Think Dark Chocolate

I would normally be loathe to waste precious MEJ posting space by even mentioning Peggy Noonan's name, say nothing of linking to and quoting her. On nearly every occasion I've had to read her tripe I've avoided calling her writing "crap" simply because it would be an insult to feces everywhere. Today, though, she's apparently suffered from some particularly serious lapse in intellectual acuity and mental stability, and it really needs to be refuted. Her topic is "Think Dark."

Noonan is making an argument against the pending military base closures. On the surface, that's fine. I agree that a case can be made against this plan, even if I don't agree personally. (More on that below.) It's Peggy's basis for the argument that I have a problem with. I'll let the Queen of Morbid Fascination speak for herself here.

The federal government is doing something right now that is exactly the opposite of what it should be doing. It is forgetting to think dark. It is forgetting to imagine the unimaginable.

Right now the federal government is considering closing or consolidating hundreds of military bases throughout the U.S. A government commission is meeting this week to vote on specific base-closing proposals in the Pentagon's plan. Yesterday they voted to close big bases like Fort Monmouth, N.J., and Fort Gillem, Ga. (They voted to save the naval base in Groton, Conn.)

But they're wrong. What they ought to do, and what the commission reviewing the Pentagon's plan ought to do, is sit down and think dark.

Among the things we may face over the next decade, as we all know, is another terrorist attack on American soil. But let's imagine the next one has many targets, is brilliantly planned and coordinated. Imagine that there are already 100 serious terror cells in the U.S., two per state. The members of each cell have been coming over, many but not all crossing our borders, for five years. They're working jobs, living lives, quietly planning.

Imagine they're planning that on the same day in the not-so-distant future, they will set off nuclear suitcase bombs in six American cities, including Washington, which will take the heaviest hit. Hundreds of thousands may die; millions will be endangered. Lines will go down, and to make it worse the terrorists will at the same time execute the cyberattack of all cyberattacks, causing massive communications failure and confusion. There will be no electricity; switching and generating stations will also have been targeted. There will be no word from Washington; the extent of the national damage will be as unknown as the extent of local damage is clear. Daily living will become very difficult, and for months--food shortages, fuel shortages.

Noonan then goes on to talk about how all of these military bases will be a "source of great comfort" to the people milling about in confusion. She speaks at length about how the military will be needed to restore order in the streets and bring the shattered nation back "under control" if you will.

This is exactly the wrong headed sort of thinking that Bush and Cheney relied on to get themselves apparently elected a second time. Keep the people living in fear and they'll vote for an aggressive military strategy. Unfortunately for Noonan, we already have the example of America on Sept. 11 and 12, 2001 to draw on for an example.

In those dark days we didn't see evil, opportunistic Americans rushing into the streets to loot, pillage, rape and throw down the government. We saw concerned citizens turning out in their thousands to help complete strangers in need. We didn't see anger at "the establishment." We saw anger at the rat bastards who did it and a coming together of national spirit which hadn't been observed for a very long time. We didn't need the military marching down Wall Street. Emergency services personnel, police, firemen, ambulance drivers... that's what was needed.

Yes, there are situations where we need an armed militia to help maintain order and security, but that's what we have the National Guard for. (Well, at least we used to have them for that until Bush sent most of them off to his misguided adventure in Iraq.) But for the most part, our military needs to be ready to go abroad when we absolutely must use force in other parts of the world. Peggy's supposition relies on a fundamentally flawed premise. In order to picture a massive need for the military here at home following the nightmare scenario she lays out, it would have to be followed by a large scale land invasion of our country by terrorist troops. It's not going to happen. That's not how they work.

Trying to equate the formula for how many troops and bases we need to the terrorist threat is faulty at its core. You have about as much hope of solving the problem of global terrorists with armies as you do of wiping out all of the cockroaches in your house by stomping on each one you see. For every one you kill, there's a lot more which are unseen and they are breeding all the time. You may have to apply some poison to kill the cockroaches today, but the way you keep them out in the long run is by stopping leaving food crumbs and filth all over your floors to attract them. The way you wipe out the terrorists is by understanding what's causing them to behave so violently and changing the conditions that breed them.

Look, I personally believe that our military is long overdue for an overhaul. I try to not shrink from commenting on the rare occasions when this administration does something right, and the government is addressing a need that's been plaguing us for a while now. We have too many bases, many of which are crumbling under the weight of ancient infrastructures and obsolete equipment and services. I do believe that, heading into the future, we need a streamlined, more centralized, highly mobile, high technology military force which can be rapidly deployed as needed. This is going to require the closing of some bases and the expansion and modernization of others.

I also fully understand the devastating effect that base closures can have on states and local communities. The responsible thing for Bush's team to do would be to take some of those billions of dollars that these closures are supposed to save us and pour it back into those communities, providing massive education and retraining programs and fiscal incentives for businesses to move in or start up and replace all of the lost jobs. That's the right thing to do - the responsible thing to do. Unfortunately the words "responsible" and "Bush" don't cross paths in the same sentence much these days unless you're talking about your latest positive results on an STD screening test.

The one argument we don't need to hear against base closings is the worn out, "Oh my God! Terrorists! We're all going to die!" argument. Peggy Noonan needs her walking papers, and the sooner the better.