Look, you're responding to a guy who made his billions by marrying a shopping mall heiress--and then wrote a book (and numerous columns) about the evils of American consumerism...Friedman is not worth your time.

And that means he is not really worth anyone's time....

That said, I too have heard this argument over and over, mostly with the people I work with, and it numbs my brain to hear it.

However this VERY modest breakdown of that argument was modestly presented, and I would be happy to refer to this is someone was to ever ask me about it.

Some degree of anti-Americanism may reflect ideology, distorted history, or a foreign government's attempt to shift blame onto others (a practice that all governments indulge in), but a lot of it is the inevitable result of policies that the American people have supported in the past.

It's a kind of self-feeding phenomena. Islamists and their ilk use American attacks on muslims and the like as justifications for their claims, but the whole thing gets filtered through a worldview that holds that the Islamic World is constantly under attack from outside forces and must be defended and purified. While Friedman's claims about supposed US benevolence are nonsense, that type of "Narrative" does exist, and it shows up in the ideology of radicals and jihadists.

Tom Friedman had an especially fatuous column in Sunday's New York Times, which is saying something given his well-established capacity for smug self-assurance.

Friedman has a talent for writing readable, anecdotal news columns, which is why it was interesting to read his articles. Unfortunately, someone gave him free rein on a newspaper column, which allows us to see his major downside- he more or less has no depth on anything. He just picks up, as if by osmosis, whatever the "big issue" is at the time and regurgitates a bunch of surface stuff with a strong degree of self-service.

It's a common retort from those who aim to show the United States' benevolence towards Muslims to point to Bosnia and Kosovo as examples.

I'm curious to know what you have to say about those episodes?

Walt could also have included a couple other caveats, etc.

1. None of the Muslims killed were killed by the U.S. because they were Muslim. All the Americans killed were killed because they were Americans.

2. The U.S. saved hundreds of thousands of Muslims from being ethnically cleansed by the Serbs in the 1990s (who, by the way, were being expelled or killed because they were Muslims).

3. Tens of millions of Muslims were liberated by the U.S. in Afghanistan and Iraq. This is not to say that either or both were good ideas or bad ideas. It is simply to say that I hope we can all agree that whatever the faults of the current governments (or lack thereof) they are better than the hellish tyranny of the Taliban or of Saddam.

The point of this is to say, yes, many Muslims have died due to U.S. policy (though again, the intent was not to kill Muslims as such) but many more have been saved. If the U.S. were truly anti-Muslim than this would NOT be the case.

Excellent article.....you forgot to list the over 800 innocent civilians killed by the US drone program in Pakistan over the last few years. They killed around a dozen suspected terrorists, and over 800 innocent bystanders.

Then of course you have the case of Dr Afia Siddiqi who has been picked up by the US along with her young children. The US government imprisoned her children who were under 14 years of age for no reason at all and held them without charge without legal representation and without even acknowledging they have them for years. Not exactly the kind of thing that helps to make friends.

Craig - You ignore that 288,000 figure. You are surely not saying it was worth killing 288,000 people to get rid of one despot!

The effect of the Israel/Palestine conflict (or: how many Palestinians Israel kills / humiliates with America's check and blessing) is grossly understated in your evaluations.

Just look how much time is devoted to Palestinian issues on Al-Jazeera (or any major Arabic newspaper) watched by the whole Arab world. I'm not saying that this focus is irrational, by the way; the US's second-hand mistreatment (and killing) of Palestinians is the action of a war criminal.

Till now, the educated American does not know that the al-Qaeda operatives behind the 9/11 attacks were 'driven' to those crimes MAINLY b/c of US support for Israel's crimes––see Mohamed Atta and the indelible mark left on him after watching footage of the first Qana massacre. The average educated American simply believe that they hate us b/c 'they hate our way of life,' no thanks of course to expert misinformation a la Friedman.

showing Muslim fatalities resulting from Muslim-on-Muslim conflicts, say, the Iran-Iraq War, Black September, Hamas' 'liberation' of Gaza, or general Arab neglect of Palestinians. Just a thought.

This list does not even mention U.S. support for Egypt's Hosni Mubarak and Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah; two men who are not afraid to kill or imprison political dissenters when their regimes are threatened in any way. Chalk up at least another 1,000 Muslim casualties on the list...courtesy of U.S. support.

And what about the U.S. role in the Iran-Iraq war...you know, that eight-year conflict that was supplied and egged on by President Reagan. While our primary goal was to create a balance-of-power approach in the Middle East, all it essentially did was drag out the violence. Washington sent hundreds of millions of dollars to Iraq, only to send some arms to Iran at the same time. The result: one million soldiers dead and thousands of civilian casualties.

Obviously, the U.S. is not solely to blame. After all, Saddam did start the war and Ayatollah Khomeini did reject a cease-fire. However, it is yet another instance of American meddling that has not been forgotten.

Walt displays the exquisite fatuousness of a man who doesn’t get out much in the world. There he was… At an academic conference, with many Muslims about, where an English journalist (?!?) offered the key on why “they” hate us… Not only the saddest “There I was” story ever proffered by an “expert,” but an unwitting exposure of a cloistered and peripherally useless academic life. Sad and useless, but Walt doesn’t look to be a man who would last long or accomplish much in the bloody lands where he so daringly tallies dead bodies.

If Walt had ever the nerve to step out a bit in the South-Central Asian AO, he might have learned enough to offer some worthwhile critiques of Friedman: for instance, Friedman’s “narrative” is strikingly incomplete in its list of infidel evil-doers: Indians, it turns out, are also a key player the grand narrative of “infidels” keeping Muslims down. If Walt were to count up the number of Muslims killed by Indians, he would certainly need the back of another envelope, generating ample empirics for another grasping blockbuster: “The Indian Lobby and US Foreign Policy” would surely be a hoot, and find eager and approving readers throughout this diverse world of ours.

It's true that the United States has been responsible for much damage in the region, however that hardly excuses the anti-Western segments for blaming all of their problems on the U.S. One generally doesn't hear much outcry over the Muslim dead in Chechnya, one hardly sees Chinese embassies being burnt for supporting dictators or for cracking down on Uighurs.

Steve,
you missed Friedman's money quote:

His statement: "Have no doubt: we punched a fist into the Arab/Muslim world after 9/11, partly to send a message of deterrence..."

And you know what THAT is called? Terrorism.

I think the idiot Friedman made a similar statement about Gaza.

-- i.e. using violence to send a political message of "deterrence".

In fact, John Tirman of MIT has found that our actions have led to the deaths of about one million Muslim civilians in Iraq alone.

And that is no myth.

Your numbers of muslim deaths are waaaaaaaaay underestimated. More than an order of magnitude.

See:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=12150

Iraq's Shocking Human Toll: About 1 Million Killed, 4.5 Million Displaced, 1-2 Million Widows, 5 Million Orphans

by John Tirman

Global Research, February 3, 2009
The Nation

We are now able to estimate the number of Iraqis who have died in the war instigated by the Bush administration. Looking at the empirical evidence of Bush's war legacy will put his claims of victory in perspective. Of course, even by his standards -- "stability" -- the jury is out. Most independent analysts would say it's too soon to judge the political outcome. Nearly six years after the invasion, the country remains riven by sectarian politics and major unresolved issues, like the status of Kirkuk.

We have a better grasp of the human costs of the war. For example, the United Nations estimates that there are about 4.5 million displaced Iraqis -- more than half of them refugees -- or about one in every six citizens. Only 5 percent have chosen to return to their homes over the past year, a period of reduced violence from the high levels of 2005-07. The availability of healthcare, clean water, functioning schools, jobs and so forth remains elusive. According to Unicef, many provinces report that less than 40 percent of households have access to clean water. More than 40 percent of children in Basra, and more than 70 percent in Baghdad, cannot attend school.

The mortality caused by the war is also high. Several household surveys were conducted between 2004 and 2007. While there are differences among them, the range suggests a congruence of estimates. But none have been conducted for eighteen months, and the two most reliable surveys were completed in mid-2006. The higher of those found 650,000 "excess deaths" (mortality attributable to war); the other yielded 400,000. The war remained ferocious for twelve to fifteen months after those surveys were finished and then began to subside. Iraq Body Count, a London NGO that uses English-language press reports from Iraq to count civilian deaths, provides a means to update the 2006 estimates. While it is known to be an undercount, because press reports are incomplete and Baghdad-centric, IBC nonetheless provides useful trends, which are striking. Its estimates are nearing 100,000, more than double its June 2006 figure of 45,000. (It does not count nonviolent excess deaths -- from health emergencies, for example -- or insurgent deaths.) If this is an acceptable marker, a plausible estimate of total deaths can be calculated by doubling the totals of the 2006 household surveys, which used a much more reliable and sophisticated method for estimates that draws on long experience in epidemiology. So we have, at present, between 800,000 and 1.3 million "excess deaths" as we approach the six-year anniversary of this war.

This gruesome figure makes sense when reading of claims by Iraqi officials that there are 1-2 million war widows and 5 million orphans. This constitutes direct empirical evidence of total excess mortality and indirect, though confirming, evidence of the displaced and the bereaved and of general insecurity. The overall figures are stunning: 4.5 million displaced, 1-2 million widows, 5 million orphans, about 1 million dead -- in one way or another, affecting nearly one in two Iraqis.

By any sensible measure, it would be difficult to describe this as a victory of any kind. It speaks volumes about the repair work we must do for Iraqis, and it should caution us against the savage wars we are prone to. Now that Bush is gone, perhaps the United States can honestly face the damage we have wrought and the responsibilities we must accept from it.

John Tirman is Executive Director of MIT's Center for International Studies.

Undoubtedly U.S killed thousands of Muslims and Arabs but at the same time U.S saved thousands of Muslims' life as well. Just one example of Bosnia. In fact, firstly U.S initiate to stop genocide against Bosnian Muslims so I think for the just claim/assertion we have to estimate how many Muslims' life saved by U.S. as well.

Neman MURADLI: student of the KDI School of Public Policy and Management

"Nor do I think it was wrong to try to catch Bin Laden -- even though people died in the attempt -- and I would support similar efforts to capture him today even if it placed more people at risk."

I will agree as long as the 'people at risk' are your children and loved ones.

So sanctions placed on Iraq were dependent on Saddam giving up power, had he done so the sanctions would have been lifted, and all the "Muslims the U.S. killed" would not have been affected by the sanctions. So in reality the Muslims killed by the U.S. were actually killed by a Muslim ultimately. AS for the 100K "Muslims killed by the U.S." during Operation Iraqi Freedom, in fact most of them were killed by their fellow Muslims. I wonder if this author were to have the police lock down his city block while searching for a suspect, and then he went and shot his neighbor, if he would blame that shooting on the cops. So really here we can chalk up about 200K of these Muslim deaths to fellow Muslims, that is if we use a rational train of thought of course.

Hi Mr.. Walt,

I found your article interesting enough to register and send my critique to you so you might be able to adjust your logic and possibly get a backbone and don't blame me, you and the entire country for the deaths caused by chaos and evil that we try to manage with our limited resources.

I mean we and us in that we, individually are the government. There isn't a wizard of oz and if you personally take responsibility for the deaths you might adjust the figure to more accurately illustrate the problem.

From the headline most will think you address "How many Muslims has the U.S. killed in the past 30 years?"

That means an American killed someone. Not some vague figure of a death star commander. I categorically refute that and I point to the impossible count of the prevention of future deaths.

We are not responsible for deaths in a country who's leader rejects world cooperation and starves his own people. The US is not responsible for deaths caused by sactions. That's buying the terrorist assumptions and is flawed from the first letter.

I can go on, but you need to think about your logic and try to insert yourself everytime you use US, America, whatever as a deflection to take personal responsibility for our government that we elect and answers to us. So we are responsiblel.

I believe that the collective job of the media is to take personal responsibiity to make sure we elect better, more capable representatives. We have so far failed our President, our Country and your children.

Using the label that I/we kill Muslims is as rediculous as it sounds. If you need to continue in this divisive and futile (my opinion) exercise, realize the you and I are the world's police neither of us applied for the job nor is getting paid for it.

Count how many people are killed worldwide by fascist, subcategorize it and it might make sense to include islamists as a subgroup and you get a better picture of the damage.

Then take into account instability of countries, WMD's , and my (and your) responsibility to eliminate the world's radicals to prevent instability and ultimately death while preserving democracies and other institutions that are more beneficial than either you or I individually.

Again no pay, just you were tapped to do it and if you don't your children would most likely perish.

Make it personal and you will find that the US hasn't KILLED Muslims. We inserted ourselves into asinine situations where others were being killed, oppressed, an it threatened you child, my kids and because others don't do the right thing and we are left to mop up the messes to try to insure my and your children have a place to live better than you or I.

That's how the 'greatest generation' collectively perceived it (oversimplification but cut me slack...took us to be bombed etc...)

Also, if you leave how many times more will die when we turn our back.

e.g. a fraction died during Vietnam Wa era than died in the immediate period after we left. Millions died when we cut off funding to that conflict. Surely that's millions of people who should be in the other column that we didn't kill, right?

Are you going to count the Muslims killed by others that we should have saved but didn't because we grew weary of the good fight?

I hope take your position and use better logic to help with the solutions instead of pouring more fuel by misinformation on the fire of hatred that is the real source of the deaths of the ones you tallied.

How many Muslims did Russia kill over this time period in Afghanistan (when Russia was the de facto head of Soviet Union) or in Ingushetia, Chechnya, and Dagestan (their African proxy wars aside)?

How many Muslims has Egypt killed over this time span (even given their poison gas attacks in Yemen do conveniently fall outside the 30 year realm)? How many Muslims did Indonesia kill?

How many Muslims did Iran kill between 1980 and 1988 and since? How about Iraq? How many Muslim Kurds did the Turks kill?

Yes, Friedman is smug, self-righteous and clueless, but at least he occasionally shows the ability at critical analysis before putting pen to paper (or finger to keyboard) - that's more than Walt can say.

He's either a one trick Israel pony, a "realist" who doesn't seem to have a firm grasp on what the reality is, or someone who makes the same arguments made by the party of Allah in Lebanon and Hamas (Muslim Brotherhood). It's a boilerplate, leftist, senseless, irrelevant and largely idiot argument aimed at people with low educational attainment or capacity for evaluating facts.

How many Muslims did the US save by providing aid to Sudan, where Muslims are killing Muslims? How many did it save in Iraq by imposing no fly over zones over Iraqi Kurdistan? How many did it save in Bosnia and in Kosovo? How many Muslims does the US save by providing billions in aid to Muslim populations around the world and to Muslim governments (who admittedly largely waste that aid)? Any examples of Muslims saving non-Muslims anywhere in the world that Mr. Walt could use?

I'm sorry, but Friedman is a lot more right than Walt on this one. There is a certain degree of idiocy when reading certain coverage of foreign policy, but Walt somehow manages to make even the most silly look like brilliant scholars by comparison.

sometimes innocent people die as a result of actions that may in fact be justifiable

Don't you mean all the time? And shouldn't that be "justifiable and not justifiable and sometimes just for the fun of it and/or because we are scared and want some revenge"? You're a realist, you should realize how fun it is to kill foreigners, especially Funny Looking and Funny Talking Backwards Muslims That Live in the Desert.

Poopy pants Dr. Walt needs to put on his American Flag Diaper and get in the Imperial Spirit. Today is a big day, the day endless war becomes the new normal, Dr. Bacevich's pivot point. Who is ready to stop moonlighting on the dark side and go full time evil?

"Sort of a silly post"

I agree. Your post is ludicrous.

I won't waste time going over each point you made in your "silly post", but I will say that many of the examples you cite are inaccurate - which shows your lack of understanding of geopolitics - or are false analogies. Many of your examples include regimes that were installed by the US and are supported to this day. The fact that you pretend to know what you're talking about with such confidence and conviction while attacking Walt for his empirical analysis, tells me that it is not worth addressing many of your mistakes.

Incidentally,

In the last nine years alone, Israelis have killed 6294 Palestinians. During the same time period 1071 Israelis were killed by Palestinians (See B'Tselem.org).

The 1967 war which was started by Israel doesn't figure into that, of course, neither does the death toll from the first and second Intifadas, nor does the expulsion and Naqba massacres of 1948.

Tdog 10:43 am

So... open discussions among citizens about who their government is killing... That's a bad thing for representative democracy.
?

Bret 1:58 pm Some degree of

Walt does indeed partly support Friedman's view of muslim anti-Americanism as ideological. And you show the mechanism:

"It's a kind of self-feeding phenomena. Islamists and their ilk use American attacks on muslims and the like as justifications for their claims, but the whole thing gets filtered through a worldview that holds that the Islamic World is constantly under attack from outside forces and must be defended and purified. While Friedman's claims about supposed US benevolence are nonsense, that type of "Narrative" does exist, and it shows up in the ideology of radicals and jihadists."

I tend to agree, though it's a worldview largely created by those who stand to profit, and promoted by many who can't stand to think.

But it's also interesting to look at switching the figure and ground in your description of a

"self-feeding phenomena: The Palinists and their ilk use muslim attacks on Americans and the like as justifications for their claims, but the whole thing gets filtered through a worldview that holds that the American World is constantly under attack from outside forces and must be defended and purified... that type of "Narrative" does exist, and it shows up in the ideology of radicals and (Christian) jihadists."

...And, more dangerously, it shows up in the ideology of much of the leadership of the U.S.'s most powerful institutions.

cole, 10:46 curious

You seem okay with the idea of punishing a people for allowing themselves to live under a dictator (and also, just co-incidentally, choosing to be born over top of a lot of oil.)

Not that Walt is much less onside with sanctions:

"...obvious caveats apply. .. the United States is not solely responsible for the 'excess deaths' attributable to the U.N. sanctions regime against Iraq. Saddam Hussein clearly deserves much of the blame for these "excess deaths."

But Walt still makes his main point: that muslim ill-will toward the U.S. might be explained less by their irrationality than by, in this case, the fact that the U.S.

"...knew that keeping the sanctions in place would cause tens of thousands of innocent people to die and we went ahead anyway."

Regarding the 2003 invasion: If someone comes to town and fires all the police/militia, do they not bear some responsibility for the ensuing mayhem? Especially if there was no good reason for them to come to town in the first place, and given that anyone could have predicted the ensuing lawlessness. Which major city in the U.S. would be safe in those conditions? Would you blame the victims in your town?

Generally,

People in a democracy have to look critically at what's done in their names; 'cause it doesn't much matter if people in dictatorships do.

Among those who have friends and family displaced, disgraced, maimed or dead as a result of U.S. policy, such facts will not engender their good will.

Figures like these should be used with caution, of course, and several obvious caveats apply. To begin with, the United States is not solely responsible for some of those fatalities, most notably in the case of the "excess deaths" attributable to the U.N. sanctions regime against Iraq. Saddam Hussein clearly deserves much of the blame for these "excess deaths," insofar as he could have complied with Security Council resolutions and gotten the sanctions lifted or used the "oil for food" problem properly. Nonetheless, the fact remains that the United States (and the other SC members) knew that keeping the sanctions in place would cause tens of thousands of innocent people to die and we went ahead anyway.
**************************************

Why not consider long term strategic US designs on the region?

Who supported Saddam for years prior to his invasion of Kuwait?

Who gave Saddam a wink and a nod when he confessed to his American overlord in 1990 that he was entertaining the invasion of Kuwait? Here's a citation from the July 25, 1990 meeting between Saddam and Ambassador Glaspie:

"U.S. Ambassador Glaspie: We have no opinion on your Arab - Arab conflicts, such as your dispute with Kuwait. Secretary (of State James) Baker has directed me to emphasize the instruction, first given to Iraq in the 1960's, that the Kuwait issue is not associated with America {Saddam smiles}". Knowing the significance of Kuwait for the US, especially given its natural resources, the motives of the United States' become more and more obvious.

In other words, not only was Saddam, America's Frankenstein, but regime change was always on the agenda after the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Iran/Iraq War. Saddam, was simply no more useful for the US. So the sanctions were inevitable and if Saddam hadn't invaded Kuwait, the US would have found another excuse. Such is the arrogance of empires, "If only Saddam had stepped down and relinquished power, we wouldn't have had to impose crippling sanctions. Why didn't he think of his people instead of being selfish? He had so many options available, the food for oil the ......". The US manipulates the politics and politicians involved and then blames the victim.

Additionally, in 2003 and prior to the invasion of Iraq, Saddam was frantically calling US embassies in the region telling them he was prepared to step down if the US merely allowed him and his sons to seek refugee in a neighboring country. The White House ignored the call.

When one takes under consideration the recent declassified information regarding bin Laden the picture becomes clearer; in 2002, the Bush administration called off the US military despite their being close to capturing bin Laden. The Bush administration at the time, explained Rep. Maurice Hinchey earlier today, feared that their justification for the forthcoming invasion of Iraq would have been undermined had they captured bin Laden.

I read the article and the comments. They (Muslims all around the world) have every right to think of the US as they wish based on whatever criteria they want to use. 99.9% of Muslims are never going to harm an American and have no wish to harm an American if they could.

Even though we had just cause and the right intentions in some cases (as in the first Gulf War)
*************
*************

"Just cause" and "right intentions" regarding "Gulf War I" would have entailed warning Saddam and admonishing him instead of pretending to turn a blind eye and financing his regime.

What should one call the propaganda perpetuated by the US in the run up to Gulf War I? Specifically, I am referring to the use of the Kuwaiti Ambassador's daughter by the Bush administration - as she pretended to be a mere nurse who worked at one of Kuwait's hospitals during the invasion - to sell the lie that the Iraqis were taking babies from incubators? They told us she was witness to such atrocities, but in fact she was neither a nurse nor was she in Kuwait at the time, she was in Paris.

Why did the US find it necessary to peddle such lies in order to solidify a coalition? Wouldn't the mere invasion of Kuwait by Saddam's army have been a sufficient enough a reason?

Edited by author on 12/1/09 7:27PM EST.

Counting deaths is not the best way to compare culpability of political actions nor to compare costs of political actions. First, who is included in "we"? Just the US? Why not Israel and NATO, too? And who is included in "them"? Just Libya, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, and the bin Laden gang? How about the Arab royalists, Egypt, Turkey, Pakistan and Indonesia? The greater damage is not deaths but permanent wounds, including handicaps, widowhood, psychological trauma, chronic illness from destroyed infrastructure, and economic suffering. "We" have inflicted vastly more wounds on "them" than visa-versa.