The Mirage Jet Fighter and Venezuelan Oil

What’s the connection? Each of these topics is the subject of a very interesting essay on the Val e-diction blog.

Val writes in considerable detail about his experiences as a military pilot in Venezuela back in the day, when he flew the Mirage III. The Mirage was France’s first-generation Mach 2 fighter, a classic aircraft of the 1960s in the same way that the Spitfire was a classic of an earlier period. (The Mirage’s reputation was made by Israel, which used it with spectacular success in the Six Day War.) The Mirage, like the Spitfire, was beautiful. And as with the Spitfire, the Mirage’s brilliant design was achieved partly at the cost of design tradeoffs which limited its overall effectiveness — low fuel capacity and short range in the case of the Spit; an oversimplified, slatless and flapless (!) delta wing with lousy low-speed handling characteristics in the case of the Mirage. This is a fascinating post if you have any interest whatsoever in aviation or military history.

Val has many other great posts on his blog, including this reminder that Castro has used our distraction in Iraq as an occasion to make an example of Cuban dissidents, and a long and thoughtful discourse on tennis, from which I know nothing.

But after his Mirage post, which for me was pure vicarious fun, his most insightful comments may be the ones he makes in discussing the political history of Venezuela. It’s not all about oil, apparently. Rather, Val argues that the country’s chronic problems result from a combination of uncontested socialist theory in the political realm and a Spanish legacy of poorly defined and allocated property rights:

In other words, during the entire second half of the Twentieth Century and while previously poorer countries like Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong were busily and successfully developing under capitalist systems, Venezuela suffered the worst-possible combination of Seventeenth-Century Mercantilism and Twentieth-Century Marxism, as if Adam Smith had never been born. That’s why Emeterio Gómez, one of Venezuela’s top economists, says the country has to relive the Eighteenth Century before it can modernize.

. . . I cannot overemphasize the importance of the historical fact that there were no pro-capitalist political parties or influential pro-market economists in Venezuela during the entire Twentieth Century.

[. . .]

But most importantly, contrary to what happened to the colonies of North America where parliamentary democracy, general access to property and individual rights were part of the English legacy, Venezuela (and Latin America) inherited from Spain an absolutist culture that cultivated state power and opposed individual liberty, responsibility and property beyond personal and basic commercial goods. In Spanish law, later adopted by Latin America in full, the state owned everything, including soil and subsoil and their riches. Contrary to what many pundits believe, Venezuela’s strong and ubiquitous state did not appear suddenly from the oil-polluted sea, like a modern Aphrodite, in a Shell.

Hmm. . . sounds familiar. And worth reading.

(I confess that I may have had a hand in provoking the Venezuela essay. IIRC I asked Val a naive question in which I suggested a parallel between Venezuela’s corruption and that of the Arab oil states. I also plead guilty to egging Val on to write about his air force experiences.)

How could they have been so stupid?

If this article is accurate, Russia has been subverting the U.S.-UK anti-Hussein alliance, has been supporting the Iraqi military and intelligence apparatus at an intimate level, and has done so until very recently. As the article puts it,

It is not known how the Russians obtained such potentially sensitive information, but the revelation that Moscow passed it on to Baghdad is likely to have a devastating effect on relations between Britain and Russia and come as a personal blow to Mr Blair. The Prime Minister declared a “new era” in relations with President Putin when they met in Moscow in October 2001 in the aftermath of the World Trade Center attacks.
And obviously these revelations, if true, are likely to have a similar negative effect on U.S.-Russia relations.

Perry de Havilland wonders how Putin could have been so foolish as to imagine that Iraq could possibly defeat the U.S. and allies, or that Russia’s role in aiding Hussein would not eventually be publicized. You might as well ask why the French could be so stupid to assume they will get away scot free after alienating the U.S., or why Saddam Hussein could imagine that he would prevail once the U.S. and its allies decided to fight.

People miscalculate. Powerful people, especially if they are sheltered from information that contradicts long-held or official positions, can make big mistakes. Saddam Hussein is an obvious example, but even Putin and Chirac may have suffered from bad advice delivered by advisors with mutually supporting opinions. (The just-as-bad alternative is that they ignored good advice. I think this is possible in Chirac’s case, as he shows some Captain Ahab-type tendencies. Putin may have been badly advised by Russian military “experts” whose expertise was at best outdated.)

No one is immune from such mistakes. Better leaders try to prevent them. Bush has succeeded largely because he is decisive and sees the big picture accurately, but also because he is a good manager and selected excellent advisors whose diverse views — e.g., Powell vs. Rumsfeld — make big conceptual errors less likely. It was not so long ago that people were asking how Bush’s predecessor, an intelligent man, could be so foolish as to make various bad decisions for which he is notorious. Hubris and overconfidence are deadly no matter who you are. Good decision makers guard against them and try to minimize their effects.

Damn Right I’m Grateful

This is in response to the person who commented negatively on Sylvain’s eloquent expression of gratitude (scroll down) for the U.S. I want to make clear that I’m grateful too.

I’m grateful for the existence of the United States, which makes the world a better place in so many ways than it would otherwise be.

I’m grateful that the U.S. isn’t shy about supporting freedom, even other people’s freedom.

I’m grateful that the U.S. has enough military power to actually do something about tyranny, not just make speeches.

I’m grateful for the decency, courage, and moral seriousness of my fellow Americans (most of them, anyway), and for our leaders. For all of their flaws, they still have the resolve to confront our enemies.

I’m grateful that most Americans have enough sense to see through captious arguments — like the argument that we shouldn’t touch Iraq because we don’t know for an absolute certainty that Saddam Hussein is a threat to us, and the argument for doing nothing because it’s possible that Iran or North Korea is in fact the bigger danger.

I’m grateful that Americans are willing to take action as soon as it becomes necessary to do so, in order to avoid a larger and far more destructive conflict, with a less certain outcome, in the future.

It’s a great country and I am grateful for it. I’m grateful for other countries, like Israel and the UK, as well. But without a powerful and confident United States, the Hitlers and Husseins would have a much easier time of it and the world would be a far bleaker place.

More on Meigs Field

We move now from the sublimely idiotic to the merely malicious and stupid. Russell Whitaker’s update on Chicago mayor Daley’s wrecking of one of that city’s unique resources provides several interesting links and comments.

Old Europe Checks In

Xavier writes, in the comments to my previous post (scroll down if link doesn’t work):

And how does poaching the best and the brightest from France help the country reform? Honestly, I’m becoming fed up at how unsufferable you Americans are becoming. How is an impovrished, isolated France in America and ‘new’ Europe’s best interests? Seriously, not many non-cons or bloggers ask these questions. Whether you like it or not Americans will have to moderate their loathing for the French.First, you’ll still need to trade with them; second they have information and resources for the ongoing war on terrorism

“Poaching the best and brightest”? Xavier certainly has an interesting way of framing this issue. Talented French people choose to come to the U.S., and he describes their choice using a term that suggests theft of state property (Sylvain, turn yourself in at once!) rather than rational behavior in response to their home country’s failure to be competitive. Next I suppose he will tell Americans they are “poaching” Cuba’s best and brightest — how else to explain why anyone comes here?

Yes, an “impoverished, isolated” France is in no one’s interest. However, it’s up to France to make itself into a country that people want to do business in and with. Until it does so, other countries will hesitate to deal with it. And until it does so, its best people will leave, and why not. They shouldn’t be obliged to sacrifice their time, effort, and capital to support the transnational fantasies of corrupt dirigiste politicians. The U.S., by providing a better alternative, helps these talented French people and itself, and does France a favor by providing some marginal accountability for feckless French pols.

As for American “loathing” of the French, my impression is that few Americans, until quite recently, regarded France as negatively as they do now (I didn’t), or even negatively at all. What changed? The French government betrayed us on a matter of enormous and lasting international consequence, and they did it, apparently, for transient local political reasons. Now they have the chutzpa, which Xavier shares, to blame us for having a negative attitude toward them since their betrayal.

And their betrayal has been a costly one. As Lex points out in the comments section of my previous post, France’s actions, in encouraging the Iraqi regime and undermining the coalition against that regime, made war inevitable and have gotten a lot of Americans — and Brits and Iraqis and Kurds — killed. So does the French government bear any responsibility for current American feelings toward France? No, of course not. It is our responsibility to moderate, as Xavier puts it (we are such cowboys!), our bad attitude. Thanks for straightening us out.

France will continue to decline until its political culture evolves to favor a competitive economy over socialism and international responsibility over self-dealing, monkey wrenching, and cheap brinksmanship. In the meantime, people like Sylvain will come to the U.S., where their talents are appreciated and rewarded, and Americans will continue to distrust and dislike France. France has only itself to blame for this situation. It will become a serious nation again only when its voters start electing serious leaders, and when those leaders stop trying to blame other countries for their own failure.

UPDATE: Xavier posts a response on his blog (Blogger links don’t work, so scroll down if necessary to the April 10 post). He argues that Canada’s lack of political response to brain drain suggests that I am unrealistic to expect France to reform itself in response to emigration. He may well be right. I leave it to readers to evaluate his responses to the rest of what I wrote.