Category: [foreign affairs]
Infidel
I recently finished Infidel, an autobiography by Ayaan Ali Hirsi. Hirsi Ali was born to a Somali Muslim family and raised in Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia and Kenya. In 1992, she fled an arranged marriage and became a refugee in Holland.
The first half of Infidel is about Hirsi Ali’s youth in east Africa and Saudi Arabia. She focuses on her family and the clan system that dominates politics, culture, religion, and economics in the region. She writes very poignantly about her upbringing, but also explores the encroachment of modernity in rural Africa, the Somalian civil war and subsequent humanitarian catastrophe in the late 1980s, the Muslim Brotherhood, Islamic education, and social issues such as female genital mutilation and spousal abuse.
The second half of Infidel is about Hirsi Ali’s adaptation to modern secular Dutch life. She eventually earned her Masters degree in political science and became a member of the Dutch parliment. She studied and contemplated the major issues in Europe today: the integration of Muslim immigrants and the long-term viability of welfare states. She also became an apostate and the victim of violent threats by outraged Muslims. In reference to the 11 September 2001 attacks, Hirsi Ali wrote the following:
People theorized beautifully about poverty pushing people to terrorism; about colonialism and consumerism, pop culture and Western decadence eating away at people’s culture and therefore causing the carnage. But Africa is the poorest continent, I knew, and poverty doesn’t cause terrorism; truly poor people can’t look further than their next meal, and more intellectual people are usually angry at their own governments; they flock to the West. I read rants by antiracist bureaus claiming that a terrible wave of Islamophobia had been unleashed in Holland, that Holland’s inner racist attitude was now apparent. None of this psuedointellectualizing had anything to do with reality.
Other articles blamed the Americans’ “blind” support for Israel and opined that there would be more 9/11′s until the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was resolved. I didn’t completely believe that either. I myself, as a teenager, might have cheered the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks, and the Palestinian dispute was completely abstract to me in Nairobi. If the hijackers had been nineteen Palestinian men, then I might have given this argument more weight, but they weren’t. None of them was poor. None of them left a letter saying there would be more attacks until Palestine was liberated. This was belief, I thought. Not frustration, poverty, colonialism, or Israel: it was about religious belief, a one-way ticket to Heaven.
I was living in Stockholm in 2001 and the issues described were and still are the major issues facing nearly every European country. Muslims have immigrated to Europe in great numbers, and generally isolate themselves in closed groups that retain the hallmarks of their clan-based societies. Hirsi Ali argues that Islam and Western values of personal liberty and equality are both unequal and incompatible. It is an argument I’m not sure I agree with entirely, but I admit that Hirsi Ali is more of an expert in the true nature of Islam. She scoffs at the media portrayal of Islam as a religion of peace and equality.
Overall, this book was exactly what I hoped it would be. The insight into clan-based societies and Islamic life were great. The insight into the adaptation of young Muslims to Western-style culture and governance will be a major issue for many years to come, especially in Europe. Sweden continues to accept hundreds of thousands of Muslim immigrants each year, to the point where the core of Swedish culture seems threatened by groups that refuse or are unable to assimilate. Even discussing the issue may lead one to seem unwelcoming or xenophobic, but it seems dangerous and willfully naive to hope for the best rather than investigating solutions that honor others’ cultures while also preserving our own.
books &foreign affairs &politics posted by: dan @ 25 Jan 2008 20:16 | Comments (0)
The Prince of the Marshes
Today, I finished The Prince of the Marshes: And Other Occupational Hazards of a Year in Iraq by Rory Stewart. Last year, I read Stewart’s first book, The Places In Between, about his walk across Afghanistan in 2002. To say that I liked both books is an understatement, in these books Stewart presents invaluable knowledge about the world-at-large, and Muslim lands in particular.
Seyyed Rory, as he is known in Muslim lands, relates how success and failure in Iraq was fundamentally a local phenomena. Without stating it outright, he clearly believes all politics are local. He relates the following:
I did not agree with the governorate coordinators in neighboring provinces who felt fatally wounded by poor planning, ill-defined missions, insufficient resources, and little support. I believed that our small teams, fluid identity, and relative isolation were inevitable consequences of the invasion and, indeed, advantages. I was pleased to work without interference from Baghdad or London; our team was by now experienced, flexible, and energetic; we had good relations with other parts of the system and were able to acquire more money than we could manage and spend. If we now failed to help [the Iraqi interim governor of Maysan province] build a functioning state, this would not be the fault of poor organization or grand planning at the center but rather a failure of local relationships.
p. 259
Only five pages and a week later, Stewart recounts the failure of the central coalition government to provide for the daily concerns of Iraqis.
In the evening [the Iraqi interim governor of Maysan province] asked me for fifty dollars to repair his windows, which had been destroyed in a recent demonstration. Although he was the governor, his salary was only four hundred and fifty dollars a month, and Baghdad had still not agreed to give the governors an independent budget…. For the sake of a tiny sum of money – a couple thousand dollars a month from the hundred billion we had spent on the invasion – we were alienating our key partner and successor.
p. 264
Stewart was unable to obtain the funds from the Coalition Provisional Authority, and finally gave the Iraqi governor money from his own pocket.
Each chapter of The Prince of Marshes starts with a quote, most from Machiavelli’s “The Prince” (I reread The Prince earlier this fall and was pleasantly surprised to see its wisdom put to good use in this book). While the Prince of the Marshes refers to an Iraqi tribal sheik, the use of Machiavelli’s Prince seems refers to Stewart’s ambiguous feeling about his role as neo-colonial governor. One quote is:
For this may be said fo men generally: they are ungrateful, fickle, feigners and dissemblers, avoiders of danger, eager for gain.
Machiavelli, The Prince, Chapter 17
Another chapter starts:
Many have imagined principalities and states that have never been seen, nor known to exist. However, how men live is so different from how they should live that a ruler who does not do generally what is done but persists in doing what ought to be done will undermine his power rather than maintain it.
Machiavelli, The Prince, Chapter 15
The front cover of The Prince of the Marshes carries the quote:
Off all the books I’ve read about the tragedy in Iraq, I think Stewart’s in the most likely to last.
Jacob Weisberg, Slate
Having been against the invasion from the start because I followed the news and watched carefully what Hans Blix was reporting, I have not felt the need to delve too deeply in the bellicose group-think that overtook Washington, D.C and London in 2003. However, I can certainly agree with Mr Weisberg’s assessment, because The Prince of the Marshes is a day-to-day account of dealing with Iraqi people crucial to the goal of a democratic and peaceful Iraq. When all the justifications for the Iraq War have been thoroughly refuted, the people of Iraq will remain the determining factor in the success or failure of US policy.
Tagged: books foreignpolicy iraq
books &foreign affairs posted by: dan @ 01 Jan 2008 22:59 | Comments (0)
links
Design for Asia Awards 2007 – Business Week has a photo set of the winning entries. I would have given it to the camera, about which they write “It evokes the days when cameras lasted a generation with its retro look and feel”.
Chinese Kids Get Foreign Toys – Time magazine has an article on an interesting trend. In my house it has been a long standing battle against collecting more and more cheap Chinese plastic toys. We last bought a Chinese toy probably in early spring.
About a month ago, I googled Lego to find out where they are manufactured. Jaxon will soon be happy to learn they are made in Denmark and Czech Republic, and decorated in Denmark, Czech Republic, Mexico and the US.
Race and IQ, cont. – More Malcom Gladwell on genetics and IQ. A good one page summary of the 4 page article I linked to.
foreign affairs &ideas &links &photos posted by: dan @ 14 Dec 2007 23:58 | Comments (0)
The Same Old New Europe
Der Spiegel Online, the largest European weekly magazine, has an interesting story about the recently concluded negotiations concerning the fate of Kosovo’s unhappy union with Serbia. The US, apparently not yet threatened by Vermont secessionists, is in favor of independence for Muslim-majority Kosovo. A two-state solution is also supported by 26 of the 27 EU member states. Not suprisingly, Russia is allied with the Slavic Serbians and objects to self-declared independence.
The implications of self-declared independence for Kosovo are both big and small. In former Yugoslavian territory Bosnia-Herzegovina, twelve years after the Dayton Agreement ended the war an EU envoy still governs alongside local representation and ethnic Serbian separatists threaten the long-term future of the nation. In Kosovo, at the very least, NATO would continue to provide military security. Meanwhile, in European countries dealing with secessionist groups, like Spain, Belgium, and Russia, the outcome will either weaken or strengthen the independence movements. While the situation may not draw as much attention as nuclear arsenals in Pakistan or Iran, it is worth remembering that the first and last major European armed conflicts of the twentieth started in the Balkans.
On the first page of the Spiegel article, there is this interesting German perspective on resurgent German foreign clout:
It’s rare that the European Union chooses a single diplomat to represent its interests. When it comes to the Middle East conflict or the Iranian nuclear program, the Germans always have a seat at the table, but so do other countries. Sometimes it’s a preventative measure designed to ensure that Germany, Europe’s dominant economic power, doesn’t overshadow the prestige-hungry British, French and Italians. But despite their neighbors’ fears, the truth is that the Germans have no qualms about being part of a collective endeavor.Kosovo, though, is a different story. The war over the small, poor Serbian province in the spring of 1999 marked a turning point for German foreign policy. For the first time since its establishment in 1949, the Federal Republic of Germany took part in an armed conflict.
In a related serious but more amusing dispute, Greece and Macedonia, another former Yugoslavian nation, continue to fight over the name Macedonia.
foreign affairs &politics posted by: dan @ 10 Dec 2007 21:55 | Comments (0)
Colonel Steven Boylan’s Email Mystery
A bizarre, unsolicited email from Gen. Petraeus’ spokesman – Glenn Greenwald, an author and blogger for Salon.com, received the linked email from Colonel Steven Boylan, the US Army spokesman for General David Petraeus in Iraq. It was sent in response to an article about the growing politicization of the Army in Iraq. It is striking that while the Marines are pressing to be redeployed outside of Iraq and all types of retired brass is urging withdrawl, the US Army command in Iraq is in lock-step with President Bush. Not just total agreement, but the same debatable talking points and semantic nonsense.
What is really interesting about General Petraeus’ spokesman’s email is that he follows it up by denying he sent it. Of course, it is simple to track the route email takes from sender to recipient. It is possible to fake email routing information, but I think it absolutely defies credulity that the US Army central communications offices in Iraq has such lax security that it is possible that this email is fake. I’ve studied network security and implemented security measures for communication protocols, including the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol used for sending email. Fake emails are easily prevented at this point in time.
Based on the evidence available, there are three possibilities:
1) The US Army computer network in Iraq has been compromised from the outside. The Army’s network security is virtually non-existent and at any moment someone may fake, or spoof, an email to FoxNews from Gen. Petraeus stating “In ten minutes, we start bombing Iran. I love the smell of napalm in the morning! Love, DP”.
2) The Army computer network was compromised from within Central Command offices. The Army and/or the spokesman failed to take the basic security precautions necessary to prevent unauthorized communications attributable to the highest ranking commander in Iraq. While it is an obvious or blatant lapse of security, this is more believable then the first possibility. Either the actual sender will be easily found or FoxNews can still expect the good news (for ratings).
3) Col. Steven Boylan, the personal spokesman for Gen. Petraeus, is a moron and lying.
I know which one I suspect. But whichever one it turns out to be, this incident seems to explain perfectly why the US is losing in Iraq. That is: wishful thinking (#1), poor planning (#2), and dishonesty (#3).
foreign affairs &technology posted by: dan @ 28 Oct 2007 21:14 | Comments (0)
links
Iran Keeps Picassos in Basement – Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran, was in all the headlines today after his speech at Columbia University. This fairly recent story from the LA Times is about the great art collected in the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art. The museum seems to prevent linking to individual images, but you can browse them all by clicking on one at that link.
Cigarette Diaries – In 1944, bombardier Second Lt. Frank Pratt was shot down by the Nazis over Poland. Newsweek published excerpts of the diaries he kept, often on the inside of cigarette packages. In the accompanying video, Mr Pratt remembers jumping out of his crashing plane.
Slick Willie, Uncut – Comedy Central posted Jon Stewart’s interview with Bill Clinton, plus 6 minutes that didn’t air on TV. Clinton is promoting his new book. If you didn’t see the interview, it is probably worthwhile. John Stewart, as usual, asked all the tough questions:
I read the book, Giving, and while I read it I wondered… “What’s in it for me?”
foreign affairs &links posted by: dan @ 24 Sep 2007 22:36 | Comments (0)