With regards to this:
Making yourself into the world’s most hated country is not an obvious way to secure that help.
The crying shame of it all is that it didn't have to go this way.
The massive wave of support the world wrapped America in registered a discernable decline immediately as Bush and friends started beating the evil empire war drums. Maybe it was a result of deja vu, maybe it was the tone of the rhetoric, maybe it was concern over what lay next.
Going in to Afghanistan troubled no one. Tightening security domestically and abroad was expected, wanted even. Denying terrorists easy financial transactions and harbor made sense to all.
But the sense was out there, I feel, was that Bush and gang had an agenda and one that didn't make sense. The decline in support picked up steam once it became perfectly obvious to all that Iraq would be invaded, no matter what, even as the pretext for invasion was still being conjured up.
America's detractors did not merely go silent after 9/11; many stopped being detractors, period, for a while. There were people and countries willing to be led by America, but they didn't find leadership that made sense and support withered away.
Bush simply blew the opportunity to bring much of the world together. Now, the massive majority of the developed world, had they a voice in the vote, would never choose George Bush.
It didn't have to be this way.
A more ambitious president, one not fallen prey to the dark whispers of a gang of ultra-aggressive and ultra-arrogant hawks, might have seized on the opportunity to really change the world, working with the world, not against it.
Three years ago most of the people in developed nations on the planet were willing to stand up and say "we are all Americans now". I believe this was truly heartfelt. I believe the feelings for America were not ephemeral, not vaporous, but tangible and solid - the type of moral support on which great movements can be built.
It was an opportunity like no other, borne out of incredible tragedy.
That feeling, that support, that willingness to line up behind America and follow her lead, sadly has been utterly and completely wasted by President Bush.
Now the world only sees day after day new evidence that confirmed their worst fears - America, and her President, can not be trusted. Much of the world was willing to suspend old concerns in the hope that out of tragedy would come new purpose; but instead, they saw only what they felt and perceive as more of the same. Status quo.
The crying shame of it all is that it didn't have to go this way. |
