Will

This is a topic covered by better bloggers than i (say it isn't so!), but with everything going on in Washington and Darth Cheney just back from what was, let's just say, a 'goodwill tour,' it's worth talking about again.

It's the Green Lantern approach to foreign policy. I won't get into the details (the link explains it), but the idea is that limited minds like the Junta see foreign policy in terms of willpower. Like GL's ring, the application of willpower - in this theory - brings victory.

Thus, to beat the North Koreans, we must stare them down and show strength. To win in Iraq, we must stay the course and show increasing willpower or we will lose and be perceived as weak.

Cheney goes on and on in his speeches about how we must not show weakness or take a step back anywhere, because any sign of weakness is, in itself, a victory for our enemies. It's the psychology of unlimited gunboat diplomacy.

And, certainly, gunboat diplomacy has its place in the world. Showing the flag and rattling the sabre are time-honoured traditions. But shows of strength are only one part of a strategic diplomatic effort. Alone, they are utterly ineffective.

You can't fight everybody all the time. What's more, it's wrong to start wars and invade countries unless the existence of your country or an allied country (or an innocent country) are at stake. Remember wrong? It used to be something we were against.

It's impractical, as the ongoing decimation of American military might proves. And it's endlessly self-fulfilling. People like Darth Cheney see the lack of success in Iraq as a loss of will. We lost Vietnam, according to Junta pal Henry Kissinger, because we lost the will to fight.

So, defeat proves their theory. What would victory prove? Right. So you end up with a theory that is right no matter what the outcome.

We used to do diplomacy. We used to be good at it. Now, our ideal "diplomat" is John Bolton, the disgraced former Junta UN Ambassador. Bolton made a career out of ending treaties. Treaties, to them, are a waste of time. They're just paper that suggests that certain behaviour happen or not happen.

What's revealing about that is what is usually revealing about these doorknobs. That is, the motives that the assign to others are simply their own motives reflected back. The Junta doesn't believe in treaties because it doesn't believe in following treaties.

If they want to make Anti-Ballistic Missiles, they're going to do it (and they are doing it). Forget the ABM treaty that helped us live through the Cold War. If they want to invade somebody, they're going to go do it - no peace treaty means anything to them.

So when other countries agree to things, it is - to them - just paper. They believe that all countries will break all treaties the moment that it's inconvenient to keep them.

And that's true - in an utterly lawless world. But in the world of diplomacy that the United States shaped after WWII, that was completely not the case. World order - particularly in the bi-polar world of the Cold War - was a reality. There were massive consequences to reneging on a promise - even for the US.

But in the no-holds-barred WWE world that Bolton and the neocons are forming, there is no international order. Countries act on their immediate self-interest, and nothing else. Just as the US does. With a law-abiding US no longer an example to the world, we have created a chaotic void where countries are justified in acting out their immediate short-term interests.

There are no longer consequences to bad acts. There is no longer a valid world order to enforce proper behaviour.

Neocons looked at a world that was increasingly peaceful and saw nothing but threats. Their paranoia has become our foreign policy, and they've succeeded in creating the nightmare that they feared most.

And that newly created nightmare is exactly their justification for more violence and war.