If I thought as you do that we had stopped pursuing AQ, I would be upset too. I don't think we have. What visible campaign do you expect to see?
I'm aware that things are going on. I just don't think we're being as aggressive about it as I'd like us to be, especially when it comes to the Al-Qaeda infrastructure outside the Middle East, which after all is the part of the organization that threatens us. This is largely a matter of intuition, obviously, as these things are not supposed to be publicly known. It disturbs me that we haven't seen at least one highly publicized fuckup, though. Hard to believe that the CIA could be pulling out all the stops without a few of those. When the Germans start complaining about the radical cleric being hustled into a van by 6 Aryan-looking fellows with white shirts, black ties, and "Elder Smith" nametags, or when the French start pointing out that the suicide note left in somebody else's handwriting beside the body of the shadowy financier with 3 passports seems incompatible with the 7 bullet holes in his head, then I'll know that our boys are on the job.
Not totally serious, obviously, but you know what I mean. There should be more signs than there are.
Problem is that perceptions in the Arab world have rather less to do with what we actually do, than with what the Arab world needs to believe. You've read Rubin, can you deny his arguments?
I didn’t deny his arguments, I pointed out that his conclusions seem not to be based on his arguments. What Arab leaders want the Arab world to believe is not what the Arab world needs to believe. It’s what the leaders need their followers to believe. They need their people to believe that they are threatened by a voracious and amoral enemy that wants to steal their resources and stamp out their faith. That belief is the only thing keeping our enemy alive. Do we want to fuel that belief or undermine it?
So you like regime change in Iran but not Iraq?
I like regime change from within. I don’t like any scenario that ends with the US installing a proxy government, for reasons I’ve already detailed elsewhere, with surprisingly little response.
there is zero chance of an overthrow of Saddam without extreme military pressure, he has run too efficient a police state.
All regimes change. I doubt that Saddam has created the most efficient police state in the history of the world, which is what he would have to do have done to achieve zero chance of overthrow. |
