Good Idea Whose Time Is Tomorrow

The generals and war planners in Washington aren’t alone in adjusting battlefield strategy. Leaders of the antiwar movement in the U.S. are too, and seemingly with some success. I say, bravo.

This new approach, let’s call it “tempered realism,” by activists and protesters and idealists just might accomplish a goal about which there should be no argument: a future without “blood for oil.”

I sided against the status quo of the Middle East and with U.S. troops once they were committed to combat in this war. And, yes, that meant siding with those who command them. This has put distance between me and some of the progressives I usually feel kinship with at home. Now, though, I can add an important, “but .... “

I continue to believe that in the death-struggle of war, one cannot “support the troops” while at the same time encouraging their foe. And surely it is apparent by now that Saddam Hussein’s government is encouraged by any sign that it might break the will of those who oppose it. Would the world be better off, really, if the U.S. pulled back and Hussein became the towering hero of Arabs?

But beyond this war, or this moment in the war, the U.S. stands at a crossroads.

You don’t have to be a war protester to understand that oil is at the root of this conflict. The U.S. didn’t set out to rid the world of a tyrant. No, we sided with Hussein when he battled the fundamentalists in Iran, didn’t we? Are we up in arms because he gassed the Kurds? Well, what took so long and why were we eager to do business with him in the intervening years? Would the U.S. have mobilized in 1991 to expel the Republican Guards if they had invaded, say, Sierra Leone? Doubtful.

Oil set in motion the 1991 Gulf War, and the momentum from that propelled the U.S. into this one.

It is a sobering realization for a nation with an unquenchable appetite for imported energy. And it gets eerier if we peer into the future in light of the recent past. Consider the numbers: In 1973, the U.S. imported 35% of its oil from abroad, and only 5% from the Persian Gulf. That year the Arab nations imposed a five-month embargo on oil exports to the U.S., sending the economy reeling and undermining our national sense of security. We resolved to do something about it, but of course we didn’t stick with it.

By 1990, when Iraq invaded and occupied Kuwait, U.S. reliance on foreign oil had grown to 42% of our needs, with 12% coming from the Persian Gulf.

Today, the U.S. imports 53% of its petroleum. By 2020, the U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that dependence will reach 64%.

“No blood for oil”? The future should alarm us all.

That’s why the new tempered realism by war protesters, or at least some of them, is so welcome. Our growing thirst for oil plus our dependence on uncertain supplies -- and all that this means in a turbulent world -- is a message that should not get marginalized or, worse, stigmatized.

In the opening few days of this war, the disruptive tactics and scattershot complaints of protest zealots and anarchists risked accomplishing that very thing. Good ideas, after all, rise or fall with the leaders who embrace them. Jimmy Carter’s humanitarian approach to foreign policy, for instance, succumbed to his bad luck in confronting Iran. A generation ago, Jerry Brown, the former governor of California, led the nation in rethinking our energy future -- right up to the moment when he became perceived as flaky, and then energy alternatives became flaky too.

Mindful of this danger, it appears that the leadership of the antiwar movement is now being claimed by steadier hands and more constructive thinkers. Maybe we should call it an emerging peace movement. Increasingly, protesters are being exhorted to woo, not alienate, mainstream Americans. Instead of “shutting America down” with civil disobedience, leaders say they “will have to educate as well as demonstrate.”

“A prophetic minority can become a progressive majority, if we do our work,” says Tom Hayden, the Vietnam-era protest leader who is back in the thick of it.

For my thinking, there still is far too much tunnel vision in the antiwar movement, too much delight at the American battlefield struggles, too much excuse-making for the atrocities of Hussein and his radical followers, too much backlash against George W. Bush without regard for the consequences of a U.S. pullback.

But, ah yes, but: Peace is another word for security. And the U.S. is unlikely to hang on to security for long unless we face up to our happy-go-lucky gluttony for essential oil that we do not possess. The Bush administration has made clear that it will not challenge the habits of consumption. In fact, during the first week of this war, the administration was reportedly at work on new gas mileage regulations to encourage the production of heavier cars -- an amazingly wrongheaded approach.

Those who believe strongest in our need to conserve and pursue energy alternatives have taken to the streets. I disagree with them at this moment -- but not tomorrow, not when it comes to avoiding the next war before it starts.