| ‘…such a lot of good ways to be bad,
and so many bad ways to be good.’
– "The Universal," by Small Faces
It’s never easy or particularly pleasant having to argue with someone you normally admire. But Christopher Hitchens’s latest book, A Long Short War: The Postponed Liberation of Iraq, compels me to do just that. Not because he’s necessarily wrong, mind you. In fact, he’s probably right. But if he is, then it’s for all the wrong reasons.
Let me explain.
A Long Short War is not a book, in fact, but a collection of essays originally published in the online magazine Slate. According to Hitchens, it represents "an experiment in journalism, or perhaps in the usefulness of it…. The idea was to test short-term analyses (of the war on Iraq) against longer-term ones…."
Hitchens’s main argument is that the war was not only justified, but also long overdue, thanks to the weakness and conniving of various western nations over the past decade. (Hitchens singles out France, especially.) He says toppling Saddam was just, proper and necessary, due to the military and terrorist threat he posed, his innate evilness and the failure of all other (United Nations-led) measures.
All of this sounds pretty familiar, having been trumpeted from the White House over the past two years. And indeed, Hitchens has recently found himself being called upon to act as an advisor to U.S. President George Bush. This pairing is incongruous, not to say ironic – Hitchens was a longtime supporter of the Communist Party and continues to launch his invective from a rigorous leftist position. Still, strained times make for strange bedfellows, I suppose.
But if it sounds familiar, then there is also a freshness and welcome transparency to Hitchens’s stand. Take, for instance, opposition claims that the war wasn’t about "liberating Iraq" at all, but about the nation’s oil supply. "Do you mean that oil isn’t worth fighting for," retorts Hitchens, "or that oil resources aren’t worth protecting? …Are you indifferent to the possibility that such a man (Saddam Hussein) might be able to irradiate the oilfields next time? Of course it’s about oil, stupid."
However, it’s that last word, "stupid," that bother me. All too often, Hitchens descends, uncharacteristically, into ad hominen attacks on those who offer or have offered ideas and proposals contrary to his own. Thus a group of antiwar students who invited him to address a rally in Seattle last January are dismissed as "potluck peaceniks," while former president Jimmy Carter is reduced to "peanut czar, home-builder, Nobel laureate and Baptist big mouth." The comments are amusing, maybe, but strictly irrelevant to the "debate" at hand. Character demolition is no substitute for reasoned argument.
But Hitchens goes even further. For example, there is the potentially embarrassing fact that the American company (Boots and Coots) that won the contract to put out the oil fires started by Saddam had been subcontracted for the task by another company (Kellogg, Brown and Root), which in turn is a subdivision of another company (Halliburton) that had once been headed by U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney. Aha – cherchez l’argent, as they say, and look what turns up!
Hitchens will have none of this. Rejecting the idea that, just maybe, the job should have gone to another, presumably independent, firm, he scornfully replies, "I think we can be sure that the contract would not have gone to some windmill-power concern run by Naomi Klein or the anti-Starbucks Seattle coalition, in the hope of just blowing out the flames, or of extinguishing them with Buddhist mantras – windy as those are."
Shame on you, Hitchens. That’s a cheap shot, at best, and one that misses its true target by a mile. I’d expect such tawdry tactics from David Frum or Rush Limbaugh, but from a man who aspires to the best standards of George Orwell, this is all too petty, mean-minded and, well, plain sad.
And that’s what I mean when I say Hitchens may well be right, but if so then it’s for the wrong reasons. He’s right in the sense that all those who opposed Hitler in the 1930s were right. But he’s wrong to belittle and berate any and all who offer a contrary viewpoint. That, after all, is the sort of freedom the liberation of Iraq was supposed to be about.
And even if Bush was right in his action, it is still possible that his ultimate motives may be questioned. After all, Hitchens himself has noted on more than one occasion that, "A theory that seems to explain everything is just as good at explaining nothing." Hitchens’s blanket defence of Bush’s policies is unnecessary to his own main argument, unsubtle in the extreme and may yet prove to be mistaken.
I say that on the basis of recent developments. Another American company, BearingPoint Inc., has been awarded an $80-million, one-year contract to oversee the "rebuilding" of Iraq’s economy. This will allow up to 100 per cent foreign ownership in all sectors excluding natural resources (i.e. oil). Within five years, Iraq’s national banks will be taken over by six foreign banks. All imports, save "humanitarian goods," will be subject to a five per cent "reconstruction surcharge." And while they may not own Iraqi land, investors may lease properties for up to 40 years.
I’m not sure what Hitchens makes of all this, or of the fact that BearingPoint is currently under investigation for potential violations of federal securities laws. But I’m sure, given time, he’ll have an answer for everything. |
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