General failures

In Judaism, the term messiah refers to a godlike figure that will appear deus ex machina and restore human affairs to its mythical orderly paradise. In politics, this individual is called “the general”. Specifically, the public wishes to believe that this seemingly uncorrupted and clearly patriotic personality, who seemingly has mastered the art of running a huge military machine, will seamlessly apply his skill and fix the mess of civilian politics. Where ever and whenever, this faith has always been disappointed.

In the United States, elected generals have shown themselves to be rather poor presidents. Andrew Jackson and Zachery Taylor were romantic but did more harm than good while Ulysses Grant was clearly over his head in trying to run the country. George Washington is highly rated not only because there was no president before him but also because there was no established political structure to manage and he was surrounded by political geniuses, many of which become president after him. Dwight D. Eisenhower is also respected but this is mainly because he did what the public wanted him to do, nothing, which is relatively easy to carry out.

Europe does not have a better track record. Napoleon was genius in terms of military skill but very mediocre in terms of administration. He left France in very poor condition and did not improve the lives of its regular citizens in any substantial manner. In modern times, Francisco Franco in Spain and Antonio Salazar in Portugal suffocated their countries economically, socially and optically for decades.  Charles de Gaulle was effective in extracting France from an ineffective fourth republic and a civil war due to its policies in Algeria but created a new system that is so open to corruption that it resembles the mythical Stygian stables. In other words, he did not fundamentally improve the political situation of the French.

In the Middle East, Israel is a country with a bit of a Spartan tradition and has always been enamored of generals. The list of chiefs of staff and top generals that have entered politics after a successful career in the Army is extensive but their glory rolls are sparse. The best that can be said is that Moshe Dayan, Igal Yadin, Ariel Sharon and Yizhak Rabin had their moments but their learning curve was no less steep than their civilian counterparts. Benny Gantz is the latest to jump into the ring of Israeli politics but the past is against him.  Egypt, Israel’s neighbor, has twice been ruled by military councils with dominant figures, Gamal Nassar in the 1960’s and 1970’s and Abdel el-Sisi currently.  Whatever foreign policies success they may have achieved, the average Egyptian has not benefited economically to any significant degree.

Many military heads are not better than one.  Juntas, whether in Europe as in Greece in the 1960’s and 1970’s or in South American as in Argentina in the 1970’s to the 1980’s, only leave their country even more poor.

In the 17^th century, Oliver Cromwell aimed to create a government of godly man to rule English but failed. The public continues to share his faith and seeks divine, military guidance, generally to little avail. The sad truth is most generals are political failures.

Middle Eastern Man is a Rational(izing) Creature

Average citizens in the civilized West must be baffled by current and not so current political events in the Middle East.  These include Egypt’s election and post-election chaos, Syria’s non-election chaos, and Israeli’s confusing election results.  They must think that we are either crazy, masochistic, or both.

I have recently read two books, a biography of Nasser, the Egyptian leader, and an analysis of (Arab) Palestinian history in the 1920’s and 1930’s.  My conclusion from these books is that this apparent insanity is neither new nor accidental.  In the words, it is perfectly rational, if not rather tragic and destructive.

My view is as follows:  Towards the end of the 19^th century, the spirit of nationalism created and sponsored by the French revolution and physically propagated by Napoleon reached the Jews and the Arabs.  This desire for independence, both political and cultural, was translated into an ideology, a somewhat far-fetched ideal.  In the case of the Jews, it was Herzel and dream of a national homeland in Israel while the Arabs aspired to the glory of the independence and dominance of Islam centuries before.  Each of these long term goals ignored several aspects of inconvenient reality, not the least of which were the European interest and the annoying existence of each other.  Nevertheless, the target populations were receptive to the idea and eventually bought it hook, line, and sinker.

It took a while, but the French and British eventually left the Middle East (tail between the legs and all), but the annoying fact that Jews and Arabs shared the same territory would not go away.  The options were simple: change the ideologies and preach tolerance and multiculturalism or maintain it and behave schizophrenically by alternating between denial (i.e. Arab distinction between “Jews” as compared to” Israelis” and Golda Meir's “there are no Palestinians”) and violence (let us count the wars).  For many reasons, changing an ideology is quite difficult (ask the U.S. Republican Party).  It is also dangerous to political and physical life, i.e. Rabin and Sadat.  So, the more convenient and popular option was to fight reality and each other. 

The results are quite tragic: death, poverty, anger, refugees, and misery.  Still, for most politicians of all stripes in the area, the greatest disaster would be peace.   It would render their ideology and raison d’être irrelevant.  As a final note, in England,  Cromwell was not despised because he was a dictator, but because he was tolerant.  The fact that, as Pascal said, man is thinking reed does not make leadership any easier.  Leaders cannot go too far from the conceptions of their people.