What are you writing?

[vimothy]

It was just an idle thought, really, spurred on by your closing sentence: "The Saudi system remains, however, and the longer it persists, the more damaging and explosive its end will be." It's certainly hard to imagine direct intervention from the US bringing this about. Thanks to the vagaries of history (to wit: the bloody oil), the Saudis have been placed beyond their powers. Still, the logic guiding American foreign policy in Central Asia, the Middle East and North Africa of applies just as forcefully to Saudi Arabia. More so, if anything, since the Saudis are tyrants at home and sponsors of terror and disorder abroad. So America's position is a compromise, and not an especially happy one at that, given how many of its people have been killed by the crazier end of Saudi Arabian proxies. One imagines that, if the chance ever arose... Not that it appears likely to at present, but history has a way of leading you down strange paths. Who could have imagined in 1821 that only a century hence, and for at least a century thereafter, the United States would invert John Quincy Adam's poetic phrase--"But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy."--and make it its practical credo in foreign relations? And yet, here we are.

 

[vimothy]

As for where I'm coming from, it's nowhere very exciting. I suppose I've gotten further away from Christopher and closer to Peter, if you see what I mean. Not that my semi-coherent mumblings are worth bothering with. But do you publish your articles anywhere, other than your blog? They're so well informed and beautifully written, it would be a great shame if they were only read by a few of Dissensus's passing trolls (like me).

 

[craner]

I just logged in and was expecting more bile, as I do whenever dropping the Rice-bomb, BUT:

Yes, the bloody oil. I've been banging on with the same argument ever since I wrote 'Terror Premium' in 2004, that this is a ruinous (in moral, tactical, strategic, political, aesthetic terms) alliance, and always has been. In some ways, the bind isn't just oil, but the political and social alternative if the al-Saud fall. What replaces them? Chaos like we have never seen. And this was true in 2004, before we'd imagined ISIS. (Although, I should say, some of us did.)

Then, there was little alternative (maybe a free Iraq trading oil on the global market?) but now there are some: fracking and all of that. Hence the Saudi energy gamble, as I discuss. There is also their place in the global order, and that includes the international monarchical clans. I never fail to mention their close friendship with the Windsors which, as much as anything, locks them securely into British foreign policy considerations. I am a republican, so I don't give a shit about that. Oil is more important than that.

In regard to John Quincy Adams' quote I recommend you read Robert Kagan's Dangerous Nation; not only is it a fantastic book, it places that speech in its original context and also within the context of pre- and post-civil war US foreign policy. It will provide you with a different understanding of it.

Thanks for the compliment, as always. As you know, I don't even bother trying to get published, and write for my adoring audience of ten or so Dissensus readers (rapidly dwindling).

 

[Mr. Tea]

(Although, I should say, some of us did.)

And how many of 'us', at the time, warned of the rise of ISIS or something like it as a more or less inevitable result of the removal of the Ba'ath regime and its replacement by a hopelessly weak and ineffective Shia-dominated government?

(That's not a dig at you personally, Ollie - I was just wondering who made up this 'us' and what proportion of them were enthusiastic about the invasion at the time.)

 

[craner]

Fair point.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Fair point.

*blink*

OK, who are you and what have you done with the real Oliver Craner?

 

[luka]

I agree tea, that's worrying. I am also concerned

 

[vimothy]

That's a good point. There's a definite sense in which the present regime is logically entailed by the liberal ideals on which America was founded. Different Americas are (or at least were) possible (and let's be honest Kagan's "neocon history" is an attempt to delegitimise them), but it's a piece of rhetorical overreach to suggest that no one could have foreseen its present stance: a wise and perspicacious parser of ideologies could have read the danger and the tendency towards technocratic managerialism and revolutionary internationalism, and indeed, there are those who did.

 

[luka]

Vimothy are you still allowed to get high? How peter are you?

 

[vimothy]

Not that Peter, but unfortunately there's no time for that sort of stuff anyway. I exist in a perpetual work-baby cycle, with occasional breaks for sleep.

 

[luka]

If not hitchens then who are Chris and Pete please that's gone right over my head

 

[vimothy]

No, you had it right: as in Peter, but not Peter to that extent.

 

[luka]

That's a relief

 

[Mr. Tea]

Vimothy are you still allowed to get high? How peter are you?

I was starting to wonder if "peter" was some highly recondite slang term for "stoned":

"Shall I roll another?"
"Best not, I'm pretty fucking peter as it is."

 

[craner]

This is an old piece of mine I was just re-reading, and which I really liked. It's a bit knotty and condensed and I'm sure a lot of it only makes sense to me, but I enjoyed the line: "Bernie Ecclestone’s Grand Prix dumped all over Liberté like a monsoon of Moët." There's some other good bits, too. But a lot of it is obscure and fragmentary and ill-thought out. You may enjoy the linguistic energy I exerted, though. I did, in retrospect.

Vanity-plug over.

 

[luka]

Yes you're a very gifted lad but you're wasting it. More of this pls stop malingering

 

[craner]

The main problem I have with this piece is that it reads a bit like the lyric sheet of Generation Terrorists

 

[craner]

In la Ville-Lumière would she outwit Valérie Trierweiler?

Liked the sound of that, also.

 

[luka]

At the time I criticised the 'we'

 

[luka]

I stand by that. Otherwise I like it a lot