As Gaza descends toward a primordial state of nature, Lebanon stands on the brink of civil war, and Iraq threatens to unravel into a multi-part sectarian free-for-all, it is worth pulling back and considering the fundamental human conflict between those forces which seek to bring order out of chaos and those destructive forces that tend to create disorder.
The tension between order and chaos occurs from the smallest level of biological organization up to higher orders. Homeostasis is a dynamic equilibrium between all the various forces which act upon the organism.
When homeostasis is shattered, individuals suffer. When a parson falls out of homeostatic balance, without outside intervention, they will fail to survive. This is as true in relation to the mind and brain as to the body.
Consider the theory of kindling and its application in Neurology and Psychiatry. Neurologists propose that in certain seizure disorders, the chaotic neural firing that characterizes a seizure starts with a small group of hyper-sensitive neurons which have a lower than usual threshold for firing. Over time, these neurons begin to fire more and more readily, until, via pathways which reinforce their tendency to fire too easily (positive feedback loops), they eventuate in the cascade of neural firings that cause a seizure. Psychiatrists believe that in certain types of Affective Disorders (Manic-Depressive or Bipolar Disorders) certain groups of cells which are important in regulating affects become hyper-sensitive over time and begin to fire inappropriately to what would normally be sub-threshold stimuli. After a time, these neurons, via positive feedback loops, cause a person's affective states to become more and more unstable, eventuating in alternating Manic and Depressive episodes.
The theory of kindling explains why certain patients develop chronic seizures which are treatment resistant; it also can be used to explain patients who develop the rapidly changing, difficult to regulate affect states referred to as "Rapid Cycling."
How can this help us understand the apparent rise and spread of disorder in the Middle East?
One important point is that it requires a great deal more energy and structure to achieve complex ordered systems than to produce disorder.
Richard Fernandez picks up on the possibility that the summer war has begun and suggests certain parameters to follow:
The obvious threat is this: 1) Syria will make a play for Lebanon; 2) Hamas will consolidate in Gaza and maybe make a move on Fatah in the West Bank; 3) al-Qaeda will make a final attempt to push Iraq into a full-blown regional conflict. Maybe it isn't the Summer War, but it is a push of some sort.
Israpundit believes that Israel will soon be forced to act:
Israel so far is standing aside. The US strategy is in shambles. It is losing everywhere.
Sooner or later Israel will be forced to respond and respond in spades it will. Just as in the past Israel must weigh the advantages of a preemptive strike against waiting to be hit first. The longer it waits, the stronger its enemies become. Can it wait for Lebanon to lose its independence or for Syria to fully rearm. Can it wait for war to break out in Judea and Samaria.
Harry Reid has now pronounced the surge a failure before it has had much of a chance to take hold; this is a slight improvement over his depiction of the surge as a failure before it even began but combined with his trashing of our military leaders does not bode well for a reasoned approach to the spreading chaos in the Middle East, and that is of concern. Reid might well consider that the next President could well be a Democrat and will have to deal with the ongoing fall-out from our present policies.
There is reason to believe that the Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas alliance, along with their de facto allies in al Qaeda, are acting out of a combination of desperation and overconfidence in thier accelerating efforts to destabilize the Middle East. Iran is facing internal unrest and a failing economy; the Mullahs have been ferociously cracking down. Syria has been busily jailing anyone speaking up for democracy or reform, has its fingerprints all over the assasinations that are a part of the fabric of life for anti-Syrian Lebanese politicians, and is almost certainly behind the recent fighting in Tripoli. Both Syria and Iran are fearful of their own restive minorites, need external enemies to rally their people, and hope to control and contain the chaos they are loosing on their neighbors.
At the same time they percieve that the chastened Americans and Israelis will not be able to respond effectively to the current strife. They imagine that Bush, a lame duck President, no longer has the abilty to control events and that the Congress will force an American withdrawal by the fall. At the same time, the Israeli leadership is in an even weaker position; the Israeli public has no confidence in their leadership and the only thing stopping the government from falling is the most narrow self-interest of a small number of Israeli MKs.
The gravest danger is that the various actors in the neighborhood will overreach, overreact, and provoke a reaction that will plunge the entire region, including Iran and Syria, into the fire. Only al Qaeda would benefit from such a state of affairs.
If the Democrats destroy our efforts in Iraq the coutnry will descend into Gazan violence made exponentially worse by the number of competing armed and vicious factions involved.
If the Syrians/Palestinians provoke Israel with a severe enough attack, a weak government in Israel could easily see themselves as under existential assault and respond with attacks on Damascus and Tehran.
If Iran miscalculates and causes enough American deaths, Bush will have little choice but to respond in kind.
Each new atrocity lowers the threshold for the next atrocity. The Middle East is an exapmle of
"kindling" at the macro level. The threshold for action lowers, the level of violence increases, and before too long entire populations can be seized with manic intensity. Iran and Syria may believe they can control the amount and intensity of violence, titrating the violence to keep it below the threshold of Western response, but once violence has been "kindled", the threat of a positive feedback loop is real and process can all too rapidly escape homeostasis; in other words, Iran/Syria/Hamas/Hezbollah may quickly find out they have set events in motion over which they have much less control than they imagine.
There are far too many ways for the current situation to descend into the abyss. Of note, Ralph Peters, no Bush apologist by any means, finds a kernel of hope:
Is there any good news at all?
Yes. Earlier this week, Capitol Hill saw a small miracle: A U.S. Army general told the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. As fine an officer as we've got in uniform, Lt. Gen. Martin Dempsey refused to pander to anyone. Instead, he laid out the grim situation in Iraq and detailed the minimum commitment required for any hope of even a flawed success.
Dempsey placed integrity, our country and our troops above self-interest. He described the padded payrolls in Iraq's national police, the sectarianism of local police forces and the long-term effort needed to get the Iraqi army on its feet and fit to fight (think years, not months). Security requirements demand 50,000 more Iraqi soldiers and cops-this year alone.
The general even pointed out that some Iraqis are nostalgic for the order of Saddam's regime: We failed to deliver the No. 1 good, security.
The testimony was sobering, to say the least. And therein lies reason for hope. After years of obfuscation and outright lies from the Rumsfeld-era generals, our troops are finally led by officers who realize we're at war-and that winning is more important than promotions.
We're stuck in Iraq, and it sucks. But were we to leave in haste, far more blood than oil would flow in the Persian Gulf. The disaster in Gaza's just a rehearsal for the Arab-suicide drama awaiting its opening night in Iraq.
In my experience, when a patient is absolutely committed to suicide, there is very little anyone can do to stop them. Perhaps the Iraqis will come to their senses before it is too late. We certainly cannot count on the Iranians, Syrians, or Palestinians doing so.
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