Osama bin Laden, Meet Joe Six-Pack

by Jim Holmes, MALD '98, PhD Candidate

Osama bin Laden and the Taliban have taken our measure and found us wanting.  In mid-October, Jalaluddin Haqqani, a military adviser to Taliban leader Muhammad Omar, predicted that U.S. ground troops would "not be able to sustain the harsh conditions that await them."  Consequently, said Haqqani, "Afghanistan will prove to be the graveyard of the Americans."

Why the confidence, in light of the punishment U.S. forces have meted out in Afghanistan?  Like Saddam Hussein before Desert Storm, Taliban leaders have bought into the legend, borne of the Vietnam trauma, that American citizens will not put up with the deaths of their sons in foreign wars.  The bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, the Somalia debacle, and the elaborate precautions taken to safeguard allied pilots over Kosovo, provide ample evidence to back up this theory.

But wait.  America may be more resilient than its dispiriting post-Vietnam history suggests.

Last weekend my wife and I bundled our two-year-old daughter into our old Honda and headed off to our first Stone Mountain Highland Games.  I was startled at the abundance of martial finery, especially U.S. military insignia and decorations, alongside the obligatory bagpipes and fiddles; sporting a T-shirt bearing the U.S. flag was basically a requirement for admission.

Why such an over-the-top - and at times warlike - display of patriotism at an event celebrating ethnic heritage?  The experience brought to mind an essay on "Jacksonian America" by Walter Russell Mead, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.  Published a few years ago in the journal The National Interest, his article sought to explain why the United States, a liberal democracy, is reluctant to take up arms but is ruthless in wartime.

Mead chalked up America's belligerence to the influence of the Scots and the Scots-Irish, who settled in the South and formed the backbone of Andrew Jackson's populist movement.  Violent, vehemently individualistic, and steeped in a stern code of honor, the settlers surged out into the frontier, fought savage wars against the native inhabitants, and planted the family farms that functioned as the wellspring of Jacksonian culture for the following century.

President Andrew Jackson

Their highland tradition waned in the 1920s and '30s with the decline of the family farm.  During the Progressive Era, proponents of social democracy hoped that subsequent waves of Catholic, Orthodox, and Jewish immigrants - representing traditions more inclined to collectivism - would wean American society from its Jacksonian frontier individualism and nudge the nation in a more communitarian direction.

Curiously enough, exactly the opposite happened.  As the melting pot took effect, many of the newcomers ended up embracing the Jacksonian ethic and - contrary to expectations - spawning an even broader populist community. What had been a largely Southern tradition now extended from coast to coast, was no longer primarily rural, and spanned a multitude of ethnicities beyond the original Anglo-Celtic stock.

What are the traits of Jacksonian America?  Modern-day populists prize self-reliance, individualism, and - the crowning virtue - physical and moral courage.  As the Stone Mountain Games showed, furthermore, military service - a concrete expression of courage - verges on being a sacred duty for them.

Where foreign policy is concerned, the Jacksonian virtues translate into an instinctive, hardy brand of realism.  Jacksonians are skeptical of grandiose schemes to reform the world - which is why they displayed little enthusiasm for military intervention in the Balkans.  But when the nation's vital interests are at stake, populists demand that all available force be used in the pursuit of victory - preferably accompanied by the enemy's unconditional surrender.

Attacks on American soil, resulting in the deaths of thousands of innocents, certainly engage the U.S. national interest and constitute a heavy blow to the Jacksonian notion of honor.  Consequently, this influential segment of American public opinion will continue to back George W. Bush unless the president seems to waver in prosecuting the military campaign.  Indeed, Jacksonians could complicate U.S. diplomacy by prodding Bush to keep pounding away until al Qaeda, the Taliban, and perhaps Saddam Hussein are utterly crushed.

And Jacksonian America won't be inclined to show mercy to terrorists.  Its adherents divide the enemies of America into honorable and dishonorable foes.  The former declare war, abide by legal restraints on the use of force, and thus merit mild treatment in wartime and magnanimity after the shooting stops.  Jacksonian populists accord the latter no such restraint. You can guess which camp Osama, Omar & Co. fall into.

So the culprits of September 11 ought to beware.  You cross Joe Six-Pack at your own peril.

Jim Holmes is a PhD candidate and scion of Clan MacDonald.  Many of the MacDonalds emigrated to the Americas after the defeat of Bonnie Prince Charlie at the Battle of Culloden in 1746. They helped to settle Middle Tennessee, the home of Andrew Jackson, and remain stalwart representatives of Jacksonian America.

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