A recurring theme in the ongoing national dialogue over the war on terror and the related conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan is the plaint that the U.S. has no stated and broadly accepted national strategy such as the Cold War era strategy of containment. This does not mean that we do not have a strategy for Iraq and a strategy for Afghanistan, or a strategy for the war on terror, because you can actually find and read these over the Internet as well as in print. The U.S. has no strategy that defines where in the world we as a nation are now, where we would like to be, how we expect to get there, and what kind of world we expect to find when we arrive there.
A major purpose behind the existence of any government is to manage change on behalf of the population that supports that government. Without a strategy or even with a strategy that is ill-thought out and unsupported, governments easily find themselves dealing with the crisis of the day with no idea of how that crisis relates to or reflects the ongoing, anticipated, and yet-to-be imagined changes confronting it. This is sometimes called “putting out the fire in the in-box” school of government.
Presidential election years are the moment when questions of national strategy and its long-term implication should be asked. Candidates for high office – whether the Presidency or a House or Senate seat – should be challenged to clearly and simply state what world they foresee for the United States and how they intend to lead the United States to achieve that world. The Cold War years of nuclear confrontation saw far too many people opt out of debates over strategy, leaving it to be debated, decided, and implemented by those political figures interested or forced to be interested, alongside a coterie of too often self-selected experts hoping to be recognized as the nation’s new “Wise Men.”
At university, one of my classes debated how or even whether a democratic political system could publicly debate and decide questions of foreign policy and national strategy. The hypothesis was that since democracy thrives on open debate but foreign or national security policy is most effective when surrounded by a degree of secrecy, discretion, and even ambiguity, there cannot be an effective open popular debate of such matters. Another argument raised against public debate was that questions of strategy were too intricate, complex, and even arcane to expect any meaningful contribution from the general public or anyone not an educated expert in the field.
In its simplest meaning, a strategy is a plan for achieving a desired goal using the resources you have available. Anyone who has and prepared a plan to achieve a goal – whether to increase sales or to win a sports match – has prepared a strategy. However, you do not really even need these experiences or qualifications for this needed debate. The contribution to this debate that is needed from you is a clear statement as to where you want the United States to be in the world and what kind of world you want that to be for you, for your children, your grandchildren, and so on. The challenge facing the United States today, as the sole surviving superpower, is what do we do with that power, understanding how our use of that power impacts the world today and tomorrow.
As in the days immediately after the end of the Cold War, two extreme choices frame that range of possible worlds:
– The U.S. actively uses its power to direct world affairs, deploying its influence and even its military forces to forcibly shape a world under which nothing is allowed to happen unless the U.S. is agreeable; or,
– The U.S. uses its power and influence to create and support international organizations, coalitions, agreements, and other mechanisms through which the U.S. and other countries together respond to crises and resolve conflicts while sharing the responsibilities and the burdens of making these efforts.
The first possibility risks ever increasing resistance to our exercise of power, leading to our having to use ever greater and more costly levels of force to achieve our desired goals. The second possibility raises the risk that the U.S. will not always achieve exactly the outcome it desires, that responses to crises may come more slowly than we desire, and that others will criticize U.S. policies and the behavior of U.S. forces when they fall short of the standards the U.S. expects other countries to meet.
What you need to do is decide where within the spectrum defined by these two extremes you wish the United States to be, make that desired goal clear to the numerous political candidates, and then ask them to explain whether they share that goal and how they expect to achieve it – how will they work in office to reach that goal.
“My general strategy at present is to last out the next three months.” British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to the Soviet Ambassador, August 1940
“The more I reflect on the experience of history the more I come to see the instability of solutions achieved by force, and to suspect even those instances where force has had the appearance of resolving the difficulties.” B. H. Liddell Hart, “Thoughts on War,” 1944
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Which is the mightiest - pen, sword, or gospel?
The study of history offers many rewards, but sometimes it’s the unexpected discoveries that are the most interesting – the individual stories that are often overshadowed by the grand scale of events as we look back. It is also sometimes surprising to see how individuals in the past lived within a different frame of reference or with different expectations, for example, of how a journalist or a military chaplain should behave.
I recently began researching the story of Arthur B. Fuller, whose name appears on the Freedom Forum’s Journalists Memorial at the Newseum (Museum of News) in Washington, DC, as a special correspondent for The Boston Journal killed during the Battle of Fredericksburg. He is one of eight journalists reportedly killed or reported to have died while covering the war for newspapers in the south or the north. Finding his name associated with both the Battle of Fredericksburg and the Boston Journal was a surprise because I have spent much of my time researching both the battle and another Boston Journal correspondent, Charles Carleton Coffin, and yet I did not remember reading about the death of any of fellow journalist. Fortunately, in world of the Internet, I was able to quickly confirm that an Arthur B. Fuller had been a special correspondent during the war and was killed at Fredericksburg, but the story still offered some surprises.
Arthur Buckminster Fuller was born on August 10, 1822 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His father, Timothy Fuller, was elected to Congress from 1817 to 1825, where he served as Chairman of the Committee on Naval Affairs. Congressman Fuller was described as frank and vigorous, a defender of the Seminole Indians against the federal authorities, and an opponent of the Missouri Compromise. Despite financial obstacles following the death of his father in 1835, Arthur was able to attend Harvard College and graduated in 1843. He then used his remaining few hundred dollars to purchase a small academy in Belvidere, Illinois and embarked upon teaching as a full time career. However, during the following two years, Fuller found his interest and energies increasingly drawn to the Sunday school he taught there and his related preaching. As a result, he returned to Harvard’s Divinity School from which he graduated in 1847.
The new Unitarian minister proceeded to pursue his religious vocation over the following years, filling several pulpits in succession and acting as chaplain for the branches of the state legislature. At the same time he served as editor of his sister Margaret’s writings preparing them for successful publication. He also acted upon his interest in education, serving on various school boards, and was active in support of anti-slavery reforms. These endeavors came to an end with the secession of the southern states and the expected onset of a war between North and South.
Reverend Arthur B. Fuller became the Chaplain of the newly raised 16th Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers on August 1, 1861, a regiment primarily representative of his own Middlesex County. The regiment left Boston on August 17, 1861. While on service, Reverend Fuller was ever attentive to his men, holding weekly Sunday School classes and services as well twice-daily prayer meetings during the rest of the week in his “chapel-tent.” He distributed Bibles, religious volumes, and songbooks that included both religious and patriotic musical selections through the regiment. As did many chaplains throughout the Union Army, Reverend Fuller offered educational classes to the soldiers. Consistent with his religious views, he formed a Division of the Sons of Temperance within the regiment, bringing together more than one hundred officers and men who would continue to hold weekly meetings. Finally, following a tradition already more than a hundred years old in Europe and now the United States, Reverend Fuller regularly reported by letter to various newspapers on the events of the war. His letters were featured in a number of newspapers including the Boston Journal, Boston Traveller, New York Tribune, and Christian Inquirer. His most famous report was a graphic account of the battle between the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia (formerly USS Merrimack).
Unfortunately, upon his enlistment Arthur Fuller was already almost 40 years old and he found that even for chaplain, army service was a young man’s work. His health soon began to fail him and he was several times forced to remain behind as his regiment went to the field. On December 10, 1862, he received an honorable discharge from this service with a surgeon’s certificate of disability, and with the promise of a commission as chaplain for a hospital or stationary camp. However, on the day following his discharge, December 11, while he was still with the army, the call came around for volunteers to cross the Rappahannock River and drive off the Confederate sharpshooters who were preventing Union army engineers from completing their bridge across the river to Fredericksburg. Despite having been discharged the day before and his lack of training as a soldier, Arthur Fuller stepped forward and armed himself with a borrowed musket and accoutrements.
We have an eyewitness account of what happened in the town from Captain Moncena Dunn of the 19th Massachusetts Volunteers who commanded some 25 volunteers out of the force that crossed the river, including Chaplain Fuller. While not previously acquainted, Captain Dunn recorded that he had heard of Chaplain Fuller’s work in the 16th Regiment and had hoped to meet him. However, their first acquaintance would come in the streets of Fredericksburg, at Carolina Street at about half past three in the afternoon as Captain Dunn commanded his line of skirmishers. It was at this point that Chaplain Fuller approached, saluted, and said to him, “Captain, I must do something for my country. What shall I do?” Captain Dunn replied that there was no time like the present and that he should take his place on the captain’s left. He described Reverend Fuller as being “perfectly cool and collected” and anticipated that he anticipated good service from the chaplain.
The Captain’s account went on, “His position was directly in front of a grocery store. He fell in five minutes after he took it, having fired once or twice. He was killed instantly, and did not move after he fell. I saw the flash of the rifle which did the deed. I think the Chaplain fell from the ball which entered the hip. He might not have been aware of the wound from the ball entering his arm, sometimes soldiers are not conscious of wounds in battle, or he may have been simultaneously hit by another rifle. We were in a very exposed position. Shortly before the Chaplain came up, one of General Burnside’s aids accosted me, expressing surprise, and saying, ‘What are you doing here, Captain?’ I replied that I had orders. He said that I must retire, if the Rebels pressed us too hard. In about half an hour I had definite orders to retire, and accordingly fell back, leaving the Chaplain and another man dead, and also a wounded man, who was unwilling to be moved. It is not usual, under such pressing circumstances, to attempt to remove the dead. In about an hour afterward, my regiment advanced in line with the Twentieth Massachusetts. They occupied the place where Chaplain Fuller fell; and they suffered very severely, it being much exposed. The Chaplain’s body we found had been robbed, and the wounded man bayoneted by the Rebel Vandals, while the ground was left to them.”
Arthur B Fuller’s remains were sent home to Massachusetts at the earliest opportunity. Later in December 1862, private funeral services were held in his brother’s house in Boston, and then on December 24, a heavily attended and reported public funeral took place at the First Church, Chauncey Street, Boston. He was buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery, in Cambridge. The Massachusetts State Adjutant General would record his death as having taken place on December 12, 1862 in Fredericksburg, possibly reflecting the date of removal of his remains from the field. Later that same month, the United States Congress would vote a special bill to award Mrs. Fuller the pension otherwise denied her on the grounds of her late husbands' December 10 discharge.
"There is no conceivable human action which custom has not at one time justified and at another time condemned." -- Joseph Wood Krutch
I recently began researching the story of Arthur B. Fuller, whose name appears on the Freedom Forum’s Journalists Memorial at the Newseum (Museum of News) in Washington, DC, as a special correspondent for The Boston Journal killed during the Battle of Fredericksburg. He is one of eight journalists reportedly killed or reported to have died while covering the war for newspapers in the south or the north. Finding his name associated with both the Battle of Fredericksburg and the Boston Journal was a surprise because I have spent much of my time researching both the battle and another Boston Journal correspondent, Charles Carleton Coffin, and yet I did not remember reading about the death of any of fellow journalist. Fortunately, in world of the Internet, I was able to quickly confirm that an Arthur B. Fuller had been a special correspondent during the war and was killed at Fredericksburg, but the story still offered some surprises.
Arthur Buckminster Fuller was born on August 10, 1822 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His father, Timothy Fuller, was elected to Congress from 1817 to 1825, where he served as Chairman of the Committee on Naval Affairs. Congressman Fuller was described as frank and vigorous, a defender of the Seminole Indians against the federal authorities, and an opponent of the Missouri Compromise. Despite financial obstacles following the death of his father in 1835, Arthur was able to attend Harvard College and graduated in 1843. He then used his remaining few hundred dollars to purchase a small academy in Belvidere, Illinois and embarked upon teaching as a full time career. However, during the following two years, Fuller found his interest and energies increasingly drawn to the Sunday school he taught there and his related preaching. As a result, he returned to Harvard’s Divinity School from which he graduated in 1847.
The new Unitarian minister proceeded to pursue his religious vocation over the following years, filling several pulpits in succession and acting as chaplain for the branches of the state legislature. At the same time he served as editor of his sister Margaret’s writings preparing them for successful publication. He also acted upon his interest in education, serving on various school boards, and was active in support of anti-slavery reforms. These endeavors came to an end with the secession of the southern states and the expected onset of a war between North and South.
Reverend Arthur B. Fuller became the Chaplain of the newly raised 16th Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers on August 1, 1861, a regiment primarily representative of his own Middlesex County. The regiment left Boston on August 17, 1861. While on service, Reverend Fuller was ever attentive to his men, holding weekly Sunday School classes and services as well twice-daily prayer meetings during the rest of the week in his “chapel-tent.” He distributed Bibles, religious volumes, and songbooks that included both religious and patriotic musical selections through the regiment. As did many chaplains throughout the Union Army, Reverend Fuller offered educational classes to the soldiers. Consistent with his religious views, he formed a Division of the Sons of Temperance within the regiment, bringing together more than one hundred officers and men who would continue to hold weekly meetings. Finally, following a tradition already more than a hundred years old in Europe and now the United States, Reverend Fuller regularly reported by letter to various newspapers on the events of the war. His letters were featured in a number of newspapers including the Boston Journal, Boston Traveller, New York Tribune, and Christian Inquirer. His most famous report was a graphic account of the battle between the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia (formerly USS Merrimack).
Unfortunately, upon his enlistment Arthur Fuller was already almost 40 years old and he found that even for chaplain, army service was a young man’s work. His health soon began to fail him and he was several times forced to remain behind as his regiment went to the field. On December 10, 1862, he received an honorable discharge from this service with a surgeon’s certificate of disability, and with the promise of a commission as chaplain for a hospital or stationary camp. However, on the day following his discharge, December 11, while he was still with the army, the call came around for volunteers to cross the Rappahannock River and drive off the Confederate sharpshooters who were preventing Union army engineers from completing their bridge across the river to Fredericksburg. Despite having been discharged the day before and his lack of training as a soldier, Arthur Fuller stepped forward and armed himself with a borrowed musket and accoutrements.
We have an eyewitness account of what happened in the town from Captain Moncena Dunn of the 19th Massachusetts Volunteers who commanded some 25 volunteers out of the force that crossed the river, including Chaplain Fuller. While not previously acquainted, Captain Dunn recorded that he had heard of Chaplain Fuller’s work in the 16th Regiment and had hoped to meet him. However, their first acquaintance would come in the streets of Fredericksburg, at Carolina Street at about half past three in the afternoon as Captain Dunn commanded his line of skirmishers. It was at this point that Chaplain Fuller approached, saluted, and said to him, “Captain, I must do something for my country. What shall I do?” Captain Dunn replied that there was no time like the present and that he should take his place on the captain’s left. He described Reverend Fuller as being “perfectly cool and collected” and anticipated that he anticipated good service from the chaplain.
The Captain’s account went on, “His position was directly in front of a grocery store. He fell in five minutes after he took it, having fired once or twice. He was killed instantly, and did not move after he fell. I saw the flash of the rifle which did the deed. I think the Chaplain fell from the ball which entered the hip. He might not have been aware of the wound from the ball entering his arm, sometimes soldiers are not conscious of wounds in battle, or he may have been simultaneously hit by another rifle. We were in a very exposed position. Shortly before the Chaplain came up, one of General Burnside’s aids accosted me, expressing surprise, and saying, ‘What are you doing here, Captain?’ I replied that I had orders. He said that I must retire, if the Rebels pressed us too hard. In about half an hour I had definite orders to retire, and accordingly fell back, leaving the Chaplain and another man dead, and also a wounded man, who was unwilling to be moved. It is not usual, under such pressing circumstances, to attempt to remove the dead. In about an hour afterward, my regiment advanced in line with the Twentieth Massachusetts. They occupied the place where Chaplain Fuller fell; and they suffered very severely, it being much exposed. The Chaplain’s body we found had been robbed, and the wounded man bayoneted by the Rebel Vandals, while the ground was left to them.”
Arthur B Fuller’s remains were sent home to Massachusetts at the earliest opportunity. Later in December 1862, private funeral services were held in his brother’s house in Boston, and then on December 24, a heavily attended and reported public funeral took place at the First Church, Chauncey Street, Boston. He was buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery, in Cambridge. The Massachusetts State Adjutant General would record his death as having taken place on December 12, 1862 in Fredericksburg, possibly reflecting the date of removal of his remains from the field. Later that same month, the United States Congress would vote a special bill to award Mrs. Fuller the pension otherwise denied her on the grounds of her late husbands' December 10 discharge.
"There is no conceivable human action which custom has not at one time justified and at another time condemned." -- Joseph Wood Krutch
Friday, March 14, 2008
Past tense; Present tense; Future tense?
There has been a longstanding debate among historians, philosophers, and others, as to whether or not history repeats itself. Anyone who has pursued the study of history for any length of time will have encountered those moments of recognition that bring to mind a similar event in another time and another place and involving completely different individuals and told in a completely different language. Since I myself count in this number, I should offer my own conclusion that it isn’t so much a question of history repeating itself as it is a matter of human beings repeating themselves – that is that human beings frequently respond in a similar fashion to similar situations or circumstances, regardless of differences of place, time, language, etc.
So it is with no surprise that I am now seeing the return of “the winter soldiers,” i.e., veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan who are recounting their experiences in these conflicts to justify their opposition to the continuation of these wars and in hopes that they will persuade others here at home to join in that opposition. The same label was adopted in the 1960s and 1970s by American veterans of the war in Vietnam who came home and campaigned for the end of that war, as many of you know thanks to John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign. The name of “the winter soldiers,” of course, is taken from that advocate and author of revolution, Thomas Paine, whose most famous work “The American Crisis” referred to “the summer soldier and sunshine patriot” who would “shrink from the service of their country.” Unlike these the winter soldiers would stand by their country and deserve “the love and thanks of man and woman.” As a historian, I cannot resist pointing out that as the ultimate “winter soldier,” the eternal agitator Thomas Paine would die in 1802 at the age 72 after years of living with ill health, poverty, abuse, neglect, and even hatred from his fellow countrymen and would even be denied burial in the Quaker burial ground that represented his natal faith.
Perhaps some 200 years later, in the 21st Century, Americans are more intellectually curious, open-minded, and sophisticated about such things. Perhaps they can even willingly listen to people with whom they disagree or with whom they suspect they will disagree if they actually bothered to hear them out before coming to a firm conclusion on that point. Perhaps in this case they may think that out of respect for their service to this country, individuals such as this latest generation of winter soldiers deserve to be heard and to have questions about their patriotism or loyalty withheld until they have been heard.
For those who think they are up to this challenge, these winter soldiers are gathering in Washington DC from March 13-16 to present their testimony about what they individually saw and experienced in the ongoing conflicts. These four days will reportedly be closed to the general public, though they will be joined by panels of scholars, veterans, journalists, and other specialists who will try to put this collected testimony into a larger context. Video footage from these four days will be shown to the public in Baltimore March 14-15 and will reportedly also be available for viewing on line at www.ivaw.org, the website of The Iraq Veterans Against the War.
I would like to think that perhaps American today are capable of meeting this challenge, but so much of what I have read of history tells me otherwise. I will try to put myself to this test as well as this effort progresses and see what conclusions I might draw from the experience, and I will try to share them here. Let us see together how we stand this test.
"Nothing ever happened in the past, only in the present. The difference is it was somebody else's present, not ours." David McCullough
So it is with no surprise that I am now seeing the return of “the winter soldiers,” i.e., veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan who are recounting their experiences in these conflicts to justify their opposition to the continuation of these wars and in hopes that they will persuade others here at home to join in that opposition. The same label was adopted in the 1960s and 1970s by American veterans of the war in Vietnam who came home and campaigned for the end of that war, as many of you know thanks to John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign. The name of “the winter soldiers,” of course, is taken from that advocate and author of revolution, Thomas Paine, whose most famous work “The American Crisis” referred to “the summer soldier and sunshine patriot” who would “shrink from the service of their country.” Unlike these the winter soldiers would stand by their country and deserve “the love and thanks of man and woman.” As a historian, I cannot resist pointing out that as the ultimate “winter soldier,” the eternal agitator Thomas Paine would die in 1802 at the age 72 after years of living with ill health, poverty, abuse, neglect, and even hatred from his fellow countrymen and would even be denied burial in the Quaker burial ground that represented his natal faith.
Perhaps some 200 years later, in the 21st Century, Americans are more intellectually curious, open-minded, and sophisticated about such things. Perhaps they can even willingly listen to people with whom they disagree or with whom they suspect they will disagree if they actually bothered to hear them out before coming to a firm conclusion on that point. Perhaps in this case they may think that out of respect for their service to this country, individuals such as this latest generation of winter soldiers deserve to be heard and to have questions about their patriotism or loyalty withheld until they have been heard.
For those who think they are up to this challenge, these winter soldiers are gathering in Washington DC from March 13-16 to present their testimony about what they individually saw and experienced in the ongoing conflicts. These four days will reportedly be closed to the general public, though they will be joined by panels of scholars, veterans, journalists, and other specialists who will try to put this collected testimony into a larger context. Video footage from these four days will be shown to the public in Baltimore March 14-15 and will reportedly also be available for viewing on line at www.ivaw.org, the website of The Iraq Veterans Against the War.
I would like to think that perhaps American today are capable of meeting this challenge, but so much of what I have read of history tells me otherwise. I will try to put myself to this test as well as this effort progresses and see what conclusions I might draw from the experience, and I will try to share them here. Let us see together how we stand this test.
"Nothing ever happened in the past, only in the present. The difference is it was somebody else's present, not ours." David McCullough
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