THE MOST ABUSED WORD IN HISTORY - The National Interest

100 Pages·2010·8.3 MB·English

. .
Number 108 July / ARug 201!0 $7.00
E
S
ADavid Rieff meditates on Islam Apologias
E
Patrick Allitt crashes the Tea Party
P
P
Benny Morris rewrites Palestinian History
A
Ammon Shea learns to Speak Globish
www.nationalinterest.org
Paul Kennedy on
THE MOST
ABUSED WORD
IN HISTORY
A single gesture.  Limitless possibilities.
a small act
a small act
Jennifer Arnold
a fi lm by
HBO DOCUMENTARY FILMS HARAMBEE MEDIA CONSIDERED ENTERTAINMENT CHERRY SKY FILMS
PRESENTS A PRODUCTION IN ASSOCIATION WITH
A FILM BY JENNIFER ARNOLD “A SMALL ACT” PRODUCED BY JENNIFER ARNOLD PATTI LEE JEFFREY SOROS EXECUTIVE PRODUCER JOAN HUANG MUSIC BY JOEL GOODMAN
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY PATTI LEE EDITED BY CARL PFIRMAN TYLER HUBBY WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY JENNIFER ARNOLD FOR HBO: SENIOR PRODUCER LISA HELLER EXECUTIVE PRODUCER SHEILA NEVINS
PREMIERES MONDAY, JULY 12, 9PM
©2010 Home Box Offi ce, Inc. All rights reserved. HBO® and related channels and service marks are the property of Home Box Offi ce, Inc.
SmallAct_NationalMag_V8_rev.indd 2 6/4/10 2:48 PM

.
Number 108 July/August 2010
Articles
7 A Time to Appease by Paul Kennedy
Appeaser! The worst insult to emerge from our political lexicon over the past century. Ever harking back to the
failures of Neville Chamberlain, the wisdom of avoiding so many potential catastrophes—Berlin, Hungary and
Cuba to name a few—is easily forgotten. As America grapples with exhausting overseas commitments and a
rising China, bringing our might to bear more intelligently will require a new sort of History lesson.

18 Dreams of Babylon by Ryan Crocker
Iraq is not yesterday’s war. The surge created room for Iraqi politicians to make major legislative strides. But it
continues to be a land governed by fear of those in power. If Obama withdraws too quickly, the tenuous peace
will collapse. America cannot afford to have Iraq turn into yet another Lebanon.
26 Grassroots Economics by Raghuram G. Rajan
No longer just the lender of last resort for the poor, the imf is much in demand all over the developed world
as countries struggle to see themselves clear of the Great Recession. Still, the Fund has become little more
than an abettor of bad policymaking. To avoid the next meltdown, the imf must become a global advocacy
group, pushing hard to reform deep trade imbalances. Diplospeak is out; punchy prose and clear policy
recommendations are in. This is the new imf calling.
36 How to Succeed in Politics by Patrick Allitt
The Tea Party movement is blazing its anti-tax and anti-government agenda across the United States, as its
adherents brandish placards of Obama as Che Guevara and Adolf Hitler. But this is a movement without a
cause. If no less than the Whigs, the Populists and the Feminists can be co-opted by the behemoths that are the
Democrats and the Republicans, it is clear this newest third party will suffer the same fate.
47 Latter-Day Sultans by Daniel Byman
Monarchy is back. A clique of fortunate sons in the Middle East is set to take over the sclerotic dictatorships
of their fathers. Western educated and armed with pitch-perfect talking points for the Facebook set, these new
leaders seem poised to remake their backward nations. Do not be fooled. Their rise to power is not regime
change. It is just the further entrenchment of the current elites. Washington should be wary of any promises of
reform from these paper princes.
Drawings AP Images: pages 19, 22, 67, 70; Corbis: pages 9, 12, 16, 37, 41, 44, 48, 51, 53, 64, 75, 77, 80;
Getty: pages 72, 95; Images.com: pages 59, 62, 93; iStockphoto: page 87; Shutterstock: pages 27, 31, 34, 83, 88.
Reviews & Essays

58 The Fall of an Intellectual by David Rieff
Western intellectuals are so blinded by post-imperial guilt, cowardice and cultural relativism that they disparage
good liberals to curry favor with closet jihadists. Or so says Paul Berman in his new book. But who are the
extremists and who the apologists? The answer is not found in The Flight of the Intellectuals, an all-too-convenient
morality play in which everyone is cast as either villain or hero.

66 A Warrior Ethos by Bing West
There is a real lesson from Vietnam: local allegiances will always trump the might of the invader. And people
will tolerate domestic oppression to expel a foreign power. Counterinsurgency as cure-all is nothing more than
a salve to Americans wary of an impossible conflict. Washington’s insistence that the troops turn Kabul into a
functioning democracy will do nothing more than erode the fighting spirit of our military.
73 Revisionism on the West Bank by Benny Morris
Persecuted refugees searching for a homeland. The battlefield heroism of the Haganah. The pioneer spirit of
the kibbutzniks. For many, Israel’s founding is shrouded in mysticism. But there is a battle raging among the
historians of the Holy Land. The current stalemate is a story of bad actions on both sides. Beware those who
rewrite narratives.
81 Klingon as a Second Language by Ammon Shea
English, tongue of freedom, democracy and capitalism, has conquered the world. As it spreads, it is seeping
into foreign cultures, mutating into a global language. Having taken its stock from everyone it has met over
the past thousand years, English borrowed opossum from Algonquian, klutz from Yiddish and pajamas from
Urdu, while donating the less-than-elegant le big mac to the French. Its footprint across the globe is only set to
expand.
89 America Under the Caesars by Michael Lind
Anti-interventionists allege our leaders traded a strong, austere republic for a weak and sprawling empire
predicated on a military might that could not match our own ambitions. If Washington only withdrew its
legions from the world, they argue, America would once again find itself safe from perils within and without.
This narrative negates real threats and real victories. It is not enough to offer an alternative to America’s reigning
foreign-policy consensus. The alternative must be plausible.
Henry A. Kissinger James Schlesinger
Honorary Chairman Chairman, Advisory Council
Justine A. Rosenthal Editor Dimitri K. Simes Publisher & CEO
Rebecca N. White Assistant Managing Editor Paul J. Saunders Associate Publisher
Edward Lawrence Assistant Editor
Michael Geremia Editorial Associate
Advisory Council
Senior Editors Morton Abramowitz
Daniel W. Drezner Graham Allison
Robert F. Ellsworth
Nikolas K. Gvosdev
Martin Feldstein
Jacob Heilbrunn
Leslie H. Gelb
Anatol Lieven
Evan G. Greenberg
Contributing Editors Fred C. Iklé
Andrew J. Bacevich John J. Mearsheimer
Daniel Pipes
Ian Bremmer
Richard Plepler
Ted Galen Carpenter
Alexey Pushkov
Bruce Hoffman
David B. Rivkin, Jr.
Andrew Kohut
Helmut Sonnenfeldt
Kenneth M. Pollack
J. Robinson West
Dov Zakheim
Editorial Intern
Marisa Hoffman
Owen Harries Editor Emeritus Cover Design: Cain Semrad
Robert W. Tucker Editor Emeritus Cover Image: © Bettmann/CORBIS
Editorial Office The National Interest, 1615 L Street, nw, Suite 1230, Washington, dc 20036. Telephone: [phone], Fax: (202)
467-0006, Email: [email protected], Website: www.nationalinterest.org
Subscription Office Postmaster and subscribers please send address changes and subscription orders to: The National Interest, P.O. Box
9001, Maple Shade, nj 08052-9662. Telephone: [phone] Rates: $34/yr.; $57.50/2 yrs.; $76.50/3 yrs. Please add $25/
year outside the United States and Canada.
The National Interest (ISSN 0884-9382) is published bimonthly by The Nixon Center. Articles are abstracted and indexed in
P.A.I.S., Historical Abstracts, International Political Science Abstracts, U.S. Political Science Documents, Political Science Abstracts and
America: History and Life; articles are available on microfilm from University Microfilms International, and archived on Lexis-Nexis.
Periodicals postage is paid at Washington, dc, and at additional mailing offices. ©2010 by The National Interest, Inc. The National
Interest is printed by Fry Communications, Inc. It is distributed in the U.S. and Canada by Ingram Periodicals (18 Ingram Blvd., La
Vergne, tn 37086; 615-793-5522) and Source Interlink Companies (27500 Riverview Center Blvd., Bonita Springs, fl 34134; 239-949-
4450), and in the uk by Comag Special Services (Tavistock Road, West Drayton, Middlesex UB7 7QX; 44-1895-444055).
Brain Gain
Read The American Scholar and find out
what other great minds like yours are thinking
AM Will Hitler Rise Again?byJohn Lukacs
William Deresiewiczon what our leaders lack ERICAN WINTER 2010 Published by Phi Beta Kappa $7.95 U.S.and Canada
SCH Our Mind-Boggling
OLAR BRAIN
Priscilla Long
The Stolen Election
An Iranian writer revisits her restless homeland
SPRING 2010 Published by Phi Beta Kappa $7.95 U.S.and Canada Gelareh Asayesh
PLUS
Mascot Keep It Shylock
Madness Short and Us
Brian Doyle William Zinsser Paula Marantz Cohen
www.theamericanscholar.org
ABreedingGroundforTerroristsbyEricCalderwood
AUTUMN2009 PublishedbyPhiBetaKappa $7.95U.S.andCanada
WhereHaveAllthe
StudentsGone?
ThedemiseoftheEnglishdepartment
WilliamM.Chace
PLUS
Rereading Depression Fitzgerald’s
Ulysses Art TaxRecords
SudipBose MorrisDickstein WilliamJ.Quirk
www.theamericanscholar.org
Step Away from the Screen
Reading fiction matters even more in the digital age AMTh Ronald Reagan Is OverratedbyMatthew Dallek
Sven Birkerts ERICAN SUMMER 2009 Published by Phi Beta Kappa $7.95 U.S.and Canada
PLUS SCHO
LAR
Good Movies I (cid:31) Nabokov’s
Still NoEnd in Sight
Gone Bad Pronouns New Novel
Alex Rose Jessica Love Brian Boyd Areb eJtoshteh hsneo pBgue. yRfso errne peaelhlayac nIer?aq’s an iAnB jebutlrahys att hninayt B Vwaaigcllhc ndaoradto ,heal
PLUS
www.theamericanscholar.org Why Your Waitress MMiikgeh Rt oBsee Smarter Than You
Four New Poems by Gary Snyder
A Fable Hypocrisy Mystic Pizza
Thornton Wilder Anne Matthews Rob Gurwitt
www.theamericanscholar.org
Get four issues for $24 and
save 25 percent off the newsstand price
To subscribe, call 1-[phone], or visit our Web site:
www.theamericanscholar.org
Brent Scowcroft Paul Pillar Geoffrey Wheatcroft Gilles Kepel
Robert Gallucci Kenneth Pollack Stephen Walt Richard Betts
John Bolton Alan Wolfe Leslie Gelb Minxin Pei Ahmed Rashid
Don’t Miss Daily Commentary From Today’s Foreign-Policy Heavyweights
www.nationalinterest.org
Subscribe Now!
A Time to Appease
By Paul Kennedy
Appeasement!” What a powerful term entieth anniversary of Winston Churchill’s
.it has become, growing evermore in assumption of the office of prime minister
...strength as the decades advance. of Britain and the Commonwealth. In the
It is much stronger a form of opprobri- evening of May 10, 1940, that pugnacious
um than even the loaded “L” word, since veteran politician arrived at Buckingham
Liberals are (so their opponents charge) Palace and was asked by King George VI to
people with misguided political preferenc- try to form a new government. Just a short
es; but talk of someone being an Appeaser while earlier Neville Chamberlain had ten-
brings us to a much darker meaning, that dered the resignation of his administration,
which involves cowardice, abandoning one’s brought down by the military disasters in
friends and allies, failing to recognize evil Norway, a large-scale revolt by his own Tory
in the world—a fool, then—or recognizing backbenchers and a general public demand
evil but then trying to buy it off—a knave. for a much more decisive conduct of the
Nothing so alarms a president or prime war. Churchill assented to the king’s request
minister in the Western world than to be and left the palace to form his own national
accused of pursuing policies of appease- coalition government. Appeasement shuf-
ment. Better to be accused of stealing from fled off stage left, and anti-Appeasement,
a nunnery, or beating one’s family. the ghost of Saint George and “Action This
So it is a rather risky enterprise even for Day,” entered from the right. Auden’s dull,
an academic to ask, in a scholarly way, dishonest decade was over. The difference
whether acts of appeasing a rival might was total: night versus day; evil versus good;
not sometimes be a good thing. You want- weakness versus courage.
ed to continue negotiations with Saddam
Hussein? Appeaser. To avoid criticizing But was the difference really so com-
Chinese policies in Tibet? Appeaser. To plete? It served well for wartime pro-
wriggle out of Afghanistan? Appeaser. To paganda purposes and building public
give in to French air controllers’ wage de- morale. It served again, and very well, for
mands? App . . . Well. Before such abuse McCarthyite criticisms of “weak” U.S. for-
of the term gets worse, perhaps we should eign policies, criticism regarding the loss of
all take a small History lesson. China, conduct of the Korean War, the do-
Moreover, it seems most appropriate to nothing posturing in Washington after suc-
return to the “appeasement debate” at this cessive Soviet crushings of East European
moment since we’ve just celebrated the sev- uprisings, the loss of Vietnam and so on.
The late and very great diplomatic histo-
Paul Kennedy is the J. Richardson Dilworth rian at Harvard Ernest May once composed
Professor of History at Yale University. a slim work entitled “Lessons” of the Past:
A Time to Appease July/August 2010 7
Nothing so alarms a president than to be accused
of appeasement. Better to be accused of
stealing from a nunnery, or beating one’s family.
The Use and Misuse of History in American surrender of a province or the handing back
Foreign Policy (Oxford University Press, of captured territories—because statesmen
1973) with a chapter about false analo- mutually agreed that compromise was a
gies of the Munich story. It is still worth a lesser evil than further bloodshed and losses.
read, and perhaps no more so than today, Once the archconqueror Napoleon was to-
when the American political establishment tally defeated by all the other nations in
earnestly debates what should be done not 1813–15, this more moderate temperament
only with regard to the imminent policy returned to Europe. Limited wars, cutting
conundrums (Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and deals, buying off a rival to avoid a conflict
North Korea) but also how to handle the were commonplace acts. Even as the great
more existential questions of the United powers entered the twentieth century, one
States’ power and place in the world (see: of the most exceptional acts of appease-
rising China). ment, and repeated conciliation, was oc-
Before delving into the depths of the curring—yet it is something that very few
1930s, a few general remarks concerning American pundits on appeasement today
semantics and historical precedents. There seem to know anything about. It was Great
was a time when appeasement was an inof- Britain’s decision to make a series of signifi-
fensive, even a rather positive term. The cant territorial and political concessions to
French word “l’apaisement,” from which the rising American Republic.
it probably derives (or the earlier medi- For example, in 1895 London decided
eval-French apeser), meant the satisfying of on a diplomatic solution (read: concessions)
an appetite or thirst, the bringing of com- regarding the disputed Venezuela–British
fort, the cooling of tensions. Even today, Guiana border they had spent more than
Webster’s dictionary’s first definition of “ap- five decades arguing over because of the
pease” is “to bring peace, calm; to soothe,” belligerent language coming out of Wash-
with the later negative meaning being, well, ington on the side of Caracas. In 1901,
much later in the entry. Even when it was the cabinet overruled Admiralty opinion
first employed in political discourse, its and agreed that Britain would give up its
meaning was benign; in 1919, hoping to 50 percent share of a future isthmian (i.e.,
bring Europe from war to peace, Prime Panama) canal, to which it was perfectly
Minister David Lloyd George declared that entitled under the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty
his aim was appeasing the appetites of the signed with the United States in 1850 to
peoples of the Continent. That was from a guarantee the waterway remained neutral.
position of strength, not weakness. In 1903, London outraged Canadian opin-
Over the centuries, though, some govern- ion by siding with the U.S. delegates over
ments have appeased other states out of a the contentious Alaska–British Columbia
sense of vulnerability, or for the purposes of border. Yet another retreat. Kaiser Wilhelm
prudence. Thus, many eighteenth-century II, who so eagerly reckoned to benefit from
wars ended inconclusively—often with the an Anglo-American war that distracted his
8 The National Interest A Time to Appease