Back in the U.S.S.R.

Dick Cheney channels Bernard Lewis at the Washington Institute on Near East Policy:

Dr. Bernard Lewis explained the terrorists' reasoning this way: "During the Cold War," Dr. Lewis wrote, "two things came to be known and generally recognized in the Middle East concerning the two rival superpowers. If you did anything to annoy the Russians, punishment would be swift and dire. If you said or did anything against the Americans, not only would there be no punishment; there might even be some possibility of reward, as the usual anxious procession of diplomats and politicians, journalists and scholars and miscellaneous others came with their usual pleading inquiries: 'What have we done to offend you? What can we do to put it right?'" End quote.

I've heard this before, and always thought it was a good reason to decide that whatever the merits of Lewis' academic scholarship, his political judgment is terrible. After all, the Soviet Union was (a) vicious and horrible, and (b) spectacularly unsuccessful. The United States, after all, won the Cold War. Why would you conclude that the United States ought to emulate the Soviet Union? Because our practices have failed to render the country 100 percent immune to terrorist violence? Even from a 9/12 vantage point, as bad as 9/11 was for the United States, the Soviet imperial adventure in Afghanistan was much worse for the Russians. But in keeping with this bizarre mentality, Lewis and his fans like Cheney went on to advocate an imperial adventure in Iraq that, like the Soviet policy initiatives they admire so much, has dealt a more severe blow to the United States than al-Qaeda ever would have been able to pull off on its own.

This is all via Greg Djerejian who aptly notes that "from this premise, use of torture and black-sites and detention without habeas corpus makes all the sense in the world, doesn't it?"

Comments

There is one political guru who has deeply influenced Lewis and Cheney, and by extension, Bush. The guru who said:

when people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature, they will like the strong horse.

Posted by P O'Neill | October 21, 2007 8:10 PM

There seems to be a desperate fear on the right to not be seen as "weak." I'm not sure where exactly it comes from, maybe Vietnam. Whatever its source, the fear of being weak seems to be a major driving force in conservative circles these days. Any action driven by fear is bound to lead to bad ends.

Posted by Captain Noble | October 21, 2007 8:11 PM

"Why would you conclude that the United States ought to emulate the Soviet Union?"

Matt,

Since the subject is dealings with Islamic terrorists, what's relevant isn't the Soviet Union's success or failure in everything else but its success or failure in dealing specifically with Islamic terrorism. If the Soviet Union happened to be successful in a particular area, even though it failed overall, why is the overall failure of the country a reason not to emulate one of its few successful policies?

I wouldn't be surprised if you, as a liberal, found a thing or two about the Soviet Union worth emulating -- e.g., they had less of your dreaded economic inequality than we do; their method health care financing was closer to what you consider ideal, etc. Does that make you crazier than Cheney or Lewis, because they respect how Islamic terrorists were deterred by the Soviets?

Posted by Juan | October 21, 2007 8:16 PM

Does that make you crazier than Cheney or Lewis, because they respect how Islamic terrorists were deterred by the Soviets?

Cheney and Lewis's position is weak because they fail to realize that the same element that made the Soviet Union effective in deterring terrorists--an intrusive level of domestic security designed to keep the general population in a state of fear--also contributed in the long term to the system's downfall.

As far as inflicting "punishnment" in the context of Lewis's original argument: I'm totally in favor hunting down and killing those resposible for 9/11. How are we doing on that?

Posted by James Gary | October 21, 2007 8:26 PM

Juan,

You skated right past the mention of Afghanistan. The argument is that if the price of the Soviets' strategy for deterring terrorism (which wasn't really the point of the invasion of Afghanistan, but put that aside) was bleeding their empire dry and hastening its collapse, it wasn't worth it. Massive invasions, surprisingly enough, often open you up to more casualties and damage than a defensive posture. Income inequality and health care financing are neither here nor there.

Posted by Ben | October 21, 2007 8:35 PM

its success or failure in dealing specifically with Islamic terrorism. If the Soviet Union happened to be successful in a particular area, even though it failed overall, why is the overall failure of the country a reason not to emulate one of its few successful policies?

Man that's killer, you made my day already. Chechnya , Afghanistan, wtf?

Posted by novakant | October 21, 2007 8:39 PM

Ben,

You answered your own question. I "skated past" Afghanistan, because, as you point out, deterring terrorism "wasn't really the point" of that invasion, and the salient issue here is the Soviet Union's policies versus terrorism.

Novokant,

See above about Afghanistan. As for Chechnya, we're talking about the Soviet Union's policies, not post-Soviet Russia's policies.

Posted by Juan | October 21, 2007 8:47 PM

Sorry, disregard the first paragraph of my last post. I didn't pick up on Lewis's USSR-in-Afghanistan/US-in-Iraq analogy, and assumed he was referring to some area in which the Soviets actually were effective.

Posted by James Gary | October 21, 2007 8:48 PM

When did the Soviet Union give "swift and dire" punishment to anyone in the middle east? They pulled out economic support of Egypt, but that was replaced by support by the US, most likely at a higher level. Is there any other example? It seems to me that this general claim is false. What is Lewis thinking of? People may have _feared_ this, but I don't see much reason to think it was, in the end, true.

Posted by Matt (not the famous one) | October 21, 2007 9:22 PM

The biggest problem with Lewis rather stupid "If you did anything to annoy the Russians, punishment would be swift and dire. " is that there's very little evidence this is true. All Lewis can do is point to a few anecdotes. Yet most of the major muslim nations through the Cold War were firmly in the US camp - Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey. Egypt switched from basically pro-Soviet to pro-US while Jimmy Carter was President!. The whole cold war is basically the story of increasing US influence in the muslim world at the expense of France, UK and the USSR. So clearly the USSR's threats of punishment and willingness to strong arm their clients were a complete strategic failure, even if they had a few tactical successes. The only firm Soviet allies were basket cases like Libya and South Yemen. The only partial exception is Iran, but even at the height of their anti-Americanism they refused to ally with the atheist Communists. So Lewis thesis is ahistorical and dishonest, like so much of the crap the neo-cons throw out there.

Posted by vanya | October 21, 2007 9:24 PM

"as you point out, deterring terrorism "wasn't really the point" of that invasion, and the salient issue here is the Soviet Union's policies versus terrorism."

The point, Juan, is that the USSR found itself in a quagmire in its military occupation of Afghanistan. The USA finds itself in a quagmire in its military occupation of Iraq. Neither have anything whatsoever to do with terrorism. And by extension, Cheney is advocating a military intervention (and evenutal occupation, because you cannot control territory from the air) in Iran, another quagmire that has nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism.

Hope this helps.

Posted by Joel | October 21, 2007 9:27 PM

Bernard Lewis couldn't be more wrong. Occupations increase terrorism. Consider this editorial in "The Boston Globe" 7/3/07 "The British way with terrorists" : "Britain is fighting terrorists without branding them unlawful enemy combatants, without torturing them, and without frightening the populace with evocations of an apocalytic war between good and evil." Bomb plots foiled thanks to good old Scotland Yard.

Posted by J.E. Dundee | October 21, 2007 9:36 PM

Bernard Lewis couldn't be more wrong. Occupations increase terrorism. Consider this editorial in "The Boston Globe" 7/3/07 "The British way with terrorists" : "Britain is fighting terrorists without branding them unlawful enemy combatants, without torturing them, and without frightening the populace with evocations of an apocalytic war between good and evil." Bomb plots foiled thanks to good old Scotland Yard.

Posted by J.E. Dundee | October 21, 2007 9:37 PM

In his speech to the Israel Lobby (as pointed out in Mearsheimer and Walt's book, "The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy," the Lobby includes WINEP, Ross, Lewis, etc.), war-machine Cheney cherry-picks history to promote the Lobby's case for war with Iran. He mentions Iranian hostage-taking in 1979 without mentioning our CIA coup in 1953; he mentions 241 marines killed in Lebanon in 1983 without mentioning that our ships were shelling innocent Muslims as we had been dragged into a civil war started when Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 (See Robert Fisk's "Pity the Nation"; he mentions the 9/11 attack by radical extremists without mentioning that it was inspired by radical extremists occupying Palestine and persecuting Palestinians. Anyone who heard Ahmadinijad speak at Columbia and the UN knows that he is being demonized and misquoted by the Lobby. He mentioned the reality of the holocaust, and he said he would accept any peace approved by the Palestinians. The cherry-picker left that out.

Posted by Sabine Wales | October 21, 2007 10:00 PM

Vanya is very right. I think Cheney (and Juan) are living in a fact-free world in this case. What, exactly, were these "swift and dire" Soviet actions? Turkey "annoyed" the Soviets by turning against them after World War II; nothing happened, they became an American client state. Egypt, as Vanya notes, turned against them with Sadat; again, nothing happened, no swift and dire Soviet fury. Saudi Arabia always was very anti-Soviet. If Cheney is referring to the invasion of Afghanistan... we know how that turned out.

Actually, one intervention that was very "swift and dire" was the CIA ousting of MOSSADEGH IN IRAN. Very swift, very dire, and a very, very bad idea. Because of that we have the Islamic Republic of Iran.

It's also incredibly misleading to treat "Islamic terrorism" as if it's an eternal process that the Soviets as well as the Americans faced, and that the Soviets defeated while the Americans did not. Why? Because terrorism is a response to geopolitical facts, to culture and attitudes; that is to say, terrorists act for REASONS. They had reasons for attacking the US in light of Israel policy. They didn't have reasons for attacking the USSR. Unless you subscribe to the opinion that they are just meaninglessly raging against the outside world.

Posted by XY | October 21, 2007 10:10 PM

Not to mention that the Russias brutal policies, in addition to losing the cold war, have been less successful than the US in regard to terrorism. They'd suffered many many more terrorist attacks than the US ever has had or ever will have.

Posted by skyler | October 21, 2007 10:18 PM

"We Americans are Nice Guys, but developing countries don't like nice guys. They only like asshole superpowers."

Posted by Julian Elson | October 21, 2007 11:42 PM

I just finished Lewis' The Middle East. Maybe he's put out a newer edition, but at the end of the copy I read, which wrapped up with Iraq's defeat in the '91 war, Lewis wasn't exactly prophetic. In particular, he was confident that the region's future would be one in which foreign powers would be less involved, even indifferent.

Posted by sglover | October 21, 2007 11:45 PM

sglover: Nice find. He's never been prophetic -- precisely the opposite. In 1960 he wrote that the rest of the Middle East would follow Turkey towards secularism, while the opposite happened. Among other things. His general attitude seems to be a kind of contempt for the region. I know this sounds ridiculous, since he is a Middle East Studies expert, but I think it's true. Some dazzling lights shone in his face when he was in Turkey in the 50s, and since then he's been unable to see anything positive in the region that's not Ataturkist secularism. If not rigid secularism, let it rot, seems to be his attitude.

The good news is that in academia, even at Princeton, he is completely dismissed as a mummified relic not only of the Cold War but of earlier strands of Orientalism. No one listens to him and everyone has moved far far beyond everything he has to say. This leaves only Dick Cheney.

Posted by XY | October 22, 2007 12:00 AM

The usual anecdote trotted out to support this notion that "brutality is better" is the case of the kidnapped Russian diplomats. Some Arabs kidnapped some Russian diplomats back in the day. The Russians paid off or something, the diplomats were released.

Then the Russian intelligence services tracked down the Arab terrorists and proceeded to torture, kill and mutilate them - and some other gruesome events like sending their heads to somebody or whatever it was. I forget the details.

Not terribly relevant to the issue of how to prevent the diplomats getting kidnapped in the first place, note.

But supposedly the Arabs never bothered the Russians again, because they realized the Russians "weren't the Americans" and "they don't take prisoners - unless it's to torture them."

There's nothing wrong with being able to send a message to somebody saying, "Don't mess with us, or we'll kill you." It's how you do it that counts as to whether it is effective or not.

Killing a bunch of people not directly connected to the terrorists really doesn't help. Bombing civilians really doesn't help. Torturing innocents in custody really doesn't help.

The only thing that actually works is directly finding and engaging your enemy and killing him effectively and efficiently, with no melodramatics or unnecessary emotional content.

Even better, of course, is not making the enemy in the first place - which requires a bit more work and even less emotional content, specifically the desire for money and power.

Naturally, a scumbag like Cheney and his prole advisers do not comprehend that. It's not in his nature.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | October 22, 2007 2:31 AM

Yes, I've read that anecdote in a lot of places. Did it happen in Beirut? Or Aden? Or Damascus? No one seems to be quite sure. Was it in 1971? Or 1980? Or 1983? Who knows.
Oddly enough, the first place I read it was in a Tom Clancy novel. Which makes me think that it is (or rather has become) an urban myth - people repeat it because it reinforces their prejudices.

Posted by ajay | October 22, 2007 5:05 AM

As for Chechnya, we're talking about the Soviet Union's policies, not post-Soviet Russia's policies.

Unless you can point out a significant shift in Russia's attitude towards Islamist threats before and after the breakdown of the USSR, Chechnya is a valid point of reference. I don't think you will be able to do that.

Posted by novakant | October 22, 2007 5:08 AM

"Ahistorical and dishonest" sounds about right; but that aside, isn't it amazing how this kinda pondering would fit nicely in a Sopranos episode or Godfather or something. A mob boss nostalgic for the good old days, fondly remembering rival mob family's ruthlessness and brutality. "That was beautiful, in those days they would whack you practically for nothing, I tell ya!"

Posted by abb1 | October 22, 2007 5:24 AM

Hey, Sadat changed sides on the Soviets twice; he ordered his Red Army advisors out of the country in 1972 in order to clear the decks before the Yom Kippur war, which he expected the USSR to oppose. He hoped that if he could give the Israelis a bloody nose, it would force the US to listen to him; which is rather what happened.

After the US delivered on the disengagement agreement and the progressive move back in Sinai, he tacked right back and had the Red Army advisors back in to rebuild his army after the thrashing the Israelis gave it.

And then he switched on them again.

Posted by Alex | October 22, 2007 5:47 AM

Hey, while a lot of arguments can be made regarding the relative merits of US and USSR diplomatic styles, let's get one thing clear: The USSR didn't lose the cold war because of it's diplomatic style. It lost it, primarily, because command economies suck.

I understand why this is an unpleasant lesson for 'liberals' to remember, but still, remember it you should.

Posted by Brett Bellmore | October 22, 2007 6:47 AM

"desperate fear on the right to not be seen as "weak.""

Maybe because most of the current crop of Republicans are to closeted homosexuals. Not that being a homosexual is a bad thing. But lying about it might induce a higher level of paranoia and fear.

or maybe they just smoke a lot of bad weed.

Posted by An Outhouse | October 22, 2007 8:59 AM

Add Sudan to the list of Middle East nations that switched from a Soviet client to a US client with no consequences whatsoever (and they started doing it before Egypt, too). I might be wrong, but I think a few Eastern European states would even continue to lend Khartoum money after they made their big break with Moscow in the early '70s.

I've always found Lewis to be a pretty fascinating writer on the middle east.. right up to the modern era. I don't know if that's because he gets a little off-kilter when Arab nations start incorporating western concepts (arab socialism, for example) or what, but he goes from an extremely well-informed scholar to just... Daniel Pipes in the body of Montgomery Burns. Sad.

Posted by sweaty guy | October 22, 2007 9:26 AM

Hmmm, Mr. Lewis must be unfamiliar with the Post WWII history of Iran, Guatamala, the Congo, Cuba, Vietnam, the Dominican Republic, Greece, Indonesia, Chile, and Nicaragua, among others.

Posted by Jose Padilla | October 22, 2007 9:31 AM

I wouldn't be surprised if you, as a liberal, found a thing or two about the Soviet Union worth emulating -- e.g., they had less of your dreaded economic inequality than we do; their method health care financing was closer to what you consider ideal, etc. Does that make you crazier than Cheney or Lewis, because they respect how Islamic terrorists were deterred by the Soviets?
Posted by Juan | October 21, 2007 8:16 PM

You don't get it Juan. I take this post as further evidence that conservatives and liberals don't just disagree, but that our brains are chemically different. No liberal worth his salt would touch anything from the former soviet union or maoist china because it is morally tainted and incompatible with western political structures. Trying to adapt soviet health policies would be like trying to graft an elephant leg onto a human amputee; rediculous and monstrous.

It just underlines how incompetent the conservative mind is. It simply can not make distinctions between those that are not itself, the demonized other must all be the same. The british labor party and Pol Pot are the same for conservatives. After all they both believe in progressive income tax. The conservative mindlessness and blindness is amazing. America's dominant intellectual tendency is pro stupidity. Not a good omen for America's future.

-------------

Hey, ..., let's get one thing clear: The USSR didn't lose the cold war because of it's diplomatic style. It lost it, primarily, because command economies suck.
I understand why this is an unpleasant lesson for 'liberals' to remember, but still, remember it you should.
Posted by Brett Bellmore | October 22, 2007 6:47 AM

Brett shows us another example of mindless conservative simplification to stupitium. Why on earth would a liberal be upset that command economies suck? Liberalism is a political philosophy built around free markets, not marxist command economies.
Again the conservative is unable to distinguish an apple from a cabbage. The conservative would have you believe that SCHIP is a manifestation of a command economy or that liberal policy wants to nationalize all production under state control. It's fantasy conservatism, our enemy is whatever we say it is. Again, America's conservatives are wedded to unreality and illusion. No wonder everything is going to hell in a hand basket.

Posted by Northern Observer | October 22, 2007 9:56 AM

Seriously, I would love to know just what the hell Lewis was talking about here. As several posters have explained above, his argument doesn't seem to make any sense. Is it possible Cheney was quoting him out of context? Or that Cheney himself might have been misunderstood? He does mumble a lot.

Posted by sweaty guy | October 22, 2007 9:57 AM

@ Brett

"The USSR didn't lose the cold war because of it's diplomatic style. It lost it, primarily, because command economies suck."

But . . . but, I thought the USSR lost the Cold War because Reagan called them evil, told them to tear down that wall and spent money on star wars? I may need some new history books.

Posted by Merle | October 22, 2007 1:20 PM