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When it comes to understanding regime change, there is no greater authority than the Dalai Lama.

Any political doctrine that you can put into words by definition has two interpretations. So it is with regime change. George Bush did not invent the unilateral war and he did not invent regime change.

The Chinese laid claim to Tibet, overran it with troops and gave the Dalai Lama two choices. Leave the country or become violent. The Dalai Lama chose to leave and live in the limbo of political exile rather than be party to the violence that would have wreaked havoc on his homeland. In today’s rhetoric he would seem to us as the un-patriot, the appeaser, the abandoner. He accepted the hand he was dealt, smiled at the Chinese, and put the well being of Tibetans above his personal or political ambitions. A revered leader that chose personal humiliation over violence for the well being of his people. I can think of no greater sacrifice.

The Chinese Occupiers immediately named their own Lama and enthroned him. There was no bloodbath, no innocent collateral damage, no looting of the National Treasures, no bombing of shrines. The ordinary people of Tibet relinquished the right to self determination for the opportunity to oppose an occupation with their hearts and minds instead of guns. They still hope for the glorious return of their rightful Spiritual and Enlightened Monk, the 14th Dalai Lama, and the Sovereignty of their Country. It could take a long time.

The Chinese for their part are “liberating” serfs from a Theocracy. They plan on modernizing and improving the lives of ordinary Tibetans and making sure the natural resources of Tibet are used to raise the standard of education and living for the entire population of the Tibet Autonomous Region. They did not undertake to overrun Tibet without some serious soul searching and a long term commitment to introduce a large number of Chinese nationals into Tibet to ensure that a compatible political establishment would be established there that would lend stability to the region. Nothing promotes stability quicker than a police state. End of discussion. I absolutely hate intolerance. Don’t you?

George Bush is in a quandry. If he pushes Kim Jong Il, Kim will make a quick decision. No one to consult. This is the situation. He has Nukes. He has declared that he’s withdrawing DPRK from NPT. He’s reprocessing all the fuel he can get a hold of. He’s declared that his country is in a severe security threat. He has issued the following statement; “The Iraqi War teaches us a lesson that in order to prevent a war and defend the security of a country and the Sovereignty of a Nation, it is necessary to have a powerful physical deterrent force......only”.

George thinks he bluffing. Using the old poker face bluff to wrangle concessions from an “appointed” president of a Culturally Imperialistic Brand of Liberty. Kim knows he has a ready outlet for the “device”, with some real money already in the kitty, and could sell his hand, or, to demonstrate that he has the goods, drop a dime to the testing facility for the “demonstration”.

This is where things get dicey. If George calls the bluff, he will be responsible for a clear and irrefutable Nuclear detonation. God knows we don’t need that. If we see a test, and it works, we have very little room to raise the ante. In fact, we might have to fold this hand and call for a new deal. It would be costly in political terms but wouldn’t cost human lives. Or we could try “Blitzkreig ii” or more appropriately “Blitzkreig il”. I’m feeling a little ill at that prospect. ONE MILLION DEAD!

Or, and this is truly galling, if not Absolutely Gauling, retreat to the Security Council for a “resolution”.

No one said the job would be easy.

Kim has the hand. We want him to work with the system. Even the Chinese want stability.

How much freedom can you tolerate? Can you tolerate that competing economic, political and religious trends stand in the way of a single politically correct solution to humanities hopes and dreams?

The Dalai Lama knows and understands more than most that there is a higher moral force than violence. Cultivate compassion, equanimity and mindfulness. We need a healthier state of mind than the one marching toward Armageddon. Read his op-ed piece in the Times.

Or I’ll break both your legs.

Bob

Posted by Bob at 05:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There is one imperative that drives the ethics of citizenship. Tell those who claim to speak for you and those who spend the money that you must contribute to the well being of the nation, what they need to know, even though, they don’t know they need to know it.

The tip of the spear in military jargon is the phalanx of warriors that are willing to inflict death, pain and suffering on the enemy in armed struggle. Until the Vietnam war, that spear was made of the sons of the republic chosen from among the pool of eligible eighteen year olds as an obligation of citizenship. Now, it is made of the sons and daughters of the republic who elect to join for the compensation, the educational benefit, the selfless service to community or personal glory and edification.

These warriors have taken an oath to follow the orders issued from on high, within the constraints of morality, or face serious consequences. They pledge their lives to maintain and perpetuate a political estate. All political estates, we are reminded by the military apparatus, begin and end at the tip of that spear. Political ideology of Western Culture advances the premise that there are no political estates that can exist for very long without the loyal dedication of the warrior class willing to make the ultimate sacrifice. We earned our freedom from the Crown based on our willingness to sacrifice our sons for the cause. Without their sacrifice we would be British Citizens.

British Citizens seem as free to us as we are. They seem not to have been overly diminished by their lack of enthusiasm for challenging the Crown with arms. They did Challenge the Crown, powerful despotic rulers, and managed to demand Constitutional Monarchy without armed insurrection. They did it with persuasion and influence gained from education and understanding. They did it from reason not from armaments.

The French, when confronting despotic Monarchs, stormed the Bastille. They established their First Republic with arms. This is not the universal case, and Republics established by the force of arms have by no means demonstrated greater staying power than some Absolute Monarchies established by decree. Obviously so when considering the number of successive French Republics.

I resent that those who purport to speak for me can allow no distinctions between Republics that lay claim to Sovereign Authority by force of arms and those that lay claim to that authority on Law and Reason. Our public servants it seems cannot bring themselves to establish a paradigm of action on the international stage that is non-violent before all other characteristics. All the treaties to which we are signatories were drawn and executed in the firm hope that they would foreclose the use of violence in the affairs of nations. Diplomacy was crafted to prevent heads of state from backing their interlocutors into corners, binding action that was predicated on violence. Pre-emption as a Foreign Policy is a policy that is predicated on violence.

It is entirely possible that the Papa Doc to Baby Doc transition could have provided the paradigm of Papa Saddam to Baby Udai or Qusay transition that would have eliminated the need for the collateral damage that this war has wrought.

Smart weapons in the hands of dumb leaders does not give any of us more security. It delivers less security.

There are several reasons that were advanced for the justification of this war. To make the people of Iraq free and to make us more secure when we venture forth in the world to do our business. A Global Economy is an economy where the First Estate can operate freely without paying protection money to thugs or their own government.

The future will determine how well the vision of a Global Economy can proceed and at what cost.

Bob

Posted by Bob at 10:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)