Reflections on Love and Fear, Hearts and Minds

The strategic relationship between love and fear has never been more apparent than in the current U.S. campaign to win the hearts and minds of Iraqis. The idea is a noble one: Provide peace and security through force while simultaneously robbing the insurgency of even the desire to level an attack against either the U.S. forces or the goals they are trying to achieve. Yet, history has shown that the success of any such strategy by one sovereign nation occupying another has been tepid, at best, unless the conquerors first completely subjugated the enemy nation by making it too painful to resist by force. Today, measures needed to eviscerate resistance are considered “draconian,” but it still remains the most effective way to quell insurgency within a population. On the other hand, it is also necessary to remain just, for utilizing the weight of military might indiscriminately will only breed hatred, and success will only last as long as the occupying power has the will and resources to continue occupation. To truly inspire a just society that both fears and loves the government, military, or people that invaded their land, a wise nation will be fierce in targeting rebellious groups initially, but will get out of the way as soon as possible. It is a strategy that is only partly being implemented in Iraq, as the U.S. is trying desperately to get out of the way, but is taking half-measures in targeting the rebellious groups in order to gain their favor. However, their favor can only be gained if the insurgency is defeated utterly. Even though the quality of a strategy that focuses on one nation in a regional struggle can be legitimately questioned, it is useful to examine the strategy on its merits while granting its assumptions.

Alexander is called "The Great" out of admiration for the span of his empire. His was among the very first "Hearts and Minds" campaigns in the history of the world; it certainly experienced some of the earliest successes. As Alexander overcame each civilization, he would adopt some of their habits and absorb some of their cultures. This helped ease the pain for his conquests, but some of his own people resented the integration of cultures, and a select few of them eventually made Alexander pay. It should be noted that Alexander would have never had success with the "Hearts" campaign, had he not subjugated their minds first.

On the other hand, Attila the Hun made few friends in his conquests of the Holy Roman Empire (and everything else he conquered or pillaged), and the rule of his subjects depended entirely on his ability to wield the might of his hordes at the slightest provocation. While many provinces were forced to pay tribute to Attila over the years or risk being sacked, they only did so out of fear for their own survival--not out of any amiability for the Huns. While tradition holds that Attila died by drowning in his own drunken nosebleed (if I had a dime every time that happened…) recent studies suggest that he may have been assassinated.

Similarly, Dresden, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki were clearly about forcing capitulation out of fear of destruction, but the victorious nations in World War II later embarked on a long campaign to rebuild both Germany and Japan, where General Douglas MacArthur famously called for immediate charity to ward off future wars. Importantly, rebuilding could not have been initiated until those nations were first docile and under control. Neither Germany nor Japan was encouraged to abandon their cultural uniqueness—a demand that would have likely bred hatred—but they were forced to abandon some of their political traditions.

In Vietnam, the quest to win the hearts of one group of people was sought at the same time as the quest to destroy their brethren. This campaign met with very limited success. After peace was made between the U.S. and North Vietnam, the U.S. withdrew from the country, and the North easily defeated South Vietnam. The U.S. had to relocate thousands of friendly and peaceful exiles, whose hearts the U.S. had apparently won in defeat. The enemy, it seems, still did not fear the U.S.

Fear is an important tool of instruction; it is central to providing meaningful security. Any time people are fearless enough to raise arms against the occupying power, they do not possess the requisite fear to facilitate a secure state. The ruling authority must always seek to respond to crimes that have already been committed, when security requires the criminals be too fearful to commit any crimes. The administration of true justice prevents fear from becoming hatred. Beyond the mere administration of true justice, the people must also perceive the conquerors just if the conquerors wish to achieve some measure of docility.

There are only a few circumstances that would engender love in the conquered for the conquerors. However, love is more likely to be given if the third party does not conquer at all, but only aids in the overthrow of a despotic regime. For awhile, France was viewed quite favorably in the U.S. after the Revolutionary War, even in many influential circles up through the Reign of Terror and Napoleon's rule. But France didn't conquer the U.S.; that country just aided the U.S. in doing what its people wanted to do anyway. Key to the success of the intervention is that the U.S. was left free to govern itself, and its people were worthy of self-government.

They, for instance, protected the ability to acquire, possess, and accumulate property. This is difficult to impose on any people more inclined to desire government intervention and centrally controlled economies, as in countries ruled by autocratic despots. Apathy, in spite of its poor reputation, is useful, since it implies society’s other needs are met. Apathy means people are concerned with their day-to-day affairs, and are not concerned with who is ruling them. Paradoxically, this also means the ruling power can get away with more, which makes it all the more important for honest people to be running the government, as distrust and dissatisfaction sow the seeds of revolution. Apathetic people do not raise arms against their own government.

At least initially, it is important for people to have some semblance of control over the affairs closest to them. Therefore, very little should be centrally controlled in a large, diversely populated country. The model should be the original Constitution for the United States of America, where the powers granted to the federal government were finite and limited, and the powers granted to the states were infinite and unlimited. A bill of rights, while its perceived value is understandable, is not as important as a strict bill of specific powers. Leave all else to the provinces or the people, where the play a larger role in their respective spheres of influence, even if this means that certain standards do not mirror those of the West. Occupying power may grant lots of food in the short term, but these donations must cease as soon as possible to discourage unnatural dependence.

Only after a period of time that people adhere to the dictates of justice, unhampered by unnecessary and overbearing government intrusion will they begin to trust the government that rules over them, and thus will they subscribe to the necessity and legitimacy of the law. By the time this occurs, the occupying power will be long gone. It is doubtful that in the post-colonization age, an occupied country will trust its occupiers to rule over them perpetually. If embarking on a quest that will lead to occupation, peace can only be won by securing the minds before trying to capture the hearts of the populace. Retribution for revolt must be swift, painful, and public. Coverage of the event must be decidedly favorable to sway public opinion. Therefore, clandestine operations to suppress unfavorable media must be authorized in the short term—say—the first five to ten years.

When occupying a foreign nation, administering swift justice and enforcing order, overtures of peace from rival factions must be accepted in good faith. To facilitate the acceptance of peaceful means to solve grievances, the ruling power must welcome serious representatives of amity into the fold quickly and completely. Once their character has been vetted, their leadership within their communities can and should be promoted to engender trust in the system, if not the ruling power. As soon as security is established, troops are trained, and the new government is in good standing, the foreign power must leave the theater of operations to function in a remote area within the country. To ensure the continuation of the process, they may accept assignments to ward off foreign threats, but not local brigands. An armed population can ward off such threats, and they will grow tired of the behavior of insurgents and terrorists sooner rather than later, if they have the means at their disposal to combat it.

However, none of this is possible if the militant or terrorist factions are not first utterly subjected to the ruling power.

The EU and the Consent of the Governed

In the course of recorded history, Europe has been a nation in conflict with itself. Home to twenty official languages and many cultures and social philosophies, achieving political harmony is a daunting and continuing task. However, the elements of a desire to be free from war and destitution and competition from the economic behemoth, the United States, have encouraged cooperation and collaboration never before imagined in Europe. Still, the fruit of that cooperation, the European Union (EU), is something of a paradox to conventional free-market libertarians. The economies of scale and lower trade restrictions that would be promoted by such free-market advocates is counterbalanced by the intentional and necessary surrender of national sovereignty to the regional political body. The distrust and differences of opinion that characterized Europe for centuries are not easily overcome, and like all political bodies, there is no guarantee that any solution obtained under the rules of the organization will result in the best possible conclusion. However, if nothing else, the new political ties that bind most of Europe appear to promote economic and political stability. By accomplishing this, businesses within the region and throughout the world can more safely invest their capital in member countries and, by doing so, promote the economic and social improvement of the citizens of those countries—as well as the financial success of the corporations themselves. Even so, the EU should not become blinded by its success. The fall of the Soviet Union provided the alliance with new member states and candidates, but failing to learn the lessons of the struggle against centrally controlled economies may doom it to become indistinguishable from the failed system it opposed for the better part of the last century.

Europe is comprised of many nations that, together, have been the hotbed of many violent and nonviolent disputes throughout the course of recorded history. Before the two world wars of the twentieth century, Europe provided the staging grounds for not only international conflicts such as the Punic Wars, the Hundred Years’ War, the Thirty Years’ War, and the Napoleonic Wars, but also internal revolutions in countries such as England and France that set the stage for other conflicts that included the Americas. As European powers realized the difficulty in achieving domination over outside territories and the fruitlessness of the failure of those efforts, they gradually adopted a general policy of conflict avoidance and maintenance of the political status quo among the territories within Europe. In the meantime, the United States was in a position, being far removed from such political struggles, to adopt a stance of neutrality towards the warring powers in Europe. Neutrality worked very well for United States, and partially because it faced no major external threat to its sovereignty and partially because of its libertarian economic and political ideals, it was able to build a vast industrial and military empire that was able to compete with, as its eventual participation in both world wars demonstrated, the very European powers that spawned its political prowess. In fact, the United States eventually displaced every individual European power in economic capacity.

After the Second World War, much of Europe was in ruins. An effort to reconstruct Europe was put into effect, and a system of open communications and collaborative debate was instituted through the UN to help avoid future international conflicts. Additionally, a network of European nations sought and achieved economic cooperation on the grounds that governments would be less likely to attack a country if the financial success of its citizens were dependent on the willing cooperation of that nation. To facilitate that cooperation, several nations adopted a collection of treaties that eventually came to be known as the European Union. The principles that formed this union are based in principles that most free-market advocates would request. They include the freedom to move people, capital, goods, and services among member nations, which would presumably reduce the cost of living and improve the quality of life of the inhabitants of member nations. Other nations could benefit from such an alliance as well. Instead of adopting the expense of sending delegations to each member nation in order to facilitate trade agreements, countries would need to send a single delegation. Once the Euro was adopted as an official currency of trade in 1999, outside countries could do business with the EU—including through direct foreign investments—with a reasonable faith that the currency would remain stable, and could thus assume less political and currency risk.

The drawback to such consolidation is the surrender of sovereignty that member countries must permit in order to achieve such financial heights and economies of scale. No longer can peoples ask their direct representatives to unilaterally protect particular industries within their countries against what they might consider unfair business or economic practices of international corporations or the countries from which they came. Such decisions to withdraw favorable trade policies are subject to the negotiation authority and approval of the august European body. Additionally, all EU members are expected to promote a particular social agenda that has included the abolition of the death penalty and the promotion of abortion clinics—not only in member nations, but across the globe. The danger in promoting any social policy is in adopting and being forced to continue bad policy because of a persistent economic interest if and when social norms change. In theory, the EU could always change its rules as cultural values change, but it does not account for changes in values of particular countries in spite of the binding effect of the EU agreements. Consequently, member countries whose peoples’ consciences cannot countenance the proliferation of certain values would be forced to support those values if it wanted to remain a member and retain the economic benefits of the EU. People who would be inclined to do so may use this knowledge to blackmail member countries into accepting unpalatable demands of the union. Consequently, the surrender of such sovereignty forces nations to choose between two or more undesirable outcomes, and thus dilutes the countries’ capacity to create and live under laws of their own choosing. Even though this ideological paradox would otherwise disqualify every nation from joining the democracy-promoting body, thus far they have been able to achieve a measure of economic and social success.

The first success of the European Union must be measured by the evident lack of major armed conflicts occurring in Europe since implementation of the various treaties that established the international economic cooperation. While a causal relationship cannot be proved, the fact that Eastern European countries that were formerly part of the Soviet bloc during the Cold War are seeking membership in the EU seems to indicate that all countries—even former enemies and developing nations—believe that there is more to be gained from cooperation than can be achieved through irrational paranoia and military conquest. Wars and the threat of wars, after all, require the attention of the inhabitants of the participant nations at the expense of other industries. Additionally, countries formerly operating under a system of centralized control are now developing market-oriented systems that will enable them entry into the EU. Although every nation is not there yet, the EU has touted not only the economic improvement of these nations, but also the quality of entire categories of essential products—such as agriculture—due to the cooperation made possible by the EU. As a result, consumable products will be made safer and, with the speed and ease at which they can be transported under the formal arrangement, available to a demanding public. The same holds true for any number of industries throughout Europe.

In a continent torn asunder by conquest, political uncertainty, and economic volatility, the European Union has exceeded the expectations of many casual observers. The premise for this skepticism might be explained by the public’s disbelief that the end to the Soviet empire was even a remote possibility. The color of war prevents grand economic cooperation because everyone is looked upon with rightful suspicion. As a result of the attention that must be paid to warding off possible attacks, little attention can be dedicated to anything else. It can be said with reasonable certainty today that Soviet communism was a flawed system that was due to fail as a result of its flaws. However, that certainty is derived only from hindsight. It is easy to forget that throughout the twentieth century, many nations either fell to the Soviet empire or had sufficient reason to fear that their countries would. If they were not being threatened by the Soviet Union’s military might, they were being threatened by willing accomplices in their own countries who embraced the Soviet empire’s ideals of centralized controls, forced redistribution of wealth, and separation of governance. While reflecting on this recent history, it would be wise for the member nations of the European Union to pay heed to the threat of centralized control and degrees of separation between the ruling and the ruled. Reduced trade barriers may be universally good, but it is unsustainable if the governed are not given adequate choices regarding their maintenance. Instability, thus, is less likely to result from war between the nations of the EU, but through internal revolution meant to restore the perceived or actual loss of sovereignty to a political body that does not represent the will of the governed.

General Thoughts on National Defense and Liberty

The world is entirely different. It’s so hard to remember what it was like before September 11, 2001. I vividly remember that day. I was considering a change of careers to sell individual retirement accounts and mutual funds, so I scheduled some time off of my day job to get fingerprinted at the local police station. Little did I know what was about to happen to the financial center of America.

My boss, Jim, came in as I was going to speak with my friend and prayer partner, George. He asked me if I’d heard “about the airliner plane that flew into one of the Twin Towers in New York City, and a few minutes later another one came in right after it.” The notion was so preposterous that I somehow made myself hear him say, “Did you hear the one about the airliner plane...”

Jim wasn’t one to tell tasteless jokes, but he did have a dry wit, and his immediate demeanor was just as calm as always, which just added to my confusion. Willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, I waited for him to continue, but he neither smiled nor elaborated. He just stood there as if waiting for some sort of confirmation that I heard and understood the news he just delivered. In the next moment, a million thoughts scattered throughout my head. The implication would be that America was under attack, and I thought no one could be that daring. No one could be that stupid. It had to be a joke.

It wasn’t that terrorism was far from my mind. The day before, I finished a difficult essay had been writing since the execution of Timothy McVeigh earlier in the summer. In the essay, I postulated that America was too powerful to be harmed by conventional means, and that the next big enemy would be terrorists due to the combination of America’s might and pervasiveness. Where a conventional army would fail, terrorists could strike at any time, because not everything could be given equal protection. They can prioritize targets based on the level of protection it is given, and by definition, they give a high priority to civilian targets.

I didn’t guess that it would happen so soon. Being an avid reader of current events, and having read about the USS Cole strike when it occurred, I probably had read about Al Queda at some point. However, when in the coming days we were told how these monsters had planned this atrocity and believed themselves justified in doing it, I did not remember having previously heard or read the name.

I don’t know if anyone had any delusions of accomplishing any actual work that day, because they would have had to pry us from the radios and television set in order to get us to do it. After running around, crying and praying in private, finally settling down and figuring out that, as terrible as this moment was and as little as we know about who the attackers were, armageddon was not underway, I excused myself and preemptively abided by President Bush’s advice to “go about” my life. I was at the police station getting fingerprinted when the first tower fell. Wanting to simultaneously remember every moment and get the day over with at the same time, I understood that, whatever happens, somebody would have to get up in the morning tomorrow. Somebody would have to get the work done tomorrow. Somebody would have to live tomorrow. And it would be twice as hard as it was today. Armageddon wasn’t here. At least not that day. But September 11, 2001 marked a crossroads for America and the world. Momentum alone would have moved us past the intersection at which we found ourselves, so staying put was not an option. We were forced to choose a path, but what our appearance would be upon our arrival at the final destination remained a mystery.

Over the next few weeks, as we sorted out the fact from fiction, we were subjected to some truly inspirational stories of hope. Willful defiance of our enemies was displayed over the trees and fields of Pennsylvania, flags were raised, battle plans were drawn, and a spirit of unity erupted unlike any seen in America for decades. Could at be that a Great Awakening was about to occur?

***
As the mountain peaks eventually erode to hills and valleys, so did the passage of time do the unity and outrage that were engendered by this sickening act of terror. Lines were drawn in the sand, alright, but we divided our attention between the actual enemies abroad and the political enemies at home. In the meantime, we paradoxically called for our government to do more to secure us as well as respect our personal space and privacy to an impossibly unreasonable degree. When our government did act, it was done with the support of an overwhelming majority of people and politicians. Over time, the support for the action we demanded eroded until the nation became as it was right before the attack happened. Split. Right down the center.

It didn’t occur to most of us that we were all taking a wrong or incomplete approach. We were exampled with the right form only recently, but we were so caught up with the idea that wars are fought by governments through their militaries, we forgot that, when a terrorist takes a docile civillian as his preferred target, it is utterly impossible to surround every unarmed civilian with an armed guard. The answer is to follow in the path of Todd Beamer and the other passengers of Flight 93. We must be strong, as they were. We must become something more than the terrorists expect, more than they can defeat, more than they can handle, and we need to make them believe it, too, so they can see the fruitlessness of their efforts and the impossibility of their endeavors.

For terrorists prey on the weak and unprotected. They do not profit from attacking positions of strength. It follows, then, that it is necessary to be neither weak nor unprotected, and since it is impossible to station a personal bodyguard with every person (and who would want that anyway?), we must protect ourselves, and we must protect each other. We must fight back, or else we will be bankrupt by our government’s futile attempt to protect everything for us.

Half of the equation is being fulfilled. We are taking the fight to the heart of the enemy, so that they are too preoccupied to fight us here. Iraq and Afghanistan are two important fronts in this struggle from a strategic standpoint. However, the attacks in London and Madrid have shown that this strategy only works up to a point. The age-old question is how to deter a fanatical terrorist--who seeks his own death--from attacking without giving the enemy more tools to generate new recruits.

On one hand, we want the enemy to fear us, but on the other hand, we do not want them to hate us. However, when a choice must be made between attempting to inspire love and attempting to incite fear, it is more effective to cause fear. This works on a personal level, too, because the enemy is afraid to attack anything that is not weak. Thus, if there are no weak points to attack--if we are all united against them in the protection of each other and in defense of true justice, then they shall not have the will to fight us. In order to defend justice, an accord must be reached on its meaning, for even the terrorists believe themselves to be just. It is important to note that belief in any one thing does not make it so. Instead, justice must be ascertained as stringently consistent with a universal good, such as the virtue of rightly ordered freedom. This freedom is not defined as the complete absence of government coersion, for coercion can be used in defense of freedom against those who would rob others of their state of peace or of their natural property, such as their lives and the fruits of their labor. Enforcing properly enacted, scrupilously targeted laws against terrorism is a form of coersion, but it is coersion consistent with the protection and maintenance of a justly lived freedom.