Writing in the WSJ, Josef Joffe, the publisher/editor of the German weekly, Die Velt sees the consequences of any US failure in Iraq:
Here is a short list. Iran advances to No. 1, completing its nuclear-arms program undeterred and unhindered. America’s cowed Sunni allies — Saudi-Arabia, Jordan, the oil-rich “Gulfies” — are drawn into the Khomeinist orbit.
You might ask: Wouldn’t they converge in a mighty anti-Tehran alliance instead? Think again. The local players have never managed to establish a regional balance of power; it was always outsiders — first Britain, then the U.S. — who chastened the malfeasants and blocked anti-Western intruders like Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia.
With the U.S. gone from Iraq, emboldened jihadi forces shift to Afghanistan and turn it again into a bastion of Terror International. Syria reclaims Lebanon, which it has always labeled as a part of “Great Syria.” Hezbollah and Hamas, both funded and equipped by Tehran, resume their war against Israel. Russia, extruded from the Middle East by adroit Kissingerian diplomacy in the 1970s, rebuilds its anti-Western alliances. In Iraq, the war escalates, unleashing even more torrents of refugees and provoking outside intervention, if not partition.
And that ain’t the whole of it.
Such remarkable clarity at last, first Der Spiegel, now Die Velt. Even Paris is coming on side. Was geschieht hier? Can it really be that the European elites are starting to understand that certain things may be true even if a certain displaced Texas politician believes in them?
It’s interesting that it takes a German journalist to see past our current political passions and to see over the near horizon, too:
The Bush presidency will soon be on the way out, but America is not. This truth has recently begun to sink in among the major Democratic contenders. Listen to Hillary Clinton, who would leave “residual forces” to fight terrorism. Or to Barack Obama, who would stay in Iraq with an as-yet-unspecified force. Even the most leftish of them all, John Edwards, would keep troops around to stop genocide in Iraq or to prevent violence from spilling over into the neighborhood. And no wonder, for it might be one of them who will have to deal with the bitter aftermath if the U.S. slinks out of Iraq.
Hmm. I wonder how that’s going to go over with the “net roots” come 2008. Having already sought to “re-define the center” of Democratic Party politics, will they hold their noses and pull the lever like they’ve been told no matter what their nominee says about Iraq, or will they sit it out in protest if s/he doesn’t promise to “bring the troops home now”?
Was the war really the defining issue of their generation, or was that just a convenient way to part the faithful from their folding cash on the way to the halls of power?
I guess time will tell.
“Was the war really the defining issue of their generation, or was that just a convenient way to part the faithful from their folding cash on the way to the halls of power?”
Faced with that question, an honest dem. candidate might answer an enthusiastic, “BOTH!”
Considering the move afoot to make Denver ’08 a repeat of Chicago ’68, it’s likely to be damned entertaining. Hillary & Huburt, yes, there’s something in the wind. Now who will play Mayor Daley?
Hey, it’s *Die Welt*.
Casca, I think the Dems should have their next one in Charleston, S.C., just for my own Schadenfreude. Remember what happened the last time they did that?
I mean, now *that* was a riot! (Cost one of my great-granddaddys an eyeball, at Chancellorsville.)
Jtg, sometimes a klugscheisser.
Maybe what everyone’s afraid of is that if our grand experiment in the middle east works, then an honest to G-d peace of sorts will break out.
rpl ~ I’m not usually a pessimist and I’d like to think that my tendencies are toward realism, even in this instance. However I’m going to have to offer up the opinion that the possibility of an honest to G*d peace breaking out is about the same as that of a snowball in he!!
One can pray though. But I wouldn’t hold your breath.
Was ist dem los mit du!
I wonder how that’s going to go over with the “net roots” come 2008.
Depends. If it’s a Dem in the big chair, they will have won their war, and will quickly lose interest in ours.
Of course, this will cause an increased focus on their other war, which is against the wealth generating, evil “rich.”
When people start talking about “world peace” – and let’s face it, peace in the Middle East may as well be considered world peace at this stage, all I can think of is this, from 1 Thessalonians 5:2,3:
“For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.”
Talking about peace breaking out all over brings me back to my Sunday School days and talks of the “end times” when I was a teenager.
The statement: Iran advances to No. 1, completing its nuclear-arms program undeterred and unhindered.
I don’t understand this argument as Iran is going to do this anyway independent of Iraq outcome. The Saudi’s will defend the richess oil nation on earth. As will we if they are threaten just like we did in Kuwait.
The truth is going in was a big mistake and all these other arguments since, as is the lastest round of reasoning, to cover that that mistake.
The surge, the peace keeping force activity that is there now is just masking of a civil conflict. We send in the surge 30,000 to suppress activity in one place. Once we leave the place it is in an up rising again because the is no leadership that wants to keep the peace. The strategy is to keep force there so there is no uprising. That means we are there indefinitely. If this admin had an understanding of the situation 2 years 1 year ago of this we should have been communicated to “America we will be there for 10 or 15 years with a peace keeping force 2 x the size we have today and it will cost $500 bln a year, and I the president believe that is what we need to do”. He just has never been honest about this or he is that clueless.
You see the surge is a joke by the admin. own admission. If the army leaves an area the uprising starts again. That means it is not a surge but a sustain strategy that must be kept indefinitely.That is not what we are being told.
So while it is not like Vietnam or anything else, we have no real objective as every year we get a different reason to be there and there is still no CLEAR CONSISE END GAME COMMUNICATED WITH THE AMERICAN PEOPLE.
Sad to see all the Dem vs. Rep. mud slinging as that is all useless banter.
John,
Thanks for dropping in and sharing that with us. Most people who come by here with disagreements attempt to use facts with which to fashion conclusions – a dry and tedious resort to reason and logic which requires those of us so inclined to marshal facts in rebuttal. Or else, if we cannot, we concede the point.
But your courageous sharing of the articles of your faith – including even such unlikely tenets such as “the surge is a joke by the admin. own admission” relieves us of any such burden.
All we need now is for someone to talk about their “feelings” and the picture will be complete.
I feel sort of lumpy these days.
Can you feel anything when I do this?
Casca, HA!
I still don’t see why anybody thinks we are going to pull out of Iraq.
For gosh sakes we are still in Germany, Japan, Korea and Bosnia.
I’m just glad that others are now recognizing that time continues once Pres. Bush is out of office. The Dems seem to have forgotten that for quite some time.
If the French and Germans are seeing the light of reality, then there just might be hope for the Democrats and our politicians, but doubtful for the nutroots.
I still say we’ll be in Iraq for the foreseeable future — probably decades. Would be nice if not so, though.
So the wife says to me, shortly after 9/11 whilst walking through security at the Airport in Seattle, “When do you think all of this security stuff will go away?
“Not in our lifetime” says I.
“oh…” Says she… “you mean this is the way it’s gonna be?”
“Yes dear”
“But what if a Democrat gets into office…? ” “Sorry honey, this is the way it will be regardless” sigh.
Danger, I fear that you are predicting correctly. I hate that, but think it’s true.
Dammit.
[...] Seeing the big picture Writing in the WSJ , Josef Joffe, the publisher/editor of the German weekly, Die Velt sees the consequences of anyA US failure in Iraq: Here is a short list. [...]