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  • Letters for Obama

    American Thinker
    Jan 4 2010

    Letters for Obama

    By Ken Blackwell

    Historian H.W. Brands has done a great service to all Americans in his
    newly edited version of the letters of Theodore Roosevelt. More than a
    century ago, in 1905, President Roosevelt basked in congratulations
    from around the world. He had just negotiated the Treaty of Portsmouth
    (New Hampshire), which put an end to the bloody Russo-Japanese War.
    For this outstanding achievement, T.R. was awarded the Nobel Peace
    Prize.

    The occasion prompted our young, Harvard-trained president to reflect
    seriously on what is needed to preserve peace. In a letter to the
    famous Carl Schurz, a German immigrant and noted advocate of
    disarmament, President Roosevelt politely but firmly dissented from
    the views held by Progressives at the time (and by all too many now as
    well). Roosevelt did not think that armed forces necessarily led to
    war. He pointed to the Ottoman Turks, who had butchered hundreds of
    thousands of Armenians while the Great Powers of Europe kept hands
    off. They "kept the peace." T.R. thought their policy iniquitous.

    Commenting on the just-completed British war against jihadists in the
    Sudan, Roosevelt said that if England had disarmed and allowed the
    followers of the Muslim Mahdi (Expected One) to prevail, "the result
    would have been a horrible and bloody calamity to mankind." But T.R.
    did not glorify armed conflict. "Unjust war is dreadful; a just war
    may be the highest duty."

    It was in that British colonial war that young Winston Churchill saw
    action as a subaltern in the cavalry. He faced death repeatedly --
    just as young Theodore had at San Juan Hill in Cuba.

    Churchill wrote that "nothing is as exhilarating as to be shot at
    without result."

    President Obama should read these letters. He too is a young,
    Harvard-trained President, and he too is the recipient of a Nobel
    Peace Prize. Our 44th president could find much wisdom in the thoughts
    of our 26th.

    T.R. was certainly an idealist. He certainly brought change. But his
    idealism was tempered by realism. He saw the world as it was, not as
    he wished it would be.

    There is of course no analogy between international law and private or
    municipal law. [Here], the law abiding man does not have to arm
    himself against the lawless simply because there is some armed force
    -- the police, the sheriff's posse, the national guard, the regulars
    -- which can be called out to enforce the laws. At present, there is
    no similar international force to call on ...

    Basically, President Roosevelt's point is well taken. I would have to
    dissent in part, because for black Americans in 1905, night riders of
    the KKK were too often aided and abetted by the police and sheriff's
    posses. To his credit, though, President Roosevelt stood strongly for
    civil rights for all Americans.

    "No one in his senses," T.R. wrote, "would suggest [American]
    disarmament." One has to wonder how those words were received by the
    leading American disarmers. Still, as president, T.R. knew the value
    of the West African proverb: "Speak softly and carry a big stick."

    Roosevelt accepted his Nobel Peace Prize while still speaking strongly
    for an armed peace. He agreed with our first president, George
    Washington, that if you seek peace, then you must prepare for war. To
    demonstrate U.S. resolve, Roosevelt sent the Great White Fleet around
    the world. Japan and Germany -- rising naval powers -- took note.

    I can think of no better example for our young president than Theodore
    Roosevelt. Tragically for our country and the world, T.R.'s unique
    brand of realistic idealism was rejected by the administration of
    Woodrow Wilson. Wilson's impractical idealism put pacifists in charge
    of the War, Navy, and State Departments in the vain hope that
    exchanging America's eagle for an ostrich could preserve peace.

    Whenever I hear President Obama talk about his year of "engagement" --
    of extending an open hand to the mullahs of Iran -- I hear Woodrow
    Wilson, not Theodore Roosevelt. The dictators in Tehran have slapped
    away Obama's every initiative, sneered at his every utterance.

    We should never forget that the mullahs are the number-one supporters
    of terrorism in the world. They are the ones who murdered our 241
    Marines and Navy corpsmen in Beirut in 1983. With this new year, can
    we count Obama's "engagement" to break?

    President Roosevelt did not inherit a war being waged on America by
    international terrorists. We can be sure that if he had, he would not
    have hesitated to call terrorists terrorists -- or to take the strong,
    resolute action necessary to defeat them.

    Ken Blackwell is a senior fellow at the Family Research Council. He
    served as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Humans Rights
    Commission and was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

    http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/01 /letters_for_obama.html
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