Iraq War's Impact Spreads in Arab World

AP | 5/03/03 | PAUL GEITNER

[kattracks]

While President Bush has declared major fighting over in Iraq, the repercussions of the war for the rest of the Mideast are just starting to be felt, and it's an open question about whether for better or worse.

So, where's the "worse"?

[tet68]

``If it fails and Iraq descends into civil strife ... the effect would be devastating,'' said Fawaz Gerges, professor of Mideast studies at Sarah Lawrence College in New York. ``Militant forces would be strengthened. America's vital interests and local allies would be endangered.''

Are they NOT already?

[BrooklynGOP]

Beirut regards Hezbollah as a legitimate resistance movement against Israel. But Hezbollah's leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, seems worried too. ``In the end, we are facing a new reality,'' he told supporters after the U.S. victory in Iraq.

That says it all.

[cake_crumb]

"Radical regimes in Syria and Iran are suddenly toning down the anti-U.S. rhetoric and urging dialogue. Authoritarian leaders in Egypt and Jordan are talking - with varying degrees of enthusiasm - about democratization, while militants in the streets of Cairo and Amman predict a wave of new recruits to fight the American occupiers and their supporters"

I somehow doubt the terrorists (media militants) are gonna be as prolific as the media hopes. Terrorist attacks last year dropped to their lowest levels since 1968 or '69. Binny's stronger horse. Arab leaders have definitely taken note. Not just of US strength, but of the possiblity that THEY can now begin cracking down on the worst of the Islamakazis in relative safety. The 'Arab street' will simply blame the unjust war on terrorism.

[liberallarry]

``We've got the message.''
``In the end, we are facing a new reality,''
Iranian hard-liners are signaling a new willingness to consider...restoring ties with Washington
``Tehran does not want any friction with Washington over issues concerning Iraq,''
``...it's going to make people here wake up to all the illusions they have with the West...It puts things in perspective and maybe then we can find a way to better serve our own interests.''

Does anyone still wonder about the real purpose of the war?
But there are risks

``If it fails and Iraq descends into civil strife ... the effect would be devastating...Militant forces would be strengthened. America's vital interests and local allies would be endangered.''

[Teetop]

Too bad the Arabs didn't remember what Yamamoto said after the attack on Pearl Harbor, "We have awoken the sleeping giant."

[cake_crumb]

"Too bad the Arabs didn't remember what Yamamoto said after the attack on Pearl Harbor, 'We have awoken the sleeping giant.' "

That would entail taking at least partial responsibility for their actions. The Islamakis prefer to whine, cringe and blame US 'imperialism' for their atrocities.

[stevem]

You honestly have to wonder what dark questions they ask one another in their live meetings in the smoke filled rooms. You have to wonder with greater enthusiasm what they must be asking themselves in the deepest chasms of their evil souls...What happened? What went wrong? These guys were all bark and no bite! Now those weasels in Al Qaeda are dead or quiet or running for their miserable, worthless lives. And here we sit. D--n it, I can't sleep anymore! When will one of those d--n things fall out of the sky and make a giant hole where I'm sitting, or failing to sleep. What happened? Whose terminally stupid idea was to attack the Great Satan, anyway?

It's reminiscent of one of those made for TV Gunsmoke movies when Matt Dillon (Jim Arness) rode into town with three lynching victims slung across horses. Then he went into a saloon and killed two other guys. One of the town's people went to the deputy and said Dillon had to be arrested. The deputy said, "Hold on there. He came into town trailing three dead bodies. He's just accounted for two more, and it ain't even noon yet! You want him arrested, you arrest him!"

[LS]

Uh, sorry, but "Tora, Tora, Tora," said that, not Yamamoto. He never made the statement. But your point is well taken.

Let's ALL go back to the forcing down of that American plane in China, shall we? Remember all the conservative hawks were clamoring for war and "making China pay?"

Bush quietly, almost embarrassingly, spoke of the Chinese as our "friends" and that this issue would be resolved. It finally was.

Then Bush dropped the other shoe. He sold a slew of weapons (although not Aegis class anti-missile ships) to Taiwan, but even more important, he announced that any attack on Taiwan would initiate immediate American involvement in defending Taiwan! Buh=bye "one China" policy. Attention, "friends": you do not screw us and get away with it.

[ChadGore]

Re: ``Announcing the end of the military operations doesn't mean the end of the war,''

Their boy Saddom lost bad, really bad, and it's time they realize this. This "victory through defeat" argument they try to pump into their people is a looser, and people are seeing it live.

[MightyMouseToSaveThe Day]

This is my favorite line in that article:

``The U.S. doesn't need to invade any more countries,'' said Iman Hamdi, an expert on Mideast affairs at the American University in Cairo. ``We've got the message.''

[cake_crumb]

"Ditto for French diplomats."

Yep. All socialists, really.

[NetValue]

IMHO World War IV ended with the cessation of combat operations in IRAQ. Historians will say this was the turing point. Henceforth the rational self-interests of the Arab states came into focus; they developed real economies, they educated all their young, they even abandoned festering, centuries-old hatreds.

And America showed once more that conquest was not on its agenda but rather showing the world a path to new levels of peace, progress and wealth.

God, please make it so.

[Teetop]

I fear all we have done is awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.

Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, upon learning of the success of the attack on Pearl Harbor
http://worldwar2history.info/quotes/

Fleet Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto - December 7, 1941
"I fear that all I have done is awakened a sleeping giant and filled him with a terrible resolve."
http://www.nhhouserepublicanalliance.org/notable_quotes.htm

http://if_i_could_only_fly.tripod.com/makotribute/id9.html

Yamamoto attended the Naval War College during the "teens" and later studied at Harvard University. As a Captain, he served as Naval Attache to the United States in 1925-28. In the late 1920s and during the 1930s, he held a number of important positions, many of them involved with Japanese naval aviation.
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/prs-for/japan/japrs-xz/i-yamto.htm

Isoruko Yamamoto was the one who said this. He knew what America's power was from being in America for so many years. Just because it was also quoted in a movie or two, doesn't change the fact he actually said it.

[Filibuster_60]

Then Bush dropped the other shoe. He sold a slew of weapons (although not Aegis class anti-missile ships) to Taiwan, but even more important, he announced that any attack on Taiwan would initiate immediate American involvement in defending Taiwan! Buh=bye "one China" policy. Attention, "friends": you do not screw us and get away with it.

Actually Bush quickly retrenched and declared there hadn't been a change in our China policy. He only said that the US will do "whatever it takes" to keep Taiwan safe, which doesn't quite kill the ambiguity over what we'll do if China attacks. And after 9/11 he had to go back to talking to China as if it were our partner.

The decision not to sell AEGIS radar - even though Taiwan had requested it - was yet another compromise made to limit the damage to US-China relations.

On top of that, Taiwan's expected attack submarines haven't materialized because Germany and Holland have refused our request to construct the boats on Taiwan's behalf - we no longer build diesel-electric subs ourselves. Have we punished Germany and Holland for placing China's interests before ours?

[toddst]

Thanks for sorting the Yamamoto quote out so quickly. I was sure he did say it but hadn't come up with good sources.

[LS]

I see this much differently. "Whatever it takes" is nothing short of "we'll go to war." It is a UNIVERSE away from the Reagan/Bush/Clinton policy on China.

[LS]

You have cited "pop" sources, but these are WRONG. Virtually every serious history of the war in the Pacific, especially Japanese sources, attribute nothing of the sort to Yamamoto. The closest ANY Japanese leader came to saying this was Nagumo, but even then it isn't really a direct quote. This is quite a myth, though. (And, being from Dayton, I well know Yamamoto visited Wright Field).

[denydenydeny]

``In the end, we are facing a new reality,'' he told supporters after the U.S. victory in Iraq.

Schadenfreude bump.