Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

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

To: Win Smith who wrote (38257)	8/16/2002 11:23:56 PM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

It reads either as if he couldn't make up his mind or was playing to several contradictory audiences at the same time. But the conclusion puts him decisively in Scowcroft's camp, which is not surprising. I've never had much respect for him. Complex mind but the Nixon years were not kind to the US. In the end, however, Iraq policy will be judged by the way the aftermath of military operations is handled politically. Precisely because of the precedent-setting nature of this war, its outcome will determine the way American actions will be viewed internationally far more than the way we entered it. And we may find many more nations willing to cooperate in reconstruction than in warfare if only because no country wants to see an exclusive position for America in a region so central to energy supplies and international stability. Military intervention should be attempted only if we are willing to sustain a reconstruction effort for however long it is needed. It is not in the American national interest to establish pre- emption as a universal principle available to every nation. Whatever the views regarding Iraq, the nations of the world must face the impossibility of letting such a process run unchecked. The United States would contribute much to a new international order if it invited the rest of the world, and especially the major nuclear powers, to cooperate in creating a system to deal with this challenge to humanity on a more institutional basis.