In discussion during the past few years about the Democrats' opposition to our involvement in Iraq, especially concerning elections from 2004 to the one just passed, I have often heard people saying that it is a unique situation. They assert that never before has a major political faction been so interested in the defeat of their nation to farther their political goals.

It is an absurd assertion. Many times throughout history, minorities in various tyrannies have welcomed foreign aggressors as liberators, as the Ukranians welcomed the Germans in World War II. However, even if we limit this argument to democracies, or democratic governments (to assuage those who insist on saying "but we're a constitutional republic!"), there are still many cases where a faction has acted against the interests of their nation solely for political purposes.

In fact, we need go back no farther than the 1960's to see a political party (again the Democrats) hoping for a defeat to farther their agenda. In fact, some of the same players involve din hoping for our defeat today were hoping for our defeat then. John Kerry established his political career fighting for our loss in Vietnam, for example. So it is hardly unique.

And while some may assert that this "Vietnam generation" is uniquely traitorous, that too is absurd. Just to prove it, let us take an example about as far removed in time as possible, the battle of Sphacteria (or Pylos).

During the early part of the Peloponnesian War, having trapped a significant number of Spartan hoplites on the island of Sphacteria, the Athenians had entered into negotiations with Sparta. The faction of Nicias was hoping for a fast negotiated peace, while the faction of Cleon wanted a peace more advantageous to Athens. In some ways they mirror today's political positions. Nicias was willing to accept assertions of friendship and promises of alliance, while Cleon saw that Sparta's allies would not accept the negotiated peace, and should they continue fighting, Sparta may be tempted to violate the negotiated peace. Even if they did not, there was nothing to stop them from picking up the war again in a few years, at which time they would have even greater advantage. So Cleon pushed for a peace settlement leaving Athens in a strategic position which would make it impossible, or at least costly, for Sparta to renew hostilities. As I said, in many ways, it resembles the situation today, with Democrats convinced of the importance of world opinion and persuaded of the boundless power of negotiation, while the Republicans hold to the policy of "trust but verify" in negotiating from a position of strength.

In any case, when the negotiations fell apart, the Athenian assembly recognized the need to act. They could not keep the troops trapped on Sphacteria forever, and so they needed to capture them if they were to use the Spartans as hostages in future negotiations, or even reap any benefit at all from their good fortune in having cut off so many troops. Nicias was voted general, but Cleon worried that he would make a show of attacking, but accomplish little. And so Cleon made the seemingly absurd assertion he could take Sphacteria in 20 days.

And here is where the similarity to recent events grows even more compelling. Nicias and his faction believed that Cleon's boast was absurd, that there was simply no way a small Athenian force could drive the best of the Spartan military from the island at all, much less in such a short period. However, convinced that defeat was inevitable, Nicias pushed for the assembly to turn the command over to Cleon, even though Nicias' faction believed it would result in an Athenian defeat.

So, you see, there is hardly anything unique in the Democrats' hopes that a defeat in Iraq would help their political goals. Throughout history, whenever there has been some advantage to be gained form defeat, political factions have banked on that defeat. So long as the defeat did not mean total destruction of their polity, there has never been a faction which has shied away from hoping for a military loss which would be politically advantageous.

Not that a historical perspective makes it any less disturbing that a political party was hoping for a loss, I still find it unsettling. After all, I didn't pray for a loss in Kossovo or Bosnia or Haiti. I did not revel in the Blackhawk incident. However, on the other side of the aisle, that is precisely what they would have been doing has situations been reversed.  And I find it upsetting.

All I wanted to do was point out, no matter how troubling, it is hardly historically unique.

POSTSCRIPT

For those who want the rest of the story, Cleon fulfilled his promise. Using unconventional light troops and a strategy developed by his command Demosthenes while fighting in the mountains of the northwest, and benefiting from a fortuitous forest fire which left the Spartans without cover, he not only took the island, but managed to force the majority of Spartans to surrender, an unprecedented event.

Athens' attempts to follow up on the victory went badly, and after another twenty years, Athens was eventually defeated. However, Spartan hegemony faded soon as well, as the Thebans took supremacy in Greece. Athens did eventually recover, though, like Theban supremacy, that too was short lived. The barbarian Macedonians, who had played a significant part in the Peloponnesian War, modifying Greek hoplites into the Macedonian phalanx, and supported by heavy cavalry, led by first Philip II, and later by his son Alexander, managed to unify the Greeks under Macedonian rule.

Though the Greek city states established some independence under Alexander's successors (the diadochi), they never rose to the level of the Athenian empire under the Delian League, nor the Spartan hegemony over the Peloponnesus. And, within a very short time, the entire peninsula was absorbed into the Roman Empire, to remain part of that empire and its successor in Byzantium, until becoming part of the Ottoman Empire. Well, there were brief independent principalities, various despots, and semi-autonomous city states under the Byzantines and the crusaders of the Fourth Crusade, but that is getting pretty far afield, so let us leave it at that.