Muster the Hoplites, Alcibiades!

I've been pondering some ideas for a new blog post. Back in late September I was going to write about the Roman disaster in the Teutoburg Forest which occurred exactly 2000 years ago (in September) and how that marked the end of Roman expansionism even though the Empire would continue to thrive for centuries. Unfortunately, that post will have to wait for the next anniversary.

Since there were a lot of interesting news stories today, I felt that a blog post of miscellany would be appropriate.

Attorney General Eric Holder announced on Friday that once again, America would be a nation ruled by laws. Ten of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay will have their day in court. However, I might be giving the AG and the Obama Administration a little too much praise. True, criminal charges and trials are long overdue and I'm glad to see that the Justice system finally found the WD-40 to get the gears turning. The fact remains that Guantanamo Bay remains an open wound in America's credibility and a rallying cry for Muslim extremists.

Furthermore, I still have doubts that the prisoners at Guantanamo will receive fair trials. Are confessions or evidence given under duress really admissable in a court (military or civilian)? Granted, the current Administration is in a tough situation that they themselves didn't create, but the fact remains that no fair, legal structure exists to deal with this situation. Five of the prisoners mentioned by Mr. Holder will be tried in a civilian court while the others will face a military court. Who determines which prisoner is tried where?

I definitely do not envy what the Administration has on its plate. I won't even touch the issues of the executions likely to result from these trials or the irrational fear of just keeping these prisoners on U.S. soil instead of limbo.

About a month ago, NASA smashed a probe into the south pole of the Moon to see if there was anything interesting (water). Apparently, they found a fair bit of water. This is an interesting discovery, but not terribly surprising and does very little to convince me that the Moon is a prime location for colonization. The fact remains that the Moon is a very dead and unexciting place. The Moon would be a great location for the second human colony or a huge observatory. If NASA/America wants to push manned exploration, Mars remains the most promising destination. It has an atmosphere and liquid water and low gravity which make it far more interesting that the Moon. Propellant can be produced on site and the low gravity makes Mars an ideal hub for human exploration (it's easier to get from Mars to the Moon than from the Earth to the Moon).

Unfortunately, the American space program is having an identity crisis, Russia and Europe are content with low orbit and China is looking for a nationalistic statement with their prospective Moon mission. Meanwhile, the weaponized Ebola and Von Neumann machines are desperate to make us regret not having a backup planet.

This week I started reading a book called "Tides of War" by Steven Pressfield. It's a bit of historical fiction about Alcibiades and the fateful Sicilian Expedition. Naturally, whenever I read it, I am reminded of the Sicilian Expeditions undertaken by the latest Bush Administration and continued by the current Administration. I will be the first to admit that the historical parallels between the Peloponnesian War and today are fairly weak, but the lesson is no less relevant.

Athens was on the rebound during the Peace of Nicias which ended the war against Sparta (low level conflicts continued elsewhere, but they were proxy wars at worst). The depleted treasury began to recover and the plague subsided when Atticans returned to their towns and farms. Then some backwater town in Sicily with loose ties to Athens called for help and a demagogic Athenian named Alcibiades decided to use this as an opportunity to expand the Athenian Empire. Three years, thousands of talents, hundreds of ships and tens of thousands of troops later, the Sicilian Expedition was over and, for all practical purposes, annihilated.

Athens went in with no regional allies, a crooked, hubristic leader and emerged poorer, weaker and at war with Sparta once more. Alcibiades was tried, in absentia during the campaign, for holding sacreligious parties and decided to switch sides. Command of the expedition fell into the hands of one of the few Athenians who opposed Alcibiades adventurism, Nicias. Prior to the beginning of the ill-fated campaign, he pleaded with the Athenian assembly to reconsider. Once Athens was committed, no one thought to call the ships back when things went awry.

Athenians learned the truth about national exceptionalism the hard way. Probably a lesson about the limits to imperial expansion in there, too (Teutoburg Forest is another good one). For the folks averse to "irrelevant" ancient history, the Soviet Union learned this lesson not even 30 years ago in an all too familiar setting.