Time is a river, and history, our boat. We may be able to have some effect on the boat's course, but, in many cases, the river will take us where it darn well pleases. We credit or blame many people throughout history with having done this or that thing. What is interesting is if we care to look a bit closer, we see that the event was historically inevitable. The person remembered for it was simply lucky or unlucky enough to have gotten there first.
History credits Columbus with having "discovered" America. A better phrase would be re-discovered. In truth we now know that the Vikings were here 400 or so years earlier, being apparently the first to arrive after the people we call the native Americans. They, however, found the land not to their liking, and went home. There is evidence to suggest that the Chinese actually arrived in 1421, but the proof was lost because the emperor who sent them was deposed while they were enroute. Upon their return, they never got credit and none of their countrymen followed.
Columbus got the credit because people from Europe did follow, and the race to colonize was on. But, if he hadn't been successful, or hadn't come at all, someone else would have, probably within the next 20 years. Europe was going through a resurgence. Exploration was all the rage. History was ready for where time was leading it. It was inevitable. Things downstream might have looked a bit different, but, America would have been discovered and settled at about the same point in history.
Sir Isaac Newton discovered the Calculus...or did he? Ask some, and they will credit Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, a contemporary of Newton. Who did or didn't isn't as important as the fact that it was discovered then. Newton, either because of better standing within the academic community or better press, or both, got the credit. But, if he hadn't discovered it, again, it was inevitable. Two men, at the same time, working on the same ideas...time was ready for Calculus.
Charles Darwin is known as the father of the Theory of Evolution and the concept of Natural Selection. But was he really the only one to discover the mechanisms of the natural world? Ask a biologist about Alfred R. Wallace. You might discover that he, too, was developing a theory on natural selection, at about the same time. Darwin, however, beat Wallace to the presses and his name is now forever linked with that discovery.
These are but three high profile examples. Delve deeper into history, and you will find that it is replete with similar stories. Our actions and events may be brought about by free will, but when taken as a whole, humanity moves in ways that are oddly predictable, at least in hindsight. Further contemporary examples would be the first flight, discovery of the double-helix of DNA, personal computers, and on and on. Time creates opportunities for many innovators. History remembers the fastest, even if the race was only won by a few seconds.
Politics is no exception to these rules. Its path is sometimes even more inevitable than other fields of human endeavor. Democracy would have re-emerged into the world roughly 200 years ago with or without America leading the way. All the forces of politics, society and economics were rushing headlong in that direction. In our country, had not a civil war brought slavery to a close, then further northern industrialism and simple social pressure along the lines of the temperance movement might have. It just might have taken until the 1870's or 80's for the slaves to see emancipation. The waves of immigrants in the late 1800's might have also had an effect on the viability and logic of slavery. Whatever the cause, it was doomed to die out roughly when it did.
Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher and Mikhail Gorbachev share the credit for ending the Soviet Union. They had the temerity, stubbornness and courage to bring about change. But, the USSR was a faulty lid on an over-pressurized cooker. Had not these three people emerged on the scene when they did, pushing and pulling the wall down, someone, or something else would have caused the same effect. It's possible the hammer and sickle might have seen the new millennium, but they'd have never celebrated their centennial. When I look back and read some of the internal things going on during it's 73 year lifetime, I'm sometimes surprised it made fifty.
It's like the chicken and the egg. Did the people make the events great, or was it the other way around? An now, to tie it all together. The war in Iraq was inevitable.
If George W. Bush was not elected president, Iraq would have been invaded. There was simply no way around it. Gore would have been president and had to deal with the UN resolutions and inspectors, and he would have gone in. He would have used his numerous statements as Vice President as rationale, and probably have blamed the former president Bush for not doing it right the first time, but he would have gone in.
If the attacks on September 11, 2001 had not happened, Iraq would have been invaded. It might have take a few more years for it to have happened, but Saddam Hussein's arrogance and disregard for others would not have gone unchecked. His days were numbered. Not by us, but by history. If we didn't take him out, the British would have. If not them, then the Russians. Regardless of who led the charge, Saddam Hussein's reign would not have seen the close of the first decade of the 21st century.
If John Kerry had defeated George Bush in 2004, he'd be defending our position in Iraq and bemoaning the negative press and the lack of reporting on the progress being made. Oh, he'd say he's doing things better, but he would be constrained by events to act much the same way President Bush is today. He's a politician, and when placed in a certain position, he would also have to become a realist.
You can blame a president for being a poor public speaker, or for having no morals, or for being naive, or lots of things. But, some things they do are just inevitable because they are right and/or their time has come. Given similar circumstances and pressures from without and within, different people will often choose the same course of action. Even if they claim it was for different reasons.
Saddam Hussein was not singled out because George W. Bush was president. He just happened to run out of time WHEN George W. Bush was president.
No comments:
Post a Comment