tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post116880470410669132..comments2024-03-26T05:18:53.709-04:00Comments on Pen and Sword: "Glittering Joe" Lieberman on IraqJeff Huberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14146644937683409726noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-1168929797171794002007-01-16T01:43:00.000-05:002007-01-16T01:43:00.000-05:00Jeff,I was reading on Wikipedia about Sun Tzu's Ar...Jeff,<BR/><BR/>I was reading on Wikipedia about Sun Tzu's <I>Art of War</I> and I was surprised to learn (if I read correctly) that this title is a translator's conceit. The literal Chinese title is simply "Sun Tzu's Military Strategy." I think of military people as serious-minded, quit distinct from the 19th-20th century notion of "artist." Why should the false title have stuck to such an important book about strategy? Is war really art? Does it make to sense to think of that way? Might some people (perhaps those responsible) be thinking of the Iraq war as some grand-scale performance art (perhaps with an unanticipated degree of Jackson Pollock thrown in)? Or, is the "art" of war a meaningless metaphor?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-1168824255898613052007-01-14T20:24:00.000-05:002007-01-14T20:24:00.000-05:00It may be worth noting that those who dream of Wor...It may be worth noting that those who dream of World War IV often don't talk too loudly about the accommodations that were reached at the end of World War II. The Nazi Party as a party certainly was annihilated, but the West Germans and the Japanese both realized they were way better off playing ball as good Cold Warriors than answering to Uncle Joe, Europe's other esteemed genocidal dictator.<BR/><BR/>The stay behind organizations were wrapped up, the dregs of the dregs hung, Gehlen and von Braun and the like changed uniforms, the Rat Lines to South America were opened, and prosecutors knew that their longevity could correlate with not asking too many awkward questions. The ODESSA network did exist. Patton and Churchill wanted to reactivate the Wehrmacht and motor on to Vladivostok. <BR/><BR/>I haven't read enough to reach a definitive judgment, but it does seem as if the plans to change Iraq were vastly more ambitious than those in Germany, where the Germans needed Uncle Sam much more than the Iraqis did, and shared a cultural heritage. Compare how the allies re-instituted the pre-Nazi flag, whereas the CPA imposed a brand new flag reminiscent of that of a country that Iraqis of all ages had been taught, even brain-washed, to see as their main enemy. If such ignorant circles saw the Second World War as a template for the "liberation of Iraq," they seem to have proceeded from an awfully skewed version of the Second World War. As programmers say, garbage in, garbage out. The pity is that we - and the Iraqis - will long pay the cost for this ideologically-driven folly.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-1168817027575410702007-01-14T18:23:00.000-05:002007-01-14T18:23:00.000-05:00Jeff,Just because CK or ST did not imagine these t...Jeff,<BR/><BR/>Just because CK or ST did not imagine these things does not in itself mean anything they said is incorrect. I took your reading of CK to indicate that his analysis still applied: "Clausewitz himself said that "war is the continuation of policy by other means," and no rational entity could consider destruction of the entire planet to be a desired political end state. That, in large part, is why the U.S. labeled the Cold War nuclear strategy as "mutual assured destruction," or "MAD.""Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-1168815933662507192007-01-14T18:05:00.000-05:002007-01-14T18:05:00.000-05:00A great question, KZ, and one that deserves an ent...A great question, KZ, and one that deserves an entire volume of examination. <BR/><BR/>The best answer I can give you for now is the one I alluded to here. Neither CK nor ST imagined a world in which great powers would have weapons capable of destroying the entire planet.Jeff Huberhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14146644937683409726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-1168815588494668172007-01-14T17:59:00.000-05:002007-01-14T17:59:00.000-05:00Jeff,This post contained just what I was looking f...Jeff,<BR/><BR/>This post contained just what I was looking for: "we have learned far more than the older sages were capable of observing, and some of what the giants on whose shoulders we stand has proven incomplete or totally mistaken." I realize it might be off the topic of this post, but I would find it fascinating sometime to read about where you think Clausewitz and Sun Tzu got it wrong -- at least for modern times.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com