Re Empire

[Otto]

"Among ourselves, we keep the law but when we are operating in the jungle,
we must also use the laws of the
jungle."

Of course I don't agree wholeheartedly and there would be several points to
get on to but I also think that the expressed point of view shouldn't be
dismissed too easily. In the light of much we've discussed past 9/11 (for
example: a justified war) I think this essay should be read:

Otto
-----------------------
Robert Cooper
Sunday April 7, 2002
The Observer

The new liberal imperialism
Senior British diplomat Robert Cooper is widely regarded as a key influence
on the international thinking of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, helping
to shape Blair's calls for a new internationalism and a new doctrine of
humanitarian intervention which would place limits on state sovereignty.
(...)
Cooper's call for a new liberal imperialism and admission of the need for
double standards in foreign policy have outraged the left but the essay
offers a rare and candid unofficial insight into the thinking behind British
strategy on Afghanistan, Iraq and beyond.

"In 1989 the political systems of three centuries came to an end in Europe:
the balance-of-power and the imperial urge. That year marked not just the
end of the Cold War, but also, and more significantly, the end of a state
system in Europe which dated from the Thirty Years War. September 11 showed
us one of the implications of the change."
(...)
The postmodern system in which we Europeans live does not rely on balance;
nor does it emphasise sovereignty or the separation of domestic and foreign
affairs. The European Union has become a highly developed system for mutual
interference in each other's domestic affairs, right down to beer and
sausages. (...) It is important to realise what an extraordinary revolution
this is. It mirrors the paradox of the nuclear age, that in order to defend
yourself, you had to be prepared to destroy yourself. The shared interest of
European countries in avoiding a nuclear catastrophe has proved enough to
overcome the normal strategic logic of distrust and concealment. Mutual
vulnerability has become mutual transparency.

The main characteristics of the postmodern world are as follows:
· The breaking down of the distinction between domestic and foreign affairs.
· Mutual interference in (traditional) domestic affairs and mutual
  surveillance.
· The rejection of force for resolving disputes and the consequent
  codification of self-enforced rules of behaviour.
· The growing irrelevance of borders: this has come about both through the
  changing role of the state, but also through missiles, motor cars and
  satellites.
· Security is based on transparency, mutual openness, interdependence and
  mutual vulnerability.

The conception of an International Criminal Court is a striking example of
the postmodern breakdown of the distinction between domestic and foreign
affairs. In the postmodern world, raison d'ètat and the amorality of
Machiavelli's theories of statecraft, which defined international relations
in the modern era, have been replaced by a moral consciousness that applies
to international relations as well as to domestic affairs: hence the renewed
interest in what constitutes a just war.
(...)
European states are not the only members of the postmodern world. Outside
Europe, Canada is certainly a postmodern state; Japan is by inclination a
postmodern state, but its location prevents it developing more fully in this
direction. The USA is the more doubtful case since it is not clear that the
US government or Congress accepts either the necessity or desirability of
interdependence, or its corollaries of openness, mutual surveillance and
mutual interference, to the same extent as most European governments now do.
(...) Within the postmodern world, there are no security threats in the
traditional sense; that is to say, its members do not consider invading each
other. Whereas in the modern world , following Clausewitz' dictum war is an
instrument of policy in the postmodern world it is a sign of policy failure.
But while the members of the postmodern world may not represent a danger to
one another, both the modern and pre-modern zones pose threats.
(...)
The challenge to the postmodern world is to get used to the idea of double
standards. Among ourselves, we operate on the basis of laws and open
cooperative security. But when dealing with more old-fashioned kinds of
states outside the postmodern continent of Europe, we need to revert to the
rougher methods of an earlier era - force, pre-emptive attack, deception,
whatever is necessary to deal with those who still live in the nineteenth
century world of every state for itself. Among ourselves, we keep the law
but when we are operating in the jungle, we must also use the laws of the
jungle. In the prolonged period of peace in Europe, there has been a
temptation to neglect our defences, both physical and psychological. This
represents one of the great dangers of the postmodern state.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4388912,00.html