This is an interesting idea and I hope it plays out the way you suggest it could. I don't think it will. My perception is that disdain for Western values is core to Islamic fundamentalism (not more progressive Islam, but that's not what we're talking about here). Nonetheless, it's possible.
This is an interesting idea and I hope it plays out the way you suggest it could. I don't think it will. My perception is that disdain for Western values is core to Islamic fundamentalism (not more progressive Islam, but that's not what we're talking about here). Nonetheless, it's possible.
I finished The Fourth Turning by Strauss/Howe a few months back. I didn't think it was a particularly good book, but the concept of an inevitable crash/break is interesting. I'm thinking of Afghanistan through that lens -- America was the world's policeman post-WWII.
In the first turning, we handled that role somewhat effectively -- the Marshall Plan; Korea; etc. -- intervening on occasion where we could do some good or as necessary, but not always. During our third turning as the world's policeman, we started to show signs that we'd lost the stomach for the job. We used the WMD fiction to kick Hussein out of Kuwait, but we stopped short of owning the whole mess that is Iraq. Still, we propped up the petrodollar system.
By the fourth turning, however, we were beguiled by our own self-deception. We thought we were more powerful than we were; that our technology could change others' ideology; that we were pure and right and others backwards and wrong. Hence, Afghanistan and Iraq II.
Now, our role as the world's cop, as well as the petrodollar system, appears to be coming to an end. I'm not sure there will be a disruptive change, but power abhors a vacuum. If there needs to be a new policeman, I'm not sure who will fill the role. China? Some other coalition? I don't know, but it appears the USA is no longer up to the task.
And, perhaps that is a good thing, particularly if it deflates some of our recent arrogance that's led us to believe we can imprison enemy combatants indefinitely in Guantanamo, or initiate drone strikes against anyone in the world, regardless of others' sovereignty, because . . . we're the USA. We're always on the side of RIGHT.
This is an interesting idea and I hope it plays out the way you suggest it could. I don't think it will. My perception is that disdain for Western values is core to Islamic fundamentalism (not more progressive Islam, but that's not what we're talking about here). Nonetheless, it's possible.
I finished The Fourth Turning by Strauss/Howe a few months back. I didn't think it was a particularly good book, but the concept of an inevitable crash/break is interesting. I'm thinking of Afghanistan through that lens -- America was the world's policeman post-WWII.
In the first turning, we handled that role somewhat effectively -- the Marshall Plan; Korea; etc. -- intervening on occasion where we could do some good or as necessary, but not always. During our third turning as the world's policeman, we started to show signs that we'd lost the stomach for the job. We used the WMD fiction to kick Hussein out of Kuwait, but we stopped short of owning the whole mess that is Iraq. Still, we propped up the petrodollar system.
By the fourth turning, however, we were beguiled by our own self-deception. We thought we were more powerful than we were; that our technology could change others' ideology; that we were pure and right and others backwards and wrong. Hence, Afghanistan and Iraq II.
Now, our role as the world's cop, as well as the petrodollar system, appears to be coming to an end. I'm not sure there will be a disruptive change, but power abhors a vacuum. If there needs to be a new policeman, I'm not sure who will fill the role. China? Some other coalition? I don't know, but it appears the USA is no longer up to the task.
And, perhaps that is a good thing, particularly if it deflates some of our recent arrogance that's led us to believe we can imprison enemy combatants indefinitely in Guantanamo, or initiate drone strikes against anyone in the world, regardless of others' sovereignty, because . . . we're the USA. We're always on the side of RIGHT.