I am finally persuaded.
The troops surrounding Saddam - and for that matter the Saudis - should be brought home. So should those filling up the NATO military camps. (Perhaps a token force should be left - our military bands are pretty good.) Whatever we have in the Balkans should be removed too.
More importantly, those 35,000 troops in South Korea who would probably become 35,000 prisoners if North Korea's (armed to the teeth with first class equipment) 1.9 million decided to come South for the winter.
But, those problems aren't our concerns. All those 35,000 do - along with the other troops across the world - is maintain our image as a military bully.
I do not believe, however, that we should abandon all contact with the outside. I think we should stay in the United Nations and attend all the committees, but more positively I do believe that we should be quick to offer lend-lease to our friends under attack and certainly send CARE packages to starving people.
No more "entangling alliances" - they are likely to mean body bags.
Heck! People across the world might even get to like us - or at least tolerate us.
Americans do want to be liked.
Harry
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Keith wrote:
Somewhere inside Iraq, negotiations are going on between Saddam Hussein and a team representing American oil corporations with an additional one or two people acting under arm's length instructions from Cheney, on behalf of his, Rumsfeld's and the Bush family's private interests in various corporations such as the Carlyle Group.The American team want some way by which oil and gas contracts can be negotiated with a regime which will deliver over the next two or three decades. Whether that regime includes Saddam Hussein or not doesn't really matter to the American team. Continuity and dependability is more important. (Interestingly, Bush has not mentioned "regime change" recently! More interestingly, Saddam has lately been severely cramping the powers of his eldest, completely-crazed eldest son.) Saddam Hussein probably realises that American threats of large scale invasion and the bombing and occupation of Baghdad are but mere threats which Bush can never carry out. (He must be laughing at the pathetic attempt of the Americans to raise the ante by making it known in the last 24 hours that they are going to send another 62,000 troops down there -- as also the pathetic attempt of this country with its scanty army and tanks that don't function in deserts and a tin-can aircraft carrier which is supposed to be armed to the teeth but would probably fall apart if used in anger.) However, Saddam would be in trouble *if* sufficient numbers of American troops were to invade Iraq and cause trouble in different ways and stay there as if on a permanent basis. This would cause him great political embarrassment within Iraq and, probably, he would have to resign or would be in danger of being assassinated by some new dictator. (There are no political parties worthy of the name in Iraq because they simply have had no expereince or tradition of any sort of normal government. There are, simply, other potential dictators and regional war lords in the waiting and some of these are quite as nasty as Saddam and probably considerably less intelligent.) We've got to be close to an end-game now, I feel. Bush or Saddam is going to blink soon. Bush will blink first, I think. He knows he can't bomb Baghdad because he'll lose his only real ally -- Tony Blair -- because the Labour Party in the country and in Parliament is close to explosion point already, and this will be followed closely by larger numbers of the American intelligentsia who haven't yet spoken up. We will never read this in our papers because Bush will blink in private and he'll do so at arm's length. But if Saddam has any sense (and of that I'm sure he has enough), he will soon restore the contracts to the Russian and French corporation that he reneged on recently -- but also make sure that American interests are well represented in future deals. I was once in eye-ball to eye-ball confrontation with a Government Minister. We held eye contact without a word and without blinking for perhaps a minute. (It may have been half-a-minute, but it seemed like 10!) The only difference between us was that he had his feet on the conference table as well -- which was such a valuable antique that I scarcely had the courage to put my sweaty hands on it. I knew I had to hold his gaze because the possibility of environmental legislation was the issue. But I also knew that the Minister of the Crown had to save face when faced with a mere mortal. (I had an environmental activist colleague with me; he had the most senior civil servant of the Department of Environment with him.) So I blinked first. And in so, doing my colleague, Noel Newsome, and I achieved the legislation we wanted. Bush will do the same because, at the end of the day, Saddam has the nous to give the Americans much of what they want but were in danger of not getting a year or two ago when Saddam did deals with the Russians and the French. Bush's spin doctors will find some way of persuading the credulous element of the American electorate that he's won a victory. Saddam won't have to find a pretext in his own country. In truth, however, it will be a draw -- but the price will have been a heavy one. Much of the civilised world will have been through great stress because of the Cheney-Rumsfeld-Bush(Senior) policy, and problems with Islam will have got worse. And, at the end of the day, Bush Junior will lose the next Presidential election just like his old man did when he hadn't given enough attention to the economy. If the Democrats select a handsome, young, intelligent Clinton clone, Bush Junior will be whopped. Keith Hudson
****************************** Harry Pollard Henry George School of LA Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 [EMAIL PROTECTED] Tel: (818) 352-4141 Fax: (818) 353-2242 *******************************
--- Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). Version: 6.0.434 / Virus Database: 243 - Release Date: 12/25/2002
