Considerations ....
Some random and not-so-random thoughts on the Taiwan situation:
* China is the most compelling interest presented to the public for any military action our CiC chooses to send Americans to Taiwan for.
* In that sense, I think back to the Clinton administration and wonder why we bothered baring our teeth when the Chinese drilled near Taiwan during the latter's election. It seemed as good and pointless a time to rumble with China as any. Instead, Clinton's presidency suffers an "intelligence" meltdown and the Chinese walk away with some important nuclear stuff. As part of our effort in the Balkans, our planes "accidentally" bomb a Chinese embassy .... I'm of the opinion that if we're determined to go to war with China, now would be a better time than in five years when the "stolen" nuke technology is online.
* American military: It seems a Republican president can send troops anywhere he wants to. The conservative faction hailed Poppy Bush for his takedown in Panama and his failed campaign in Iraq. Nobody seems to care that this was just ol' George taking care of business. Both dictators benefitted from George HW Bush; Noriega when Poppy was CIA director, and Saddam Hussein during the Iraqi buildup of the 1980's during their war with Iran. Strangely, however, a Democrat is generally accused of all sorts of low motives when deploying troops. Clinton caught flak for Somalia, which was Poppy Bush's mess left unfinished, and for Haiti--for which I raise a toast to the, uh, Peanut Farmer, as such--which was also Poppy's mess. (It is worth noting that, at the same time that our troops were repatriating Hatian refugees, Senator Ted Kennedy signed his name to a bill that was passed and eventually signed into law by Poppy that allowed the entry of up to 40,000 Irish "war refugees".) And the Balkans? People screaming for action, people screaming for nonintervention; and all of them want "peace". How many presidents ignored that mess? Two, at least? Notwithstanding that we find Aldous Huxley, in 1926 (
Jesting Pilate), musing on conquerors and the conquered, and even then he refers to what we now call ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. In the modern day, if Hitler's ghost stoked the fires once more, we would find ourselves amid a public debate whether this or that president had the moral right to send troops. This is a far cry from our World War II era, when the desire for peace equalled sympathy for the enemy. (See the collection,
Dr Seuss Goes to War, or read periodicals of the day.)
*
Human rights are not exclusive rights of Americans. Of course, a number of things can be said here: That Americans do not enjoy the, uh ... "privilege" ... of human rights at all. This I believe is the practical truth of the present. Look at our Drug War; look at how our Bureau of Indian Affairs looted the tribes for over a half-trillion dollars over the years; speak nothing of the failed Equal Rights Amendment--for what reason did we need the Amendment in the first place if human rights were respected? To the other, and over the plethora of objections against the American idea of human rights,
I assert that it is as much our duty as a nation to respect and demand human rights internationally as it is my duty to stop a violation of those same rights taking place in front of me. (I might remind all that tickling a person is a violation of their human rights according to some international agreement or another--honestly, I think it's part of the Geneva Accords--but that one I let go unless the ticklee is restrained and under the lights and truncheons.)
* Commercial concerns will continue to motivate warfare and human destruction as long as we, the people of the human race--and of the United States of America, especially--consider money more important than human life. What the hell is so important that people have to kill one another? (This includes the aggressors, so self-defense is exempted from that question.)
My well is running dry for the time being ... but it should be noted that one is allowed to shoot a person to death in this country if they ask you for directions. I'm well aware that Americans behave badly, but as the world grows closer and closer together, what reason do we have for carrying out the same farce over and over because we "respect" diversity to the point that it doesn't get addressed until people cannot function properly. After all, Muslim fundamentalists, for instance, are going to have to stop blowing things up every time they don't get their way before the world will give them what they want. I know that sucks, but Israel will never apologize to the Palestinians; the British will never apologize to the Irish; Americans will never apologize to anyone unless it's so far down the road that a former hippie turned president decides it's the right thing to do. On the same note, we Americans need to stop assuming a couple of things as well; above all else, that a penny saved in this world is not an American's right to extort, swindle, or seize; and also that it would be nice if more than our economic concerns were addressed in warfare. Talk of human rights is cheap, in the American case; I don't see those rights seeding and rooting anywhere we've been with our guns.
Taiwan is a pawn in this game; the real focus here is China, whose people have, in my opinion, forfeited any notion of Americans fighting to "liberate" them. They had their chance to make a stand over a decade ago, and let their troops massacre the people who believed they were standing for freedom. I take my hat off to an old man with his grocery bags ... few things leave me speechless, but a still-shot of the most absurdly beautiful stand of dignity still does the trick. (It's a heavy enough image to me that I've never downloaded it.) But the bottom line is that the people seemed to take it as a weeding out, and the international community rushed for the money instead of what we all seem to proclaim is right. That the people have not and will not take their mass stand gives the appearance of endorsement. And any nation that threatens another nation's sovereignty also threatens human rights by the simple spectre of warfare. My take on Taiwan here is that it's eventually going to eat it, from one direction or another, and I'd rather make a stand against such a usurpation than not. If it comes to blood, give them fire. But warfare is merely a signal of surrender: it is too difficult to figure out how to treat people right, thus we give over to the ease of treating them horribly.
When the world wants to do away with national borders, I'm generally for it. Until then, the American "right" to use Taiwan as a stepping stone is limited only by American will, and an international response to Taiwanese objection. I do not proclaim this last as a concept I endorse, but rather as a fact I have observed and extrapolated.
Okay, for real ... I'm finished now. Is that my faithful soapbox I see beneath me?
thanx all,
Tiassa
