we have come full circle or ellipsoid:
I don't subscribe to your conclusions about China.. They may not want to get involved in North Korea, but they have to make a decision. Some 200 Million Chinese depend on exports to the US (dividing their exports by the average GDP). So what's more important.. avoiding pressuring "Krazy Kim", or risking the loss of US markets for their goods?? Tough decision, but I think they are rational people and understand what's at stake.
Furthermore, I think some Chinese leaders are hoping to use the N. Korean crisis as leverage to diminish US support for Taiwan. But encouraging a re-militarization of Japan is the trump card that I believe Bejing feels is not worth the cost. There is also the possibility of permitting S. Korea to develop nuclear weapons to maintain a balance of power and economically they are more able to sustain such an arms race than the North. Thus, N. Korean generals will see their ability to coerce the South diminished substantially, and will likely perceive Kim as taking them down a path they don't want to travel. Setting up the possibility of a coup.
Thus, the best strategy the US can play is to require any talks to be multi-lateral, negating Kim's desire to create the sense that NK is now some kind of "superpower"..
the Iraqi initiatives may just have given the developing trend that extra bit of ooomph.
Over the short term... But the long term places Iraqi oil assets under the control of the west, who will likely opt to pump as much as possible in order to diminish Saudi economic power, or at least as leverage in forcing reform in SA, or at least repression of the Wahabbists, while draining their coffers and ability to fund Islamo-Fascism..
It will become apparent that the economic lot of the average Iraqi will improve. And bringing in friendly Arab states such as Kuwait, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, and Qatar to help administer the rebuilding of the country should reassure the "arab street" that the US is not planning on turning the country into a colony.
There is a chance that the route now chosen and apparently with your concurrence, will not get us to the correct solution, and in fact may have introduced a few more independent and dependent variables into the existing set of simultaneous equations without having concurrently shown us new equations, leading to null for solution
Sure.. but 9/11 happened without our doing anything... It's been brewing for decades, contained only through occasional repression by authoritarian Arab governments with no little legitimacy, nor sustainable economic solutions for providing for their burgeoning populations.
This was apparent to me 14 years ago when I did a political risk analysis of Egypt. I predicted a 25% chance that Mubarak would be overthrown by the Ihkwan, who were showing they could provide better social services than his government (funded with Saudi money, of course).. Fortunately, that did not occur.. But it required serious repression on Mubarak's part, and a measure of accomodation as well, to prevent such an overthrow.. But I believe Mubarak is weaker now, with much less leverage for opposing the Islamists, thus his respite has come at a price. But fortunately, the US has converted his military to US weaponry. Thus, he is dependent upon the US for spare parts and technical support, without which his military is vulnerable and unable to sustain long-term combat... And it ties him to the US and limits the ability of his people to push him into a regional conflict. At least in my analysis.
The solution is to bring order to the region Jay. There are too many regimes who live by only their own law.. Saddam and Assad are two primary candidates, closely followed by the hardliners in Iran. And they survive by encouraging and supporting turmoil throughout the region so no one has the ability to focus on their own regimes. But this showdown with Saddam has been inevitable.. Either with him, or one of his equally ruthless sons.. And were Saddam to obtain nuclear weapons, it would vastly alter the balance of power in the region, as well as providing him a shield from behind which he could dominate the region...
Because it would be unthinkable to see US forces stationed in Saudi Arabia, as we were in Germany for long-term protection. It would only inflame the Islamist like Bin Laden even more... In fact, many analysts have asserted that the continuing US presence in SA for the purpose of containing Saddam, has been one of the primary reasons that Al-Qaida were able to attract such a following... So the solution is to create sufficient stability in the region that US forces can exit, and thus, deflate the "raison d'etre" for Al-Qaida and Islamic groups like them..
But in the short term, as I said, there may be some increased recruiting for such organizations..
Hawk |
