It seemed to me the last time I was in Europe that a whole generation of Europeans had been brought up with the idea that America is pretty depraved and it is a place to be opposed. In Europe, even in central Europe and in places where Americans used to be pretty popular like the Czech Republic, there is really not much sympathy for the United States. I think it is easy to blame the United States for all the ills of modernism. I don't think it is accurate to do that, but it is nice to have another country that you can blame for all the contemporary ills and all the vulgarity of contemporary life. You can always say, it's not us, it's them, they're doing it, our culture was great until they came along and that [attitude] is not only in the Third World or Islam, it's in Europe too.
The most recent swings in the military situation in Afghanistan have turned the tables on people who were criticizing our bombing strategy. A week ago, you noted the longer the war lasts "every day it lasts, it gets tougher." That doesn't seem to be true anymore.
At this point, we do seem to have achieved -- with air power -- to have driven them out of the cities. I'm glad it went well. I was worried. But I don't want to be complacent. I think there is a lot of possibility for the infighting of the sort that happened before 1992, among ethnic groups and tribes. I also think that trying to find bin Laden is going to be difficult. I don't know why that ever was the declared aim at the beginning -- to really make him such a celebrity.
In "Outerbridge Reach," your main character, Owen Browne, longs for "the good fight or the right war -- something that eased the burden of self and made breath possible." Isn't this war different from Vietnam in that many Americans are thinking of it as a good war, a right war?
I think that's right. If you look at the crowds who are listening to Bush, they are really trying to be inspired, they are waiting for him to say something wonderful, and of course all he is doing is reading this stuff off the teleprompter and they just sit there and wait to be inspired or try to convince themselves. I think you are right, people are looking for a good war, but they are not being given anything except a lot of inept propaganda. And if the propaganda that they are using abroad is as inept as the propaganda they are using here, they are in bad shape. And I am sure it is. But the fact is, I can't say that if I were in the position of the people who run the country that I would do anything quite different.
Is there any way out of this mess?
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