LAST TUESDAY, former President George H. W. Bush broadsided his son's critics. Speaking at an oil industry group's annual meeting, Bush called denial of progress in Iraq "deeply offensive and contemptible." "There is something ignorant," he said, "in the way they dismiss the overthrow of a brutal dictator and the sowing of seeds of basic human freedom in that troubled part of the world." Bush called the past year of Iraqi history a "miracle."
Several hours later, Iraqi militants killed four American civilians. A jubilant crowd mutilated the four charred bodies, dragged two of them through the streets of Fallujah and hung them from a bridge that spans the Euphrates.
Our current president has spoken of a clear moral agenda of democratic miracle-working to bring peace, democracy and prosperity to the world. And while all must dedicate themselves to this noble vision, the president's (and most other presidents') version has one large problem: It doesn't include most of the world. The United States has made a policy of treating tiny portions of a very sick human society, destroying our credibility to ever adopt a humanitarianism outside of our own interests and exact a dedicated, holistic vision.
President George W. Bush and the high-level ideologues he imported to the White House have dreamed of miracles in Iraq since they took office, even (according to Richard A. Clarke) as rescuers pulled charred remains from the rubble of the World Trade Center on Sept. 12, 2001.
The current administration gives strong rhetorical support to freedom around the globe and America's willingness to take action for it. The president said on Feb. 17, "Building democracies in nations that have endured decades of tyranny will require the kind of sustained commitment that won the Cold War. We accept that duty. We accept that duty in our time because it is right."
The jury remains out on what will become of Iraq. The rest of "that troubled part of the world," however, disappoints. As ex-CIA analyst Robert Baer has pointed out, Saudi Arabia is quickly crumbling and may not be reforming its government, economy and relationship with the United States fast enough to stem the twin forces of poverty and radical Islam.
In Afghanistan, which the United States invaded in 2001, U.S. aid and troop presence runs scanter than in Iraq, which has fewer people and more money. Warlords and Taliban still roam the countryside while the U.S.-sponsored government clings to power.
But more important than whether Bush is achieving an ideal vision in the Middle East (and why he has selectively applied his principles even there) is how such a seemingly broad-reaching moral vision manages to apply mostly to one region. His silence on the increasingly strong-armed Vladimir Putin is shocking. And it is frightening that Bush, moral convictions and all, remains silent on people like Jean-Pierre Bemba. In late 2002, Bemba's rebel movement (in the northeast Democratic Republic of the Congo) executed a campaign called "Clean the Slate," designed to terrorize the population with ethnic cleansing and widespread rape. Most famously, Bemba's men cannibalized civilian victims. The country's adopted peace plan has since made him a vice president of the DRC.
So where is our commitment to the DRC? What about Sudan, Zimbabwe or Haiti? In all kinds of developing nations, billions of people live in severe material deprivation, have little hope for the future and enjoy no freedom to determine their life's course. Doesn't Bush's moral vision include them?
Our nation suffers from a severe myopia that the political system does nothing to challenge. We cannot recognize that in the grand scheme, one toppled dictator is a drop in a sea of unjust misery. We must envision the liberation of billions, not change one regime and declare the world a much better place. The needs of the world and dictates of our rhetoric demand much more than that, but we cannot see tragedy outside the bounds of our calculated interest.
Many falsely believe that cycles of our own war-and-liberation heroism can remake the world. But we can't invade every oppressed nation, and Iraq has destroyed our integrity to lead a concerted effort at the wide-reaching reforms that are needed. After the war in Iraq, millions would maim our burnt flesh in the streets before they would follow us to a better world.
In the end, our "miracles'" limits and insincerities doom the prospect of vast and real ones. We have our regions, and we have our aspirations. We have our scope of vision.
And the world should be happy, because things are going well.
Michael Slaven's column appears Fridays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at mslaven@cavalierdaily.com.
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