[lit-ideas] Re: Global warming claims tropical island

  • From: Brian <cabrian@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Wed, 27 Dec 2006 22:47:49 -0600

Irene, I don't believe this to be true. A month ago Max Boot wrote an article entitled "Iran and Syria aren't our friends in Iraq" and here is a lengthy quote from that same piece:


FOR CERTAIN members of the foreign policy cognoscenti, there is no problem so intractable that it cannot be resolved through dialogue...

Proponents of "engaging" Iran and Syria argue that it's against their interests to see chaos next door. As opposed to what? They probably think they're better off today than they would be if they had a strong and potentially hostile Iraq on their border, especially one allied with the United States. They're happy to see the U.S. bled dry and Iraq immobilized as a regional player.

Given that mind-set, we would have to offer Syria and Iran some mighty enticing carrots to get them to cooperate in a U.S.-led rescue effort for Iraq. Tehran would most likely demand, at a minimum, a guarantee that we would do nothing to foster regime change in Iran or stop its nuclear program...

Are these wishes that Washington could or should accommodate? Do we want to betray the democratic revolution in Lebanon? Do we want to give Iran's loony president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, carte blanche to build nuclear weapons? And all in return for dubious promises that may not make any difference in Iraq?

Hard to believe, but those who advocate negotiations under such circumstances are known as "realists." A real realist would realize that Syria and Iran are only likely to accommodate the U.S. when they're afraid of us. Iran played a constructive role in Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban in 2001, and Syria scuttled out of Lebanon in 2005 under strong pressure. Now, however, we would be bargaining from a position of weakness, not strength.

In his column a few weeks later he suggests that the Baker-Hamilton Report be thrown in the trash and calls it an intellectually bankrupt document. He has mocked and derided that document, as most of the serious people have, so I'm curious where you got the idea that he believes what you said he believes. It is true that he supports preemptive action, though not in the way Arthur Herman advocated in his Commentary piece I posted, but in supporting their dissident voices and possibly funneling weapons and money into the country in order to foment an insurrection against Ahmadinejad.

~Brian

On Dec 27, 2006, at 8:59 PM, Andy Amago wrote:

Now the Baker report and people who originally supported the war, like military historian Max Boot, are supporting friendly relations with Iran for mutual advantage.

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