War in the Twenty-First Century

Editorial

Thomas P. M. Barnett, author of The Pentagon’s New Map—War and Peace in the Twenty-First Century, is senior strategic researcher and professor at the U.S. Naval War College. He outlined a brief that could guide the Pentagon in the new world after 9/11. Senior military officials cited this brief as the Rosetta Stone for the Bush Administration. His writings were published December 2002 and March 2003 in Esquire, producing invitations to speak at public and private gatherings in Europe and Asia, and e-mailed to generals and diplomats and policy-makers world-wide. He outlined his position in the House of Commons. If you want to understand the present conflict in Iraq, and other places, and know why President Bush does what he does, you will find the answers in this book. It is easy to read, though it is repetitive.

After the death of Communism, there was no major country to fight, which was confusing for the Pentagon. Our generals had planned massive wars for so long that they did not know what to do when there was no major threat. According the Thomas Barnett, war between states is over. The United States is the only major power, the only one with sophisticated equipment for war, able to dominate any country. What is the military responsibility for the United States in this new world?

Our author says the world is divided between a functioning core and a non-integrating gap, and the non-integrating gap is primarily Islam. By a functioning core he refers to economic globalization. Industrialized countries trade with each other without fighting and this cooperation brings peace and prosperity to each country involved. Countries belonging to the non-integrating gap must be brought into the family of nations, which means they have to become trading partners with others. This simple goal demands wisdom, effort, and discipline, but it outlines the direction that must be pursued if we are going to create a better world.

We are the only super-power. The seas belong to us because there is no other comparable navy. The technical precision of our air force can bomb at will any thing we want to bomb, from our home base if necessary, and do it so exactly that only the target will be destroyed. The power of our land forces is beyond any other country. We cannot bring peace with victory, however, only give peace a change to emerge. The Pentagon’s goal is to stamp out those who attempt to disconnect the world, and then bring in others who can persuade local residents to live productively. For the United States, this work will begin with the State Department, but needs help from other countries who share with us a vision of a better, peaceful world.

Some countries in Europe who should help the cause of peace resist what we do. They prefer we spend our money and the blood of our citizens while considering us cultural primitives. They are jealous of our might and think themselves fitter for governance. Their desire for power is childish and as uncivil as the dreadful behavior of Islamic militants.

We pursue a peaceful world because no one else can. We are not imperialistic. We do not dominate other countries, and never have. It is to our glory that we have many patriotic citizens who give not only their money but their blood to make the world a better place. We have been doing this for most of the 20th century and must continue this heroism into the new century. We are not without selfishness, however, because disruption anywhere causes us harm. Oceans do not protect us from barbarism in this new world and neither does economic isolationism. Economic globalization disturbs many and is used by the Left to abuse Bush in the present election, but, without economic globalization, we shall have constant war on a world-wide scale.

 Poor Arabian countries harbor the wild barbarians who cause so much trouble; they are the disconnected, without a future, with most citizens wishing they could live any where but their home country. That is the problem. Their countries have to become active partners with the rest of the world, and we have to help them to do so. Entry into the Middle East was an amazing act of courage by the Bush administration because it entered the hot spot of the world where, if we can be successful, a major portion of the disconnected countries can be brought together.

This entry into the Middle East was an act of sound judgment not sufficiently understood. We moved our base from Saudi Arabia to Qatar, a small peninsula easily defended and removed from radicals. This enables us to better handle Saudi hypocrisy. Saudis pay for attacks upon the rest of the world, including the United States, by using our money to educate their citizens who then commit barbarous attacks. Hopefully, we shall save the supply of oil for the world by getting Iraq into production, negating the power of the Saudis. Iraq has the world’s second largest supply of oil.

The attacks on us by radical Islam are acts of desperation, a confession that Islamic nations are so inferior to the rest of the world that the only alternative is hate. Islam is on the run. Iran is a major problem for the Middle East and the world because a bloody, hateful clerical dictatorship rules with an iron fist. The majority of Iranians detest their leadership—radical clerics who forbid the vote to any save themselves; but Iran cannot continue its dictatorship indefinitely as it must rely on suppression. Turkey is an Islamic state, but the rule is by the secularists who counsel clerics to emphasize decent rather than bloody behavior. This has to be the model for all Islamic countries.

Followers of Islam say their religion is peaceful. So it is, to a point, but it also has a tradition of blood. Mohammed was a peaceful man if you did what he told you, but he might kill you if you did not obey. If he had material needs and saw a caravan that had wealth he did not have, he did not hesitate to conquer and steal. He never claimed to be more than a man but he claimed that his instructions were of God. If he wanted something, no matter what it was, God gave him permission, including getting another woman if he desired her, even if she were a Jew—which was forbidden by his own instructions. Mohammed was a brilliant soldier who aimed to unify Arabia, which he did. Obedience to command was one of his great weapons, which he got by imposing the habit of what he called prayer, amazingly practiced to this day. (At a conference some years ago I met a seemingly intelligent young lady who excused herself so she could go to her room and pray.) Islam means obedience, and this was attained by having all Muslims put their heads on the ground and their bottoms in the air and pledge obedience, supposedly to God but practically to whoever had a point to advance. This habit needs to be broken, or renamed for what it is: a collective act of obedience and submission. This is valuable in armies but not conducive of critical intelligence.

The Christian tradition has reformed itself by repudiating evil in its midst, and so must Islam. We, like the Muslims, have gone to war over theological wrangling, but we have had intellectual traditions in the secular realm that have compelled Christian churches to promote proper behavior, and only proper behavior. Anything beyond that is dismissed or forbidden. By proper behavior is meant what has been approved as such over the centuries and best detailed in the Ten Commandments. Islam must have the same conversion if the world is to have peace. The sovereignty over all citizens of the secular society does not mean there must be a separation of religion from society. This is impossible because behavior habits are religion. If we say we can do without religion it means we can live without standards, and this is nonsense. The need is to prevent clerics from exercising power. Almost without exception they become intolerant and fanatical. Today, sadly, many clerics have become extremely tolerant, the opposite of Islam, and so tolerant they neglect practical standards, which is the proper role of religion.

According to our author the world is divided between those who cooperate with each other and those who are disconnected, and most of the disconnected are Islamic. The disconnected have to be brought to the connected, and this is a matter of economics and personal behavior, or religion. Armies can defeat militants by establishing structured societies that promote freedom and responsibility; victory comes when the conquered are friends. The United States is good at that. We accomplished cooperation in Europe two times in the last century, and we did it in Japan. The world is on the way to becoming civilized, with only a few foolish traditions that need reformation. Our calling is to continue reformation. No other country has the power or the passion for others that is our heritage.     Ω

“The Government is like a baby’s alimentary canal, with a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.”—Ronald Reagan