Free Republic

<p>President Bush's Sunday address to the country was an encouraging expression of presidential resolve to succeed in the war on terrorism, and specifically the Iraqi component of that long struggle. Perhaps, understandably, he left the description of the United Nations' role general and vague. This may maximize his political support on postwar policy for awhile. His national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, characterized that role as, in effect, a fig leaf to permit other countries, such as India, to send troops. Many of those who opposed the war in the first place view the U.N. role as a fig leaf, not for the contributing countries, but for the United States to effect a quick exit from Iraq. Such a process sounds dangerously like the decent interval that the United States once gained by Vietnamization, followed by retreat and defeat.</p>

<p>The United States plans no retaliation against Mexico for its opposition to the American-led war in Iraq, U.S. Treasurer Rosario Marin said Wednesday.</p> <p>"There is no list in any department or agency of things that we will do against countries" that opposed the U.S. invasion of Iraq, she said when questioned by reporters after an appearance in this central Mexican city, 60 miles (100 kilometers) northeast of Mexico City.</p>

It strikes me that something fairly big is happening, fairly quietly, in Washington. It amounts to a new diplomatic strategy, post-Iraq — of the kind which, given American power, generates in and of itself a "new world order". (The father talked; the son acted.) It emerges less from conscious thought than from years of frustrating trial and error, brought to a head in the Security Council just before the invasion of Iraq. And it begins to reveal itself as a way of dealing with immediate difficulties in Iraq and elsewhere (most immediately, North Korea). But though not the product of...

France is in a diplomatic pickle, wanting both to heal the rift with America and to play up the nation’s newfound prominence. How will its president balance the two desires? April 28 issue — Late in life, Francois Mitterrand let slip the news of a secret war. “France does not know it yet, but we are at war with America,” reports his biographer, Georges-Marc Benamou. “A permanent war... a war without death. They are very hard, the Americans—they are voracious. They want undivided power over the world.” FRANCE’S CURRENT PRESIDENT, Jacques Chirac, likens himself more to Charles de Gaulle than...

Coalition of unwilling still at it Saddam Hussein's statue falling in Baghdad's Paradise Square will be a lasting symbol of the liberation of the Iraqi people. But the comments of Iraq's UN Ambassador Mohammed Aldouri last week sum up the collapse of the Saddam regime. "The game is over," Aldouri said simply. Game? Aldouri went on to say he meant that the war was over. But his first statement was more telling. The Iraqis, with the able assistance of Jacques Chirac, Gerhard Schroeder, Vladimir Putin and, of course, Kofi Annan, gamed the U.S. and the coalition at the UN for...

The US and Britain appear intent on continuing to "punish" France for its anti-war stance, in spite of recent gestures of conciliation by Jacques Chirac (pictured), the French president. The diplomatic pressure on Mr Chirac contrasts with a softer tone towards Germany and Russia, the other two leading members of the "coalition of the unwilling". The difference in approach was evident on Friday in a newspaper interview in which Tony Blair, prime minister, said the failure to secure a second UN resolution had put British soldiers' lives at risk. Downing Street believes that Mr Chirac's threat to veto such a...

Even if civilian casualties in Iraq (news - web sites) are light, expect a great deal of attention to the subject in the days ahead. In a number-obsessed society, focusing relentlessly on the deaths of innocents--and inflating the numbers, if necessary--is a conventional way of undermining support for war. This helps explain why dozens of civilian-casualty articles sprouted in the news media within hours of the first shots in Iraq, even before coalition ground forces swung into action. The news agencies of our chief non-allies--France, Russia, China, and Germany--were quick off the mark. Agence France Presse may have established the...

ST.PETERSBURG, Russia, Apr 11, 2003 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday welcomed the toppling of Saddam Hussein's government but said the U.S.-led war on Iraq had undermined international law and the very concept of sovereignty. Speaking between meetings with his two main allies in the opposition to the war on Iraq, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and French President Jacques Chirac, Putin called for the leading role in settling the conflict to be restored to the United Nations. "Obviously the toppling of a tyrannical regime was a plus. But the human losses, the humanitarian catastrophe, the...

THE leaders of Russia, France and Germany angrily denounced American policy in Iraq yesterday and called for the restoration of United Nations authority. At the start of a summit in St Petersburg, President Putin criticised the United States and Britain and gave warning of the danger of the world sliding “into an endless series of conflicts”. President Putin, President Chirac and Gerhard Schröder, the German Chancellor, were the most vocal critics of the use of force against Iraq. Yesterday all three emphasised the centrality of the UN to the future of global conflict-resolution. “We have a joint view of the...