Jumping the Shark: What it means for America
What do we stand for these days? What are those things that we, as a nation and as a society, hold so dear that we are willing to fight to the last man? I think we’ve reached a crisis point in our national identity; our inability to identify and articulate these things is only fueling the chaos in the world.
There has been a lot of talk this week about a possible need to change the US strategy in Iraq. From the fall of Amara to the prospects of a second test of a nuclear weapon by North Korea, from the press conference a couple of days ago with MG Caldwell, to the news today of President Bush meeting with troop commanders from Iraq, the turmoil in the world and in the American leadership’s views of the world may be an indication that the United States has, in fact, jumped the shark. And if the US has in fact jumped the shark, do we have or can we hold the same values as before?
Jumping the shark. It’s an expression usually reserved for TV shows. It’s that point in time when you realize something has peaked, reached its zenith, climaxed, and it’s not only not going to be as good as that in the future, but that it’s actually going to go downhill from there on out. The Fonz, one season, literally jumped a shark (on water skis), and, even though the show had a number of successful seasons after that, it just never was as good as it had been before he made that jump.
That sure sounds like America in this post-Soviet world, despite our best efforts to keep that from happening.
Over at the National Journal (no, not one of my regular reads), James Kitfield posted the question of whether America really would be ready to commit everything to win in Iraq.
Everything.
I just don’t know. Part of me wants to believe that the answer is yes, but a large part of me knows that the answer is no.
I suspect that, back in the day, the US would have. Back in the days of the Cold War, when the world was divided in two and you were with the US or you were with the Soviets, any conflict, every conflict, had that all-or-nothing sense about it. Everything was on the verge of escalation to warfare that involved the commitment of all aspects of our country and our society. The fear of and the threat posed by the Soviets was just that big.
So, if America as a superpower has jumped the shark, what is it for which we are now willing to wholly commit to going to war?
It’s not the long war, the struggle with the Salafists and Al Qaeda. These last few years have shown that, especially if you consider that the struggle has been going on for the last few decades. There’s been no mobilization of the country, no radical changes to the economy, no war bonds to fuel the spending spree required to win a war.
It’s not WMD, or the nuclear threat. After North Korea tested a nuclear weapon, the most the US could muster was talk of sanctions and promises of more talks about how to implement those sanctions. Much the same can be said about Iran and the prospects of it developing nuclear weapons (and likely with aid from North Korea in doing so): “We must do something” is not the same as actually doing something.
And it’s not genocide. How many instances of it have we had since WWII and the calls of “Never again!”? Or does “Never again!” only mean that there shouldn’t be another genocide of the Jewish population? That’s a hard one to explain to the Bosniak Muslim enclave at Srebrenica, or the Tutsis of Rwanda, or the Fur, Zaghawa, and Massaleit ethnic groups in Darfur.
If the US really has jumped the shark, maybe it would be a good thing for President Bush and his top military leaders to get together and look at what it is that the United States really is willing to wholly commit to for war.
To win in Iraq, would you be willing to see across-the-board tax increases? More taxes on everything, from the food you buy to the gas you use, from your salary to your property?
To win in Iraq, would you support a return of the draft? Would you be willing to see every man and every woman under the age of 42 be made available for service in the military? Your sons, your daughters, your husbands, your wives — everyone? To win in Iraq, would you be willing to fund and resource a greatly expanded military and intelligence community? More soldiers, more Marines, more spies and spy planes? And would you be willing to see your sons and daughters march off to war, without there being plans for their return, as it was on December 8, 1941, when military units formed up and shipped off to join WWII? They might be back next year, they might be back in 5 years.
To win in Iraq, would you be willing to risk the economic future of our country through massive spending and an expansion of the national debt? Would you risk your retirement? What about the educational options for your children and your grandchildren?
In the Army, we use the term “go to ground” to describe a unit that has reached that point where they stop running, they stop thinking of escaping and of their own survival, and they shift to prepare to fight to the death, to the last man and the last bullet. If the United States has jumped the shark, and is not ready to go to ground over things like the war in Iraq, or the Long War, or the proliferation of nuclear weapons, or even genocide, then what it is for which we stand?
I don’t know the answer to this. I don’t see it in the campaign speeches for this upcoming election, or the political platforms of our two main parties.
I don’t know the answer, but I’ll think about it some. We probably all should, for that matter.