A Daring Age
It was an expected and oft-repeated ritual of childhood. Someone would boast of some prowess or make an exaggerated claim about what he or she could do, provoking a challenge from a skeptic in the gang: “I dare you to…” Like a gloved smack across the face, it couldn’t be ignored if any semblance of honor were to be preserved. Sometimes a clever retort offered a compelling reason why the dare was stupid or inappropriate for this time or place, buying an opportunity for the one challenged to move on without need of any demonstration of ability or courage. But sometimes the stakes would be raised exponentially with tried and true rejoinders like, “Prove it!”, or “Try and make me,” or the gauntlet thrown that could not be topped: “Oh yeah, I double-dare you to…” Such escalated bravado had the impact of a put-up or shut-up ultimatum, forcing the confronted party to weigh all possible alternatives before accepting the dare or walking away in disgrace.
As I follow the high stakes dare and double dare posturing that is now playing out on the world stage, memories of such youthful brashness come flooding back. Gamesmanship played out between states and among nations is hardly new, even if the outcomes are far more consequential than any that we once rehearsed on neighborhood and school playgrounds. The designs of Vladimir Putin in encroaching on Ukrainian territory are clearly another step in restoring the geopolitical expanse of the former USSR. His transparent and telegraphed intentions were an “I dare you to stop me” delivered to a NATO alliance that has mustered a partial “Oh yeah!” in return. But for how long, and to what degree of effectiveness will it be willing to support the beleaguered Zelenskyy is anybody’s guess. Meanwhile the dare stands for all to see, while the rest of us numbly look on in our various states of helplessness.
And what should we make of Nancy Pelosi’s Asian junket that, either shrewdly or stupidly, included a touch down in Taiwan. Not surprisingly, this “I dare you” gesture from the third in line in our presidential pecking order has triggered a “how dare you,” from The People’s Republic of China. Should a visit to this tiny island of Chinese nationalist emmigrees have triggered such alarm or offer such offense? Was such a visit prudent given the level of Cold War tensions now engulfing Europe and the Far East? Most amazing to me is how this political statement has both raised eyebrows among some in her own party, while rallying support from those in the other party who regularly castigate and lampoon anything she says or does. At the very least Rep. Pelosi has put everyone on pins and needles to see what the next move will be. At this juncture it appears she came, she commiserated, and she left—unscathed. It appears that the challenges issued from both sides—a genuine “double” dare if you will—have so far been more sound than fury, yet concerning nonetheless.
Both of these ripped-from-the-headlines crises serve to remind us that, no matter how old, civilized, powerful and sophisticated our human race becomes, we never seem to progress very far beyond the trash talking and power leveraging we practiced so often in childhood. If history teaches us anything, when it comes to dares and double dares on a national or international scale, we would do well to heed the lyrical wisdom of troubadour Kenny Rogers when he sang, “you’ve got to know when to hold, and know when to fold.”
These observations have led me to recall some of the more memorable and decisive of our moments of derring-do, and derring-don’t, that have mightily affected all of us as Americans. Among them are the times…
· when Abraham Lincoln dared to reinforce Ft. Sumter in Charleston harbor, and it was met by an artillery response that brought us to the brink of national dissolution;
· when FDR resisted every dare to stand up to fascist aggression until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor rendered that position defenseless;
· when the North Korean army poured over the 38th parallel, daring us and our NATO allies to come to South Korea’s aid in stopping it;
· when Nikita Khruschev’s bold missile build-up in Cuba dared an unproven John Kennedy to either stand up to his challenge or stand down in acquiescence;
· when a messianic Islamic cleric named Khomeni held 52 Americans hostage for over a year while daring us to do something about it;
· when Ronald Reagan ordered an “oh yeah” air strike on Muammar Gaddafi’s headquarters when his terror bombings dared the world to act, landing on him like a punch in the nose from which he never fully recovered;
· when George Bush, the elder, met Saddaam Husein’s daring invasion of Kuwait with a multi-national response that thwarted his ambitions;
· when each of our 21st Century presidents has faced the dare posed by jihadist attacks, bombings and executions by directing military operations, sanctions, threats, troop withdrawals and hell-fire assassinations—all while we have had to live under threat whenever we fly, hold a parade, or stage a major sports or entertainment event.
Even such a cursory look at history reminds us how the dares and double dares issued by those occupying seats of power have brought this world unbearable tensions and tragedies. As an American I’d like to think that our nation’s policies and actions have been justified by the threats and aggressions of regional and global bullies. But I think that would be a highly biased position to hold, however comforting I find it. For we, too, have been inclined to challenge other nations and offer them ultimatums, even if we have not always followed through or lived up to them. At the same time we, more than any other major power, have gone out on limbs in standing up to those whose ambitions have trampled the territorial or political sovereignty of their neighbors. Whether those dares were issued by Hitler, Mussolini or Tojo, Mao, Kim or Xi, Stalin, Khrushchev or Putin, or Khomeini, Gaddafi, Hussein or Bin Laden-—our leaders have, sooner or later, felt compelled to offer reply. Sometimes our response has come in diplomatic outrage and economic sanctions. But all too often—more than a dozen times since that infamous Sunday in December, 1941—-it has been the threatened or executed deployment of our military might that has borne the burden of opposing an aggressor or restoring some semblance of global order. Sadly, the outcome of most of these high stakes, but nonetheless juvenile, games of geopolitical power and prestige has been death and destruction from which no one has been spared.
Could it be that we are at such a place once again. The “I dare you” challenges emanating from Moscow, Tehran, Beijing and Pyongyang now pose a threat to a world already reeling from the onslaught of climate, population, immigration, economics, poverty, and viral crises. Perhaps the derring-do of our world’s ancestral heroes needs to be tempered by the derring-don’t of leaders who really do comprehend the magnitude of what is now at stake, for all of us. Dare we be content to keep engaging each other in zero-sum games in which the price of winning and losing comes at a cost none of us can afford to pay? Or is this a time for us to demand of those in positions of power to cease indulging those adolescent impulses that too often turn us into us-verses-them, winner-take-all, fight-to-the-death adversaries? Given the tenor of these times, when the survival of our planet is hanging in the balance-— how dare we do otherwise?
