Specious, self-exculpatory and hypocritical - 7 comments

Are we letting the big beasts of the Labour blogosphere trample us? Who are the pro-war left, and what right do they have to assert a moral and intellectual superiority over the rest of us? If you think this is a fair representation of the situation in 2005, read on. If not, let us know what you think.

Is there a level playing-field, or is one side running away with the ball?

Talk Politics has a long, detailed, and defiant post about the pro-war left - or, as some would dub them, the pro-war right. For him (and others), "root causes" is not a needle with which to sew up the mouths of dissenters. There's no doubt that millions of people are unsatisfied with the answers they have heard thus far. Likewise "fascist" - a term to be used with the utmost care.

There is a very good reason why we should, indeed we must, try to understand and explain terrorism. Why we cannot ignore the complex chains of cause and effect upon which it feeds and from which it draws both its ideological and material sustenance.

That reason is to be found not in modern political analysis and certainly not in the sophistry, rhetoric and propaganda of the pro-war left but in a single statement contained within a treatise on the subject of war written more than 2,000 years ago, a book entitled, prosaically enough, 'The Art of War'.

"Know your enemy and know yourself and in a hundred battles you will never be defeated" - Sun Tsu

You cannot defeat terrorism through ignorance of its drives, motives and objectives, by dehumanising the terrorist and turning them into a bogeyman, or by denying even the possibility, let alone reality, that own own actions have, in a multiplicity of ways, contributed to and, in some instances, created the context in which terrorism exists.

And, to conclude:

Ultimately the pro-war left's position on Al Qaeda and on the recent terrorist attacks on London is wrong, fundamentally wrong, because their goal is not just to oppose terrorism but to try to channel public anger over these attacks into support for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, an invasion which remains as illegal today as it was on the day it was launched irrespective of their efforts to rewrite history and sell Bush's great desert adventure as an act of 'humanitarian interventionism'.

Their position is, at once, specious, self-exculpatory and hypocritical, a product of intellectual dishonesty, propaganda and a blind refusal to accept any shred of accountability or responsibility for the mess created by the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

So tell me again - just who are the apologists here?

Let us see a proper debate, which means us bloggers making the effort and taking the time to consider one another's arguments (point by point - no stereotypes or magniloquent flourishes), walking around the block with them bouncing about in our heads, and then expressing an honest opinion on the basis of actual thought, rather than the rhetorical viagra that so often passes for "thoughtful" (or even worse - "insightful") commentary.

Get this right and you might have the chance to take a section of the population with you (or rather, us). It's vitally important that we do this. With the conservatives a pitiful, moribund, huddle of social reactionaries, Thatcher-fetishists, and "Bell Curve racists", now is the time for the left to get its act together.

UPDATE: I've struck out the last couple of sentences - they were pompous and unhelpful.

UPDATE II: I probably ought to clarify that this isn't about my personally coming down on the side of either a "pro-war" or an "anti-war" position. One issue is: are we open to one another's views? Another is whether or not support for/opposition to the Iraq war is inextricably linked to some of the issues bloggers often associate it with. For example, does supporting the war really put you on path that involves you supporting Blair, supporting Bush, and celebrating the power of the US military? Does opposing the war really make you a pacifist, an enemy of Israel (or worse), a tolerator of terrorism, a Guardianista?

UPDATE III: James Hamilton and Rob Newman have now contributed good articles on this topic.