A slim hope

Stephen M. Walt, left, and John J. Mearsheimer.

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Why do I think at this point that McCain would be a better foreign policy choice than either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama? Basically because I think that on foreign policy, deep down, he is in the line of traditional, Eisenhower Republicanism. It is George W. Bush and Cheney that are outside the party traditions, up to their necks in Wilsonism.

Frankly I think McCain wants to actually do what Dubya said he wanted to do in 2000. That would be a G.H.W. Bush "restoration". Baker, Scowcroft, Powell doctrine stuff. Even Rice was supposed to be in that line. The surprise was when, after 9-11 Bush-II threw in his lot with the former Trotskista neocons. Even Yassir Arafat, who was pretty sharp, thought that Dubya was going to be like his father... they say the disappointment broke the old fellow's heart (sniff).

Although unfortunately phrased, Baker correctly defined the basic relationship between the oilmen Republicans and the Jewish community. I don't think that underlying logic has really changed. I suspect (hope?, pray?) that McCain is a closet Mearsheimer-Walt devotee.

The surprise was Dubya, who went against his entire culture and background to avoid antagonizing the people his father thought had cost him his reelection. I don't imagine that McCain has the same oedipal problems with Bush-I that Bush-II does, nor to share in his evangelical, last-days devotion to maximalist Zionism. In short, I'm hoping that he is an old fashioned, country club Republican.

As to McCain's professions of undying support for Israel, as Master Sun said, "war is deception": you don't telegraph your intentions. Keep AIPAC neutral. Talk about a hyperbolic, "hundred years in Iraq". Talk about, "bomb, bomb, bomb: bomb, bomb Iran". Neither a hundred years in Iraq nor bombing Iran appear doable: America is maxed out.

The fact is that if the USA could go to war with Iran it would have already happened; Cheney would have done it long ago if he could have. However, the United States' military is overextended and weary, and the country is on the brink of financial collapse. Setting the Middle East on fire would only push it over the edge.

Getting out of Iraq with some dignity is the number one foreign policy priority of the USA and the only existent plan for getting out of Iraq is the Baker Iraq Study Group's and negotiating with Iran is the key to its success. That is why the Israelis still hate Baker.

My feeling is that domestic policy (health care, education) should be in the hands of the Democrats and foreign policy should be in the hands of the "realists" and that US foreign policy should be deliberately minimalist, not the sort of Quixotic, Wilsonian brew that Obama is offering up or the Madeline Albright redux that Hillary is flogging.

None of this is at all sure, but frankly I cannot see any other successful alternative. DS

Osama's vote in 2008

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Many people seem to think that the Democrats are a shoo-in to win the the US presidency in 2008, but I'm not so sure.

Neither Hillary or Obama are in any way Swift Boat proof and any of the gentlemen pictured (except the one with the beard) could easily end up occupying the White House. Impossible you say? Following Bush, unthinkable that a Republican could win? Think about it a little more.

The one with the beard, Osama bin Laden, has been doing very well with Republicans. Surely he would prefer another ugly, national security Republican as an adversary. He once told Robert Fisk that his main objective was to leave the United States "a shadow of itself"... The Republicans have done everything possible to oblige him, and in effect, the United States is now a shadow of its former self. Why would Osama, of all people, want to change?

With a simple video appearance he won the last election for Bush. This time it probably would take a bit more.

Imagine that either Giuliani or McCain were running against either Hillary or Obama and Al Qaeda pulled off another "big one" in the USA. I would be amazed if either of the above named Democrats could survive that, which is a very good reason to believe that Osama would choose that moment to attack.

Here in Madrid we have lived though exactly the same dynamic. Bin Laden saw that a few bombs at the right place and the right time would have the maximum effect and it did: the government fell and the Spanish troops were withdrawn from Iraq. Because this "alignment of the planets" has long been visible on the horizon, I would imagine that whatever Bin Laden has in mind has been long in preparation, at least three, perhaps more years. Its elements are already in place and simply "sleeping" waiting for the moment... which logically would come late in the presidential campaign... second half of October, I would imagine.

I think this is, if not a sure thing, extremely probable. The only Democrat that could possibly survive this would be Al Gore, and I'm not sure even he could. So all the the Democrats that think the presidency is like a ripe fruit ready to fall into their laps should think again. DS

Blue helmets in Iraq: the Marxist Grouchist solution

Rufus T. Firefly (Groucho): Awfully decent of you to drop in today. Do you realize our army is facing disastrous defeat? What do you intend to do about it?

Chicolini (Chico): I've done it already.

Rufus T. Firefly: You've done what?

Chicolini: I've changed to the other side.

Rufus T. Firefly: So you're on the other side, eh? Well, what are you doing over here?

Chicolini: Well, the food is better over here.

"Duck Soup" - Marx Brothers (1933)

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I can't think of a more pitiful admission of total failure than Niall Ferguson's "Marxist-Grouchist" solution for the tragedy of Iraq. Niall Ferguson is a professor of history at Harvard and formerly a great believer in America's imperial 'mission'. Where are the blue helmets supposed to come from? Muslim countries? Okay. Sunni or Shiite? Non-Muslim countries from outside the region? Okay. Who is going to risk the lives of their young people to pull America's chestnuts out of the fire? Who has enough ground troops available even if they wanted to send them? Russia? China? Don't they back Iran? This reminds me of another dialog from "Duck Soup": "Chicolini: You no unnerstan? Firefly: Of course I understand. This is so simple that an eight could understand it... Quick, get me an eight year old child!" DS
Niall Ferguson: Blue-helmet time in Iraq - Los Angeles Times
Abstract: The flaws in Bush's new plan are real enough. But they are not the flaws the Democrats want to name. The most obvious one, articulated (bravely, in view of his presidential hopes) by Sen. John McCain, is that 21,500 extra troops will not be enough. In 1920, when they crushed an insurgency, the British had about one soldier for every 23 Iraqis. Even with the projected "surge," the ratio of Iraqis to Americans will be 174 to 1. Yet even if the president were in a position to send in 215,000 extra men, I doubt they would suffice to halt the civil war. Why? Because, having been the war makers who precipitated Baghdad's descent into anarchy, U.S. forces now lack the legitimacy to be regarded as peacemakers. Bush's medium-term goal of handing over responsibility for law and order to the Iraqi security forces is also fatally flawed. Left to their own devices, those forces will become at best ineffective and at worst active participants in the civil war. For these reasons, I see only one credible alternative to Bush's strategy: U.S. forces should hand over responsibility for Iraq's security not to the Iraqis but to a new force provided by the United Nations. READ IT ALL

Gallup poll shows: after six years of Bush the American people are finally wising up

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This Gallup poll shows that after six years of George W. Bush, Americans are wising up, they finally realize that the menu of US presidential candidates they are being offered is similar in quality to the McDonald's menu in "Super Size Me". Certainly the "people's choice", that great American, "Don't Know," is good news, a sign that "vox populi, vox dei" may still be in force. DS

Abstract from Editor and Publisher: The frontrunner for winning the White House in 2008 is a true dark horse: Don't Know. A new Gallup survey, which offers a twist on its usual preference poll. includes "Don't Know" as an option. It now wins with 38%, trailed by Sen. Hillary Clinton at 15% an Sen. John McCain at 11%. Gallup Poll director Frank Newport sums it up this way today: "Many Americans cannot spontaneously think of the name of a person they would like to see elected president in 2008. While this lack of firm conviction about presidential candidates over a year before the first 2008 primaries is not necessarily unusual, it underscores the certainty of change as various politicians announce their candidacies and jockey for position in the months ahead." Sen. Barack Obama already is in the #3 slot, at 6%. Five other possible candidates are picked by between 2% and 5%: former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, former Sen. John Edwards, Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, and former Vice President Al Gore. This "top-of-mind" survey was taken Nov. 27-29. McCain leads Clinton among Independents by a narrow margin.

Bush Cites Lessons for Iraq in Vietnam - New York Times

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Reading this story I was really struck at how painful the next two years are going to be. How deeply embarrassing not just for Americans, but for nearly everyone. There is an expression in Spanish, "verguenza ajena", which describes the embarrassment you can feel for others: a smiling lady with spinach in her teeth; an after dinner speaker with his fly open. I think if the USA weren't so busy killing and torturing and imprisoning people without trial many people would begin feeling truly sorry for Americans. DS

Abstract: In his first day in the capital of a country that was America’s wartime enemy during his youth, President Bush said today that the American experience in Vietnam contained lessons for the war in Iraq. Chief among them, he said, was that “we’ll succeed unless we quit.” “We tend to want there to be instant success in the world,” Mr. Bush said after a lunch with Prime Minister John Howard of Australia, “and the task in Iraq is going to take a while.”(...) the day was filled with jarring imagery. There was Mr. Bush in the palace in the center of this most gracious of Asian cities, being greeted in the former palace of the French governor general of Indochina by President Nguyen Minh Triet. The welcoming ceremony took place in a high-ceilinged, European-style hall dominated by a huge statue of Ho Chi Minh. Mr. Bush sat and chatted with Mr. Triet as Ho’s bearded visage looked over them. Mr. Bush spoke of driving by the lake where Senator John McCain’s plane crashed nearly 40 years ago, focusing less on Mr. McCain’s long imprisonment afterward than on the fact that “he was, literally, saved, in one way, by the people pulling him out.”(...) For Mr. Bush, who had never set foot in Vietnam before, this visit is something of a tightrope walk. America’s defeat here is increasingly being mentioned in comparison with how Iraq may turn out, and Mr. Bush was careful to stress that in Iraq, unlike Vietnam, defeat is not an option for the United States. “The Maliki government is going to make it unless the coalition leaves before they have a chance to make it,” he said of Iraq’s prime minister. “And that’s why I assured the prime minister we’ll get the job done.” In private, some White House officials concede that Mr. Bush’s visit to Vietnam for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting, scheduled many months ago, is proving to be spectacularly poorly timed, because of all the uncomfortable parallels between the two wars. READ IT ALL