Nobody is a prophet; therefore no one knows what the future
holds. Because experience says there will be good times and bad times, wisdom
says you should prepare for the bad times as best you can. But the question is
how to prepare for what you don't know.
That's when wisdom comes to the rescue. It gives an advice
you may call the Golden Advice. From it flows all that you need to know as you
go through life. The Golden Advice goes like this: Whereas individuals seek to
upset the natural equilibrium to take advantage of what ensues, life tends to
restore the equilibrium. Whereas human beings design schemes for short term
gain, life's response is never constrained by time. It will restore the
equilibrium instantly or restore it in the long run.
The universal lesson that flows from this wisdom is that you
must never upset the equilibrium whose restoration you may not be able to
handle when life will decide that the time had come to do the restoration. And
you never stand in the way of life as it tries to restore equilibrium because
if you do, life will chew you and spit you out.
If you, my friend, feel comfortable with this philosophy of
life, you'll find little comfort in the philosophy that's espoused by Benny Avni,
author of “The recipe for foreign-policy greatness starts with FDR,” an article
that was published on January 19, 2017 in the New York Post. Avni starts his
discussion by wondering if the foreign policy of the newly elected President
Donald Trump will come to look like that of Barack Obama or that of Franklin
Delano Roosevelt (FDR).
This being a comparison between three different situations,
each mired in its own mix of equilibrium and disequilibrium, you prepare
yourself for a detailed discussion on what might have constituted a desirable
balance in the era of FDR, in the era of Barack Obama, and what will be the era
of Donald Trump. But you get disappointed because that's not what Benny Avni is
offering his readers.
In fact, Avni's piece shows that he was never interested in
what Obama did or tried to do to craft a world that's in equilibrium. Instead,
he is interested in what Donald Trump can do in terms of theatrics – absent a
world war – to make himself look like Franklin Roosevelt, winner of the Second
World War. As to the lens through which Avni sees the unfolding of theatrics,
it is showing him the following scenes: “Russia ,
Turkey and Iran convened
the Astana summit. That's bad for us … So how can Trump turn it around? …
Projecting military power is one way”.
It is bad enough to know that Avni has placed the playing of
theatrics above helping to restore equilibrium where disequilibrium has seeped
in. It is even worse to know that he is calling on President Trump to be the
agent of disequilibrium. Sadly, that's what Benny Avni is doing. You can tell
he is on the wrong track because you see him collide against life's attempt to
restore equilibrium where it was lost.
The best place where you can see that phenomenon is off the
coast of China .
Benny Avni let it be known he is unhappy because “[China 's] military has expanded in
the last decade. President Xi Jinping became aggressive, dominating the seas
around him … China
could become a formidable foe.” That's an example demonstrating how life is
attempting to restore equilibrium where it used to exist but does no more.
Things may not go smoothly at the start of a process in which China regains
its rightful place under the sun, but if you try to oppose the attempt, you put
yourself in a situation where life will chew you and spit you out.
And yet, to oppose the attempt is what Avni is recommending.
He seems to have no inkling as to what the people of the region want for
themselves or their neighbors. Or if he does, he doesn't care what they want
because he believes that his wishes for them supersede their wishes for
themselves.
What they want is a silent partner whose presence in the
region will speak for itself. They don't want a “new sheriff in town” who will
poke North Korea or China in the
ribs. They want to see life take its course restoring the equilibrium that was
lost. But Avni has convinced himself that America
will finally turn bellicose against China
when Japan 's prime minister
will visit Washington
and meet with Donald Trump.