the Feather
If you could have President Obama's ear for a few minutes, what would you say to him?
April 1, 2009
Dear Mr. President,
As someone who voted for you in November 2008 in hopes that you would bring new direction to domestic and foreign policy, I would like to take this opportunity to express my concerns over two issues.
I am a creature of the American West and am deeply moved by and attached to the landscape. The Bush years were a very distressing time because the administration engineered troubling if not altogether illegitimate land management plans clearly tilted toward expansive industrial development of energy resources at the expense of preservation. Much of the rhetoric of this slanted policy centered on the notion of achieving “energy independence” under the presumption that a country which holds just 5 percent of world energy resources, but uses 25 percent of total output, could somehow force those lines to intersect somewhere in the future. As worthy a goal as energy independence may be, I do not believe we can actually achieve it under the current circumstances, nor do I believe the price to be paid is worth the costs.
Mr. President, now is an opportune time to reorient our collective approach to public lands and natural resources. May I suggest that instead of seeing the public lands as larder for our profligate use and disposal, that we approach the land with a greater degree of humility, respect and wonder? May I suggest that we need to move beyond the simplistic way of seeing places as merely useful for us, and instead see them as alive, vibrant, and numinous? Rather than developing every last square acre in pursuit of the dubious goal of energy independence we need a new version of progress that moves beyond the entrenched ideas and institutions that have brought us to the brink of environmental ruin and spiritual deprivation.
Instead of embarking on a disastrous development binge in the American West, I would urge you to instead immediately shift upwards of $100 billion (directly from defense spending) into developing renewable energy resources and improving conservation across the country. The federal government should work directly with state and local governments to retrofit millions of homes for solar and wind generated electricity. In addition, there are millions of homes across the country that can benefit from energy efficiency improvements, from insulation to weather stripping to lighting. Not only will we save energy, but families will lower their heating and cooling bills and we can avoid further harm of our public lands. Here is how we prove old Dick Cheney wrong and undercut the long-time fallacy of our energy policy: conservation can be a vital part of a national energy strategy. The Europeans and Japanese have been successfully implementing energy conservation programs for decades. Why should the U.S lag behind in such important efforts, particularly with the dire consequences of climate change already manifesting themselves across the globe?
In the area of foreign policy I am deeply concerned that you are planning to deploy more US troops to Afghanistan, something on the order of 4,000 additional personnel to add to the existing commitment of over 17,000. While I applaud your plan to draw down troop levels in Iraq, shifting them to Afghanistan is not a wise move in my estimation. Mr. President, Afghanistan is not referred to as the “graveyard of empires” for nothing. No country in recorded history has ever been able to achieve their aims in Afghanistan, and the United States will not be the first. The land is too unforgiving, the local tribes too unrelenting to yield to superior firepower and modern logistics. No amount of esprit de corps by our troops on the ground will produce the desired outcome. I do not believe we have the foggiest idea of what a victory in Afghanistan would actually look like and I have not heard anyone in your administration yet articulate a vision of victory. Nor have I heard any explanation from any credible source about how your proposed troop increase will achieve the ends of our policy.
In the final analysis, our willpower will be worn down and we will ultimately face an ignominious outcome. I am certainly not a supporter of the Taliban or their socio-political values, nor do I wish to see Afghanistan turned into a base of operations for al-Qaida, but ultimately the Afghan people must determine their own fate, irrespective of our particular desires or policy designs. The problems of Afghanistan or indeed the entire region cannot be solved by military means, or at least not by military means forced upon it from the outside. Even billions dollars more for the Afghan Army will not produce the desired results. History clearly shows that military victory in Afghanistan is tenuous and short-lived at best and our experience there will likely be no different. I believe that any escalation in troops and combat activity will merely lead to more violence and instability, thus bringing about the opposite result of what you appear to desire. I am deeply distressed that you would continue the folly of the previous administration and would urge you to rethink your plans.
More generally I find your Afghanistan rhetoric to be profoundly distasteful, even misleading. In your speech of late March, you sounded a lot like Dick Cheney in making references to 9/11 and future terrorist attacks on the US, and like an out-of-touch cold warrior with references to falling dominoes in south Asia. Mr. President this rhetoric is unhelpful and masks complexities and realities on the ground according to accounts of the situation in Afghanistan and in the Afghan-Pakistan border region. Frankly, I believe such fear mongering and sweeping generalizations are beneath you. What we need is an honest assessment, honestly communicated.
While I am on the subject of foreign policy I would also urge you to review the scope and purpose of the US military commitment across the globe. Is there any security or moral justification for the US having something on the order of 700 bases and facilities of various sizes around the world? (Source: Defense Department's annual inventories from 2002 to 2005 in its Base Structure Report.) This is a costly burden in terms of taxation here at home (the Pentagon reports does not provide a cost figure) as well as the perception of the US by the “host societies” (also not evaluated in the Pentagon analysis.) Mr. President I do not believe this degree of commitment to the maintenance of American empire is either sustainable or wise and I urge you to take immediate steps to drastically scale back our excessive and expensive overseas military commitments.
I wish you great success Mr. President.
Respectfully, Kyle Gardner, Manitou Natural History Society ∞
