Category: Politics

A violent mob attacks a US government building, seizes and occupies it, and attempts to incite a larger revolt. Order is only restored after violence resulting in the deaths of several of the attackers. The press, local and national, provides immediate coverage of a national sensation, calling the attack an “insurrection”, “rebellion,” or “treason.” The surviving attackers are put on trial. Some media relentlessly hype the story, assessing the profound implications of the attack, how things have permanently changed, that some people can no longer be trusted in any way, that there is no way to compromise with evil.

January 6th, 2021? Nope. October 16th, 1859. The attack is now known as John Brown’s Raid on the federal armory in Harper’s Ferry, Virginia. The parallels are frightening, but instructive. No one called it a raid at the time: that was a convention which only happened after the Union won the civil war. It was an insurrection or treason, and those who engaged in it were so charged and executed. The raucous press came from the technological wonders of the telegraph, just then becoming the means of instantaneous communication. The obsessive media coverage was in the South, which not only viewed the attack as the last straw, but used it to further inflame popular opinion. John Brown’s intent to incite a nation-wide slave revolt struck deeply at the fears of Southern plantation life, where hundreds of such revolts (large and small) had created an atmosphere of panic which only needed a small nudge to disunion.

As a spark along the lines of John Brown’s raid, January 6th pales in comparison. Yes, it was ugly, a stain on our nation’s record, and totally unnecessary. But the proximate cause of our next civil war? Sorry, no. For a moment, let’s consider the counterfactual case: this was the spark, it does lead to civil war. What would that look like? Let’s start with some data, shall we?

This graphic shows how the US voted, county by county, in the 2020 election.

The traditional analysis of this data is the US is a “sea of red” areas with little population surrounding isolated blue city-states. One could imagine a contiguous Red-state region comprising the south, midwest, and mountain states, with blue territory in the DC-Boston corridor, the Pacific Northwest, and Arizona/New Mexico. But such a configuration is more illusory than real. Illinois is a blue state; the area east of the Cascade mountains is quite red. Urban areas across the South are big and blue. There are areas where one can never run into a person of a different political perspective (think Roberts County, Texas, or San Francisco), and Americans are increasingly moving to places which align with their political views, but that doesn’t (yet) make either side a coherent nation when looking at the state level. Which means a Second American Civil War would not be an organized one with armies marching on Capitals, but a disorganized one, pitting armed groups against one another. Less Gettysburg, more like Bleeding Kansas.

Where food is produced (green for crops, orange for herds):

There is an obvious advantage to the wide-open red spaces in that that is where much (but not all!) of the food is produced. The longer the disunited battles go on, the more important the need for food. Sieges and starvation are huge weapons to be wielded under such circumstances. However, the other side of the coin is transportation:

It goes without saying that all forms of transport (and communication) go through urban hubs. So while red areas may produce the food, they will find it difficult to share it, and even more difficult to communicate. To borrow a military term, blue city states may have “interior lines of communication” which give them a natural advantage against larger red areas.

Speaking of forces here are the US Armed Forces totals, 2020:

But where do these service members come from?

I have seen some pundits smirking that whoever tries to start a civil war will be no match for the US military. That is true of course, but neither were the Mujaheddin. The US military was totally unprepared to pacify a small place like Iraq, let alone red or blue America. Occupation and pacification is manpower intensive, and the US military simply “does not have the dudes” as my boss used to say. On top of that, more of those in uniform come from red areas, and while some would honor their oath to the Constitution, others would interpret it differently (same as it ever was). The US military would be riven by the same divisiveness as the rest of the country.

Speaking of weapons, here is a 2020 breakdown on the twenty states with the largest registered gun totals:

The key word above is registered. Only 6 million of the 390 million firearms in the US are registered (according to the Pew Research Center). Read that again. And the vast majority of these weapons are in red hands, in red areas.

So where does the data lead us? We have to make two assumptions here. Which side is provoking the action, and which side is trying to be “left alone” rather than dictate to the other side. I think it is fair to argue red America would be more likely to provoke, but also is more likely to want to be left alone. These are arguable assumptions, but we need to make them to push the analysis forward.

After the “spark,” one would see declarations by various states and areas denying federal control or jurisdiction. Local militias set up roadblocks or engage in raids to seize key infrastructure or to terrorize adjacent population centers. Some rural, red areas would sit out the conflict, either siding with their blue state government (Illinois? New York?) or just passively watching and waiting. Likewise, some major urban areas in the south would choose to go with the red flow. Some deep red areas would barely notice a change: a farmer in Iowa might wonder what all the fuss was about?

Blue citizens in the cities would feel a pinch first. Things like water supplies, power generation, even airports are far enough from urban centers to be at risk of occupation. Of course everyone would notice the stoppage of the free flow of goods and people: something far more drastic and uncertain than anything during the pandemic or even 9-11. One real wild card is information flow in this information age. Blue America would hold an advantage here, with an early monopoly on broadcast and social media. But, it is hard to deny broad area access to the internet for extended periods of time. More likely, information access would be a bargaining chip played against other essentials (water or power, for example).

All this happens as a million scores are settled across the land. Red Americans living in the cities will uproot and flee just as rural or suburban blue Americans do the same when violence, or just the threat of violence, beckons. America is a country with a high tolerance for violence, and a second civil war would challenge the upper limit. The absence of pitched battles does not mean the absence of large numbers of casualties.

Both sides would be exhausted within months. Assuming red America just wants to be left alone, there is no need for storming the Hudson river bridges and occupying Wall Street (literally). Blue America would fairly quickly realize there is no way to force red America to capitulate, and where is Idaho, anyway? Negotiations begin, and some of the more moderate people on both sides would question whether the fighting was really worth it. There is no simple geographical resolution, no two-state solution, as the fighting would have made clear. Who gets the nukes? Who gets the federal debt? The infrastructure was unified and can’t be apportioned. How does the place formerly known as America begin to function again?

I bet the daunting nature of the challenges, the horror at the damages inflicted, and the dim prospects for the future would serve to further a tacit re-integration of the United States of America. The peace process would probably include a constitutional convention to address the root causes and prevent a relapse. Some state boundaries would be re-aligned, and states would acquire more authority over theirs laws and resources, to the cost of the federal government. Red states would use this new authority to cement certain cherished conservative positions (e.g., guns, abortion, voter fraud) and blue states would do the obverse. Blue states would seek to limit resources transfers (via the federal government) to red states. If federal authority is lessened, the US might end up with a weakened President and Executive Branch, a single (unicameral) legislature with a mixed representation by state and perhaps other groups, and a more limited Supreme Court. Deep scars would remain, and the re-United States would need a legal remedy to address the war crimes, expropriations, and other calamities.

In this analysis, red and blue America waste countless lives and treasure to end up back where they started, only greatly reduced and with an enforced national commitment to be civil again. Hardly the stuff of patriot dreams. This is only one hypothetical analysis, but the data provided earlier has real and strong implications. It doesn’t require the gift of foresight to know widespread violence rarely leads to a better life. The common folk, red and blue, know this. Southern newspapers inflamed their readers after Harper’s Ferry, so much so that the South began secession before Lincoln even took office! When you hear talk of another civil war today, ask yourself, “are they trying to prevent it, or foment it?”

Much of the recent focus on the possibility of another American Civil War stems from the coverage of the anniversary of the January 6th attack on the US Capitol. I made the case in the last post that this focus on a potential spark misses the point: we aren’t ready for a spark. But what might push the red and blue extremes to make the psychic break that violence is necessary, and therefor create the conditions for a future spark and conflagration?

The key question is how much respect there is–on either side–for the system of government.

During the first civil war, Lincoln famously made the conflict all about the Union, that is, the system which bound the states together.

If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.

Abraham Lincoln in a letter to Horace Greeley

While Lincoln later ennobled the effort to save the Union by including emancipation, his initial impulse was telling: the American system was worth saving at any cost.

The Confederacy also paid mock tribute from their side, borrowing much language from the US Constitution and making the argument that the issue was state’s rights, not slavery (a red herring, but the attempt shows how important was the need to justify the conflict in terms of the existing governmental system.).

Today there is ample evidence for conern that both sides show fundamental distrust for the American system.

How are our norms holding up? It is easy to point out Team Trump’s “deep state” conspiracy, and Trump himself was to political decorum what Genghis Khan was to the law of war. Now President Biden has called the other side traitors favoring a return to Jim Crow. Senator McConnell famously fiddled with US Supreme Court vacancies, making up new traditions as he went. Majority Leader Schumer is calling to ease the filibuster (he might want to whisper in the ear of the late Harry Reid as he lies in state in the US Capitol, and ask how that might work out the next time Republicans are in control of the Senate). For forty years Republican Presidents found their Supreme Court Justices never quite worked out the way they intended; now Democrats insist the court must be term-limited, expanded, or otherwise neutered to the left’s taste. Don’t even mention the electoral college: I don’t blame the average American for not knowing why we have one, or what purpose it serves. And the constant refrain of “American Democracy” has had the predictable effect of leading people to wonder why the popular vote is irrelevant. All of which is to say, yes, our norms are up for debate by both sides, with neither side seeming to understand that if the rules of the games are gone, we are about to engage in political Calvin Ball.

Well, at least we have legitimate elections, right?

Again, Trump’s nascent 2024 campaign seems to be predicated on discredited theories about voter fraud in the 2020 result. And various GOP state parties are trying to amend state election rules to permit political officials to overrule vote counts. But then don’t forget all those who claim the Supreme Court “stole” the 2000 election (they didn’t, according to the NY Times AND the Washington Post), or that the Russians engineered Trump’s 2016 victory because he was their Manchurian Candidate (he wasn’t, and the Steele dossier was garbage). Stacey Abrams claims she lost the 2018 Georgia Governor’s race due to voter suppression in an election where Georgia registered the greatest increase in average voter participation of any state in thirty years. And now Republicans are banking on rolling back more liberal voting rules introduced for the pandemic, and Democrats are calling it Jim Crow 2.0. Except for one small point. There is no evidence greater turnout favors Democrats or hurts Republicans. There is also very little evidence easy registration, drop boxes, early voting rules, absentee ballots or voter identification laws affect voter turnout. Both sides are posturing about this, and calling into question every election at every level of government. If elections are only legitimate when your sides wins, you have a problem.

What about the ability of the American system to force compromise? That too hangs in the balance. Both sides agree the Electoral Act of 1887 needs to be updated to rule out the type of shenanigans Trump’s lawyers peddled about the electoral count. Yet the Democrats haven’t moved on it. Republicans won’t support any form of lifting the debt limit. The Congress passed the infrastructure bill with bipartisan support, but the Democrats insist on stuffing the Build Back Better bill with items even all the Democrats can’t agree on. Both sides and both Houses are set to pass a budget resolution, but mostly because it will reinstate earmarks (designated pork for one’s constituents). I guess that is some hope: Congress can still agree on bacon.

If you’ve read this far, you may be wondering how I come to the conclusion that we’re not ready for a spark. Our norms are under attack, elections results are questioned, our legislature gridlocked. That’s not a pretty picture, but both sides are still fighting within the system. I don’t think the system is healthy right now; I do think that if either side continues to over-react by challenging the system itself, we will set the stage for eventual violence.

What that may look like I’ll consider in part III.

A Canadian academic warns that Canada needs to be prepared for the break-up of it southern neighbor. American academics are far beyond that, warning the nation is on the brink of falling into authoritarianism. US General Officers warn the US military is not prepared for–but should be prepared to suppress– insurrection. President Biden likened the January 6th, 2021, riot to an insurrection (a “knife at the throat of our democracy”), and many more commentators called it the first shot in an increasingly violent political battle. A recent poll found one-third of Americans believe it may be necessary (under some circumstances) to take violent action against the federal government!

I agree we live in volatile times, bordering on the violent. The increasing number of road rage incidents and other violent crimes, and the general state of discourse on social media all confirm it. People are on edge, that is unarguable. But civil war?

I’ll take a few blog posts to talk through why civil wars happen, how they happen, and even consider what another American civil war would look like. To begin, I don’t think a civil war is particularly likely. Too much is made of recent history like the January 6th attack on the Capitol, and not enough attention is paid to deeper trends which are much more important.

First off, why do civil wars happen? They are not accidents of history; they require certain fundamental precedents, much like a wildfire requires a dry spell and under-brush. The most fundamental requirement is deep-seated resentment. Groups have to fear one another, loathe one another, separate from one another, and finally hate one another. The reason is immaterial: the attitude is all important.

Next, for cause, there is the absolute necessity for either side to decide there is no way out except through fighting. This is the realization that despite all the pain and suffering envisioned, the only choice is war. This hurdle is the most difficult to surmount. People understand that civil war brings immense uncertainty to their lives, so they don’t undertake it lightly. If there is an alternative, they will usually choose it.

Finally, the resentment and resignation (to fight), like a wildfire, needs a spark. Something happens which crystallizes the thinking of one side or the other: Things will not get better. Mind you, you may need more than one spark. Leading up to the American Civil War, there were crises over Missouri, Kansas, Texas, California, the Supreme Court ruling on the Fugitive Slave Act (Ableman v. Booth), John Brown’s raid, and finally the election of 1860. Ernest Hemingway’s famous comment about how bankruptcy occurs applies here: “Slowly, and then suddenly.”

So where does the United States stand today against these criteria? We certainly have deep-seated resentments among the polar ends of the political spectrum. Progressives and Trumpsters have nothing but venom for one another, and those of us in the middle often get lumped in with one side or the other for any attempt to provide balance or perspective. While most Americans fall somewhere in between the political extremes, the activists on either side–and the media on either side–work hard to divide. At this they are succeeding.

Has either side decided there is no way out except for fighting? No, but the trends are not good. The Capitol riot was a horrible affair from start to finish, and the President’s intent (even in the rally) was to intimidate the Congress (and the Vice President) into changing the electoral outcome. It was an ill-conceived, poorly planned, and ultimately unsuccessful effort, but the violence it condoned was another escalatory step. On the other side, Progressives explained away the violence of the Black Lives Matter movement as “understandable” and also excused the anarchist violence against the government in Seattle and the Pacific Northwest. Not at all the same thing, but yet also steps in the wrong direction.

These steps were less important in my opinion than the current moves afoot to change our system of government–or its norms. I will address these changes, and the dangers they pose, in the next bog post. Suffice it to say the current focus on whether January 6th, or the mid-terms, or the 2024 election could be the spark to civil war puts the cart before the horse. Neither side has made the determination that only violence will succeed. But that determination may be forthcoming if it looks like the governmental system itself is up for debate.

In late May and early June of 1940, the German army blitzed across France. The speed and violence of the panzers and stukas left a beleaguered British Expeditionary Force and some remnants of the once-proud French army surrounded along the coast at the tiny port of Dunkirk. Over the period of eight days, the British navy, merchant marines, and thousands of individual ship owners conducted an improvised, hasty withdrawal-under-fire. They rescued over 330,000 soldiers, albeit with nothing more than the soaking wet uniforms on their backs. It was a humiliating defeat, but one tinged with a tiniest glimmer of hope, which was sorely needed by the British people at that point. Prime Minister Churchill reminded his nation that “we must be very careful not to assign to this deliverance the attributes of a victory. Wars are not won by evacuations.”

The American experience in Kabul these days has me thinking of Dunkirk.

First off, the President continues to defend his decision to end the “war in Afghanistan.” This statement demonstrates his fundamental lack of understanding. Afghanistan was a theater of war: just one of many. While it is possible to surrender a theater in order to win a larger war, one must always remember that there is a larger war on. We did not start this war. Radical Islamic terrorists declared war on the US back in the 1990’s. We ignored them at the time, like a much-older brother ignores the taunts of a much-younger sibling. But like that sibling, the terrorist movement grew-up, and when they knocked down the towers, the game was on.

The US could not have cared less about Afghanistan or the Taliban but for their harboring Al Qaeda (AQ). When the Taliban refused to turn AQ over to us, they became another campaign in the war. And as I continue to remind, we can not declare that war over: only the loser can. So we can end the war tomorrow by admitting our evil, renouncing our ways, and publicly proclaiming the Shahada (“I bear witness that none deserves worship except Allah, and that Muhammad is the messenger of Allah.”). It really is that simple.

Secondly, I hear much soul-searching about ‘where we went wrong’ in Afghanistan. A few misguided souls says we should never have gone in; I won’t dignify that view with a critique. For the record, I was in favor of going in to Afghanistan to expel the Taliban and root our AQ. BUT, I was also in favor of a cold-hearted, realpolitik approach. Turn the “nation” of Afghanistan over to various regional warlords with this simple admonition: those who fight the Taliban and kill AQ will receive our funds, those who don’t will receive our bombs. Let them fight it out and install whatever puppet-regime the Afghan people could stand in Kabul. Yes, this would have made for atrocities and corruption and human rights violations, but thus was it ever in the Hindu Kush. At least we would be at a distance, and not directly involved in a place where our only interest was the absence of AQ.

When President Bush decided to expand the mission in Afghanistan to nation-building, I thought it was ill-advised but not impossible. I do not understand the logic of those who say “the US can’t do nation-building.” History will long remember our excellent examples in nation-building: Germany and Japan. We took two of the most militaristic cultures of the twentieth century and turned them into committed pacifists barely able to staff military forces (or in Japan’s case, even call them an “army.”) We took nations literally burned to the ground and rebuilt them into economic powerhouses which eventually rivaled us. This took decades to accomplish, even though we had fought a savage war against each.

Bu the best comparative examples for US nation-building are Vietnam and Korea. In the first case, we quit, with predictable results for South East Asia. In the latter case, we stayed. Now somewhere I hear a reader crying “Pat, you can’t be comparing Afghanistan with today’s South Korea!” and to that reader, I say “You’re right; I’m not.” But Afghanistan at year twenty IS comparable to South Korea in 1971. Let me refresh your memory: the Asia Times described South Korea in 1971 as a “Lost Land, . . . a gritty, poverty-racked, unsophisticated nation that was one decade into an industrialization program that would lead to riches.” It varied between democratic leaders, oligarchs, and an occasional military coup. During the previous twenty years, North Korean forces attacked the US and South Korea, killing our soldiers and marines. They continued doing so for the next twenty years.

Now I am not saying Afghanistan was on the path to similar success. But anyone who says we can’t do nation-building is wrong, and anyone who says Afghanistan would never have made it has to explain why South Korea did. Impoverished nation? Check. No democratic culture or history? Check. Pervasive external threat? Check. Persistent US military casualties? Check.

Thirdly (yes, I’m still counting), the President and other senior leaders have said “the Intelligence Community (IC) did not predict such a sudden collapse.” Without having been in the room, I know this is true. It is also a red herring: the IC does not predict anything. Prediction is the realm of prophets and seers, not intelligence professionals. I guarantee you that the IC did consider the possibility of such a scenario and included it as a worst-case one. How do I know that? Because if they didn’t, the President and others would have said as much and fired those responsible. He didn’t (fire them), so they did (cover it).

Likewise, my fourth point is a question. Given that the President has warned for days of a terrorist attack (meaning the IC had good info that an attack was imminent), and given that we remain at war with the Islamic State, and given that the Islamic State is the sworn enemy of the Taliban: why did we wait? Why didn’t we attack the Islamic State in Afghanistan before they attacked us, in order to perhaps disrupt their planning? We didn’t suddenly determine they are our enemy. Nor did we suddenly figure out where ISIS is in Afghanistan. Did we think the Taliban cared? Why the delay? Inquiring minds want to know.

On a tangentially-related, fifth point, who is advising the President on his messaging? Having him stare into the camera and intone “we will not forgive; we will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay” is not intimidating. He shuffles on and off stage. He squints at the teleprompter, which is not atop the camera, so it looks at times like he is not speaking to the audience. Either dim the klieg lights, enlarge the size of the font, or get him contacts/glasses. His speech is halting, and no, this is not his well-understood stutter. Joe Biden has been a public figure for well-nigh fifty years. He never was this forgetful, or confused, or halting. Assuming he is still in command of his faculties (and God help us if he isn’t), why are his handlers insisting on putting him in such a bad light?

Sixth and finally (I know, you’re relieved!), the President most recently said he is following the advice of his senior military commanders. This is always re-assuring to hear. The problem is no competent military officer would ever suggest that we conduct a noncombatant evacuation operation (NEO) of unknown size, from a toe-hold perimeter around a civilian airport in an urban area. Someone made a decision to pull the military forces out first. Someone made a decision to evacuate the US Bagram airbase first. Someone made the decision not to accelerate the visa application process. There are reasons why such decisions might have been made: they are not blatantly stupid decisions. But someone made them. Those persons must be identified and given the opportunity to explain themselves, or suffer the consequences if their explanations do not suffice. Blanket admissions of where the buck stops are irrelevant. Who made the decisions?

Dunkirk is an interesting footnote in the history of World War II. It was not decisive in a military sense. The British could afford to equip and field another army. It was the channel, the Royal Navy, and the brave few pilots of the Royal Air Force whose “finest hour” thwarted any ambitions Hitler had of parading past Buckingham Palace as he had down the Champs-Élysées. But it was the snatching-of-a-small-victory-from-the-jaws-of-defeat that helped stiffen the English spine for the dark days ahead. During this brief period, Churchill gave a series of impassioned speeches in the House of Commons which are long remembered: “their finest hour” “blood, toils, tears, and sweat” and finally “we shall fight on the beaches, . . . .” Such is the stuff of legendary leadership.

We are still in a generational war against radical Islamic terrorism. We’ve had a Dunkirk moment, one of our own making. President Biden explained his decision to withdraw from Afghanistan by asking how many more casualties should we endure? He is now responsible for more casualties in one day than the US experienced in the prior two years. I am still waiting for what is his strategy for the larger war. And for when he will stiffen our spines for the fight.

Within days, we’ll witness a string of atrocities across Afghanistan, as the Taliban consolidates power, takes revenge on those who opposed it, and reimposes its sordid, misogynistic rule. The US went into Afghanistan to evict the Taliban not because they were, and are, evil; we went there because they refused to turn over Al Qaeda to stand justice. For this reason, the US deployed the force necessary to evict the Taliban in a truly amazing display of military power.

In the twenty years since that happened, various American Presidents tried and failed to extricate the nation from the war. It was clear to all that the end of an active US military presence in the Hindu Kush (the ancient term for the area we know as the “nation” of Afghanistan) would mean a return of the Taliban. America tried increasing its presence and operations to destroy the Taliban, tried increasing its civil involvement (building schools, writing laws, fostering businesses), tried reducing its military footprint to reduce frictions, and finally tried negotiating directly with the hated Taliban.

In the last five years, the US engaged in a strategy of delay and stalemate. We provided the Afghan government with all the means to succeed while realizing it never could: in effect we propped it up. We built up the Afghan military so it could resist the Taliban, but only if it retained the continued training, air support, and logistics from the US Army. This strategy succeeded by not losing.

Some decried this strategy as defeatist. While the American way of war emphasizes victory, the American public (and its elected officials) no longer have the stomach for the carnage (both to our soldiers and the enemy) that entails. Waiting the Taliban out was always a long-shot, but it had worked so far. Why did we abandon it?

Some said that Afghanistan was America’s longest war. They are either wrong or simply lying. We have been at war with the People’s Democratic Republic of (North) Korea for seventy-plus years. The fact we currently have an armistice that makes people (even South Koreans) think the war is over is testament to how a strategy of waiting the enemy out can succeed. In the meantime, South Korea evolved into a vibrant economy, a manufacturing powerhouse, and even a nascent democracy.

That long “not peace” was not always as peaceful as it is today. At times after the 1951 armistice, the sides exchanged fire and postured. North Korea infiltrated forces across the DMZ to attack targets in the South, and even master-minded an attack on the Blue House and the terrorist bombing of a South Korean airliner in 1987. The US and the Republic of Korea forces suffered casualties, but full-scale combat was avoided. This was a long-term, successful strategy by any measure.

Could this strategy have worked in Afghanistan? It was. Over the past five years, the US drew-down forces and reduced its footprint and operational tempo. We gradually let the Afghan Army take the lead, but were always close at hand in case “things went south” (as we used to say in the Army).

But what of the casualties? I want to be crystal clear here. I was a soldier once; many of my classmates served in Afghanistan, and some died there. No soldier wants to die, and soldiers deserve to know they’re not being sacrificed for no reason. But they do know, from day one in basic training, that they may be sacrificed. Especially in an all-volunteer, professional military, this is a well-understood proposition. Our casualties during the last five years in Afghanistan ran under ten deaths per year. We lose a thousand service-members annually to training accidents. There was no countless-deaths-in-vain reason to withdraw.

But what of the cost? Even with the monumental (and well-documented) corruption, Afghanistan represented a minimal financial burden to the US. In the last few years, we were spending around $50 billion US dollars annually on all activities in Afghanistan; that’s what the entire US government spends in two days. The people who say the cost was too high are the exact same people who said we couldn’t just destroy Al Qaeda and leave the Taliban in charge, we had to create a democracy and build Afghanistan’s civil infrastructure. We tried; it didn’t take, or at least it didn’t take well-enough that Afghani soldiers felt compelled to fight and die to defend it. Maybe it just needed more time, but the clock ran out.

President Trump was wrong to direct a withdrawal from Afghanistan. Like most of his decisions, it went against his own hand-picked advisors, and seemed to be based on his gut instincts or his dislike for the Bush family. He thought he was being decisive in “ending an endless war,” when he simply misunderstood that in combat, only the loser can end a war. He has that decision on his record forever.

Even more execrable is President Biden’s decision to not only withdraw, but to accelerate the timetable. President Biden has seen fit to completely rescind almost every policy President Trump put into place, but here he doubled-down on it. I recall the quote of the Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who said Mr. Biden had the unique position of being ‘the only person wrong on every major foreign policy issue in the past forty years.’ Looks like the string remains unbroken. His administration set arbitrary (and inane) deadlines, like withdrawing by September 11th. Then they advanced them further, apparently realizing all hell was breaking loose but not that such a move would be reminiscent of Saigon, 1975.

Proving that this was a policy decision not fully coordinated with the military, the administration conveniently ignored the fact that thousands of Afghanis (and their families) who worked with the US military had to be evacuated or they would be massacred; the haphazard evacuation continues today. Administration spokesmen blithely bat away the helicopters-on-the-rooftops comparison, while the President orders three-thousand US Marines back into Kabul to evacuate the US Embassy. Guess we’ll use Humvees this time.

Yes, this war dragged on. Yes, the US engaged in mission creep, and was never willing to destroy the Taliban. Yes, the US military was going to keep sending soldiers home draped in coffins as long as this war continued. No, there was no compelling need for President Trump’s rash decision, nor President Biden’s inexcusable continuation of it. No, we were not bleeding ourselves dry outside Kandahar, nor were we bankrupting the nation’s treasure bankrolling corrupt Afghan officials. No, this loss was not inevitable. It was a choice.

As I said before–and as it has always been–the losers determine when a war ends. There is no dignity in this withdrawal, whether or not we see people clinging to helicopter skids. Our military did exactly what it was asked to do. This “L” is on our Leaders, who lost hope, lacked fortitude, and thought they could finesse it. There will be no finesse in Kabul soon, only peace, the peace that comes with the grave.

Our leaders always knew, from Day One, what would happen if the Taliban returned. They now share this legacy.

As we close on another American Independence day, I’ve been thinking about the nature of patriotism. It seems to me we Americans have lost the concept of the word. People talk about “love of country” and “American exceptionalism” leading to arguments that miss the point. Patriotism is not uncritical support; it is also not unsupported criticism. It is not the extremism of the fan who thinks only his team should ever win, and every referee’s decision or sport ruling to the contrary is unfair and biased. Yet it is also not detached neutrality, a keeping-your-distance and not-being-emotionally-committed attitude common in academia.

When I worked for the government, I used to remind my employees they were not neutral observers of American foreign policy: they wanted that policy to succeed, whether they personally supported it or not. (Note: we weren’t talking about policies they morally opposed; of course one is required to quit if asked to support a policy you could not in good conscience support). You didn’t need to chant “U…S…A, U…S…A!” all the time, but neither should you act like it made no difference to you.

Enough about what patriotism isn’t; what is it? Try this concept on for size: patriotism is an appreciation for the unique advantages your nationality bestows on you, unmerited on your part. Thus it does not mean your country is better than any other, nor does it mean everything your country does it right or best. This appreciative version of patriotism requires an objective view of your nation’s history, other nation’s histories, and the state of the world today. But it avoids silly chest-thumping on one hand, or ridiculous a-historical criticism on the other.

There is nothing particularly patriotic about believing your country is the greatest ever, nor in thinking solely about its many shortcomings. Both approaches lead to dead ends. There can be little doubt nations and nationalities demonstrate differing areas of excellence, and acknowledging this fact is not unpatriotic, just realistic. Brazil plays beautiful football. Nobody does cheese like France. Taiwan and computer chips. Sometimes patriotic fervor isn’t about absolute excellence, but simply relative excellence or good fit. I wouldn’t prefer the United Kingdom’s National Health Service, but the British cherish it as a national accomplishment nonetheless. It just works for them.

Heaven is where

the police are English,

the chefs are French,

the mechanics are German,

the lovers are Italian,

and the Swiss organize everything.

Hell is where

the Germans are the police,

the English are the cooks,

the French are the mechanics,

the Swiss are the lovers

and the Italians organize everything.

An old joke about Heaven, Hell and Europe

I didn’t storm the beaches at Normandy, but I benefited from the those who put an end to the Nazis. I never enslaved anyone, nor did my Irish forebears, but I was born into a society that had far more opportunity in South Bend than Sligo, just as an African American descended from slaves but born beside me in South Bend had so much more opportunity than a distant cousin still in Soweto. That we both had different (and unequal) opportunities is both a global statement of fact and a call for continued hard work. It is simply amazing to me that some people today think it is a remarkably American failing that inequality exists; if this surprises you, you either haven’t traveled much or weren’t paying attention when you did.

All nations have strengths and weaknesses. As do all forms of government, all ethnic groups, and all individuals. Being honest about these strengths and weaknesses is not disloyal, while only considering one or the other might be. I have little patience for those who say “America: love it or leave it.” I have no patience whatsoever for those who claim unrelenting criticism is some higher form of patriotic fervor.

America is, was, and ever will be far short of perfect. Yet it remains a blessing to be born an American, regardless of race, creed, or color. In praise or criticism, this remains true, and only an ingrate would challenge it.

Happy Independence Day!

It’s not every day one sees Catholic doctrine debated on the front pages of the New York Times and in the chyrons of the so-called news channels. Given the quality of the debate we’ve witnessed recently, that’s a good thing. Watching professed-atheist journalists wrestle with concepts like transubstantiation is like watching monkeys with the proverbial football. Better still is “former” Catholics proclaiming their own gospel, Bishops suddenly attempting to regain the standing to make moral judgments, and poorly-catechized Catholics offering their take on right-and-wrong. Phew; what’s a poor sinner to do?

You may have heard that the US Conference of Catholic Bishops recently decided to issue a document attacking President Biden for receiving Holy Communion when he attends Mass. You might have heard that Pope Francis warned the American Bishops not to do this, but they did so anyway. You may have heard the Bishops are in the tank for former-President Trump and are attacking the current occupant of the White House for political reasons. You might even believe the Bishops have no moral standing to tell anybody anything, what with several decades of child sexual abuses allegations on their hands. All these things have an element of truth to them; none is actually correct. Like the blind men and the elephant, people are grasping for a partial truth, and oftentimes seeing what they want to see. Let’s stop looking through a glass darkly and see things as they are, shall we?

I know you were told there would be no math, but no one said we wouldn’t discuss Catholic doctrine, which is where we have to start. First off, Catholics believe in the Real Presence, namely, that the bread and wine on the altar are trans-substantiated into the real body and blood of Jesus Christ. This is a non-negotiable, eternal element of Catholicism. It means that the Eucharist is the “source and summit of the Christian life.” It is nourishment for the journey that is life, and a source of strength for life’s battle between good and evil. It made me laugh when some claimed the Bishops were “weaponizing the Eucharist.” Why of course they were; that is its purpose.

Because of this teaching, Catholics must be worthy to receive the Eucharist. This is a nuanced subject, as no one is truly worthy to receive the Savior’s body and blood. What worthiness involves is being in communion with the Church (believing what the Church teaches), not being in a state of serious (i.e., mortal) sin, and having completed the prescribed fast and penitence. So all Catholics are sinners, but repentant and in accord with the Church, so we go to Mass and line up for Holy Communion, or if we know we don’t qualify right now, we stay in the pews until we are. It does not matter whether you failed to keep a one-hour fast before communion, or you are remarried but not annulled in the eyes of the Church, or you are an abortion-performing doctor: all require the believing Catholic to repent and do penance before returning to the Eucharistic line. A long time ago, the faithful only took Holy Communion once a year, or tried to win a Divine Trifecta by being baptized, confessing, and receiving their first communion on their death bed (talk about just-in-time delivery!). Eventually the Church taught we all need the sustenance of the Divine Presence, seeking to avoid such heavenly gamesmanship.

The Church in America today is in crisis. Actually, the entire Roman Catholic Church is always in crisis. It began with leaders who were doubters, deniers, braggarts, vengeance seekers, fools and knaves, and never got better. There is a wonderful story about Napoleon occupying Rome, and learning that the Pope had forbid it, whereupon he threatened a Cardinal thusly, “Your Eminence, are you not aware that I have the power to destroy the Catholic Church?” To which the Cardinal replied: “Your Majesty, we Catholic clergy have done our best to destroy the Church for the last eighteen hundred years. We have not succeeded, and neither will you.”

Somewhere between one-half and two-thirds of American Catholics do not believe in the Real Presence, despite it being consistent, unchanging Church teaching. Now there is nothing wrong with believing communion (note the small “c”) is only a symbol of Christ’s presence; this is a common holding of many Protestant sects. But is it most certainly not Roman Catholic teaching. So there is little doubt that Catholic catechesis is lacking, and whose job is that? The Bishops. Despite whatever other failings they have, the job is theirs.

On top of this, about half of Catholics don’t think abortion is a serious (as before, mortal) sin, reinforcing the lack of Catholic education. Again, there has been no change in Church teaching, as abortion has been around as long as the Church. And to remind, mortal sin is a dis-qualifier for receiving Holy Communion. Many of these Catholics don’t go to Mass, so the issue is somewhat academic. But some do. Now if you secretly support abortion, and go to Mass, and receive Holy Communion, your sin is very serious, but a private one: no one but you and God will know. You may be damned (it’s up to Christ), but your twitter standing is secure.

But what if you publicly proclaim your support for abortion rights, support funding for it, defend it as a morally-acceptable choice, and campaign for officials who do likewise, and then go receive Holy Communion? Why, you’re President Biden! Or Speaker Pelosi. Or any of a number of Catholic politicians who do so. And here’s the rub: by being public in their position, and continuing to receive Holy Communion, they commit an additional sin the Catholic Church calls scandalizing the faithful. This means other Catholics will look at them, see they say and do as they please with no sanction, so they must not be wrong, right?

This is the dilemma the Bishops face. Failing to act, and to teach what the Church believes, they ended up with faithful who don’t believe. Take a position, and you enter into politics, since the overwhelming majority of Catholics who support abortion rights are Democrats. What about the Bishop’s support of then-President Trump? Isn’t it hypocritical to call out President Biden? President Trump wasn’t Catholic (Gracias a Dios) so supporting him was a prudential issue, where one had to measure various political, moral, and ethical positions and decide. Faithful Catholics could come down for or against, and they did. President Biden is Catholic, so his behavior becomes an issue of Catholic teaching and who gets to decide what Catholics believe. Which are the Bishops.

Or should I say, the Bishop. One aspect of Catholic doctrine only covered in passing is the role of the national conferences. They are advisory bodies, a relatively recent phenomenon, meant to give the Church a means to speak in unity on national issues. Their writ extends to consensus documents and to such things as which extra holy days of obligation (Church feasts) to require for the faithful in their country. This is why Pope Francis admonished the Bishops to ensure whatever they taught about receiving Holy Communion, it was not divisive. He did not, and could not, say it was ok to receive Holy Communion in a state of serious sin, nor did he suggest support for workers’ rights, immigration, or child care were issues as serious as abortion. In fact, then Cardinal Bergoglio was the principle author of the Aparecida document which stated the prohibition forcefully: “We must adhere to ‘eucharistic coherence,’ that is, be conscious that they (editor’s note: politicians) cannot receive Holy Communion and at the same time act with deeds or words against the commandments, particularly when abortion, euthanasia, and other grave crimes against life and family are encouraged. This responsibility weighs particularly over legislators, heads of governments, and health professionals.”

In the end, whether President Biden receives Holy Communion in the District of Columbia every Sunday is up to Cardinal (Archbishop) Wilton Gregory, who has said “yes, he may.” And if the President travels outside of Archdiocese of Washington, it is up to the Bishop in whatever diocese he visits. Normally, these issues are dealt with privately in a parish setting. The would-be communicant visits the parish pastor, finds out what is needed to be “in communion” and not in a state of serious sin, then accommodates the priest’s directions. Sometime a priest recognizes someone in line for Holy Communion and is forced to make a snap-judgment: the priest may know the communicant was (at some time) not eligible, but what if they went to some other priest and are now “worthy” in Church eyes? The problem with public figures is they provide a public example, which reinforces the lack of understanding by the faithful, requiring a very public response which can be characterized as political. And remember, the priest is responsible for helping even a wayward Catholic, for in knowingly receiving Holy Communion in an unworthy state, the sinner merits even greater punishment.

Are some Catholic American Bishops engaging in politics? Maybe. Is there a deficiency in Catholic Americans’ understanding of the Real Presence? Yup. Will the Bishops author a document attacking President Biden? Nope. In the end, they will reiterate Church teaching on worthiness, specify that it is incumbent on the faithful to comply, and that Bishop’s only–not the believer–make the determination. I would bet they will have a sentence or two reminding public officials that, despite the claims of President Kennedy and Governor Mario Cuomo, there is no exception for elected officials who are Catholic. That will be all. The Bishops will approve the document, as will the Vatican. There is nothing new here.

Not all sins are equal, and I understand that non-Catholics may find it hard to believe that failing to support programs for real live children is not as morally suspect as abortion. However, for Catholics, there are differences, and if you want to say you’re Catholic, you don’t get the option of personally challenging how the Church categorizes sin. Sin, by itself, does not disqualify a Catholic from receiving Holy Communion. Serious sin, and disregarding Church teaching to reform and refrain from it, does. Even for Presidents.

In my last post, I reviewed the tangled, complicated events of the most recent conflict in the Gaza strip between Israel and Hamas. Some friends asked whether there was any way to cut the Gordian knot and achieve peace between the Israelis and Palestinians. The expert opinion says “no” because the issues are many, the hatreds deep, and the political will is lacking. All three are true, but there is only one thing preventing peace in the area (in my opinion): unrealistic expectations.

Such expectations can be moderated by real leaders, to the benefit of all concerned. Currently, leaders on both sides choose to pander to the expectations, with predictably violent results.

What are those unrealistic expectations?

For the Jews, there are some who believe they have a Divine Writ to the Holy Land, meaning all the territory of Judea and Samaria belongs always and forever to the State of Israel. I am not here to debate the theological underpinnings of this claim, but only to state it is a maximalist position that can never be realized. For if Israel were to ever claim sole jurisdiction over all that territory it would cease to be a majority Jewish state in a matter of years. There are currently about seven million Jews and seven million Arabs in that territory, and another two-and-a-half million Palestinian Arabs in Jordan and Syria. The Jewish state would soon face an Arab majority voting bloc, or the need to create a permanent sub-class of Arab citizenship: real apartheid. Which would be anathema to most Jews and the international community. So it’s never going to happen.

For the Palestinians, there are those who believe they have the right to a separate, fully-sovereign (aka “normal”) state with Jerusalem as its Capital. Now it is undeniably true that this was mostly what was on-offer in the 1947 agreement which the United Nations brokered (Jerusalem was shared). But that was eight wars, two intifadas, and few thousand terrorist attacks ago. Things have changed, so to speak. The first thing the new Palestinian state did was ally with five Arab nations and attempt to destroy Israel. During the period of Arab control, they evicted all Jews from Jerusalem and prohibited Jewish prayer at the Kotel, or Western Wall. Given the upper hand, the Palestinians have repeatedly acted in bad faith: and all this knowing that the very creation of the State of Israel happened as a result of international recognition that the Jews could not rely on other nations to behave.

Drive off the unrealistic expectations on both sides and an agreement is difficult, but possible.

For Israel, Palestine must recognize its right to exist and to defend itself. This has been the secret to Israel’s successful negotiations of peace with Egypt, Jordan, and other Arab states. There is no sense engaging diplomatically toward a long-term agreement with an opponent who insists you must die. The Palestinians must accept this. And, because the geography of any two-state solution is so irregular as to make Israel literally un-defendable, and because of the long history of unprovoked attacks, the Palestinians must accept status as a demilitarized state: no military forces, no weapons of any kind. There is only one country interested in attacking Palestine, and it is Israel, for defensive purposes. Remove the ability to threaten, and you remove the need for any military force.

Next, secure this solution by giving Israel complete control over the land/air/sea ports of embarkation into the Israeli/Palestinian territories, solely for purposes of excluding the introduction of weapons. The Palestinians can control immigration, but any object moving in or out must be inspected by the Israelis. The Israelis would also retain the right to patrol all borders, for the same reason.

Third, Jerusalem would remain under Jewish control, but further resettlement and historical claims to land titles would be reviewed under UN sponsorship. The Palestinian government would be given land and transit rights to establish government buildings (like the UN has in New York) and the right to claim Jerusalem as its capital. Religious sites for Christians, Muslims, and Jews would be under the control of religious authorities, with guaranteed access as long as they are used solely for religious activities (i.e., no protests, no political rallies, no violence, in which case they could be temporarily closed by Israeli authorities).

Fourth, Jews and Arabs who lost property in the wake of the 1947 war and other conflicts could apply for remuneration under a UN-sponsored process allocating funds donated by the international community. While it is unfortunate that people lost long-standing family homes, it is impossible to recreate the 1947 status quo. Application is contingent on surrendering any existing claims to actual property.

Fifth, and finally, the lines between the two states should be established solely by the determination of local communities in one-time plebiscites. While this will create mostly contiguous borders, there will be isolated minority communities, which will require detailed negotiations on management and access. The goal here (remembering that the security issue is mitigated by the overall peace agreement, as well as the Israeli control of borders) is to encourage more open commerce and interaction between the communities, in hopes that eventually they choose to co-exist.

The Jews would have a Jewish majority, secure state, with the ability to ensure no threatening weapons can enter. The Palestinians would have a state of their own, with a Capital in Jerusalem, but at the cost of total demilitarization and demonstrated acceptance of Israel’s right to exist. Those made refugees receive redress, if not the return of their property.

Are these peace terms unprecedented? Hardly. Costa Rica is an example of a state without a military despite living in a bad neighborhood. Japan went from militaristic to pacifist in a single lifetime, and no sane nation fears Japan’s Self-Defense Forces. There are even great examples of the details of a demilitarization process. The US and Switzerland have seventy-five years of experience with the functioning of extra-territorial government bodies (i.e., the United Nations). Many nations split their government functions up at multiple sites, and several have non-contiguous territory.

If it is all so clear and precedented, what is the hold-up? As I alluded to earlier, leadership. I mentioned the Israeli government’s paralysis, giving Prime Minister Netanyahu the push toward his natural, uncompromising positions. It is even worse for the Palestinians. The President of the Palestinian National Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, is (a memorable quip from The Economist) “in the seventeenth year of a four year term.” Some suggest Hamas is not a terrorist group, since they have social service and administrative elements, and they even won an election in 2006. This is straining to put things in a good light, like the doctor who tells you that you have “a good cancer.” Those who always argue for more democracy should take a long look at this situation: many votes have brought to power (1) a corrupt leader beholden to a minority of extremists, (2) a corrupt and ineffectual octogenarian who has missed every opportunity to negotiate, and (3) murderous terrorists. So much for the wisdom of these crowds.

A breakthrough is unlikely either in Israeli politics or Gaza. Hope remains that a new generation of leaders in the West Bank could revive negotiations, leaving Hamas and the Gaza strip as a problem to be resolved later. A successful peace negotiation just for the West Bank would be a powerful impetus and undermine Hamas’ claims, while also allowing even tighter restrictions on Gaza in the meantime.

The Jews and Palestinians are like conjoined twins fighting it out in the womb, neither one realizing that the death of one will result in the death of both. We should all pray they choose new leaders, who choose life.