Newsletter January, 03
Table of Contents:
[An Appreciation of the War on Terror] [An academic scandal: The importance of peer review] [Kingsley Wages War with NCC] [Voices of Freedom]
Editor’s Remarks
No matter what anyone ever says on a major issue, it usually turns out that someone has said what needs to be said before, and expressed him or herself more clearly than I can ever hope to.
A case in point concerns T.R. Fehrenbach’s classic history of the Korean War This Kind of War (Printed in 1962 and reprinted by in 1994). After reviewing the long litany of disasters and close calls for the US and its Allies in that war, Fehrenbach concludes with points that are more relevant than ever:
"It was time for free, decent societies to continue to control their military forces, but to quit demanding from them impossible acquiescence in the liberal view toward life. A "modern" military may ride sky vehicles into combat, fire and sense its weapons through instrumentation, employ devices of frightening lethality in the future —but it also must be old-fashioned enough to be iron-hard, poised for instant obedience, and prepared to die in the mud.
"If liberal, decent societies cannot discipline themselves to do all these things they may have nothing to offer the world. They may not last long enough."
We hate fighting wars, fear violence and dread the prospect of losing men and women in uniform — all reasonable sentiments. But, when our safety is imperiled, we need real soldiers who are braced to do whatever is necessary. To do otherwise invites disaster.
An Appreciation of the War on Terror
Rene Descartes championed the deductive approach to problem solving, and his basic methodology is drummed into junior officers and NCOs as the "Appreciation" system. In making an appreciation of a situation, one should first remember what their aim or intentions are; list the factors that influence the situation; and outline the available options. By this time a plan should suggest itself. By and large, making an appreciation of most situations is a good habit.
In the 16 months since al Qaeda murdered over 3,200 people in less than two hours, we have learned that dealing with this Meta-Network of Islamic Fundamentalists will not be easy. So what should we do?
The normal Appreciation system taught in militaries consists of the following:
-- What is my aim? Specifically, what do I want out of this situation?
-- What are the factors affecting my aim?
-- What are my options?
-- What is my plan?
Sometimes this process can be simple: A platoon commander ordered to capture a lone defended house on a barren hilltop knows exactly what his aim is, can see where the enemy is and (probably) what weaponry he has, knows what support his platoon can count on, and can see the terrain he must use. Thereafter, he runs through his options about his support arms and possible routes, during the course of which his plan will emerge — undoubtedly something simple like mortaring the #%$@ out of the building while flanking it on two sides, then sending his third section to break inside and start the usual close-quarters brawl that house clearing entails.
Handling al Qaeda is a problem of a much more complex nature and a much higher order of magnitude.
Still, our aim in handling al Qaeda should be simple enough: We want to be free of the threat they and other Islamic Fundamentalist terrorist groups entail.
The aim is simple and, yes, there is no guarantee that another group could not rise to offer the same degree of threat in the future. Still, one must deal with problems as they come. So what are the factors that affect our aim?
Al Qaeda is a terrorist group that is impelled by an ideology. In short, rational discussion with their leaders is as likely to succeed as Chamberlain’s 1938 chat with Hitler. As ideologues, reason is subordinated to their cause and belief system.
The goals of al Qaeda are unacceptable. First, they want a free hand in the Middle East with no outside presence. In short, let them overthrow any government in the Muslim world that they care to. Bear in mind that al Qaeda’s ideas of governing principles have been seen in action with the Taliban "government’’ and its behavior in Afghanistan. Moreover, besides the nightmare they would create for over a billion people, the next phase of the Fundamentalist grandiose plans is the aggressive expansion of the Islamic world through violence and conquest. If we give them any rope, they will hang somebody, and then hang us.
Moreover, if we could negotiate with al Qaeda, with whom would we be negotiating anyway? Private actors who are totally outside the law of nations and feel no real compulsion to abide by any laws but their own cannot be expected to be honest dealers.
Al Qaeda is an unusual terrorist group in that it is a ‘meta-network’ or network of networks; that enjoys the support of at least tens of millions of Muslims around the world and has the broad sympathies of hundreds of thousands more. This means that it can expect discrete unofficial cooperation from any number of people in official positions, perhaps tipping them off to raids, "accidentally" leaving the back doors open to arms warehouses, or not looking too closely when arranging large money transfers for a shadowy client. At present, their ability to regenerate themselves is almost unlimited.
Islamic Fundamentalists present themselves as a heroic future to the impressionable and disturbed peoples within today’s Islamic World and promise answers to all that aggrieves them. Yet, as Richard Pipes has pointed out, much of the Fundamentalists’ agenda and program has been borrowed (albeit unconsciously) from 20th Century totalitarian movements. Unfortunately, they have an almost unchallenged ability to inspire popular imaginations, particularly as their ideology is presented to Muslim populations as a pure and orthodox version of their faith. Other Muslims cannot easily challenge Fundamentalist constructs; both because doing so endangers them, but also because they lack the Fundamentalists’ dramatic appeal. In arguing against the Fundamentalists, non-Muslims cannot use Islamic symbols and notions, as doing so will irritate many ordinary Muslims.
Given that al Qaeda can continuously reinvent and re-arm itself, and cannot be effectively countered by moral suasion or propaganda, it will present a continuing threat for at least another generation if it is embarrassingly humiliated and has its confidence shattered.
An active al Qaeda is a very real danger and, worse still, they are winning so far. While they have not yet been able to match the damage they wrought in the 9-11 attacks, they did manage to achieve the Bali Night club attack and startled the world’s aviation and tourism industries (again) with the SAM-7 attack and hotel bombing in Kenya. Dozens of al Qaeda operations have been prevented since the World Trade Center toppled — such as the plan to introduce Sarin gas into the European Parliament or to convulse Singapore with 11 truck bombs — but there is a tremendous imbalance between the cost it takes to mount these attacks and what expensive results these have on us.
The 9-11 attacks cost al Qaeda an estimated $500,000 to plan and execute. They cost the US and the Global economy some 3,200 lives, almost $100 Billion in direct costs (destroyed buildings, recovery costs, reconstruction, and insurance pay-outs) and the indirect costs in terms of lost business, economic instability, higher insurance premiums and new security budgets. Even if only one al Qaeda attack in 50 succeeds, it does so at a ruinous price to us. One might do well to remember the line in Kipling’s 19th Century poem about British troops in Afghanistan -- Arithmetic on the Frontier. It read "Two thousand pounds of education/Drops to a ten-rupee jezail [a simple Afghan matchlock musket]."
Normally, an anti-terror campaign is an exercise in attrition. Authorities confronted by a terrorist group hope that, year by year, they can capture the skilled experts and leaders within the terrorist group faster than new ones can develop; thus eventually limiting the ability of the group to do real harm. In the case of al Qaeda, they have lost their Afghan sanctuaries and hundreds of their members have been detained. But there are thousands more trained members at large, including most of the senior leaders of the group, and there are areas where they can cautiously train recruits without much interruption.
Al Qaeda can operate on an international scale, and the campaign against the group needs international cooperation. But, different nations have different operating methods, different resources and degrees of motivation for the campaign. In exchanging information on financing, or swapping intelligence on suspects, the US has received a good degree of cooperation. The liberation of Afghanistan received less concrete support, although a large number of countries lent a hand. Even if the UN determines that Iraq is in violation of resolutions about its weapons programs, the US could really count on a handful of active partners when it moves to topple Saddam. Plainly, support for the campaign is going to be widely variable.
One aspect of the durability of al Qaeda will probably be that a great many sources of its support cannot be identified or dealt with. The Wahabi sect whose puritanical strain is the foundation for much of al Qaeda’s thinking is practically the state faith of Saudi Arabia. While Pakistan’s leader has bent over backwards to support operations against al Qaeda, the ability of his government (or that of any Pakistani government) to impose its will in the wild northwestern provinces is extremely limited. Many other Muslim countries that have connections to al Qaeda are on the verge of being failed states, and even if their governments should wish to cooperate with Washington and its allies, it would be impossible for them to do so.
The hot and cold running attitudes of partners and allies will compound another problem. In passively fighting terrorism, success breeds complacency that in turn breeds vulnerability. So long as the Western world acts defensively, its successes are going to result in a complacent public, relaxed security, dwindling budgets… then thousands more us will be killed, billions of dollars of property will be destroyed, and the cycle will resume as everyone rushes to be vigilant once more.
There are two other points about being passive; an old military maxim which Napoleon frequently cited was that "he who defends everything defends nothing." This is especially true considering that terrorism involves a constant search for weaknesses to exploit. Also, the most sure guarantee of defeat is to surrender the initiative to the enemy — as a host of lost battles and slaughtered armies can attest throughout all the ages of recorded history.
However, if acting passively is reasonably sure to annoy some other nations, an aggressive posture certainly would. Still, the Western world is very good at inflicting death and destruction — in fact, we excel at it. Terrorists prefer to remain covert and hidden among civilians, and al Qaeda learned very quickly in Afghanistan that there was no refuge that could protect them from the open power of Western militaries. If the West was willing to meet violence with violence, we could do so very easily indeed.
However, Western societies share a reluctance to unleash our capacity for violence. It frightens us and reminds us of the dire carnage and destruction that results from wars fought between Western peoples. Additionally, we have habitually constrained our conduct in warfare with rules and restrictions on how we fight; and only set them aside with the greatest reluctance.
Yet, it is one of the sordid secrets of counter-terrorism that fire can be fought with fire. The new Irish government of 1922 was faced with renewed terrorism by IRA members who were outraged by the conditions of peace with Britain. Dublin then seized dozens of IRA men and shot them after drumhead trials. The insurrection stopped. Decades later, one of the reasons why the Provisional Wing of the IRA agreed to the 1994 Ceasefire in Ulster was that Protestant paramilitaries had taken to randomly murdering Catholics in Republican neighborhoods — thus pointing out that PIRA was powerless to protect the very people it purported to represent. There are similar examples from other terrorist campaigns.
So what options does the Western World have?
Negotiation with al Qaeda? This is both impossible and unacceptable.
Being defensive and passive? It may work in the short term, but will prove to be a losing proposition in the long run. In the aftermath of the invasion of Afghanistan, this is largely what we are doing now.
Being totally offensive? It is tempting, and might even work after a while — but the price would involve permanently poisoning our relations with the rest of the world (except, perhaps, India); but would also be unacceptable to most of our own population. We could win, but the price would be unacceptably high and we might ruin the legacy of our own civilization.
Operating defensively while taking aggressive action when and where possible? This sounds like what President Bush and Prime Minister Blair have already cooked up, and hope to advance with the toppling of Iraq. It also sounds like the guiding basis for a workable plan for a struggle that will probably take a decade or two to accomplish.
An academic scandal: The importance of peer review
A constant danger for activists, regardless of the worth of their cause, is an eagerness to ‘over-egg the pudding’ when making a point. Michael Bellesiles’ 2000 bookArming America: the Origins of a National Gun Culture provides a case in point. Academics and scientists are supposed to be reputable seekers after the truth and, while free to engage in activism, should be careful with respect to how they cook their book.
The Bellesiles scandal is attracting media attention in the US, but it has barely shown up on Canadian radar. Michael Bellesiles, an historian at Emory University in Atlanta, won the prestigious Bancroft Prize in 2001, but he is now scrambling to defend himself against charges of "fraud" and "intentional deception." He is still under suspicion as the department continues to investigate the charges.
Despite the fact that this scandal concerns American history, it raises an important challenge for Canadian academics. How could allegedly fraudulent research, not just get published, but win prestigious academic prizes? The rise and fall of Bellesiles opens a window on a more general problem, the fragility of peer review. According to Professor Emeritus David Bordua, at the University of Illinois, the real scandal concerns the willing gullibility of ideological reviewers and academic historians. The Bellesiles case represents a monumental failure of peer review. When his work was first published, reviewers hailed the book apparently without bothering to evaluate the research. The book even won the Bancroft Prize without anyone on this prestigious panel bothering to check his footnotes thoroughly. Isn’t this something academics are supposed to do even with run-of-the-mill undergraduate papers?
In 2000, Bellesiles was being fawned upon by academic and popular critics alike for his book Arming America: the Origins of a National Gun Culture. Peter Onuf, the author of Jefferson’s Empire," opined that "Michael A. Bellesiles moves to the front rank of American historians with this deeply researched, brilliantly argued, energetically written, and timely book." Robert J. Spitzer, author of The Politics of Gun Control, claimed the book was, "Meticulously, even extravagantly, researched." Michael Zuckerman, the author of Peaceable Kingdoms even said, "This is stunning history, brilliantly argued. It throws into a cocked hat our most cherished assumptions about guns and gun culture in early America." Today, these critics are silently eating crow.
What was all the fuss about? In his book, Bellesiles claimed to have examined over 11,000 probate records between 1765 and 1850 and found a surprisingly small number of firearms. He concluded that firearm ownership was less widespread than previously believed, so that, before the 1860s, a widespread "gun culture" didn’t exist. More provocatively, he claimed that onset of the US Civil War, and the rapid growth of the arms industry, gave birth to the distinctive American gun culture. If true, this would undercut the myth of the American "minuteman" who plays an important role in American political theory.
This is heady stuff. To many historians and social critics, this study supported their prejudices against firearms and their distrust of industrial corporations. Without checking too closely, many rushed to applaud Bellesiles as their new hero.
Unfortunately for Bellesiles, cracks soon began to appear in his argument. First, legal researchers challenged his sources. When these scholars checked the sources they couldn’t confirm his findings. For example, when professor James Lindgren, Professor of Law at Northwestern University, tried to check the records, he found glaring discrepancies. Bellesiles records either weren’t where he said they would be or, if found, they differed substantially from what Bellesiles said. Other scholars also checked; all found it impossible to get Bellesiles to share his sources.
Worse was in store. When the records were checked further, many of the records Bellesiles claimed existed couldn’t be found. When asked, he had various excuses, each more implausible than the ones he’d used earlier. All however were variations of ‘the dog ate my homework.’ Bellesiles told professor Lindgren that he’d kept his notes on yellow foolscap and had no records on disk. This is surprising, but then he said his notes had been destroyed when there’d been a flood in his office. However, professor emeritus Jerome Sternstein at Brooklyn College wasn’t impressed. Particularly troubling, archives where Bellesiles claimed to have taken extensive notes had no record he’d ever been there. His goose was cooked when he was confronted with claiming to have studied records that were lost in the great San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906.
His academic critics have now painstakingly shown that Bellesiles made up or grossly misrepresented much of his data. The academics who nominated him for the Bancroft Prize are no longer supporting him. The American Society of Criminology scheduled a panel to examine the scandal, but no one could be found to defend him. The National Endowment of the Humanities has acted to remove its name from Bellesiles’ fellowship. After a six-month investigation, Emory University has now placed him on leave pending their decision about the charges of academic dishonesty.
Academics such as professor Bordua argue that the ease with which his book was accepted by academics is even more shocking than Bellesiles' deficient scholarship. How could anyone be awarded the Bancroft Prize without any serious effort being made to corroborate his research? The real scandal is not that a professor would conduct fraudulent work, but that his peers accepted it. The most plausible explanation is that ideologues believe the end justifies the means.
In Bellesiles' case, historians eagerly allowed themselves to be hoodwinked. The charitable interpretation is that academics, like anyone else, are not as critical of arguments that support their prejudices as they are with those that are less comforting. This is just human nature. But, academics are supposed to be professionals. Every discipline has set up methodological standards to guard against such human failings. In order to be published, academic books and articles must survive rigorous criticism in the peer-review process. If we do not honorably adhere to the highest disciplinary standards, our research loses credibility.
A less charitable interpretation is that academics are more cynical. Historians may have willingly supported Bellesiles’ outrageous claims, even knowing they were implausible, because doing so furthered their political objectives. Historians tend to consider themselves "progressive," and so they share a dislike of firearms. Thus, they willingly flocked to support Bellesiles in order to promote their ideological agenda.
Some academics defend such cynicism, arguing that there is no such thing as truth. Everything is subjective. Unfortunately, this standard too easily promotes propaganda. Academic prizes are seen as rewards for your friends or fellow travelers. As one European intellectual told me, "The law only exists to be applied to your enemies." I believe such a cynical approach undermines faith in all academic research.
Don’t misunderstand me. This problem isn’t limited to history. Nor is it limited to liberals. The Bellesiles case illustrates how crucial peer review is to all academics — Canadian or American, historians or scientists. If peer review can fail in history, it can fail anywhere. Recently, the Journal of the American Medical Association admitted that there are serious problems with peer review in medical publications. All academics must work to keep the peer review process healthy and act vigorously to root out unprofessional conduct.
There is no happy ending to this story yet. Peer review did eventually uncover the gross distortions, but this took years longer than it should. Bellesiles’ critics continue to grow as the evidence against him mounts relentlessly. Unfortunately, the American Historical Association does not appear to be listening. It is too soon to know if the flaws in the peer-review process that failed with Bellesiles have been recognized, let alone fixed.
-- Gary Mauser
Gary Mauser is a Full Professor in the Faculty of Business Administration and a Research Fellow in the Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies. In 2001, he won the Nora and Ted Sterling Award for Controversy — awarded to those academics who choose to swim upstream while observing the full standards of their profession.
Kingsley Wages War with NCC
Founded in 1967, The National Citizens Coalition has waged a long war (since the 1980s) against repeated attempts by successive Federal governments to impose "gag" laws and other restrictions on free speech on Canadian citizens. It has been an honorable fight waged on behalf of every citizen. The NCC’s vice president, Gerry Nichols, gives an update of the latest clash. This article was first printed in the Hill Times on January 27th, 2003.
Canada’s Chief Electoral officer, Jean Pierre Kingsley, is out to get me.
Well, it’s actually not me personally he’s out to get, but rather the group I work for, the National Citizens Coalition.
The NCC is one of Canada’s foremost organizations for the defence and promotion of free markets, smaller government, and individual freedom.
But that’s not why Kingsley doesn’t like us. He despises us because we keep going to court and shooting down something very precious to him: election gag laws.
Election gag laws, as the name implies, restrict the right to free political expression.
In fact, gag laws make it a crime for private citizens or groups to spend their own money to express their own views at election time.
Imagine sending someone to jail for the "crime" of expressing an opinion.
But a lot of politicians like the idea of gag laws. Officially they claim such laws stop the wealthy from "buying elections." But that is nonsense. Canadians make their decisions about who to vote for based on facts and issues not on how much money is spent.
And politicians know this. The real reason they like gag laws is simple.
These laws give political parties a monopoly on debate during elections.
Simply put, gag laws enable professional politicians to shut up and shut down voices of the people.
Canada’s first gag law made its appearance back in 1984. It didn’t last long, however, because the NCC went to court and had it declared unconstitutional. The court basically ruled that election gag laws could not be justified in a free and democratic society.
In 1993 then Prime Minister Brian Mulroney came up with a gag law of his own. Once again the NCC challenged it in the courts and once again a gag law was ruled unconstitutional.
Then in 2000 it was Prime Minister Jean Chrétien’s turn. He enacted a gag law that not only imposed severe restrictions on what private citizens or groups could spend to express opinions, but also forced those wishing to express opinions to register with Elections Canada, a regulatory process that is intrusive, costly, and burdensome.
Again the NCC went to court to defend free expression. But this time we not only had to contend with the Liberal government but with the Chief Electoral Officer as well.
Jean Pierre Kingsley, you see, demanded the right to intervene in our constitutional court challenge. He appeared as a witness and offered such a one-sided defence of gag laws that one of the journalists at the trial dubbed him "Canada’s Chief Ideologue."
It is an apt description. Although he is supposed to be an impartial administrator of elections, Kingsley is anything but impartial when it comes to gag laws. In fact, he loves them. For years, he has been agitating from the sidelines urging Parliament to adopt them.
In any event, Kingsley’s testimony clearly put him into a conflict of interest situation. After all, can a bureaucrat who is clearly a gag law advocate be trusted to make impartial decisions when it comes to applying this law during elections?
Well as it turned out the answer is "no he can’t."
Or maybe it was just pure coincidence that Elections Canada happened to charge the NCC with breaking the gag law during the 2000 federal election.
The NCC’s crime? Well during that election we ran a 15-second TV ad to raise public awareness about our gag law court battle.
A Liberal Party boss saw the ad, didn’t like it, and sent a letter of complaint to Elections Canada.
A little while later, Kingsley’s "Speech Police" burst into our Toronto office to inform us that we had been charged with breaking the gag law.
The charge is a sham. The TV ad in question was not an election ad. It didn’t tell people who to vote for, it did not endorse a political party. It simply asked Canadians to support our court challenge.
Meanwhile things got even more interesting when on December 16, 2002 the Alberta Court of Appeal ruled that Chrétien’s gag law was unconstitutional.
For us it was a wonderful victory. Not only had the NCC once again killed a gag law, but we were also sure that Kingsley would now drop the charges against us.
After all, we knew that it had always been Kingsley’s policy not to enforce the gag law if it had been declared unconstitutional anywhere in Canada.
But we were wrong. In what appears a purely vindictive move, Elections Canada ordered the trial to go ahead, court ruling or no court ruling.
The NCC will now be forced into a costly and lengthy criminal trial to defend ourselves against a law which has already been declared unconstitutional in Alberta.
Of course, in carrying out this vendetta, Kingsley has unwittingly provided another reason why gag laws are wrong. Not only do they restrict free speech, they also provide politicians and bureaucrats with a powerful weapon to punish people they don’t like.
Today they are using the gag law to punish the NCC. Maybe tomorrow they will use it to punish you.
Gerry Nicholls is vice-president of the National Citizens Coalition. Those who wish to contact the organization and offer support can reach it at 416-869-3838.
Voices of Freedom
Fight for honor, for dishonor is easily won.
--Traditional Arab saying.
I am I plus my surroundings and if I do not preserve the latter, I do not preserve myself.
-- Jose Ortega y Gasset, Meditations of Quixote
You might as well fall flat on your face as lean too far backward.
-- James Thurber, "The Bear Who Let it Alone."
And this just in from the Boy-Is-There-a-Lot-to-Read-Between-These-Lines Department…
"Appropriate in stature, quick in movement and unafraid of hardship, Chinese astronauts are obviously superior."
-- Su Shuangning, head of the PRC’s Space Program in a January 2003 press conference on the planned launching of their ‘Divine Ship’ manned rocket (and it sounds like their capsule will be even smaller and more uncomfortable than most).
John Thompson is President of the Mackenzie Institute which studies political instability and terrorism. He can be reached at: mackenzieinstitute@bellnet.ca
CLICK HERE FOR MORE ARTICLES
|