Here’s another weird column from Tom Friedman. I think he’s trying to see what happens when you mix wishful thinking and realpolitik in equal measure. What you get, it seems, is an argument held together by repeated use of the words “audacious” or “audacity.”

Friedman knows what the long-term goal of the Administration’s foreign policy is, and he also knows that most Americans don’t have any stomach for it:

This war has two purposes … The stated purpose is to disarm Iraq. The unstated purpose is to transform it … into something better. … [I]t can be a more decent state one that doesn’t threaten its own people or neighbors. And it can serve as a progressive model to spur reform educational, religious, economic and political around the Arab world. This is the audacious part.

Unfortunately—- or perhaps conveniently—- the only way we can make Iraq into a model nation is to install a massive occupying force along with a puppet government, “a long-term U.S. occupation of Iraq under Gen. Tommy Franks” (and maybe his wife). Further,

Iraq will be controlled by the iron fist of the U.S. Army and its allies, with an Iraqi civilian “advisory” administration gradually emerging behind this iron fist to run daily life and produce an Iraqi self-governing authority.

Friedman thinks this is “a long-term, difficult, risky, costly, audacious project” that “will require a real nation-building commitment, and a real effort to stabilize the region”. (The kind of effort we’ve been putting into rebuilding Afghanistan?) But not to worry—- the risks, difficulties and costs are justified because it’s “audacious”.

Friedman doesn’t say how exactly Iraq will transform itself under the “iron fist” of U.S. occupation. He twice suggests that an Iraqi occupation will be “along the lines of the rebuilding of Germany and Japan after World War II.” The analogy is terribly weak. Elsewhere in the column, Friedman suggests the “Arab street” will support a U.S. ouster of Saddam “as long as a war… does little harm to Iraqi civilians.” But his whole argument is premised on the idea that “This is not going to be Grenada.” The reconstruction of Germany and Japan began only after their civilian populations had had their cities bombed into oblivion, together with many of their civilians. And besides, this reconstruction began after the largest war in history, in which the Allies were not the aggressors. It wasn’t a reason for starting a war.

As soon as he articulates his grand vision, Friedman is seized by doubt about it. Only repeated use of the word “audacious” keeps his fear at bay. He says it’s “time for the president to level with the American people” about the scale of this project, acknowledging that Bush hasn’t been honest so far. But he’s already laid out the typical response of ordinary Americans in his third paragraph: good job on Afghanistan (please follow through), go after Al Qaeda as hard as you can, and fix the goddamn economy. Oh, and how come North Korea is able to do for all the world to see what you keep claiming (but can’t prove) Iraq is going to get invaded for doing?

Nothing in Friedman’s column addresses any of those points. He just hopes the Administration will reveal its audacious plan, that Americans will be shocked and awed (to coin a phrase) by its audacity, and that this will allow him to put his doubt and ambivalence to rest. Then it’s on with the iron fist and into Iraq we—- that is to say, thousands of young American soldiers—- go, for an indefinite period of occupation. I don’t know if it’s possible to create a quagmire in the desert, but this seems like a good way to find out.

(Update: Tim Dunlop has more.