be happy to defend this position.

another problem with the quote: it arbitrarily attributes subjectivity to nation-states. which is ridiculous.
but this kind of move does underpin conservative pseudo-analysis, in that it enables even more ridiculous language to be imported--that of morality, for example.

on this question, i agree with art.

for that matter, any neocon would agree too. they have in the main read at least the military sections of machiavelli. the neocons in power are obviously seduced by a cliffnotes understanding of machiavelli. this kind of thin is central to conservative "realism" in politics.

i dont think anyone actually believes that morality and realpolitik have any contact with each other.

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wonderwench

Morality of nations is only the sum of that of individuals. A nation is not a super consciousness. That said, I do believe our form of government is a far better moral construct than the far majority that have ever existed. The rule of law, as opposed to that of arbitary totalitarianism, holds individuals to higher standards of behavior in their actions towards others.

onetime - great post. Our perceptions on this matter are quite congruent.

highthief

I agree that self interest plays a huge role in such decisions (though humanitarian motives do exist to some degree in some situations). I think the French business interest angle is overblown, just as I believe the Haliburton angle is overblown. The self-interest angle of the French government was probably more to do with "well, our electorate doesn't want this war, we will follow their wishes" than it does with byzantine business deals.

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roachboy

one more note, on machiavelli--there is an irony here that i remembered while checking the post above for spelling mistakes--according to machiavelli, it is the people who might actually believe that the existing order is moral--the people must be manipulated. what matters is the appearance of morality, or consistency.
it would follow then that using the language of morality with reference to politics is a kind of demonstration of having been manipulated.
to argue on that basis is then a kind of intellectual self-delegitimation----a kind of self-immolation.

something to think about.

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ARTelevision

absolutely.
those from either end of the political spectrum - and anywhere in between - who invoke morality as the basis of their political views are either politicians or they are citizens who have no idea how the world is managed and are susceptible to being manipulated because their ideas are hopelessly unrealistic.

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wonderwench

Whether or not you meant it this way, RB, your comment portrays the viewpoint of the "Big Government" types who think that we all need to be socially engineered.

Example: When one mentions that many government charity programs would be better managed by private organization, a common response is that people are too selfish and greedy to voluntarily contribute to private charities.

I completely disagree that what matters is only the appearance of morality.

roachboy

wonder-- i was talking about "the prince".......the whole of the last post was about machiavelli.
you know, the hero of the neocons who now occupy a position of power.

given the above, your argument about "charity" is a non-sequitor.
maybe a different thread sometime.

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

wonderwench

I didn't get the memo about Machiavelli being the heros of the Neocons. I must be out of the loop.

roachboy

maybe read something about them?

i figure that if i can work out the questions of influence in those political circles, if i can make myself read what they write, what they say, because i am interested in how they think, even though i violently oppose everything about their politics, it should be easy for folk whose politics are more sympathetic to that position to do the same....

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Kadath

Bickeriffic.

ART, I find it amusing that citizens who evoke morality are clueless jackasses but politicians who do the same are nothing unusual. Does that mean the "moral" politicians are manipulating the idiots, and if so, do the idiots deserve to be manipulated?

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ARTelevision

I wouldn't describe politicians as moral. In the scheme I proposed above, the politicians who use morality-based arguments are doing so to manipulate the citizens. BTW - to me, that includes my President and my party.

As for citizens who hold unrealistic beliefs, I don't generally use the term "deserve" in normal discourse. I would simply say they are out of touch with reality.

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onetime2

One additional point I'd like to add about the influence of France and Germany's position within the EU as it relates to the Iraq war.

The big stumbling block to French and German "control" (in quotes because it wouldn't really be control but more very high level of influence) of the EU is Great Britain. Great Britain's close alliance with the US on the Iraq issue made it an excellent political opportunity for France and Germany to paint GB as a US lapdog. France and Germany's opposition enabled other countries (like Canada) to oppose the US led invasion of Iraq. There are plenty of reasons why other allies opposed the move including fear of becoming terrorist targets, being perceived as being led along by the nose by the US, avoidance of alienating large segments of voters during campaigns/elections, fear of a massive war in the desert with lots of bodies heading to home ports (don't forget the dire predictions about what would happen should we need to invade Iraq) etc.

I think a great number of decisions on whether to join the coalition or not were based not on right and wrong or lack of enough evidence but more about political safety.

On a side note, I think it will be extremely interesting in the years to come to see what alliances are forged within the EU. France and Germany are taking the wrong tack, IMO, to exert influence. They are alienating Britons, Italians, and Spaniards while attempting to bully the smaller countries within the Union (and those with an eye towards joining). Of course, more in depth discussion of this would warrant a new thread and I've pretty much laid out my entire opinion in the last couple of sentences.

Oh well, back to work.

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Pacifier

and a great number of decisions to join the coalition were based on money. A proper name for the coalition would be "coalition of the bought"

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onetime2

Just as the French and German governments didn't dissent solely for monetary reasons, neither did the other coalition members.

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ARTelevision

Pacifier, yes. That is as it should be. There is no free lunch in world economics or politics. In keeping with the direction of the thread, France, Germany, Russia, and others saw greater economic value in the Hussein regime than they saw in an alliance with the US and the coalition.

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roachboy

in my view, art, i think that all the major players were heavily invested in iraq---the report i tried to reference in the earlier version of this thread (the one that got locked) was to the andres zumach article based on the iraqi report to the un from the period just before the war happened--the report addressed questions of procurement, naming names, countries of origin, and levels of sales to iraq concerning the wmd systems that were at issue.
i could only find the article itself in german, sadly---the links on that thread are to it, and to infrmation from/about it in english.

the point was that all the major arms exporting companies (for example--the instances could be multiplied across economic sectors) were implicated to a considerable extent, and that means the decision could easily have been motivated by other concerns.
because if you want to simply make the vote into the result of proft/loss calculations, the same would apply to all parties. which would lead you directly into arguments about american corporate beneficiaries of war, their ties the the administration, etc etc etc.

maybe the administration simply did not have a compelling case before the unsc? maybe the vote happened as it did **because** their case was not compelling? given recent information that us mere mortals are getting access to, that assessment certainly seems more than plausible.

and what is the difficulty with admitting the possibility of principled disagreement within the unsc anyway?

given the nature of the sources for arguments that only france germany and russia stood to benefit from economic relations with iraq, the timing of that information, etc., i think it wise to be suspicious of it both as such and as explanation......

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

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ARTelevision

roachboy, I'm OK with your statements here. They are well-reasoned.

As to the fact that moral arguments do figure (genuinely) into political decisionmaking: that's due to the fact that some smart politicians and even some smart people hold moral principles they believe in deeply. It's a human failing as far as I'm concerned. I have no use for moral principles as a human being.

But if I was a politician I would dutifully attempt to promote the moral world views of my constituents. In that sense, I can accept the fact that others have moral sentiments that are and need to be acknowledged and reflected in the political - and geo-political - process.

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Seaver

Augh, I always hate when Machiavelli quotes are thrown in because no one takes the time to research WHY he said those things. Sorry this isnt meant as a personal attack but it's one my pet peeves and it happens all the time.

Machiavelli worked for the Democratic government in the city. When the Monarchy system won power back he was kicked out of the city and out of his higher level administrative job. He wanted the job back, so he wrote those things trying to get on the good side of the dictatorship. He wrote things to justify their position of power, and he wrote things to finally get them to forgive him for working for the power that userped them earlier.

He didnt believe those things, otherwise he would have fought the democratic powers instead of joining them. He just wanted his old position back in the center of the city instead of staring at the city walls from is new exiled-house.

ARTelevision

But wasn't that very Machiavellian of him?

In any event, his words have struck many with their utter sensibleness - at least in so far as they illuminate the processes of power among human beings, in human groups, and of people as political animals.

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roachboy

seaver--i wasnt trying to give a complete account of machiavelli, nor his motives, nor the strategies in the text of the prince that enable you to read it in a number of different ways. i did not mention the discourses. i did not outline the democratic reading of the prince. i did not bring up the possibility of irony.

were i teaching a course that uses machiavelli--which i do--i would have noted all this.
i do so every time.

but i understand the peeve.
i share it no less.
but not in every context.

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Sun Tzu

In your opinion Art; what is the main reason every great empire has fallen throughout history?

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ARTelevision

I'd say great empires are like people in that they have finite lifespans. I really don't believe that the two standard responses to this question, i.e. overextension of empire or moral decline are anything more than vast and sweeping overgeneralities that beg particular questions and points of view. Empires are composed of people. People have many failings. I see the failings of people to be essentially variations on the theme of stupidity in one form or another. I define stupidity as the inability to correctly discern what is in one's self interest and what is not.

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Seaver

As I said Roachboy that was not intended at all a point to you but a rant against the general people who use his quotes as their face value seems to be.

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roachboy

its fine, seaver--dont give it a second thought. i took no offense whatsoever.

i dont remember what was going on when i wrote the last post around me, but something was.....

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite