Thursday, August 24, 2006

Machiavelli 101

The unjustly-reviled Florentine would have snorted at the US behavior in Iraq, and the Israelis in Lebanon. He understood that one must first win unquestionably and establish oneself as master. Once in charge and unquestionably so, you can worry about how to order things. But attempting to calibrate the use of force so as to win "World Public Opinion" and "Hearts and Minds" is a recipe for disaster because it breeds contempt and anarchy.

Because Machiavelli was blessedly free of simple-minded, unidimensional moralism, he could see the paradox that forsaking bloody actions for the sake of wanting to be loved can lead to greater bloodshed and cruelty later on. Particularly in the nuclear era, when the US can slay by the tens of millions at the push of a button, a great power cannot ever be position where it sees the situation as "Them or Us." Any state will choose "Them," and Hiroshima will look like a garden party. All for the sake of "Upholding Our Principles" some years earlier.

From the beginning of Chapter 17 of the Prince:
Descending next to the other qualities set forth before, I say that each prince should desire to be held merciful and not cruel; nonetheless he should take care not to use this mercy badly. Cesare Borgia was held to be cruel; nonetheless, his cruelty reconciled the Romagna, united it, and reduced it to peace and to faith. If one considers this well, one will see that he was much more merciful than the Florentine people, who so as to escape a name for cruelty, allowed Pistoia to be destroyed. A prince, therefore, so as to keep his subjects united and faithful, should not about the infamy of cruelty; because with very few examples he will be more merciful than those who for the sake of too much mercy, allow disorders to continue, from which come killings or robberies; for these customarily harm a whole community, but the executions that come from the prince harm one particular person. And of all princes, it is impossible for the new prince to escape a name for cruelty, because new states are full of dangers. And Virgil says in the mouth of Dido: "the harshness of things and the newness of the kingdom force me to contrive such things, and to keep a broad watch over the borders."¹
Later in Chapter 17, Machiavelli makes the important distinction between being feared and being hated. Machiavelli notes that it is not only possible, it is even the best of all possible worlds, to have the first without the second. Americans don't understand that -- thinking that to be feared is to be hated. And, far worse, they don't understand that others do see things that way, particularly honor-based cultures such as the Arabs, to whom there is nothing more contemptible than weakness.
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¹ I quoted from a translation other than the one I linked to, because Harvey Mansfield's translation of the Prince (the one I like best and the one the quote is from) is not available online.

6 comments:

Mark Adams said...

Harvey Mansfield? Ha! Everyone who truly want to understand The Prince reads the Leo Paul de Alvarez translation.

Anonymous said...

(1) "the (unfortunately common) view that 'Arabs only respect strength' smacks of racism" ... which makes it untrue ... why? Learn about cultural diversity, Scott.

What, exactly, does "the Arab news media" have to do with the question of what Arab values are? I'm not saying it does or can have nothing to do with the matter, but the way you've put things is incredible vague.

Of course, the Arabs "take questions of justice into account." But what "justice" is is a reflection of their values, and this value pluralism can also makes their behavior (a matter on which you're again being quite vague) quite rational from their point of view of their values without having to make it so from hours. Islam, Islamic chauvinism, and honor-based culture's values account for a lot.

(2) If everyone acted according to the dictates of M, then we would have perpetual war. Which is an argument against NM being correct ... why? What if "only the dead have seen the end of war" and NM is simply describing reality? Do you think you can wish reality away reality about how people act, by saying, well, if everyone acted that way, we'd have perpetual war. Some things (defeat, slavery) truly are worse than war, or at a minimum we have to act as if they are. Foreswearing war merely leaves those who do so at the mercy of those who do not.

What I don't think you're getting is that we conquered Iraq the Western way -- very quickly, as bloodlessly as possible, not engaging in repression and showing every sensitivity we could. It hasn't exactly produced boundless Arab love for us, has it?

And what exactly does "walk the walk" mean in this context. Are you saying we can appease Islam by accepting their values? That we can buy them off by appeasement?

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