Scowcroft praises Bush's UN efforts as a triumph of diplomacy:
The United States has just concluded a remarkable exercise in diplomacy. It has opened up a possibility for peaceful resolution of the crisis over Iraq that few would have thought conceivable only three months ago....
By credibly threatening unilateral military action to resolve an Iraqi problem that has festered for years, the administration achieved two objectives. First, it induced the United Nations Security Council to face up to its responsibilities. Second, by declaring that the only sure solution to the Iraqi problem was regime change by military force, the administration maximized the odds that Saddam Hussein would take the United States seriously, accept U.N. authority and avoid a conflict that could well involve incalculable consequences for the region.
By some odd chance, he neglects to note that Bush achieved this triumph by ignoring Scowcroft's advice of last summer -g-. Now, Scowcroft suggests, Bush should give the inspectors plenty of time to do their jobs, and use the downtime to apply his attention to the Mideast crisis:
The United States has already taken a first step by developing, with its partners in the "Quartet" (the international consulting group consisting of the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia), a road map for the achievement of a Palestinian state by 2005
Naturally, to expect the an actual Palestinian cease-fire is unreasonable,
The Palestinians need to end terrorist attacks and reform the Palestinian Authority. To require total compliance as a precondition, however, is simply to put control of the process in the hands of those on both sides who do not want it to succeed
but Israeli withdrawals are essential,
For the Israeli side, there must be a willingness to pull back forces from West Bank population centers short of a total cessation of violence -- which no one can guarantee. Any type of settlement expansion must cease.
washingtonpost.com
What a pity Israeli PMs haven't ever learned world-class hypocrisy. I'm sure the Quartet could give them some lessons. Then Sharon could wring his hands and say, "I deplore those rotten settlers. What, they just put up another town? O me O my. How terrible." Why not? It works great for Arafat.
I hope and expect that President Bush will give this advice the same close attention he gave the advice of last summer.
David Frum adds a few acid comments in his new blog:
The Path Not Taken: Chretienism does however have its American supporters – notably former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, who appears in the Washington Post this morning with an absolutely breathtaking article. For Scowcroft, it is never too late for one last effort to save Saddam Hussein. He proposes that President Bush pocket his UN Security Council Resolution, give the inspectors lotsa-lotsa time to go about their business, and in the meantime devote himself to – guess what? – restarting the Israeli-Palestinian “peace process.”
Scowcroft pays lip service to the idea that “peace” requires that Palestinians refrain from acts of terror. But he carefully notes that “total compliance” cannot be required as a “precondition” for peace. The “peace process” in other words has become an elegant euphemism for a policy of urging Israel to make concessions to the sponsors of terror. We can all recognize that this is a dumb idea for America. It doesn’t get smarter when it is applied elsewhere.
Unfortunately for Scowcroft, publication his article coincides with the latest Palestinian enormity - this time a bomb attack on a bus packed with students on their way to school. “A torso that had fallen over the side of the bus was covered with a white-and-blue checkered blanket. Sandwiches and schoolbooks lay scattered in the street.” Eleven are dead, 48 wounded, eight of them very seriously. We need to call such acts by a less arid name than “noncompliance.”
nationalreview.com |
