Correspondence
Correspondence BEERS ON BEERS STEPHEN F. HAYES's "Uncle Sam's Makeover" (June 3) correctly identifies the vital importance of communicating America's values and policies to the Muslim world, but...
...Commission on Human Rights, whose newest member is Zimbabwe, and urges that the United States be prepared to go it alone ("Don't Appease the United Nations," May 20...
...Although Chetwynd decries the level of coverage in the American press of the Canadian losses in Afghanistan, that press is in general very much in sync with Canada's U.N.-oriented foreign policy...
...RICHARD A. DERHAM Seattle, WA...
...And, when appropriate, we'll use posters, pamphlets, and public-service advertising...
...Would that be more expensive—or more wrenching—than having a 100-plus story tower on Manhattan's waterfront brought to the ground...
...The terrorist who has gotten on board with a semiautomatic weapon can spray enough rounds to burst the side of the plane and suck the nearest passenger, his carry-on, and his seat out the hole...
...Barnes claims it would be "extravagantly expensive" to put an air marshal on every flight...
...words can kill...
...Fred Barnes's June 3 editorial "Arm the Pilots and Profile the Passengers," which passionately argues that arming pilots "is such a simple solution to airline hijacking," shows that Barnes has no expertise with either planes or firearms...
...In A Dangerous Place, Daniel Patrick Moynihan's memoir of his service as ambassador to the United Nations, Moynihan writes of similar challenges, which he met by using the institutions of the U.N., specifically its forum for raising and debating issues...
...We should be careful generalizing too much from polls that say pilots favor such a move...
...But the majority is somewhere in the middle...
...CHARLOTTE BEERS Under Secretary of State Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Washington, DC OUR CANADIAN FRIENDS LIONEL CHETWYND's "Dulce et Decorum Est" (June 3) was the best article I've seen that explains the U.S.Canada relationship, but I have a different read on Americans' muted reaction to the deaths of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry's Sgt...
...Scott went out in style, magnificent style...
...Contrary to Chetwynd's implication, Canada did not go to war in World War II to protect American interests, and it fought in Korea under the banner of the United Nations, consistent with a long postwar policy Chetwynd seems to feel developed only after Korea...
...Hayes concludes his article by citing a recent speech by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, in which he called on us to speak to the millions of Muslims who aspire to "freedom and democracy and free enterprise...
...It is also available on videocassette...
...Marc Leger, Cpl...
...Attitudes do matter...
...Currently, we cannot even keep terrorists off airplanes—even the ones who pack bombs in their shoes...
...Ainsworth Dyer, Pvt...
...A modest proposal along the lines of Moynihan's: Before jockeying begins for next year's elections, the United States should announce its belief that members of the U.N...
...Recognizing this challenge, why would we devote our limited public diplomacy resources to engaging exclusively with those already in basic agreement with our values and views...
...Indeed, the dean of the "bash America" press is Canadian-born Peter Jennings...
...Hayes's larger point seems to be that our public diplomacy campaign in the war against terrorism fails to distinguish between "good Muslims and bad...
...JONATHAN F. KEILER Bowie, MD GUNS, PLANES DON'T MIX I AM A FORMER World War II U.S...
...The actors' performances and the full-color beauty of the photography are unbeatable...
...Given the importance Hayes ascribes to this link on our website, readers might be surprised to learn that it has been only one of 11 links to non-governmental organizations on the State Department's "Muslim Life in America" website...
...I flew round-trip to Florida last week and asked each Delta Airlines pilot after landing coming and going if they thought pilots should be armed...
...Pilot training procedures would have to be altered significantly in order to turn pilots into accurate gunmen...
...Correspondence BEERS ON BEERS STEPHEN F. HAYES's "Uncle Sam's Makeover" (June 3) correctly identifies the vital importance of communicating America's values and policies to the Muslim world, but Hayes describes the public diplomacy programs that I direct at the State Department only partially...
...This oversimplifies the task at hand...
...If we don't do this, make no mistake: There are plenty of others around the world—indifferent or hostile to us and what we stand for—who are ready to step in and "define"America to Muslim audiences...
...The Canadians know how we feel and we know how they feel...
...I couldn't agree more, and we at the State Department are developing programs that will engage such individuals and groups as partners and interlocutors to help explain the power and purpose of the United States in the world today...
...In the service I spent about three hours on a firing range and most of that was shooting skeet to learn how to "lead" an enemy fighter...
...It's worth a try...
...That is not always true...
...At the other extreme, terrorists and their hosts are properly the purview of military, intelligence, and law enforcement action...
...This analysis is superficial to say the least, for it does not take into account America's Pacific effort, the Manhattan Project, or the enormous industrial and logistic contributions of the United States to its far-flung forces and allies, all which were as necessary to victory as putting more soldiers in uniform...
...First, the matter of CAIR—the Council on American-Islamic Relations on which Hayes dwells at great length...
...Again each will be voted down, but not without cost to the nation whose policies are thus exposed, and to the credibility of the commission itself...
...A small minority actively supports a resort to acts of terrorism...
...Commission on Human Rights should be held to the highest standards...
...We need to do this to establish a common foundation of values—not only to remove sympathy and support for such acts, but to articulate a shared vision of a future built on opportunity and freedom, not on grievance and death...
...Because the terrorist who has incited his armed emergence is going to kill him, because that's why he's there...
...army pilot and a former FBI agent, so I know something about airplanes and something about handguns...
...Such a game plan would force the commission to be true to its principles and might just deter nations like Zimbabwe from seeking membership in the first place...
...L.S...
...Second, the United States should propose that an annual report on each member of the commission be presented and discussed at a commission meeting...
...Richard A. Green, and Pvt...
...ARNOLD BEICHMAN decries the hypocrisy of the U.N...
...We, as practitioners of public diplomacy, must engage those between these extremes—the wider community of individuals and organizations who aspire to a better life but are ambivalent regarding acts of terrorism...
...These were deaths in the family, and the "general silence" Chetwynd writes of is proof of the bond...
...MICHAEL FROST Glenwood, IA THE INHUMANE U.N...
...Then down goes the plane...
...The important readership of The Weekly Standard deserves a broader view...
...In my opinion, the overall American reaction to the soldiers' deaths has been appropriate, as its strength has been based on Canada's losses in the war on terrorism compared to those of the United States...
...Where America is defined as godless, militaristic, anti-Islamic, and uncaring about families and foreign cultures, then, yes, I would say that a re-presentation, or reintroduction, of America and American values is in order...
...Of course the proposal will be voted down each time it is raised, so third, the United States must prepare its own reports and raise one or two at each meeting of the human rights commission and propose an investigation...
...These links have been provided only as information resources, and there is no endorsement by the State Department of their content...
...Third, Barnes and others claim that the large number of ex-servicemen among pilots means they "are trained in firearm use...
...These programs will include arrangements at Middle East universities and other institutions to provide multimedia access to information on the United States, our society and values, as well as an expansion of exchange programs to enrich and deepen the dialogue among Americans and Muslims abroad...
...A spectrum of attitudes exists within the Muslim world...
...The place to begin preventing airline hijackings is on the ground, at the airports...
...Canada's contributions to victory in World War II were noteworthy, but Chetwynd's whole point appears to be based on the higher percentage of Canadian to American troops mobilized during the war, compared to total populations...
...Nathan Smith...
...And no one should believe Boeing when it says that several rounds through the fuselage won't bring the plane down at that altitude...
...Second, 30,000 feet high is the wrong place to start a gun battle...
...The two do not mix...
...Think of it this way: First, when the pilot emerges from his cockpit waving a handgun, he has about one second— maybe two—before he's dead...
...Polls and surveys demonstrate conclusively that negative stereotypes, disinformation, and outright demonization of the United States and the West are widespread in the Arab and Muslim worlds and can provide an environment in which large numbers of people—in effect, enablers—ignore, excuse, or justify acts of terrorism...
...Even if it was Scott's last film and maybe the start of the "adult" western, I find it impossible not to appreciate this classic...
...DABNEY Chestnut Hill, MA GREAT SCOTT AS SOMEONE UNDER THE AGE OF FORTY who loves westerns, Randolph Scott, and Sam Peckinpah, I enjoyed Terry Teachout's essay on the films of Randolph Scott ("Horse Opera," June 3...
...A somewhat larger group actively rejects such acts...
...Ride the High Country is a great western, a great Scott film, and a Peckinpah masterpiece...
...Images have consequences...
...Teachout is right—it is unfortunate that so many of Scott's B westerns are unavailable on videocassette...
...Instead of obligatory ululation, we reacted with the private tears and prayers we reserve for our own...
...But after I finished the article, it dawned on me that Teachout missed a wonderful opportunity to expose movie enthusiasts to a truly great film, Ride the High Country (1962...
...That the Canadian loss merited limited coverage in America is hard to dispute...
...Each pilot answered with an abrupt "No...
...And no pilot will get the firearm training I got as an FBI agent...
...and we would be derelict if we did not engage those who hold such negative views, however antithetical to our own...
...I don't know an M-l from an AK-47 and neither does any other pilot...
...JEFF DENNIS Sacramento, CA ONE CAN ADMIRE the contributions of Canadian troops on D-Day and still be puzzled by Lionel Chetwynd's critique of American reaction to the loss of four Canadian soldiers to friendly fire in Afghanistan...
Vol. 7 • June 2002 • No. 39
