Belligerence

The New York police have decided not to allow Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to visit the site of the September 11 attacks. (Read it here).

Presidential candidates have climbed aboard the Outrage Express, calling the request “shockingly audacious” the State Department has called it “appalling,” and U.S. Jewish groups are apoplectic (the Iranian President has called for the destruction of Israel).

The shrillness of the outrage is easy to understand, but it seems too many of the most vocal are using the 9/11 tragedy to further their own agenda. There is something of a false note in the screaming. Nowhere have I read that Iran was involved in the 9/11 attacks. (Nor was Saddam Hussein, right everyone?)

Iran is of course developing a nuclear bomb and using client groups to create anguish around the world (we taught them well). Is Iran a state sponsor of terror? Probably.

But there might be some benefit if the world’s Muslims could see a Muslim leader laying wreathes at a site where Muslim extremists killed innocent U.S. citizens. What is the downside? A dubious moral imperative? The satisfaction of name calling?

Frankly, to deny the visit seems a bit petulant. We should accept another's acknowledgment of our grief. We might have been able to forge a propaganda tool out of the visit. As it is, the world’s Muslims will see once again that we scorn them.

As far as I know, belligerence has yet to prove effective in furthering national interest over the long term. It has not served us so well in the last 50 years, it does not seem to be serving Israel (though it is hard to know what would ameliorate that region’s toxic anger). Did it help in Northern Ireland? Depends on which Irishman you ask, but peace may have broken out.

Self-righteous indignation is powerful drink. Belligerence is the glass. The hangover is often quite brutal.