You Say You Want a Revolution...

The alt-righters, white supremacists, gun nutters and all those on the far right have harshed my enjoyment of Philadelphia and its heaps of Revolutionary History.  How so?  Because these folks tend to take the symbols and words of the Revolutionaries and twist them.  I wanted to buy a postcard at the Franklin Museum of the classic divided/united snake, but I know that they use the don't tread on me stuff for their own "hey, we should be able to mess with everyone else without retribution or consequences" thing.  Likewise, the Declaration of Independence is so cool--consent of the governed and all that--but they like Jefferson's tree of liberty must be watered by the blood of tyrants.... when they are the tyrant-wannabees.

Still, I enjoyed the Museum of the Revolutionary War until we got kicked out--some kind of emergency that caused them to evacuate.  I was super-bummed because I was just getting to the part of the Revolution that was least covered in all of the classes/movies/etc: the part after the Declaration and before Yorktown. 

Here's some stuff I saw on the streets of Philly and then in the Museum (and it belongs not just in a museum, sorry, Indiana):

Love this

Of course, Ben was the one who said it

Sounds about right

True dat

Whataboutism? No,
honesty about propaganda

Propaganda!

They covered the less covered history pretty well

The Canadian Campaign!!!

Arlington, About Time

Over the past several years, I have been to many cemeteries in Europe and have seen war memorials around the world, but I had never been to Arlington despite working around the corner for a year and visiting DC on a regular basis [Update: my big sister reminded me that I went there as part of a family trip when I was 6 or 7--I have no memory of that trip although I seem to remember visiting the White House in the two years we lived in DC].  So, I was due.  And D-Day +1 + 72 years made for good timing. As a scholar of conflict and war, it pays to spend some time being reminded about the costs.  One can snark and be blase about the costs of using the military as an instrument of policy, so seeing these resting places is a good reminder of the costs of the policies one advocates.

Women's memorial

 I am in DC for about 24 hours--to present how blogging can help bridge the gap beteween policy makers and academics, so I had time in between lunch with my dissertation adviser (unbreakable vow indeed) and a 4pm beer call with my natsec twitter friends.  I spent that time wandering around Arlington National Cemetary.

The site is beautiful, peaceful and full of respect for those who gave their all and then some.  The location is perfect because:

• More by accident than by design, the land was taken from Robert E. Lee to use as the Union was running out of places to put the dead.  So, the traitor lost territory (his descendants got a big check to compensate, alas) to put the dead that he helped cause (had Lee been a lousier general, the Union might not have lost as many lives).
• It is around the corner from the Pentagon, so those who plan and deploy the troops have a constant reminder of the costs of their decisions.
• It is across the river but quite nearby the White House and the Congress, which should but does not always remind these folks of the gravity of their decisions.  It is easy for folks elsewhere to declare the need to do MOAR in Syria, Iraq, etc. since they do not work near the place where the folks lost in previous military efforts rest.  



101st memorial

• And it is so close to the other memorials nearer to the Mall that also mark the big efforts of the past--the Vietnam memorial, the WWII memorial, Korea, etc.

 I wish I had more time and was better equipped (nice clothes and a heavy bag were not great for exploring on a warm DC day), but I was glad I made the trip and will definitely try to get a guided tour since I missed much on this trip.  Oh, and, just like last year's trip, at the airport, the gate next to mine was full of vets from Peoria who had spent  a day visiting Arlington and other DC sites.  Mostly very old folks, but very feisty ones. 

Supremes

JFK/RFK and eternal flame

Teddy Kennedy

Memorial for those who died in the
failed Iran hostage rescue effort

Challenger Memorial

Columbia Memorial

Tomb of Unknown Soldier

 And, yes, blogger does really give me good control of how the pics appear.


 

History of Hate

I am not a scholar of American racial politics, but when there is something obvious to point out, I point it out.  Today it was a lesson about hate:

The additional flag flying over the capital of South Carolina--known as the Confederate flag despite the best efforts of pedants--was not always there.  I pointed out that this flag had gone away but came back in the 1950s and 1960s, that it was put on the flags of many southern states and was popularized deliberately as a symbol of opposition to the civil rights movement (my tweet of this has gone viral... well, viral for me: more than 160 RTs, 100 favorites so far).

Of course, then this leads to the question of: why would one oppose equal rights for African-Americans?  Hmmmm.  Why should those of a different color be denied the front of the bus, to be denied to eat at restaurants and stay at hotels of their choosing?  To be denied the right to vote?  The only answer, of course, is racism.  Sure, it is easy to look back from 2015 to 1955 or 1965 and call those who opposed civil rights racists, but other than hate/fear of African Americans, what can motivate the denial of equal rights?

So, yes, it is pretty easy to see how the Confederate flag is a symbol of racism.  Not just because it was a symbol of a government founded on the defense of slavery, but because its return was part of a process of attempting to fight the civil rights movement.

Whenever anyone contests this and argues that the Confederate flag is a part of southern heritage, I was wonder why they would want to venerate that part of the South's heritage that is defined by hate and racism.  The answer, of course, is that they are racists denying that they are racists.  Otherwise, they would pick other symbols of the South as defining their heritage.  

Meanings of America

Last weekend, I got to see Ellis Island and Liberty Island.  I had been to the latter before but not to the former.  What struck me most of all?  How incredibly diverse the people visiting these places were.  I am not a huge fan of ELF--ethnolinguistic fractionalization score as a variable in quantitative work on ethnic conflict and civil war--but I cannot imagine any place getting a higher value than those two places. ELF--essentially measures the odds of whether you bump into someone in your ethnic group--was close to one, indicating that nearly everyone there seemed to be from a distinct ethnic group/nationality. 

And I felt real good about that--that these two locations represent a key part of what it means to be an American--that being American is not about where one comes from or the color of one's skin or the language they speak but something else.  What that else is may change over time.  It is freighted with the tragic mistakes and problems of the past (slavery, what was done to the native Americans) and of the present.

Others see America as a place for white people, maybe white Christians (narrowly defined).  That seems to be the story of today (again) as a white guy shot up a Black church.  This crime is not one thing--it is not a hate crime or terrorism or spree shooting--it is all of these things.  And apparently the guy said that he viewed Blacks as taking over and they "need to go."  This hate is deeply ingrained in American history, but it is not the America that I saw at Ellis Island and at Liberty Island. 

So, we have dueling conceptions of America, and this conflict is not going to go away.  We will see stuff like this happen again and again as it has happened many times before.  I'd like to focus on the positive side, but that is easy for me since I never had to worry much about the personal consequences of Driving While Black, Walking While Black, Hanging Out in My House While Black....

All I know is that what happened is awful and that we will probably not learn that much from it because it is really not anything new.  What a depressing thought after an uplifting weekend a week ago.

The Starting Points Visited and Re-visited

Manhattan looked great from the other side

Mrs. Spew and I were footless and fancy-free yesterday as we were in northern New Jersey for a family event the day before (the last Bar Mitzvah of my sibling's kids), so what did we do?  Ellis Island and Liberty Island.  This seemed like a good way to spend a day, especially after the past few years have taken me to the beginnings of the U.S.A.: Jamestown, Plymouth Rock, Yorktown, Leiden (where the Pilgrims left Europe for Massachusetts).

Twas a very modular main room--reconfigured
again and again over the years.

There was so much that was so striking but what impressed me most about Ellis Island was the composition of the tourists.  It was one of the most diverse collections of humanity I have ever been among (the ELF score was pretty much at its max).   I have been to many tourist sites around the world, and I cannot remember one that had so many people from so many backgrounds.  Which makes sense, partly because NYC brings tourists from all over the world and partly because much of the world went through Ellis Island during its three decades as primary destination for immigrants headed to the US.

Of course, the history of the US and its immigration is not all peaches and creme.  I was glad to see several displays featuring the backlashes against immigration.  No, I am not a fan of xenophobia even if it played a key role in the Bill and Steve book (being re-printed as a paperback this August thanks to our pal Putin).



The timing was particularly apt as I recently got into an argument with a Canadian journalist who insisted that the US needed to make Spanish an official language of the US.  Given that English is not an official language, this seemed strange to me.  Indeed, after ten years in Quebec, I am more firmly convinced that the American strategy is the better one: rather than forcing folks to learn English, the US government lets the market and the society induce people to learn English.  The great consistency over the centuries has been this: the first generation may not learn English but the second one will pick up enough and the third will be fluent.  Which is why the picture to the right struck me: the many languages people spoke and wrote when they came over.  Again, American history is chock full of conflict and the union still needs to be perfected, but there are some good reasons why people still want to move to the United States.  I don't think Russia or China have the same pressures caused by people wanting to immigrate.  People do indeed vote with their feet.

 Maybe I am being overly patriotic because I found this while walking around Ellis Island:

 We learned that these panels were not of all immigrants who went through, but those immigrants who entered somewhere and had family members recognize them (pay $, I suppose).  Still, the idea that I was standing near where my ancestor came across more than a century ago gave me some chills.

And, of course, maybe it has to do with how beautiful the Lady was yesterday:

Hate and Heritage

Today is Martin Luther King Day.  It takes on a  bit more meaning in my house this year since we just saw Selma, which reminded us that MLK kept pushing and pushing when he knew his life was at stake. 

It led to a conversation with Frosh Spew--she said she had learned that the appearance of the Confederate battle flag on state flags in the South was not something that had been around since the Civil War but was a response to the Civil Rights Movement.  Yep.  So, the flag came to symbolize not the war and whatever heritage might be involved but opposition to Civil Rights. Which means it stands FOR segregation.  It stands for Voter Suppression.  It stands for ... White Supremacy.  

It is just that simple--that the timing of its re-emergence as a symbol means that the heritage that is bound up with the confederate battle flag is not brotherhood in battle in the Civil War or States' Rights but racism. 

Which is why I am appalled to find out today something that I did not know or had forgotten: that in some places in the South, MLK Day is also Robert E. Lee Day and Stonewall Jackson Day.  FFS!!!  It is perhaps the perfect way to diminish the day--combining MLK with those who fought to perpetuate slavery and White Supremacy. 

Whenever I discuss inequality and discrimination with my daughter (racial, gender, whatever), I tend to emphasize the progress, and she always sees and finds unacceptable anything short of equality.  She has tremendous impatience with the way the world is.  A tremendous passion for seeking change.  And, as a result, I have a hard time arguing with her.  Because she is right. 

As long as we have states continuing to lionize those that fought for inequality and politicians undermining the gains of MLK via Voterfraudfraud, we will need to be passionately impatient.

Fighting After the Whistle Blows

I have always had a fondness for the Battle of New Orleans.  Why?  First, the idea that the biggest American victory took place long after the peace treaty had been negotiated amuses me.  Second, I wrote a paper in either middle or high school on the battle. 

So, I was most pleased to see this video posted on twitter by Kelsey Atherton (https://twitter.com/AthertonKD):


Lego plus music!

Happy 200th anniversary, Battle of New Orleans!

America's Favorite Wars

I was having a beer with several Canadians this weekend, and the topic of 1812 came up (before the wonderful British Embassy tweet).  And I asserted that the War of 1812 is not among the top ten favorite American wars.  Of course, that is an exaggeration--but top five?  No.  Let's check.

And by favorite, I refer to a combo of how each war fits into American mythology, American pop culture (movies, books, music, whatever), and what I remember of American history classes from back in the day (which slights the recent wars as teachers would run out of time).  Favorite does not entirely mean loved or liked, as how can we really like war.  Indeed, some unpopular wars are still favorites in terms of popular discussion/imagination.

1. World War II.  Really?  Yes.  Because it is the last big war the US so unambiguously won.  Many, many classic war movies and books from this war, and the boomers are always fond of lauding their parents as the Greatest Generation since that makes them almost great, too.  Ok, that is unfair.  
2. U.S. Civil War.  Holy re-enacting!  More re-enacting than WWII but less in the way of movies.  Plus the whole divided outlook on the war itself, with some folks still denying that slavery was at the heart of it.  
3. The Revolutionary War.  Yes, the founding war is third.  Why?  When was the last time you saw a movie or tv show about the American Revolution?  "Turn"?  Exactly.  The political stuff certainly continues to dominate America's sense of itself, but the war?  More Americans can name more battles from WWII and the Civil War than from the American Revolution.  I wonder how many would name Saratoga as a key turning point?  Yorktown as the last big battle?  The last notable movie about this war starred Mel Gibson as the good guy.... so yeah.
4. Vietnam. Plays a huge role in Americans' imagination of war.  Any new conflict is immediately considered the next Vietnam.  The boomers obviously had much obsession with this war, and they still shape much of American attitudes about stuff.  Heaps of movies and books.
5. Gulf War (1991).  The US loves a victory and this is the most recent mostly unambiguous victory.  Plus George Clooney was in a movie about it. 
6. Korea.  M*A*S*H.  
7. Grenada.  Due to that Clint Eastwood movie. World War I.  It is hip again with the one hundred anniversary, but so very distant in time and entirely eclipsed by the war that this war to end all wars did not prevent.  I think we have more music from that war than movies/books.  Again, this is my take on the American stance on these things.  Obviously, Europeans have stronger memories about WWI, having lost a huge hunk of a generation.
8. The various wars against the Native Americans.  Sure, Westerns are no longer popular, but the conflicts in the Old West play a big role in the American history books.  It would be interesting to see if Americans could list more Native American war leaders than generals of the opposing sides in various wars.  I would guess that only the US Civil War would be an even match.
9. Wars of Texas Independence/US Irredentism. Thanks to John Wayne and the Alamo.  
10. War of 1812.  I am pretty sure that Americans would have a hard time guessing what was the big battle the US won (after the war was over) or what the war was about.  Sure, we got the National Anthem from this war, but how many people can sing it?  It is also diminished by the fact that this war was a sideshow for the big wars in Europe with that Napoleon dude.

The funny thing is that the Conservative government of Canada has been playing up the War of 1812 as a key point in Canada's founding mythology even as it preceded the founding of Quebec.  I guess it is like the "French and Indian War" that is a key part of American history books, mostly due to the rise of George Washington and setting the conditions for the Revolution.

Anyhow, I am not an historian nor have I read surveys on how Americans view the wars.  Just my impressions from what I saw in my various schools and how the wars play in American culture.  I think most Americans would agree that the War of 1812 is near the bottom of the list of American wars.  I guess getting one's capital burned can lead to some selective amnesia.  

Independence Day From Canada

Here is my annual post on observing the US from Canada on Independence day.  This one will be very different for me--I will actually be on US soil ... technically, as I am going to the US Ambassador's residence for his big party.  And that is American soil-ish.

I will report tonight or tomorrow what that party is like.  All I know is that I am supposed to wear "whites".  Good thing I have a good white hat for the occasion.

Enjoy your Independence Day, America and the World's as well.

Comparative Occupation

I was a bit flummoxed yesterday on TV as Todd Van Der Heyden (who cameo-ed in the Channing Tatum White House hostage movie) asked me about Afghanistan as compared to the occupations of Japan and Germany.  I was caught off guard because I thought we had pretty much dispensed with those examples, but I guess I was wrong.  To be fair, the point Todd was making, that 13 years or so is not nearly enough to state-build/nation-build is absolutely right.  International forces are still on Bosnia and Kosovo, and we still have a ways to go with those.

Anyhow, I thought I would come up with a list of how Germany/Japan after World War II are distinct from Afghanistan, as I could only cover a couple of points on TV.

• Unconditional surrender makes a big difference.  Americans, Brits, Canadians and others were not getting killed after World War II, so the publics and politicians were more patient (although to be fair, the active occupation stuff ended before thirteen years).
• The neighbors were far more cooperative.... even the Soviet Union.  Sure, there was heaps of spying and perhaps some mild subversion, but the Soviet Union and its bloc were far better neighbors than Pakistan has been.  
• Both Japan and Germany had industrial bases, while temporarily laid low, that one could build upon.
• Same with civil society, more or less.
• Neither Japan nor Germany had twenty years of civil war preceding the occupation.
• The US was serious and committed from the start in 1945.  In Afghanistan and Iraq, the US government resisted the idea of nation-building, of state-building, of even planning for the day after the fall of Baghdad and perhaps for Kabul as well.
• Karzai is no Adenauer.

Indeed, rather than most similar comparison, the cases of post-WWII occupation and post-9/11 efforts are really most different comparisons.  Some of the Bush folks looked back on the German/Japanese cases for inspiration--de-Ba'athification--even if they had no clue about how that stuff actually played out.  The post-WWII experience probably gave Americans (and others) a wee bit too much confidence about what the US can do.  Afghanistan and Iraq should diminish American hubris.  At least, I hope so.

To be clear, the US is not becoming isolationist, but it is becoming a bit more aware of its limitations.  That it cannot transform broken Mideast countries the way it helped to bring Germany and Japan both back to their feet and into the world of functioning democracies.  This should not lead us to deeply into paralysis (although it might), but being a bit more wary may not be a bad thing.

Afghanistan is Not the Hotel California

"You can check out anytime, you can never leave?"  Not for the American military.  President Karzai may be operating under the belief that Afghanistan is too important for the Americans to up and leave.   That the U.S. is bluffing.  If so, he really sucks at history. 

The first American move after every conflict is to go home.  The exception was World War II, where the Americans participated in the occupation of German and Japan (ok, and the Philippines).  Vietnam?  All we were looking for was a "decent interval" between when the US left and when South Vietnam collapsed.  Sure, there was the hope that American air support and other assistance could keep the North Vietnamese from winning, but Congress was not so enthused and limited how much assistance could be given.  Afghanistan should not rely on any sunk costs argument since the U.S. spent far more of its blood in Vietnam (almost 25x).

Iraq?  Well, as the Iraqis are now telling the Afghans, don't think too much of yourselves.  “Don’t be under the illusion that no matter what you do the Americans are here to stay,” Mr. Zebari told Mr. Karzai. “People used to say that about the American presence in Iraq, too. But they were eager to leave, and they will be eager to leave your country as well.”  Iraq has been far more important to the US due to its oil, its position relative to Iran and so on.  Yet we left.

What Karzai and other Afghans seem to forget is that the U.S. has only cared about Afghanistan when it fit into a larger conflict.  The US supported the opponents of the Soviet invasion as part of the Cold War.  Once the Soviets left, the US didn't think twice about Afghanistan until 9/11.  Ok, that might be an exaggeration--the US might have had a thought or two, but certainly did not care much about Afghanistan. 

The on-going intervention?  It is not that we care about Afghanistan but that we cared about Al Qaeda and its tendency to set up in failed states.  We also cared that instability in Afghanistan might be bad for Pakistan.  Now that we realize that Pakistan is a major source of that instability, well, little reason to stick around.

What Karzai and other believers in America's endless devotion to Afghanistan seem to ignore is that whole domestic politics thing where folks are tired of war.  They also are missing the conversation where the folks who have the tough argument are the supporters of continued involvement.  It is easy in the US to argue that it is time to go.  The hard argument is to try to argue that it is worth additional money and lives to hang out in a part of the world that has never been in the American sphere of interests (I need to figure out that argument myself). 

Central Asia is almost entirely irrelevant to the US.  South Asia?  Just preventing a Pakistan-Indian war (particularly now that both have nuclear weapons).  Otherwise, these places are peripheral.  Sure,  more than a decade of war might lead one to believe otherwise.  But if Karzai thinks that the US really and truly cares about Afghanistan, then perhaps he is smoking some of the pot that grows so tall in his country.

Spew Book of the Year: Smuggler Nation

I have been meaning to post about a fun book for much of the year, but I procrastinated.  So, I can use the premise of this being the book of the year to finally blog about Peter Andreas's Smuggler Nation: How Illicit Trade Made America.  The book really opened my eyes and changed my perspective on American history.  Andreas cites Tilly early as he asserts that smuggling made the nation and the nation made smuggling.  And then he is off to the races to show how the efforts to smuggle and the fights to stop smuggling interacted in ways that shaped US history and institutions.

The first insight that blew my mind was that the American Revolution was not so much about new legislation from London but a new effort to enforce old laws.  Americans had gotten rich* by violating various prohibitions, and then only sought to revolt from Britain when the British started to take such violations seriously.  That many of the folks who got rich off of smuggling ended up in positions of power reminds me of Andrea's earlier book, Blue Helmets, Black Markets, which focused on the impact of civil war and crime on Bosnia and its power structures.

*It was fun to see Providence and Brown University play such key roles in the old smuggling history as that is where Andreas works (and where some of my family resides). 

British mercantilism, like most restraints on trade, just provided folks with huge incentives to dodge, dip, duck, dive and dodge the laws.  And creativity seems to increase with incentives.  Ye olde smugglers were pretty smart folks.  Of course, once the Revolution happened and a new government was founded, it had to try to restrict some of the trade as well, and found itself fighting the folks who funded some of the rebellion.  Good times.

The tale of American industrialization also changes quite significantly, as today's concerns about other folks ripping off American intellectual property can now be seen as chock full of irony, given how American entrepreneurs ripped off British technologies left and right.  This helps to underline a key theme in the book--the more things change, the more they stay the same.

The smuggling of smut in mid 1800s, with the boom in publishing, seems pretty familiar, with the internet having a similar impact.  This chapter was particularly fun to read, as the American fight against vice just seems even more ridiculous than the efforts to fight other smuggled goods.  Plus the image of Andreas studying old porn is just, well, amusing.

Andreas moves on to discuss people smuggling--Chinese--that again has parallels today.  Then booze with prohibition.  Andreas does a great job of showing the interplay between public outcries, legislation, increased enforcement and the perverse impacts on smuggling--changing routes and techniques but not really impacting the flow very much.  This all leads to the drug war.

The futility of stopping smuggling raises a key question--should drugs be legalized to eliminate the incentives & crime that come with smuggling illicit goods?  That seems to be one key conclusion to draw from the book.  I talked to Peter at the APSA meeting, and he indicated that complete legalization is not the way to go, but that the focus needs to be on the demand side more than the supply side (I may be quoting him unfairly, but then again, this post promotes his book, so I doubt that he would mind).

It is, naturally, a pretty depressing take on things, as the US invests more and more effort (money, personnel, distractions) and gets very little out of it, as the drugs, antiquities, technologies, bodies, and other illicit trade continues.  The enforcement efforts lead to a bigger US government but not a more effective one and in some ways a more repressive one.  And this just provides more incentives for folks on the other side to organize and exploit.

I do like Andrea's plea at the end: "We need to take a deep breath.  The sky is not falling."  The urge to do something just to do something needs to be resisted.  Indeed.  Alas, the domestic political incentives have not changed much, so his pleas are unlikely to be heard.

Happy Identity Day!

Blogging has been light as I have been traveling back from Budapest.  In a post later today, I will discuss what I learned in that very beautiful city.  In this post, I just a few brief thoughts on yet another Fourth of July viewed from my perch north of the Wall.

It was a good thing that I was not in Canada when this list of the 99 ways Canada is better than the US was published.  Luckily, the first I learned of this is when I read Andrew Cohen's column this morning that does a nice job putting things into perspective.  Now, I don't have to come up with 100 ways the US is better than Canada.

Instead, I will focus on just one for this Independence Day.  Every identity includes multiple aspects about who one is, but a key part of that is by defining who one is not.  Canada, because of its proximity and relative size, absolutely has to define its nationalism in large part by what it is not--the US.  Which leads to various stuff that can be good and bad.  I have been less than thrilled with "Americanized" as an insult up here--that Hillier was Americanized, the Harper is Americanized, which explains how they could be so unCanadian. 

One of the things that makes the U.S. "great" in my humble opinion is that there is no single Other that defines the U.S.  While the US has been in opposition to the British early on and then the Germans twice (and Japanese once) and the Soviets for quite some time, to be an American is not so clearly defined by not being like country x, y or z.  To be unAmerican does not mean acting like a Canadian or a Russian or a Chinese person.  It did mean, for quite awhile and with some nasty consequences, being Communist or seen as a sympathizer to communism.

The U.S., for all of its problems, tends to have loftier targets for what defines it than other countries--the ideas that it represents and the ideas that it opposes.  So, all the goodness in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution (leaving out the ugly bits, like condoning slavery for more than four score years) are key bits of the content in the American identity that resonate, and the Others that have defined the U.S. and American identity have been colonialism/empire (that would be mostly of the British kind, admittedly), fascism (too many Germans in the US to hate Germans for very long?), and Communism.

The problem today is that Terrorism has much less content than the ideologies of the past, so the Other is really a strategic or a tactic, which means the US ends up defining itself by the strategies it chooses to fight Terrorism.  Alas, the strategies that now definite American identity include rendition, torture, and drone strikes.  Of course, this affects more how others see Americans than how Americans see themselves, but identity is, as academics say, intersubjective.  Our identities are products not just of how we see ourselves but how others see us. 

My American identity is probably a bit more complex than it was before 2002, as I see more clearly (although I am often quite confused) how others perceive Americans, including as The Other.  With Great Power not only comes Great Responsibility but also a Great role in how others construct their identities and nationalisms. 

I am pretty ambivalent these days about the State of the Union and the place of the U.S. in the world.  I have a column coming out later today at OpenCanada.org that addresses this.  But I wanted to just address some identity dynamics as I am too tired from my air travels to come up with one hundred reasons why the US rocks.  Not why the US is better than Canada but why the US just rocks (thanks again, Andrew Cohen!).  Maybe next year.  In the meantime, enjoy Independence Day, which marks the anniversary of an incredible document that mattered not just then and there but since then pretty much everywhere.  Indeed, despite the flaws of the founders, their hopes and ambitions for what this country would become, this imagined potential, is pretty damned terrific and is worth more than a few fireworks and excessive blogposts.

And, yes, this speech still gives me chills.

First-est!

I spent today, the day after a two day conference in Williamsburg, checking out Jamestown where America began.  I could not help but think of a few things while going through both the Jamestown Settlement Museum which has re-creations of the first colony and the actual site of Jamestown  which has much archaeology going on:

• Not much has changed.  There was many conflict among the settlers that threatened the colony's survival, making today's politics seem a bit less toxic.  Ok, almost.
• Lost has enduring relevance.  Jamestown was located on the shore amidst a swamp, which made clean water really challenging to get.  Not unlike the first season of Lost where Jack discovered fresh water but most folks wanted to stay on the beach.  Maybe Lost is really Jamestown, complete with conflict and then cooperation and then conflict with the Others--the Indians.

Anyhow, I learned much and remembered stuff that I learned but had forgotten.  I had forgotten how Jamestown nearly failed, with less than forty of the one hundred plus surviving the first year.  The location of the settlement was aimed for optimal defense-ability but the very factors that made it easy to defend also made it easy to contain via siege.  The starvation the first year or two was as much about being unable to venture out for food given the Powhatan conflict as the weather. 

I was surprised to see how well the museums addressed the origins of slavery in the U.S., just a bit over a decade after Jamestown was founded.  English privateers were able to capture some Africans and then sell them to the colony, so America's original sin was earlier than I remembered.  

I was also surprised to learn that another American stain was partly responsible for the success of the colony: tobacco.  That the colony was not a profitable enterprise for anyone until they figured out how to grow tobacco, and that led to folks getting rich pretty quickly (1620s). 

One last surprise--that the archaeology and forensics going on today seem to be relatively new.  I would have expected bodies to have been dug up long before recent times.  But the archaelogical effort is going on now, with the recent discovery of cannibalism: Jane.

Oh, and it was pretty damn cold.  I had the chance to buy some fleece jackets or a rain jacket at a nearby outlet shopping center, but did not.  So, I have been pretty cold the past couple of days.  I don't remember ever being this cold in late May in the middle of the East Coast. 

Still, I had a great time at the workshop (with lessons learned to be reported tomorrow), and hanging out with some old friends from grad school.  I guess with Jamestown and Yorktown (after the book workshop here 1.5 years ago), the next place I must visit is .... Gettysburg, right?

Declaration of American Exceptionalism Meme

Heaps of folks have been writing about the true meaning of Independence Day and whether the US is exceptional.  I wrote on being an American abroad at CIC, but did not take on American exceptionalism.

Stephen Walt largely poo-poos the idea of American exceptionalism, as the US in its behavior in the world does what everyone else does (will need to find the link again).  I largely agree that the US is fairly ordinary in what it does in the world, but perhaps disagree about the why that Walt poses: not just about international pressures but domestic political dynamics.  Each country's politics affects/mediates how it responds to international pressures.  The US is somewhat exceptional in that sense because of its political system.  There used to be far fewer Presidential systems than there are now, but they are still the minority with most democracies being either parliamentary or mixed (having elements of presidential and parliamentary systems).  One could write a book on how such differences affect how the civilians control their militaries especially in multilateral contexts (yes, the book is now out of our hands and under review at a press). 

To be clear, my biggest problems with American exceptionalism are: (a) the refusal to compare and to learn from the experiences of other places; and (b) people using any comparisons as accusations that someone is not sufficiently supportive of the US.  The word un-American is usually used by those who are betraying American ideals (McCarthy most obviously).  To be considered un-American because one dares to think there are things the US can learn from elsewhere, that there are elements of the US that are, dare I say it, inferior, is problematic in the extreme. 

Anyhow, I would to highlight two sharp posts on related topics:

At Inkspots, there is a very good post on why this is not the day to celebrate the military and the veterans.  Instead, Gulliver argues that this is the day to celebrate what the American ideals are, not sacrifices made on behalf of those ideas, especially since most of the wars the US has fought have not been for American freedom, especially lately. 

Dan Drezner does a nice job of focusing on what the Declaration really means and what makes it stand out so:

It was the American desire to allow future Americans to migrate to these shores, and to truck, barter, and exchange with everyone else, that stands out this year when I read the Declaration of Independence.  Which is something to think about when one major party candidate for president demagogues immigration and the other one demagogues trade. 

That the US was founded on not just democratic ideas of consent but on tolerant ideals (yes, with huge caveat about slavery that took four score and then some to correct) makes the US stand out a bit.  There are other countries whose populations are nearly entirely based on past immigration (and repression of the indigenous peoples), but the conscious justification of independence based on freer flows of peoples is something that is easy to overlook but makes the US pretty darned exceptional.   Indeed, I always get more than a bit annoyed when people take anti-immigration stands in the US--these efforts betray not just American history but also American ideals. 

I have made much fun of xenophobia for a while now as I realized that hate can serve as a brake on irredentism, but in all seriousness, fear of foreigners is, despite being quite a tradition in the US, anti-American, given the words in the Declaration. 

It is this tolerance that makes possible the continuation, even in these hard times, of the American dream.  Other countries have their own dreams, of course, but I am pretty fond of the American dream.

Was It Worth It?

It would be Iraq.  I had a student in my office ask today whether the war was worth it.  I think that question is far harder when it comes to Afghanistan than Iraq.  Since the US is leaving Iraq this month, let's focus on that one.  There are several ways to answer the question. 

One could focus on Weapons of Mass Destruction--Iraq not only did not have any, but did not have significant programs.  Turns out Hussein was a bit deceptive on this one.  So, the principle justification for the war turns out to be a chimera.  So, one that one measure, nope, not worth it.

The Bush folks would be saying Saddam Hussein, Saddam Hussein, Saddam Hussein.  Yep, the dictator is dead and gone.  Was that worth 4,500 American lives, tens if not hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, the empowering of Iran, the recruitment tool of a generation for terrorist groups, the trillion dollars or so now and the trillions down the road in veterans' health care costs?  While the sanctions regime was starting to collapse, it is not clear how all these costs could be outweighed by one entirely contained dictator.

The new justification of democratization, something that only really believed by the fevered mind of Paul Wolfowitz, would assert that democracy in Iraq set off a cascade of democratization that we now know as Arab Spring.  There are so many problems with this assertion, including:

• how one can draw a casual connection from Iraq to Tunisia;
• that we actually have democracy thus far in only Tunisia, not Egypt and not Libya;
• that "democracy" in Iraq is a pretty questionable thing, which end up being more about tyranny of the majority (Shiites crush Sunnis and Kurds) than about the features we usually associate with democracy.
• Oh, and having thousands of US troops in Iraq probably didn't help the opponents of the regime in Iran at all.  

While it is absolutely brutal to tell the US troops that their sacrifices were "not worth it," it would be entirely dishonest to say the war was not a mistake--in terms of the decision-making, justification, design, and implementation.  This was very much a war of choice--that the Bush Administration asked for and got this war, that the Democrats who went along with this were more afraid about domestic politics (Senators who opposed the first Iraq war made lousy presidential candidates) than about doing their jobs (but then again, they let the torture czar become Attorney General), that the media was too cowed by 9/11 to really investigate the pre-invasion claims, and that the public was too shocked by 9/11 to seriously consider the dubious claims of the administration.  Many folks did see the train wreck ahead of time, but could not do anything about it.  It will be a sad chapter in American history, and most Americans seem to agree now on this.

Going Back to the Start

I realized while walking around Yorktown that this is a most suitable place to be towards the end of the Dave and Steve project on multilateral warfare.  Yorktown is only the victory that led to the endgame with the British and produced American independence due to an alliance with France, which provided not only the ships to corner Cornwallis but the siege weapons and doctrine.

I had a choice of Jamestown or Yorktown (not both since I was already spending the rest of the day at Busch Gardens (see next post).  I chose Yorktown due to my fondness for military history.  Given that this project has allowed me to learn more about World War I, World War II, and the military histories of Canada, France, Germany, Britain, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Australia (I don't remember going to a military history museum in New Zealand), it only made sense to go to the starting point of American military history--the revolution. 

The Park Service has done a nice job of preserving the battlefield.  They had the berms and the trenches in place along with cannons.  The Park Service center had a short film and some information, and an old tent of George Washington's.

The monument was beautiful.  Complete with a real live bald eagle flying nearby.  Really.  Some folks were getting married at the Victory monument.  A very pretty site but strange location except the groom was wearing some kind of cadet uniform.  The monument has three phrases circling towards the middle: One Constitution, One Country, One Destiny.  Of course, that was less ironic than it could have been since it was built in 1880, even though its creation was mandated by the Continental Congress in 1781.


Walking around Yorktown reminded me of how much history is embedded in the place.  The Civil War ran over this territory as well with the Peninsula Campaign.  I also realized about 30 years later than I should have known that one of the carriers playing a big role in the early days of the Pacific, including being sunk at Midway, was named after this battlefield.  Duh, Steve.

I then ventured over to the Yorktown Victory center, which, I think, had some civvie reanctors hanging out, in addition to the center's regular personal, so I took a video (which I will try to upload later) that has two teams of artillery folks--regulars and VA militia. 

They didn't seem to know each other well. I learned some history that I should have known--that the US Constitution was the first written constitution?  Really.  I guess so, since the Magna Carta does not count as a constitution (suck it, limeys!).  The words by the renowned scholar Jeffrey Spicoli, PhD resonate louder today:

What Jefferson was saying was, hey we left this England place 'cause it was bogus. So if we don't get some cool rules ourselves pronto, we'll just be bogus too.

One last thing--if you go, definitely take the Colonial Parkway.  The road surface was, what, stone?  Lined by trees until it is along the river/bay.  Just beautiful. 

Ritual 4th Post

And, yes, a chilling scene despite the fact that, as Bob Dole would put it, the average American is dead.

Exceptionally What?

I admit that I have not been paying much attention to the whole "Obama denies American exceptionalism" stuff that has become the meat of GOP messaging.  I discounted it because I think it was utter crap, but that does not stop it from becoming covered and repeated and rinsed.  Richard Cohen has a pretty good take on it at the Washington Post. He notes the origins that focused on the opposition to socialism among the working class in the US, distinguishing the US from Europe.  He goes on to argue that there is lot that is exceptional about the US (meaning different, not better) such as a high murder rate, and then argues that the right wing is infusing the term with religious overtones:

Therein lies the danger of American exceptionalism. It discourages compromise, for what God has made exceptional, man must not alter. And yet clearly America must change fundamentally or continue to decline. It could begin by junking a phase that reeks of arrogance and discourages compromise. American exceptionalism ought to be called American narcissism. We look perfect only to ourselves.

 Obama upsets these guys for so many reasons, including his recognition that the US is flawed--that we must strive to perfect the Union even if the goal of a perfect Union is never reached. 

What drives me crazy is a different element of the narcissism--that we cannot and should not learn from the experiences of others  One of the things that drives me the craziest about the Canadians is that they only compare their health care system to that of the US, which means that they completely ignore better models elsewhere.  Well, the idea of American exceptionalism implies that the US is so different that we can learn little from elsewhere.  But the US is not the only Presidential system, it is not the only Federal system, it is not the only Great Power to have overextended itself, it is not the only country where immigration is at the center of its history, the US is not the only country to have a winning record when it comes to war (although the post WWII record has put a dent into that), the US is not the only country with a death penalty that is combined with an uneven justice system, and so on.

Yes, there are key differences, such as the US spending way more on defense spending than the remaining major powers combine, that the US military has far more reach than any other, that US consumers (even through this recession) are far more willing to buy foreign goods (which gives the US power), and so on.

But we can and should learn from other countries as the US does not have a monopoly on good ideas about governance, about accountability, about democracy, about regulating markets, etc.  The cry of American exceptionalism is an effort to do two things--return the US to an idealized past that never existed (yes, minorities must have loved the 1950's so much, before the Civil Rights movement, just to name one element) and that we cannot import ideas from elsewhere. 

This is really quite funny since I believe that Locke and the other philosophers who influenced the founders of the US were not from America.  Ooops, the founders were largely not from the US either.  Perhaps that is what American exceptionalism is all about--the acceptance of immigrants not just into the society but into the power structures of the country.*

* But, of course, other countries have immigrants rising high as well, but perhaps not as quickly or as frequently.

Sesquicentennial Celebrations: Happy Civil War Everyone!

Today marks the 150th anniversary of the beginning of the bloodiest war in American history.  It can be called many things: the American Civil War, the War Between the States, the War of Northern Aggression,etc.  But one thing stands out--the right side won.  While folks can claim that the war was not about slavery, but they would be wrong.  The Southerners chose to secede because Abraham Lincoln was elected, and it was not his anti-state's right position that caused such a reaction--it was the key issue of the day that defined the state's rights/federal government's responsibilities debate--slavery.

I am no expert on the Civil War, but we have seen over the past year here and elsewhere posts about the origins of the war that make it mighty clear why there was a war. Of course, individuals chose sides for all kinds of reasons that may or may not have related to the master narrative about slavery, but the war had a very clear outcome, one that the Southerners had fought to prevent: the end of slavery. 

The war did not solve America's race problems nor did it resolve the debate about state's rights (except to rule out secession).  Today, we still have a debate about what is the proper role of the federal government, with Southern states mostly lined up against the federal government.  Red vs. blue does not strictly correlate with Blue and Gray, but it damn near does.  Wouldn't it be cool if we could just not have all of those right wing voters and politicians that skew our political systems?  Sure, secession of the South today would be mighty cool since I no longer live in Texas.  But history is just a bit path dependent.

So, one could ask whether the war was worth it?  Well, that is a neat academic question, but given that there were people living and dying in chains, the question is hardly academic at all.  Sure, it took another hundred years to realize some of the promises made during and after the war (13th, 14th, 15 amendments) via the civil rights acts, the federal government using troops to integrate high schools and universities, the movement led by Martin Luther King Jr. and so on.  And, yes, many African-Americans live behind bars today as our war on drugs has been carried out in a way that is quite unjust.  But it took a great deal of bloodshed to address America's original sin, and slavery is such an abomination that, yes, it was worth it.

We will certainly spend the next four years re-visiting the war, which will provide ample opportunity for revisionists to try to gloss over this very central point.  But the words of past Presidents and the current one about "a more perfect union" have at their core the notion that we started flawed, but not fatally so.  That we overcame slavery, that we overcame much (although not all) oppression due to race, religion, gender, and sexuality, but there is much left to do.  Remembering where we started, how far we got, and what it cost might not be a bad way to spend the next four years.