September 11, 2002

THE OTHERWISE BENIGN HEGEMON RECOVERS FROM THE SHOCK OF 9/11

By Tom Plate

But is the U.S. becoming more Sparta than Athens?

(C) 2002 Asia Pacific Media Network

LOS ANGELES --- The terrible tragedy that occurred last Sept. 11 left America not only with a sense of deep loss but a renewed sense of direction and national mission that had been noticeably absent in recent years. Certainly, for the administration of George W. Bush, floundering from the outset for a North Star to which to align its policy compass, the gruesome massacres did the job. Now, we have seen the enemy -- and they are the terrorists. There's not much dissent in the United States about that.

On one level, the inadvertent benefit of what happened a year ago was immediate. In Europe, America's allies began quarreling a little less and cooperating with Washington a little more. Joint intelligence efforts were accelerated, and old tensions were, for a while at least, set to the side. In Asia, it quickly became clear that, with real enemies to worry about -- Al Qaeda and the like -- Washington didn't have to ratchet up problems to solve and improbable enmities to stare down, no time for phantom bad guys of the Washington political opera.

One almost instant such effect was the re-normalization of relations with China. Of course, there were, and still are, serious tensions in the Sino-U.S. relationship (Taiwan, human rights, etc.). But, rather quickly, China became part of the solution instead of the problem when the Bush administration realized -- its unilateralist gut notwithstanding -- that America needed all the outside help it could get. And the Jiang Zemin government played its hand well enough to stay on the right side of the line in the sand being drawn by Sheriff Bush.

Before long, however, the definition of the 9/11 problem began to grow enormously. Iran, Iraq and North Korea were famously lumped together as the Good, the Bad and the Ugly -- an evil trio if there ever was one. But with all the ballooning rhetoric came a familiar Washington phenomenon: mission creep. Having failed to capture or confirm as officially dead Osama bin Laden, the Sheriff in Chief began drawing his sights on a more visible "Axis of Terror" target: Saddam Hussein.

On one level, that's a good move. He's a genuinely bad guy; it's possible to imagine that the amount of genuine sympathy for him worldwide, put on the head of a pin, would leave enough room left for, say, the Three Gorges Dam. But if a new war against Iraq ensues -- after the more or less automatic approval of Congress and the rounding up of just enough international support to blur the Bush Lonesome Cowboy image -- the United States will be on a war footing for at least the duration of Bush's first (only?) term.

And that would seriously mar the image of an America that the world admires -- the America that not only won World War II but helped rebuild much of the world after that triumph -- in Asia as well as Europe.

The point was put well recently by China's Tang Shui Bei, now head of the Research Center for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits, a major mainland think tank. Ordinarily advice from China, which imprisons political dissidents and acts in many ways not the American way, doesn't travel well; but Tang -- the irrepressible former head of cross-strait relations for the People's Republic of China -- spoke with obviously sincere conviction of the U.S.' need to diversify its international portfolio. With its rejection of the Kyoto Protocol and several other well-meaning international treaties, America's "kinder, gentler" side -- as Bush Sr. would have put it -- is at risk of getting lost in the war-dance shuffle. One year after the World Trade Center/Pentagon devastation, the United States must not compound that tragedy by diluting its moral standing as a benign hegemon.

For this essential national characteristic was key in obtaining the cooperation of much of Asia in the effort against Al Qaeda. No country, including China, could believe that U.S. designs on acquiring Central
Asian territory was the true motive, suggested Tang and his delegation while visiting Los Angeles. But as the United States moves closer to invading Iraq, it looks more like a martial Sparta and less like a cultivated Athens, when ideally America should be striking a balance between the two.

Even the West Coast-based RAND Corp., a famous think tank with an image about as dovish as the Pentagon's, raised this fear in its recent quarterly review. A major essay by prominent experts proposed that America take the lead in organizing a massive world health effort. Enemy bombs are not our only mortal enemies. So, too, are epidemics that cross international borders; and disease and poverty that germinate the cultures breeding terrorism's foot soldiers. What the United States needs is a something of the humanitarian order of a massive first-class global health aid plan -- even more than it needs the head of Saddam Hussein on the Pentagon's platter.

For publication and reprint rights, contact the author directly or John Simpson (john.simpson@latsi.com) of the Los Angeles Times Syndicate International.

Previous Columns:

Waging War Against Asia Stereotypes (September 4, 2002)

Crouching Asian Film Tigers to Slay Hollywood Dragon? (August 28, 2002)

Did The Devil Make President Chen Do It? (August 21, 2002)

The Hawaii-ization of Asia (August 14, 2002)