Lame geometry —the axis of evil - World Watcher - Brief Article

IS IT ENOUGH that a silly phrase, an "Axis of Evil," has been beaten to death by adversaries and allies? Hardly. There can be no limit on what can be said about this inappropriate and misconceived characterization of what was intended to be the central foreign policy theme of the Bush Administration.

Both ends of the simplistic phrase deserve as much attention as we can give it. Let's start with the designation of "evil" for the three countries named--Iran, Iraq, and North Korea. Until Sept. 11, evil was something you found in third-rate movies and in churches from the dark side of Christianity. Evil has to do with the devil, the supernatural, and divergent religious beliefs that underlie subcultures. Evil is propagated by the devil, that grotesque figure conjured up with ghosts and demons by true believers. It plays on the most primitive instincts of mankind in calling together those who fear the earthly manifestations of the spirits of Hades.

By branding the conflict one between good and evil, Bush has brought religion to the battle with terrorism. While arguing that the current conflict is one with a radical subgroup and not with Islam, the President, with his axis of evil analogy, nevertheless calls upon conservative Judeo-Christian sensitivities to rally the nation (and a few others) behind his cause. The inclusion of the concept of evil incorporates religion, underpinning the notion that this is a clash of cultures and that ultimately this is a war between civilizations--Judeo-Christianity vs. Islam.

The Administration's argument might be more plausible if the three named nations had something in common that could realistically be labeled evil, but they don't. Iran's positioning for the last 23 years has clearly been one of having an alternative religious foundation to that of the Judeo-Christian West. Being driven by powerful and recognized beliefs that are at variance with those of the West is not evil. Saddam Hussein of Iraq, from a political science point of view, would better be identified as a criminal tribalist than as evil. North Korea's monarchic and dictatorial leader, Kim Jong-Il, is frequently portrayed as a psychologically unbalanced loner, out of touch with the reality of the modern world. If this is evil, we have thousands of institutions (and many more households) filled with evil people right here in America. Iran is a religious state built around the premises of Shi'a Islam. Iraq is a secular government, albeit Sunni Islam in most of its personnel. North Korea is an antireligious system with operations more akin to thuggery than to organized political opposition. What the three states have in common is a willingness to flout U.S. policy more than any strain of underlying evil.

The use of the term "axis" is a gimmick to bring the U.S. effort into comparison with the vastly different circumstances of World War II. There is more to having allies than just a common enemy. The World War II Axis involved several characteristics that set it off as a bloc. Germany, Italy; and Japan had common authoritarian political systems and similar centralized economic ones. They saw themselves as cooperating in a war effort against the Western Europeans and the U.S. German and Italian troops fought together, and German troops even fought on Italian soil. Iran, Iraq, and North Korea have no such trait or any willingness to work together. Equating the World War II Axis and the grouping of the two Middle East rivals and an Asian megalomaniac is like equating plywood and sawdust. One is missing its most important ingredient--glue.

There is no glue among the three rogue states. The only linear relationship the three have is their willingness to defy U.S. dictates and to seek every means to undermine American hegemony in the world order, including the use of weapons of mass destruction. If this is the source of linearity, there may well be other states--especially in the Islamic world--that are similarly inclined, but just don't have the physical capabilities yet. In addition to the evil three, Russia, China, Syria, and Libya have been named as potential targets of U.S. nuclear weapons--maybe even with preemptive strikes--if they become threats to American civilization in the way made imaginable by the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks.

"Axis" in this circumstance looks like very lame geometry. If not simply disconnected and isolated dots in the galaxy of peoples and states that are challenging the U.S., the three could at best be described as a "V of potentially violent contrariness" in the international system--no axis and not evil.

One of the most threatening consequences of the use of an axis of evil as an organizing concept is the fact that it focuses on nation-states as the object of foreign policy. If anything was learned from Sept. 11, it should be the fact that the old world of realist foreign policy is gone. While nation-states like North Korea still must be dealt with, it's clear that they can be dealt with. We can deter, defend against, and even defeat Iraq, Russia, or Syria. Dealing with the subterranean and conspiratorial zealots of Al Qaeda is a horse of a different color, a different dimension than the World War II partners in global criminality. The axis of evil concept dismisses the thought of Al Qaeda as an independent movement, with roots far deeper than the political ideologies that have been witness to the wars of political worlds that came to represent the 20th century.