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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: SirRealist who wrote (14655)	12/24/2001 7:20:23 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

INTERESTING TIMES: Arafat vs. the Bush Doctrine By Saul Singer (December 24) Question: Who is the nemesis of the war on terrorism? A: Osama bin Laden, B: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, C: Militant Islam or D: Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat? The answer is E: All of the above, but the division of labor is not what you might think. To rank these villains, a distinction must be made between terrorism itself and the legitimacy of terrorism in international relations. For his role in September 11, bin Laden has earned the title of world's No. 1 terrorist. But no man has done more to delegitimize terrorism in the eyes of the world. The enormity of September 11 has led the world to understand, as President George W. Bush said at the United Nations, "No national aspiration, no remembered wrong can ever justify the deliberate murder of the innocent." Instead of the war he was trying to launch - that of the Islamic world against the United States - bin Laden succeeded in launching an American war to eradicate terrorism. Crushing bin Laden was an obvious opening step in this war, but now that his Taliban protectors have fallen and his days are numbered, his status will soon be downgraded from top terrorist to former threat. With bin Laden on the run, Iraq's Saddam Hussein looms as the primary must-defeat target of the war on terrorism. As the icon of state-supported terrorism, everyone understands that Saddam must fall if this war is to mean anything. A strong case can be made that his fall is not enough, but there is no plausible definition of victory that leaves Saddam in place. And now the Afghan war has revealed the road map for how to do it: Support the local opposition to the hilt and watch as the tyrant's forces abandon him in droves. After Saddam falls, a corner will have been turned in the war against state-supported terrorism, because the fall of two regimes will go far toward scaring other governments out of the terror business. A string of American victories will also dampen the attraction of militant Islam, but the US will also have to insist that Saudi Arabia stop funding schools across the Muslim world that incubate jihad against the West. Over the longer term, winning this war requires addressing its real "root causes" - not poverty or the lack of a Palestinian state, but dictators who attempt to diffuse domestic dissent against themselves by fomenting hatred of the US and Israel. All of the above is rapidly percolating into the post-September 11 conventional wisdom. But what is Arafat doing on this list? Arafat is a big problem for Israel, but what challenge does he present to the war on terrorism? The answer is that Arafat is the most serious threat to Bush's courageous goal of not just crushing terrorists, but ending the utility of terrorism in international relations. Arafat is mounting the most brazen and credible bid to carving out an exception to the global unacceptability of terrorism. The most succinct statement of the Bush Doctrine is, as he told a Thanksgiving gathering of US troops: "if you harbor terrorists, you are a terrorist." Arafat is setting out to prove not only the possibility of harboring terrorists and holding power, but of reaping diplomatic rewards through terrorism. This is not surprising, because Arafat has achieved everything in his life either by terrorism or by promising to refrain from terrorism. Arafat is a poster boy for the proposition that terrorism works. Terrorism made him the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people" in the eyes of the world (and ultimately of Israel). It even allowed him to turn down an offer of a Palestinian state over 97% of the West Bank and Gaza because he would have had to give up on destroying Israel demographically through the "right of return." US and Israeli leaders are fond of saying that violence has not gotten the Palestinians anywhere. The truth is it has gotten them a voucher for a state that they have so far chosen not to redeem. Israel obviously cannot return to negotiations at gunpoint, whether that gun is still shooting, or just cocked and loaded. It seems to be less obvious, however, that if Arafat succeeds in making himself an exception to the Bush Doctrine it is not just Israel's problem but the first Western defeat in the global war on terrorism. The implications of such a defeat would be far reaching, and could substantially undermine the positive reverberations from victories in Afghanistan and (potentially) Iraq. In some ways, Arafat represents the greatest threat to the war on terrorism, because he has the best chance of poking a gaping hole in the Bush Doctrine. jpost.com

To: SirRealist who wrote (14655)	12/24/2001 7:48:25 PM
From: tekboy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Are there any indications that our leaders are following this course? none whatsoever--and don't expect them to... a subtitle for the Indyk piece might have been "do as I say, not as I did." The odds are, however, that the Bush administration will do as its predecessors did, and for similar reasons. Accepting short-term losses for potential long-term gains is difficult, and rarely favored by those in power. :0) tb@welcometotheworkingweek.com

To: SirRealist who wrote (14655)	12/24/2001 7:56:43 PM
From: dvdw©	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Dont agree at All, Indyks piece never mentions personal liberty, it's all more of the same devolutionary thinking that empowers the few as elites over the many. The US Constitution is the only Revolutionary historical document in two thousand years. Everything since, is a taking away, that places more power in the hands of the few. When was the first time you heard, current world leaders, placing their faith in the providence & practice of their own populations as free men and women? Liberty and the degree of it active in a society is the sole arbiter of progress. There is no solution, nor will there be improvements in the lives of the globalized citizens without Liberty as a catlyst to what comes after. Look right now at Japan, the homogenaity of that society breeds a hegemony over the population which is slowly devolving the entire country. This is the model many in the US state department and our government wish to take. Oligarchic institutions, be they labor, corporate or religious institutions, seem to be the driving force behind globalization, where our choices are relegated to the few,and powerful, mobility dictated by the political and expediant whims of a ruling class. The problem with this thinking and it's subsequent momentum is that it does not advance mankind, it devolves it. Liberty remains the sole defining characteristic that lifts an entire society. Until people, and those who would lead them, come to know, that only through the exercise of free thought and action, social coopertion will evolve & flourish. This metaphorical place is where peace & prosperity align to the benefit of all, where belief in respect for ones self, means respecting your neighbor. And only at this destination will we all understand how Obsolete much of the worlds leadership has become.