Posted on 09/11/2002 3:32:38 PM PDT by traditionalist
The fires had not yet gone out at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, a year ago, before the War Party had introduced its revised plans for American empire. What many saw as a horrific atrocity and tragedy, they saw instantly as an opportunity to achieve U.S. hegemony over an alienated Islamic world.
President Bush initially directed America's righteous wrath and military power at al-Qaida. But in his "axis-of-evil" address, he signed on to the War Party's agenda.
What lies ahead? When America invades Iraq, it will have to destroy Saddam and all his weapons of mass destruction. Else, the war will have been a failure. And to ensure destruction of those weapons, we must occupy Iraq. If you would see what follows, pull out a map.
With Americans controlling Iraq, Syria is virtually surrounded by hostile powers: Israel on the Golan, Turks and Kurds to the north, U.S. power to the west in Iraq and south in Jordan. Syrian President Assad will be forced to pull his army out of Lebanon, leaving Israel free to reinvade Lebanon to settle accounts with Hezbollah.
Now look to Iran. With Americans occupying Iraq, Iran is completely surrounded: Americans and Turks to the west, U.S. power in the Gulf and Arabian Sea to the south, in Afghanistan to the east and in the old Soviet republics to the north. U.S. warplanes will be positioned to interdict any flights to Lebanon to support Hezbollah.
Iraq is the key to the Middle East. As long as we occupy Iraq, we are the hegemonic power in the region. And after we occupy it, a window of opportunity will open – to attack Syria and Iran before they acquire weapons of mass destruction.
This is the vision that enthralls the War Party – "World War IV," as they call it – a series of "cakewalks," short sharp wars on Iraq, Syria and Iran to eliminate the Islamic terrorist threat to us and Israel for generations.
No wonder Ariel Sharon and his Amen Corner are exhilarated. They see America's war on Iraq as killing off one enemy and giving Israel freedom to deal summarily with two more: Hezbollah and the Palestinians. Two jumps ahead of us, the Israelis are already talking up the need for us to deal with Libya, as well.
Anyone who believes America can finish Saddam and go home deceives himself. With Iraq's military crushed, the country will come apart. Kurds in the north and Shi'ites in the south will try to break away, and Iraq will be at the mercy of its mortal enemy, Iran. U.S. troops will have to remain to hold Iraq together, to find and destroy those weapons, to democratize the regime, and to deter Iran from biting off a chunk and dominating the Gulf.
Recall: After we crushed Germany and Japan in World War II, both were powerless to reassume their historic roles of containing Russia and China. So, America, at a cost of 100,000 dead in Vietnam and Korea, had to assume those roles. With Iraq in ruins, America will have to assume the permanent role of Policeman of the Persian Gulf.
But is this not a splendid vision, asks the War Party. After all, is this not America's day in the sun, her moment in history? And is not the crushing of Islamism and the modernization of the Arab world a cause worthy of a superpower's investment of considerable treasure and blood?
What is wrong with the War Party's vision?
Just this: Pro-American regimes in Cairo, Amman and Riyadh will be shaken to their foundations by the cataclysm unleashed as Americans smash Iraq, while Israelis crush Palestinians. Nor is Iran likely to passively await encirclement. Terror attacks seem certain. Nor is a militant Islam that holds in thrall scores of millions of believers from Morocco to Indonesia likely to welcome infidel America and Israel dictating the destiny of the Muslim world.
As for the pro-American regimes in Kabul and Pakistan, they are but one bullet away from becoming anti-American. And should the Royal House of Saud come crashing down, as the War Party ardently hopes, do they seriously believe a Vermont-style democracy will arise?
Since Desert Storm, America has chopped its fleets, air wings and ground troops by near 50 percent, while adding military commitments in the Balkans, Afghanistan, the Gulf and Central Asia. Invading and occupying Iraq will require hundreds of thousands of more troops.
We are running out of army. And while Americans have shown they will back wars fought with no conscripts and few casualties, the day is not far off when they will be asked to draft their sons to fight for empire, and many of those sons will not be coming home. That day, Americans will tell us whether they really wish to pay the blood tax that is the price of policing the War Party's empire.
You have a mighty short attention span.
Are you sure you're not a libertarian?
"Then take your bitching to Congress, not President Bush."
186 posted on 9/12/02 12:10 PM Pacific by rdb3
Partisan blame-shifting between the legislative and executive branches of Government is as old as the hills.
We the People will only continue to lose our freedom if we allow ourselves to be buffaloed by this "game".
Sweet Jesus. Here we go...
G'day, Willie.
The New Republic - September 9, 2002
American Spirit
To the editors:
While I appreciate the gracious welcome Franklin Foer gave our as-yet-unpublished magazine, let me dissent from his conclusion that we "could not have chosen a worse time to start a journal of the isolationist right" ("Home Bound," July 22).
This is precisely the right time; for there is, as Foer writes, an absolute conformity of thought at National Review, The Weekly Standard, and Commentary--and among the pundits who pass for conservatives at The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. They are all free-trade-and-open-borders Democrats; like you, they relish the prospect of the coming Pax Americana and "cakewalk" to Baghdad--after which we shall tutor the Muslims in democracy and go nightsticking recalcitrant regimes according to a priority list drawn up for us by Bibi Netanyahu.
Why is this the right time for our magazine? Because there is a void and a need. No one else in this city says what we say: that neoconservatism is a counterfeit. It is not conservatism at all but a hybrid of Wilsonian-FDR globalism and Rockefeller Republicanism. Free trade, interventionism, empire, eternal alliances, foreign aid, moral imperialism-- these are not conservative traditions but the antithesis of those traditions. As for neocons who bray that we "won the culture war," they deceive themselves and the rest of us. And because neoconservatism has no deep roots in our history or in America's heart, the American people will repudiate it when they learn that the price is permanent war, lengthening casualty lists, ever-expanding government, and endless bailouts of bankrupt regimes in the name of Global Democracy. Do you seriously believe that conservatism is now wholly encompassed by Norman Podhoretz, Jonah Goldberg, Ramesh Ponnuru, Rich Lowry, our virtuous Teletubby William Bennett, Charles Krauthammer, and the Kristols, pere et fils?
If President George W. Bush and his War Cabinet decide to go warlord-hunting and nation-building in Afghanistan and send 250,000 U.S. troops up the bloody road to Baghdad-- while subcontracting Mideast policy out to Ariel Sharon-- they will put the United States on the wrong side of tribalism, nationalism, and faith in a vast region of one billion people and end up in the history books alongside Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, and Dean Rusk. We intend to say so, and, if we're the only ones, fine. We believe we are right, but, then, we're all going to find out fairly soon.
Patrick J. Buchanan Co-Editor - The American Conservative http://www.theamericancause.org
G'day.
You just sold a subscription Mr. Buchanan....
It was more than mere thirst. It was a panting, slobbering lust. Similar to Clinton's bloated face as he called in bombing runs on Bosnian Serbs as Monica's black beret bobbed up and down beneath the gaze of his pig eyes.
Luckily, the man who was President at the time---former General George Washington (who shivered with his men at Valley Forge)--steadfastly refused to sully America's hands.
Great piece of work. I especially like the illiteration.
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