Epilogue Revisiting the Liberal Conscience

Abstract

The boy on the cover of this book is part of a kite-flying team of three. He is the anchor man. The youngest, he holds the spool of thread. An older boy will actually fly the kite with his hands while this younger lad lets out the thread. A third boy, the actual kite runner (who should be quite fast), will run down the cut kites. In Afghanistan, much like everything else, flying kites is a competitive sport, a duel to see who can fly best and who can cut the lead line of the opponent first. It is not easy when one considers the people of Afghanistan to think of leaving them at the mercy of the Taliban. Surely intervention was the right option. Surely we can never leave. This book does not hold answers; those questions remain and are for the reader to decide. Hopefully, however, the reader has come to appreciate the difficulties with peace-making and state-building through the case of Afghanistan. It would seem that heroic interventionism in the name of democracy promotion should die and be buried in the sands of Afghanistan. Although the liberal heart may bleed with sympathy at the plights of others, the realist brain must check the rash impulse to intervene. This is not cold-hearted, it is prudent and ultimately it is more humane. Acting on the desires of the radical liberal conscience will bring nothing but endless war, unfulfilled expectations, broken promises and death. Perhaps in time the situation may be better, but the argument that one must break some eggs to make an omelet is ultimately callous.

Wherever the standard of freedom and Independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be.

But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.

She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all.

She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.

She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example.

She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom.

The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force …

She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit …

John Quincy Adams, 1821