Tribute to Iran

The High Muckety-Muck (HMM) of Iran sent President Bush an 18 page letter this week, doubtless with very tiny writing, in which he wrote:

Liberalism and Western style democracy have not been able to help realize the ideals of humanity. Today these two concepts have failed. Those with insight can already hear the sounds of the shattering and fall of the ideology and thoughts of the liberal democratic systems.

Translation: in the war we are fighting, you in the west will be defeated, and we Iranians will win, because you have failed to help others.

One of HMM's chief platoons in the war is Hamas, a terrorist group that receives religious, moral and economic support from Iran, and now has a base of operations in the Gaza. Without Iran, Hamas—and the war—would not last long. So what have American leaders done about this?

This week, Secretary of State Rice convened a meeting with Russia, the UN Secretary-General, and Europeans, to discuss the resumption of economic payments to Hamas. Rice said that their goal was "to provide assistance to the Palestinian people so that they do not suffer deprivation and do not suffer an humanitarian crisis." In other words, the Secretary took HMM up on his challenge to send him money.

Caroline Glick has exposed this forcefully as a flight from reality: http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0506/glick051106.php3

In Glick's potent words, "the US on Tuesday recommitted itself to a Middle East policy that has no connection to reality and thus no chance of ever succeeding. Indeed, failure is inevitable."

There is, of course, a consequence to such a "delusion": "the fact is that by aiding Hamas, the US is aiding Iran." This is the fact that our leaders are desperate to evade.

Glick recognizes that "The purpose the Quartet was founded to advance was the shunning of reality, in the hope that if reality was rejected strenuously, that reality would change." This is the epistemology of subjectivism: the notion that reality follows our whims.

Our leaders refuse to see that the Iranians—and Hamas—will not use the cash to help their people. They will see our largesse as weakness. The money will demonstrate, to those most passionate for war, the very weakness that HMM wrote of in his letter. What our leaders see as altruistic goodness is in fact moral capitulation. It is aiding and abetting the enemy, by paying him tribute.

The Romans once demanded tribute from those they conquered by the sword. As their Empire lost strength, they began to make payments to the barbarians at their gates. The barbarians saw this as weakness, and stepped up the attacks.

Today, our weakness is not physical, it is moral. We are not forced to send tribute to killers. Our leaders do so because they accept it as a duty. It won't help us—and they know it—so the delusions get deeper as the aid increases.

It is only our acceptance of this duty that motivates us to send tribute to our sworn enemies. At least the Romans had to be forced to pay. At their worst moments they were never so perverted as to do it voluntarily.

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Related:

• “No Substitute for Victory” The Defeat of Islamic Totalitarianism
• High Time to End the Iranian Regime

Image: Marcello Casal JrABr

About John David Lewis

John David Lewis was a contributing editor to TOS from the journal’s second issue, in 2006, until his death, on January 3, 2012. He was a visiting associate professor in the Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Program at Duke University. He held a PhD in classics from the University of Cambridge and taught at the University of London. He had also been a senior research scholar in history and classics at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center, Bowling Green State University, and a fellow of the Foundation for Objectivist Scholarship. He published in journals such as Journal of Business Ethics, Social Philosophy and Policy, Polis, Dike, and Bryn Mawr Classical Review, and lectured on classics, military history, and contemporary political issues at numerous universities and for private groups. His research interests were in ancient Greek and Roman thought, military history, and their connections to the modern day. His books are Solon the Thinker: Political Thought in Archaic Athens (Duckworth, 2006), Early Greek Lawgivers (Bristol Classical Press, August, 2007), and Nothing Less than Victory: Decisive Wars and the Lessons of History (Princeton,2010). Dr. Lewis also wrote for Capitalism Magazine. His website is www.JohnDavidLewis.com.

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