James R. Huntley: Nation-Building, Too
International Herald Tribune

Regarding "Go ahead and make the world safer" Opinion, Feb. 12) by Margaret Thatcher:

Baroness Thatcher's advice to "the superpower" may or may not, in general, be good advice. But in one key respect, President George W. Bush should disregard her counsel.

She writes, "It is best that the United States, as the only global military superpower, deploy its energies militarily rather than on social work," which she defines as "trying to promote civil society and democratic institutions."

She both overestimates and underestimates the United States. One can hardly imagine a successful long-term campaign against terrorism relying on U.S. military might alone; America's allies, including Britain, are more important than ever in this open-ended fight, militarily and in all other ways.

On the other hand, for the United States to eschew its vital role in the democracy-building job in Afghanistan would be a serious mistake. America and its allies failed to take on that job in 1989, after helping the Afghan tribes throw out the Russians. What was not done then must now be done, at far greater cost.

After 1945, Britain, the United States and France did the right thing in Germany, i.e., fostered - over more than a decade - the political reorientation of the West Germans toward modernity. General Douglas MacArthur's similar efforts in Japan bore fruit as well.

The United States has tremendous resources for both jobs: defeating the enemies of democracy and helping to build durable free institutions.

One cannot hope to build, or rebuild, democracy everywhere it has failed or has no roots.

However, when opportunities, such as a failed Afghanistan, occur in an obviously strategic place, America and its fellow free nations have no choice but to help the people assert, or re-assert, their rightful place among the community of democracies, which is the main force for the future of a peaceful, cooperative world.

Letter to International Herald Tribune responding Margaret Thatcher on U.S. Supremacy