A few months ago, I submitted a column to Newsweek for their feature called "My Turn," in which ordinary folks like you and me get a full page to write something that's a little more on the "personal" side. But, they are quick to remind submitters that they get hundreds of such columns each week and can only publish one. Guess what? I lost this time--probably for several reasons, not the least of which is that my thoughts were a little more "political" than "personal." Nonetheless, here for everyone to see (even you folks in Malaysia, Poland, Brazil, etc. etc.) is what I sent them. It is, in many ways, my stance on what we are doing in Iraq:
In last fall’s campaign for the U.S. Senate in Minnesota, candidate Mark Kennedy, defending our actions in Iraq, ran TV spots that included this statement: “You can’t negotiate with people who want to kill you.” For many, such a quip might seem so correct and so self-evident that even a smidgen of skepticism about its wisdom would be incomprehensible.
But for me, whenever I heard this statement, the question always arose, “Aren’t those the very people you’d want to negotiate with?”
“Negotiation,” “discussion,” and “communication” seem like wimpy words to many people. A letter-writer to the Star Tribune last fall said that we need to “get tough” in Iraq, including the use of “heavy artillery” and “Hiroshima-style bombs,” because “the only way we will be victorious in the war on terror is to bring the enemy to its knees, and force them to surrender.” For some people, there’s no problem that a few nukes couldn’t handle!
Unfortunately, the prevailing mindset is that “terrorism” can only be conquered with violence. However, a foreign policy based on trying to “kill the enemy” is destined to fail. Whether it be the Hatfields and the McCoys or the United States and Al-Qaeda, the lesson we should have learned, over and over, is that violence simply tends to beget more violence. This is even more the case when the “enemy” has no national identity. We could get the Japanese nation to surrender in 1945, but we cannot do that so readily with antagonists who are spread across many countries and are not legal representatives of any political state. We cannot really “win a war” here; we must instead win hearts and minds.
We hear a lot about our military strategy “to win the war on terrorism.” But we don’t hear anything about our communication strategy. What do we know about these other people, and their cultures? How do their values and communication styles differ from ours? What are their political and religious views? What do we have in common with them, and where are the tension points? Until we are ready to address these questions seriously, we leave ourselves in the position where the only option seems to be violence.
If I were the President, I would make effective communication my number one priority. If elected, I would say to the world: “Osama bin Laden, Al-Qaeda, and anyone who has issues with the United States—I will meet with you, anytime, anywhere to try to make this world better. Let’s sit down and see what we can agree upon, and what we need to work on. Because the reality is that what we are doing right now just isn’t working--for anyone.”
I can already anticipate the letters to Newsweek in the next few days. Words such as “hopelessly idealistic” and “incredibly naïve” will appear. Doesn’t he remember the Nazis? Why should we appease “aggressors”? Weren’t the 9/11 attacks unprovoked? And how do you negotiate with people who want to kill you? Of course, part of the answer involves another communication skill: the need to listen, and to realize, even if it is abhorrent to us, that in the view of Al-Qaeda, 9/11 was not unprovoked.
Still, there are no simple or magic answers to the world’s problems, and that includes “better communication.” But until we make a concerted effort to communicate more effectively with the rest of the world, we are left with options that are, in the long run, not only more unpleasant, but counterproductive. Indeed, the times when we have shined as a nation have been built around the positive force of our vision for a saner world, whether that be in the form of the Marshall Plan, the Peace Corps, or the courageous nonviolent campaigns of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Change is not always easy or pleasant, but it can happen when people are committed to making it happen. We’ve squandered hundreds of billions of dollars on the military in Iraq, and yet some might have the nerve to suggest that better communication is somehow a wasted and pointless effort. But with a small fraction of that military money we could engage the world in substantive discussions and intercultural initiatives that would do far more to move us in the right direction. A smart cultural, economic, and diplomatic strategy would have far better results in the long run and could restore the tarnished image of the United States in the world community.
What is highly ironic to me is that many people have defined “stopping terrorism” as the central, defining issue of the 21st century. Terrorism, so this view goes, is the pivotal issue of our time. The irony is that by trying to kill our way out of this mess, we are creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. A foreign policy that is based on military intervention will help ensure that this remains a military problem, far into the future. What we desperately need in order to break this cycle of violence is a radically new stance that will reach out to the world, start meaningful exchanges with both our friends and our foes, and make the United States a constructive force for peace, something that would make us all proud.
This message, of course, is hardly original and certainly not profound. But it is such a neglected and overlooked message that someone needs to say it here and now: we simply cannot secure the peace by waging war.
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