Vital Interests

I don't mean to lodge this as a specific complaint about John Edwards, but I was just having a conversation with Spencer in which he said people shouldn't be allowed to use the phrase "vital interests" in Foreign Affairs essays without giving some kind of which interests they see as the vital ones and, ideally, why they're so vital. Then he walked out the door and I read Ari Melber's blog post about John Edwards' Foreign Affairs essay and it contains, at a key juncture, the phrase in question:

There is no question that we must confront terrorist groups such as al Qaeda with the full force of our military might. As commander in chief, I will never hesitate to apply the full extent of our security apparatus to protect our vital interests, take measures to root out terrorist cells, and strike swiftly and forcefully against those who seek to harm us.

The essay is almost 6,000 words long, but Edwards doesn't name any vital interests. In his defense, Barack Obama's manifesto also says that "We must retain the capacity to swiftly defeat any conventional threat to our country and our vital interests" but doesn't say anything about which interests are the vital ones.

And yet, this seems like an important question! Without answering it, these formulae take on a pretty tautological quality. The question isn't would you use force when you thought it was vital to do so, the question is when is it vital to use force? I think this now-meaningless phrase acquired its talismanic powers back during the Cold War when "protecting our vital interests" in some country or region was a thinly veiled euphemism for "not letting Communists take over." That doesn't mean that every statement made about "vital interests" was correct or reasonable, or that preventing a pro-Soviet regime in Angola really was a vital interest, but one at least knew what one meant.

By contrast, when Edwards or Obama talks about vital interests I actually have no idea what they're talking about. You have a very wide range of substantive disagreement as to what our interests are (and, of course, which of our interests are the vital ones) as well as how best to advance them, and I also here people trying to stretch the notion of an "interest" to encompass other kinds of policy priorities like genocide prevention. An essay on the subject of "what I think America's vital interests are" (heck, even a numbered list) would tell us a lot more about where these candidates are coming from than do these essays.

Comments

Re "By contrast, when Edwards or Obama talks about vital interests I actually have no idea what they're talking about"
---------
My general approach is to look at who's giving money to whom. But then I'm a little bit of a cynic.

http://www.opensecrets.org

Posted by Don Williams | August 22, 2007 7:29 PM

"Vital Interests" = "Precious Bodily Fluids"

Posted by Shawn | August 22, 2007 7:35 PM

Matt,

Yer right about the vital interests thing. I could riff on this for a while: e.g. did Jefferson reconstitute the Navy in 1802 to fight the Barbary pirates perhaps because they were interfering with the American slave trade? Just asking...

But the big question is, what the fuck does the military have to do with "terrorism" or with small groups of fanatics who use terrorism as a tactic?

Terrorism is a police and social policy question. It is emphatically not a military problem.

* * *

In Afghanistan, as I read people's faces on TV, the teenage and twenties ministers of the Taliban were quite willing to hand over Osama, because his crimes offended their sense of the clean and new in the society they were trying to build, if only Bushlet had deigned to talk to them politely.

* * *

Iraq, of course, has nothing to do with terrorism: Saddam was a modernist and a secularist. George Bush is the only religious nut in this picture.

* * *

The whole thing is a police and justice question.

Cheney and Bush to The Hague!


.
.

Posted by David Lloyd-Jones | August 22, 2007 7:37 PM

The problem with buzzwords like "vital interests" is that on the one hand, they can become meaningless but on the other, while they are a useful shorthand, defining them can be an essay in themselves.

Posted by Reality Man | August 22, 2007 7:42 PM

Vital interests are interests which I have determined to be vital. You think your gonna catch out a future president that easily?

Posted by Bill | August 22, 2007 7:42 PM

Good post. The empty invocation of "vital interests"--or even more vaguely, "U.S. national interest"--typically serves to end the discussion when it should only be the beginning. The "interest" in question is often safeguarding the private investments of U.S. corporations in other economies. For example, U.S. "concern" about the nationalization of oil in Venezuela has more to do with protecting the assets and profits of ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillip than with "national security." The phrase "vital interests" has been reduced to a rhetorical device to suppress further inquiry.

Posted by Geaghan | August 22, 2007 7:43 PM

shawn's basically right. "vital interest" is also pronounced "oil"

Posted by upyernoz | August 22, 2007 7:49 PM

When JE uses the words "vital interests", I feel reassured. When Dick Cheney uses the words "vital interests" I feel worried.

Posted by mickslam | August 22, 2007 7:54 PM

For some reason, whenever I hear "vital interests" with relation to Foreign Affairs, one word occurs to me: Israel.

Posted by raff | August 22, 2007 7:55 PM

Geaghan's right and it's pretty obvious. If Matt doesn't know this, he needs to read more books by those to his left.

Posted by The Animal | August 22, 2007 7:56 PM

David-Lloyd Jones writes: Cheney and Bush to The Hague!

Hear hear! But the obstacles to ever doing that seem insurmountable. The U.S. government isn't a signatory to the treaty that created the International Criminal Court (for reasons that have become obvious since 2003), and the U.S. would veto any referral from the U.N. Security Council to an ad hoc court on the model of the one that prosecuted Milosevic and others.

The U.S. would never extradite Bush/Cheney even if they were indicted for war crimes in the national courts of other countries. Belgium's law allowing prosecutions for crimes against humanity committed anywhere, by anyone, was weakened under intense U.S. pressure.

So we're left with a prosecution in the U.S. courts, which doesn't seem likely. And, as we know, Speaker Pelosi declared that impeachment is "off the table" in May of 2006.

Bottom line: Bush and Cheney walk.

Posted by M.J. O'Brien | August 22, 2007 7:58 PM

That's the whole point. By deliberately not addressing what "interests" are these candidates take a null position, basically able to justify any action or nonaction.

Likewise, this use of empty-signifier lets the constituency define in their own minds what "vital interests" are and assume, incorrectly, that this candidate has views equivalent to their own.

It's all just conventional political rhetoric.

Posted by Thomas | August 22, 2007 8:04 PM

Re: The question isn't would you use force when you thought it was vital to do so, the question is when is it vital to use force?

Wouldn't this really depend on the specifics of any given situation? This is one of those thinsg that I donlt think reduces to an easy generic or formulaic asnwer.

Re: did Jefferson reconstitute the Navy in 1802 to fight the Barbary pirates perhaps because they were interfering with the American slave trade?

Was the slave trade being conducted in the Mediterranean? I thought it was concentrated in the Atlantic, and farther South too, from about Dakar down to Accra.

Re: Terrorism is a police and social policy question.

Oh good grief, like we were going to dispatch New York's finest over to Afghanistan to arrest Mr bin Laden and gang? No, terrorism like piracy in days gone by may well require amilitary response-- though certainly not a response that uses it as an excuse for foreign adventuring allover the map.

Re: the teenage and twenties ministers of the Taliban were quite willing to hand over Osama

Then they should have done so and spared the country an invasion and kept themselves in power.

Re: The U.S. would never extradite Bush/Cheney even if they were indicted for war crimes in the national courts of other countries.

The only countries that would have any business indicting Bush and Cheney are the US itself, Iraq and Afghanistan. I cannot for the life of me imagine what business Belgium, for example, would have involving itself in the matter. There is a matter of jurisdiction here, and that's not trivial. How would you like the police in Alabama to arrest and try you in California for things you did in California which did not involve Alabama or Alabamans in anyway?

Posted by JonF | August 22, 2007 8:18 PM

Well, duh! I think they were referring to the interests that are vital. Hence the term "vital interests". Geez, let's not make this too difficult. How many vital interests could there be?

As Americans, we all have shared values and interests, except for the people who don't and we hate those people. So unless you're one of the people we hate, you have the same interests as the rest of us and you already know what those are. What could be more simple than that?

Posted by Doctor Biobrain | August 22, 2007 8:37 PM

I'm not sure this is a real issue.

"Vital interests" are of course what the American public can be persuaded they are, and are only broadly static, and pre-defined.

Do we really want a list? I know we probably all wish we had had one for Bush, but for the democrats, I would think the crazies would have been weeded out by now. Though I'm less certain of Hillary than I am Edwards.

Posted by MasonMcD | August 22, 2007 8:42 PM

"e: Terrorism is a police and social policy question.

Oh good grief, like we were going to dispatch New York's finest over to Afghanistan to arrest Mr bin Laden and gang? No, terrorism like piracy in days gone by may well require amilitary response-- though certainly not a response that uses it as an excuse for foreign adventuring allover the map. "

Except that much of counter-terrorism is more suited to the CIA (and maybe select light, mobile and covert Special Forces like Delta Force) than the US military in general. Afghanistan was more of an exception in that AQ had somewhat co-opted the de facto state in Afghanistan: the Taliban party-state. Going after the 1993 WTC bomb plotters in the Philippines IIRC wasn't exactly performed by the Navy, Air Force and Marines. If you heard about a major, verifiable and competent plot being formed in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo or northeastern Uganda against the US or its embassies, etc., sending in the US military would probably be suicide, but sending in a few CIA guys to put some bullets in some heads would probably be a better idea.

Posted by Reality Man | August 22, 2007 9:38 PM

"Vital interests" is just a code word for "maintaining control".

In other words, hegemony - by any means necessary.

It's monkey talk.

Don't let anybody get ahead of you, it might be a problem.

So make sure that you pull down anybody above you and stamp on everybody below you in the hierarchy.

This is how humans behave. By acknowledging this would be acknowledging that they're animals, so it has to be covered up by code words like "vital interests."

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | August 22, 2007 9:39 PM

"during the Cold War when "protecting our vital interests" in some country or region was a thinly veiled euphemism for "not letting Communists take over."

Or, in the absence of a Communist leader (Guatamala 1954, Jacobo Arbenz) consider that land reform must be Communistic and it wouldn't do to have United Fruit's acreage split up among peasants.

So maybe our vital interest in that case was keeping the banana crop American.

Posted by cal1942 | August 22, 2007 9:52 PM

This is a bit unfair re: Obama, as he has recently specified such things in a way that can be applied to his further pronouncements. IE he would go after al-Qaeda in Pakistani border territory, leaving Iraq is an act of moving to protect vital interests, moving troops from Iraq to Afghanistan, as will be various related policies having to do with neighboring countries (leaving troops in Kuwait for whatever reason ((not that I agree this would be helpful, whereas in PK I do))).

Those are the immediate concerns right now. Those situations both have to be addressed in a new way, and we don't have much ability to act beyond them for the time being, so I must say I feel somewhat satisfied that he has been open about what he means. Edwards partially but hasn't made as many national security-related pronouncements in such a way that one can anticipate his actions. Hillary has been as clear as a cardboard box about most of it.

Posted by Onceler | August 22, 2007 10:12 PM

There is something shameful about having to rely on military might to protect your "vital interests". If the reason we Americans live high on the hog is because we have the biggest, baddest military on the planet we should confess to ourselves that we are simply grasping bullies on humanity's playground.

But we can't admit such a thing. We can't even call things by their proper names. For instance: the agency that lives in the Pentagon, and on which we have lavished trillions of dollars in the past few decades, is misnamed. In plain English, "defense" means "protecting your home ground", and we decided four years ago that we needed a whole new Department for _that_. If we are not honest enough to call a spade a spade, and rename the Pentagon the "Department of Offense", it's hardly likely that we will ever define our "vital interests" coherently.

Our "vital interests" are at stake, we are told, when something threatens "our way of life". But what the hell is our way of life? Last I checked, some of its prominent features are booze, gambling, and pornography, not to mention gluttony and sloth. I like those things as much as the next guy, but I do not fear for their continued existence -- not even after "another 9/11". The first 9/11 hardly put a damper on them, did it?

-- TP

P.S. to dlj: good to meet you again, David!

Posted by Tony P. | August 22, 2007 10:31 PM

I feel like I'm takin crazy pills!

Guess what they all mean: I'm Bill Clinton.

Nothing more, nothing less.

I realize why that is a problem for some here.

Posted by Andruw | August 22, 2007 10:32 PM

"Oh good grief, like we were going to dispatch New York's finest over to Afghanistan to arrest Mr bin Laden and gang? No, terrorism like piracy in days gone by may well require amilitary response-- though certainly not a response that uses it as an excuse for foreign adventuring allover the map. "

Goodness gracious, of course not, you send the military over who immediately nab Mr bin Laden and his gang ... Oh wait.

Terrorism by non-state actors is very much a policing problem. International terrorism, like other international criminal problems, requires international collaboration of police forces. The military comes in when states provide sanctuary to terrorists. The same can be true for criminals (see Noriega).

Posted by empty | August 22, 2007 10:38 PM

More seriously, and this has been a gripe of mine for a while: What would anti-Clinton commentators have done differently, "post-cold war?" Not bombed 'Yugoslavia?'

Meaning, which wars Clinton "started" did you oppose? Amd how does that predict the further Clinton Wars?

Posted by Andruw | August 22, 2007 11:03 PM

Over on Democracy Arsenal, the bloggers only talk about US "interests", dropping the word "vital".

Melber tells us that Edwards doesn't tell us when he would use military force, as if that were a real question. Our principles suggest that we should comply with the United Nations Charter, but these guys think the President can do as he sees fit.

Posted by masaccio | August 22, 2007 11:14 PM

relatedly:
http://crookedtimber.org/2007/08/21/a-perpetual-declaration-of-war/

Posted by snuh | August 23, 2007 1:00 AM

Geez Matt, you and Spence are in the weeds on this one.

No rational leader would spell out (or make a numbered list of) our vital interests-- our enemies will take that to mean anything not mentioned is fair game. On the flip side, there are some interests we are not willing to throw down for, but if we keep strategic ambiguity, potential invaders may stay put because they're afraid we might intervene.

"On 12 January 1950, Secretary of State Dean Acheson gave his famous Aleutians speech at the National Press Club, Washington, DC. Acheson said that United States would adhere to the principle of non-interference with respect to the Chinese question and that the American defense line in the Pacific was one that connected Alaska, the Japanese archipelago, Okinawa, and the Philippines. He said the US Pacific "defense line" or "defensive perimeter" "runs along the Aleutians to Japan and then goes back to the Ryukyus.... We hold important positions in the Ryukyu Islands, and these we will continue to hold... The defensive perimeter runs from the Ryukyus to the Philippine Islands," he said. This -- Acheson tried to explain much later -- was no more than what the US Joint Chiefs of Staff and Gen. Douglas McArthur held at the time... But just because he did not include South Korea as part of his "defensive perimeter," it was said later on that such omission had served to give the communists "the green light" to try to overrun Korea.

Emboldened by the exclusion of South Korea from the American defense line in the Pacific zone in the so-called Acheson Declaration, Kim Il-sung decided to launch an outright invasion of the South."
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/korea.htm

Posted by beowulf | August 23, 2007 1:27 AM

This is a good question, and there is no answer.

Posted by Jimm | August 23, 2007 1:40 AM

"Vital Interests" = "Precious Bodily Fluids"

That too.

Posted by Jimm | August 23, 2007 1:41 AM

Already noted, but:
"vital interests" is standard-issue politician-pabulum; far more worrying is the unquestioning embrace of the assumption that full-on militarism is the only way to address the fact that there exist people out there who wish to carry out terrorist attacks in or against the US.

Posted by live | August 23, 2007 2:33 AM

Democratic candidates say vital interests because spelling out what exactly these are would cost them support. For the US, it includes oil, access to markets and capital, protection of allies, and some day perhaps food and water. I do not believe most Americans want to delve into what their "vital interests" really entails. Also, there is no easy way to explain to someone why they are fighting and dying to secure shipping lanes.

As poorly as the US has acted during its time as global hegemon, I do not look forward to the day when it is no longer capable of projecting force around the world. I certainly would appreciate a more judicious use of said power.

Posted by durty ferner | August 23, 2007 3:40 AM

Okay, here's a list for starters off the top of my head, in rough order of vitalness:

- Nobody can invade America.

- Nobody can interfere with freedom of the seas and skies (e.g., oil tankers from the Persian Gulf and freighters from China are not harassed by pirates or by foreign naval blockades, as during the run-ups to the War of 1812, WWI, and WWII).

- Nobody can commit terrorist acts against us with impunity.

- Nobody can conquer anybody else if we disapprove (e.g., no Kuwaits in 1990s).

- Nobody can abuse our borders.

- Nobody can greatly increase trade barriers against our exports without serious consequences.

- Nobody can expropriate our citizens' property without paying fair compensation.

- Nobody can commit massive environmental damage that severely hurts the health of Americans.

- The standard of living premium that American citizens enjoy is protected against complete globalization of wages.

-- The standard of living premium that Americans enjoy because we own a big, relatively uncrowded country is protected against excessive immigration.

-- Our governmental and industrial secrets remain secret against foreign spying.

-- American intellectual property rights are protected from foreign piracy.

Posted by Steve Sailer | August 23, 2007 5:47 AM

I forgot: another one is that nobody can significantly increase the cartel power of OPEC by one oil-producer conquering another (e.g., Iraq conquering Kuwait in 1990).

Posted by Steve Sailer | August 23, 2007 5:50 AM

Then there are the vital interests that depend more upon domestic policy. For example, it is a vital interest of ours that China not so badly outcompete us economically that at some point in the future, they can outcompete us militarily, but that depends less on foreign policy per se than on domestic policy, such as having a highly skilled work force, which in turn depends upon policies like education and immigration.

Posted by Steve Sailer | August 23, 2007 5:54 AM

Re: Except that much of counter-terrorism is more suited to the CIA (and maybe select light, mobile and covert Special Forces like Delta Force) than the US military in general.

I agree, if we're talking about preventing future terrorist attacks. But in the case of 9-11 there simply was no other option than to go after Al Qaida with the military given that it was being sheltered in and by a foreign nation beyond. Again, I think the comparison with piracy works, and pirates occasionally had to be cleared out by military action (see: Barbary War).

Re: There is something shameful about having to rely on military might to protect your "vital interests".

Nations have done this since before Pharaoh Cheops built his pyramid. What's shameful about it?

Re: For the US, it includes oil, access to markets and capital, protection of allies, and some day perhaps food and water.

The US has enormous agricultural and water resources (see: Mississippi River system and Great Lakes). If these somehow become inoperative (say, after a nuclear war or a massive asteroid impact) the rest of the world will be in as bad of shape or worse.

Posted by Jonf | August 23, 2007 7:04 AM

A great race war approaches. Each race will fight brave. Each race will fight for own survival. But in the end, only one race will survive.
The white man has had his day in the sun. Its now Age of the Brown Man.

Posted by Raja | August 23, 2007 7:06 AM

This is what victory in Iraq will look like:

When enough Iraqi children die from suicide, low birth weight, starvation, complications from malnutrition, exposure, lack of potable water, diseases associated with poor sanitary conditions, absence of medical care and medicine, mental illness, civil war, crime, terrorism, and collateral damage that there will not be enough of them that survive to replace the current insurgents.

An unjustifiable and illegal slaughter. Grim.

Posted by screamingmimi | August 23, 2007 7:15 AM

I liked Steve's list. I would cut it down because he has some domestic and bilateral trade issues I would not say come under vital foreign policy interests.

And I would say that we should be clear that we seek to maintain our vital interests by peaceful engagement and dialogue 1st, with military war or "actions" being the last resort, not the 1st.

My List:

1. Control of our Borders and securing our nation against invaders, be they enemy Muslim combatants, illegal economic migrants, or political refugees that demand sanctuary in only 10 or so nations they think will double to quintuple their standard of living over the country they fled and didn't fight for.
Without control of our Borders, the America we created will end.

2. Captain Mahan of the Navy defined America's greatest vital foreign policy interest besides Borders secure from univited, invading foreigners - as seapower to ensure freedom of the sea for access to strategic goods we couln't prosper without (not just oil, but strategic minerals like Niobium ore, bauxite, zirconium). Later expanded to freedom of air transport.

3. We do have sort of a list of places where invading Chicoms or Russians or Jihadis would face American troops, no question at all. NATO countries, Japan, S Korea, Australia, Thailand, the Western Hemisphere under both old US 'manifest destiny' doctrine and by agreement of member Americas States. Curiously, Iceland because of its strategic position though it is not a full NATO member. Certain Pacific Islands few have heard of, and some everyone knows - like Timor, the Philippines, Tahiti, Singapore.

They are considered vital interests and we would be there if some other major power invaded. And other major powers know that and have their own little lists of "no-go areas" that would trigger THEIR military response.

Also, the Gulf States, Kuwait, KSA, Egypt.

NOT on our list of places we would automatically engage the enemy are Taiwan, Israel, New Zealand.

4. We have a global economy and to ensure that capital investment and purchase of trade goods the US needs overseas continues, the US cannot accept expropriation of it's citizens property without fair and just compensation.

5. Foreign nations that accept American emassies, military personnel, visitors and workers have an obligation to protect them as well as their own. If they fail to, the US will consider actions to protect those vital interests - our citizens - by a range of options that includes military intervention.

6. We cannot allow military and industrial espionage to happen without taking a range of actions to thwart it.

7. It is in our vital national interest to have foreign policy that helps protect our intellectual property, our patents and brands. Our export markets. To not be dependent on foreigners for energy or basic foodstuffs, and certain industrial production. To have a reasonable trade balance. Unfortunately, Globalists in both Partys have collaborated to sell everyday Americans down the river on all that for decades.

8. It is in our vital interest to have a foreign policy that accepts international treaties and conventions that help us and our values and charity impulses(World Health Organization, Antarctica Treaty, Geneva) and reject those that hurt or gravely disadvantage us compared to other nations. (Kyoto excepting India and China, and ICC that is set up to work against great global powers while smug prosperous places like Belgium safe behind our skirts moralize.)

Posted by Chris Ford | August 23, 2007 7:42 AM

A "vital" or "strategic" interests is a magical phrase that turns something that isn't yours into something that ought to be.

Posted by catalexis | August 23, 2007 7:50 AM

Vital Interests = Stealing other peoples stuff and letting our companies make millions off of it.

It really doesn't mean anything else, or they would state those vital interests.

Posted by soullite | August 23, 2007 8:25 AM

RE: American intellectual property rights are protected from foreign piracy.

Say what ? We should invade China because CD's of "The Bourne Ultimatum" are on sale on the streets of Shanghai ? We should invade Russia because AllMyMp3s.com is hosted there ? You lost me on that one.

Posted by Tharsis | August 23, 2007 8:46 AM

I would suggest that an American vital interest is that we don't spend more on protecting foreign investments than what we take in from taxes on said investments.

This, in itself , would destroy the professional foreign policy community -- since their whole livelihood is based upon developing two-faced, deceitful sophistry to justify use of the US military and Treasury to protect the foreign investments of their wealthy patrons.

As far as Steve Sailer's rule "Nobody can expropriate our citizens' property without paying fair compensation."

-- our own government already does so. Why should foreign governments be any different? It's called taxes.

Frankly, if some rich capitalist lays off American workers, moves his factory to China and then later loses said factory to nationalization, I don't see why the US common citizen should give a shit. Must less spend tax dollars and risk the deaths of their sons to get said factory back. Fuck the rich capitalist. And his HR staff too.

Posted by Don Williams | August 23, 2007 9:06 AM

Re Chris Ford's comment "Captain Mahan of the Navy defined America's greatest vital foreign policy interest besides Borders secure from univited, invading foreigners - as seapower to ensure freedom of the sea for access to strategic goods "
-----------
Sir Francis Drake (c. 1610 ) was a little more forthright:

""Whosoever commands the sea commands trade; whosoever commands the trade of the world commands the riches of the world, and consequently the world itself".

Posted by Don Williams | August 23, 2007 9:15 AM

Global shipping --especially oil shipping -- has to pass through several narrow chokepoints. Those are strategic locations:
- Strait of Hormuz (Persian Gulf exit --huge traffic in oil tankers)
- Bab el Mandab (Southern entrance to Suez Canal)
-Suez Canal
- Gibraltar - western exit from Med
- Cape of Good Hope (Southern tip of Africa)
- Panama Canal
- Magellan Strait (southern tip of South America)
- Bosphorus - western exit of Black Sea --oil tankers carrying Caspian Sea oil
- Strait of Malacca -- shipping from Europe/Middle East to/from East Asia

See http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/World_Oil_Transit_Chokepoints/Background.html
and
http://people.hofstra.edu/geotrans/eng/ch5en/conc5en/ch5c1en.html
(Note map on left menu)

Posted by Don Williams | August 23, 2007 9:28 AM

Wow, Sailer and Ford in an imperialistic, exceptionalist circle-jerk - quite a sight.

Reminds me of Karen Allen in Raiders of the Lost Ark: "You can't do this to me, I'm an AMERICAN."

Posted by novakant | August 23, 2007 9:53 AM

Ah, forgot to mention. If you look at oil imports into the US, you will notice that most of them go into the Houston /New Orleans ports. That is where much of our refining capability is --although Los Angeles and Philadelphia also receive oil. Large pipelines from Houston radiate out throughout the USA for over a thousand miles.

If you look at the depth charts of the Caribbean, you will notice that oil tankers from the Middle East heading into Houston have to thread the needle through a narrow, very long corridor.

If you look at the range of US fighter jets , you will notice that the southern end of that corridor lie outside the range for bases in the USA. You might also compare the depth of aircraft carriers and see why they are sitting ducks in that location.

At which point you might begin to understand why Ronald Reagan went apeshit over finding Cubans building a big runway in Grenada. And why the concern for the American medical students was cover for concern over something else. Something that the news media were, as usual, too fucking stupid to recognize or tell us about.

You might even begin to understand why President Kennedy et al went batshit crazy upon learning that Fidel was worshipping strange gods.

Posted by Don Williams | August 23, 2007 10:33 AM

"... Barbary pirates perhaps because they were interfering with the American slave trade?"

If the American slave trade had been operating through the Mediterranean and if Barbary pirates had in fact been interfering with it (rather enslaving American sailors) such a theory might make sense...Just suggestin'.

Posted by DMS | August 23, 2007 12:20 PM