Plainly put, the Bush Doctrine asserts that there is no justification for terrorism, and that terrorism is an evil which must be fought with all means necessary in all parts of the world. It is a doctrine that will put Bush’s name in the history books as one of the great leaders of all time. It will have a lasting impact on world affairs long after Bush has descended from the stage of leadership. In that, it is at least the equal of the Marshall Plan of 1945, which formed the basis for the US involvement in rebuilding Europe.
There are few if any people today who would find the Marshall Plan unacceptable. The program has had such a beneficial effect – not only on Europe and Japan, but on the rest of the world as well – that it is the classic application of cooperative diplomacy, upon which much of Liberalist international theory is based.
And like Marshall, Bush has the opportunity to provide a classic example of his own, not of cooperative diplomacy, but of the proper and justifiable use of the military to achieve political aims. With the US campaign against international terrorism, the Bush can demonstrate the proper use of force without colonial aims. This is not the first opportunity a US president has had to achieve this. Indeed, President Bush’s own father had such an opportunity, on equally justifiable grounds. But Bush Sr. squandered his opportunity, and history, along with the US electorate, did not forgive him.
Bush Jr.’s opportunity, however, is one that must not be missed. Terrorism is very real, and nothing that Bush or his advisors have said, in public or in private, in any way over-estimates the threat it poses to the world as a whole.
Six months ago, I wrote that I did not think Bush would succeed in his war against terrorism. I based my opinion on the Bush Administration’s inability to determine clear targets other than Afghanistan, and the lack of will to hit all those targets. While Bush has been better at fighting this war than I expected, I continue to hold the opinion that he will ultimately not succeed in eradicating terror.
The problem is the inherent dichotomy between the Bush Doctrine and the position of Administration officials, from the President on down, regarding Israel. Bush did do a little to reconcile these positions in the first four months of the war against terror. But beginning with Prime Minister Sharon’s visit to Washington last month, the Administration has reverted back to its previously-held positions regarding Israel. Yesterday, as the UN Security Council voted to support a Palestinian State (one the Palestinian leadership itself has rejected) without a US veto, President Bush issued a harsh condemnation of Israel’s anti-terror policy.
“Frankly, it is not helpful what the Israelis have recently done,” Bush said. “I understand somebody trying to defend themselves, and the need to fight terror, but the recent actions are not helpful in achieving peace.”
“What the Israelis have recently done,” is enter Arab villages in Judea, Samaria and Gaza. They have conducted house-to-house searches for terrorists, weapons caches, bomb factories, and other elements of the entrenched terror infrastructure that exists in these communities. Thousands of terrorists have been arrested, hundreds have been killed, and tonnes of weaponry confiscated.
For the past 18 months, Israel has suffered terrorism on a scale that makes the World Trade Center look like a bank robbery. On a per capita basis, Israel has lost more than 3 citizens for every American killed on September 11. Babies are being slaughtered in their strollers, bar and bat mitzvah celebrations turn into nightmares, and it is increasingly unsafe to drive on the roads in any part of Israel.
Until two weeks ago, the Israeli government was either failing to react, or was doing so in such a feeble way that it only encouraged more terrorism, and more murders of Israeli citizens with impunity. But since the end of February, the IDF has actually been allowed to undertake operations that are actually fighting terrorism and restoring a measure of deterrence to Israel’s image, without inviting a regional or international war.
Yet Bush can find only room for condemnation of such measures. While the US has indiscriminately destroyed much of Afgahnistan’s infrastructure, killed hundreds of people, and taken thousands of prisoners to camps half way around the world – all justifiably done – they have problems with Israel’s handling of a much more serious threat and much more delicate situation, in a much more humane and effective manner.
Prime Minister Sharon is to be congratulated for the past two weeks’ activities. It appears that he is finally on the right track to beginning to restore Israel’s security. Certainly, the job will be difficult, and it has been made more so by the past year of incompetency. But it is a start.
The condemnation should rather be levelled at President Bush. It is all fine and good for him to lead the world’s war against terror. But let the Jewish State stand up for itself and begin to fight the terror with which it has had to deal uninterrupted for its entire history, and Bush is ready with the complaints.
President Bush cannot win the war against terror, simply because he cannot tell when it is actually being fought or who its true targets are. Syria, the world’s largest State sponsor of terrorism, sits on the UN Security Council. Iraq and Iran, which provide the weaponry and financing for the vast majority of the world’s terror organizations, and which are both in the advanced stages of non-conventional weapons development, have thus far been spared attack. North Korea, the most de-stabilizing factor in the Pacific Rim, has likewise been spared. And while Pakistan aims terrorist attacks at the Indian parliament building and continues to give refuge to the murderers of US journalist Daniel Pearl, the US makes full use of Pakistani hospitality in the war against Afghanistan.
Bush’s understanding of terrorism is restricted to attacks against US national symbols. But the World Trade Center and the Pentagon can only provide so much mileage in this war. Once that mileage is exhausted, the war will end. If Bush truly wishes to finish the war on terrorism and to ensure the full implementation of his own doctrine, he must first adopt a far less-hypocritical attitude toward the real front line countries in the war on terrorism – beginning with Israel.
Copyright 2002. All rights reserved. Yehuda Poch is a journalist living in Israel. Reproduction in electronic or print format by permission only.
