Thursday
Yesterday a tweet by a Wall Street Journal reporter in Syria brought me up short because it sounded right out of Mark Twain’s Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. The two situations are disturbingly similar.
First Dion Nissenbaum’s tweet:
Remarkable day in Syria: The US military carried out airstrikes to destroy the headquarters for its counter-ISIS campaign after Turkish backed forces closed in on the base. US military says it is carrying out “deliberate withdrawal.”
Now Twain’s progatonist:
Time for the second step in the plan of campaign! I touched a button, and shook the bones of England loose from her spine!
In that explosion all our noble civilization-factories went up in the air and disappeared from the earth. It was a pity, but it was necessary. We could not afford to let the enemy turn our own weapons against us.
In Twain’s time-travel novel, Hank and his men find themselves fighting the entirety of medieval England, having failed to turn it into a modern-day republic. Their use of modern technology gives them an overwhelming advantage, and through the use of electrified fences and gatling guns they enact their own version of Desert Storm:
“Stand to your guns, men! Open fire!”
The thirteen gatlings began to vomit death into the fated ten thousand. They halted, they stood their ground a moment against that withering deluge of fire, then they broke, faced about and swept toward the ditch like chaff before a gale. A full fourth part of their force never reached the top of the lofty embankment; the three-fourths reached it and plunged over—to death by drowning.
Within ten short minutes after we had opened fire, armed resistance was totally annihilated, the campaign was ended, we fifty-four were masters of England. Twenty-five thousand men lay dead around us.
Twice in the past 20 years, America’s superior fire power has yielded what appeared at the time to be spectacular victories, once in Afghanistan and once in Iraq. Increasingly, however, those victories appear to have been as hollow as Hank’s. In his case, the illness unleashed by the dead bodies kills everyone in the compound. In Afghanistan, we are hunkered down in a compound and an interminable war. The situation isn’t much better in Iraq.
But back to Syria. Trump boasted that we had crushed ISIS, then gave Turkey the green light to attack the Kurds, and now we are seeing ISIS raise its flag once more. While it appears that our troops, unlike Hank’s, will escape with their lives, for the Kurds it’s a different story.
Humiliated by Turkey, Trump is now throwing out empty threats. I’m particularly struck by the similarity between his letter to Turkish president Erdogan and Hank’s letter to the opposing knights. Both prove to be equally ineffective.
First Hank:
TO THE HONORABLE THE COMMANDER OF THE INSURGENT CHIVALRY OF ENGLAND: You fight in vain. We know your strength—if one may call it by that name. We know that at the utmost you cannot bring against us above five and twenty thousand knights. Therefore, you have no chance—none whatever. Reflect: we are well equipped, well fortified, we number 54. Fifty-four what? Men? No, minds—the capablest in the world; a force against which mere animal might may no more hope to prevail than may the idle waves of the sea hope to prevail against the granite barriers of England. Be advised. We offer you your lives; for the sake of your families, do not reject the gift. We offer you this chance, and it is the last: throw down your arms; surrender unconditionally to the Republic, and all will be forgiven.
(Signed) THE BOSS.
Now Trump:
His Excellency
Recep Tayyip Erdogan
President of the Republic of Turkey
Ankara
Dear Mr. President:Let’s work out a good deal! You don’t want to be responsible for slaughtering thousands of people, and I don’t want to be responsible for destroying the Turkish economy — and I will. I’ve already given you a little sample with respect to Pastor Brunson.
I have worked hard to solve some of your problems. Don’t let the world down. You can make a great deal. General Mazloum is willing to negotiate with you, and he is willing to make concessions that they would never have made in the past. I am confidentially enclosing a copy of his letter to me, just received.
History will look upon you favorably if you get this done the right and humane way. It will look upon you forever as the devil if good things don’t happen. Don’t be a tough guy. Don’t be a fool!
I will call you later.
How was Twain able to anticipate Trump so perfectly? Because he understood American braggadocio as well as anyone ever has.