As explosions rock any hope of an orderly withdrawal from Afghanistan, there is a temptation to think military power can somehow fix it.
But if Afghanistan proves anything it's that "military power" isn't. It isn't powerful enough to bring order to the withdrawal -- any more than it could end the oppression of women.
Afghanistan is a wake-up call that we must recognize the limits of military power.
The mighty Soviet Union fought tribesmen in Afghanistan for 9 years and lost. The incredibly "powerful" US military fought them for 20 years -- and only pushed the nation into the hands of the most virulent of the extremists.
In Vietnam, the US dropped twice as many bombs as were dropped in all of World War II - -- but couldn't beat them either. France tried before that and failed. And China, way before that.
Bombing Iraq and Libya brought not democracy but failed states.
Is it time to realize that no amount of military power really has any power? That foreign powers bombing folks just makes enemies? And strengthens them? Causing people to rally around whoever is trying to beat the "foreign invaders"?
If the US can't be the cops of the world, if it can't enforce the rights of women and others, If it can't prosecute wars and punish "bad guys" into submission, who are to be the prosecutors and cops of the world?
How about actual prosecutors and cops? A real system of enforceable World Law?
The US led the struggle for the very cornerstone of evolving law to protect the human rights of everyone on the planet -- the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted unanimously by the United Nations in 1948.
Yet since then US administrations have opposed crucial advances in international law, even those adopted by the vast majority of the world's nations and legally in force -- such as the court set up to enforce laws against genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The International Criminal Court holds guilty government leaders responsible -- not whole societies.
Only seven countries voted against it -- United States, China, Libya, Iraq, Israel, Qatar, and Yemen.
Maybe it's time to change course -- for the US to cooperate with the rest of the world in moving toward creating enforceable world law - binding on the heads of state of all nations, rich or poor.
An evolution to world law is key to giving the world the real power needed to save not only women, oppressed minorities and victims of aggression -- but also our entire planet!
The Earth can't be saved from the crimes against the environment by any one nation. Fires set to burn the Amazon end up causing fires to rage across US Western States. Such ecocide crimes threaten the very continuation of life on earth. As do nuclear weapons -- already banned by international law, but sadly not the US.
We need real power to save us from such threats -- and the superpower that can do it is the combined will of the world's people embodied in a system of enforceable law.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
