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

To: tekboy who wrote (49481)	10/7/2002 1:08:18 PM
From: carranza2	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

I haven't yet bought or read Pollack's book, so I might be entirely off-base here, but I sense a logical problem that requires discussion. Assuming that invasion is needed because the danger of the threat posed by Saddam is one that can't be tolerated, then, logically, it is of sufficient magnitude such that post-Saddam nation-building considerations should carry a lesser weight. Otherwise, the calculus is skewed. Does Pollack envision a post-Saddam Middle East which is actually more dangerous than one in which the status quo is tolerable? I haven't read the book, but his squirming suggests that he doesn't. Don't get me wrong, I believe we need to engage in a substantial nation-building process post-Saddam in order to protect our own interests. But if we are unwilling to do so because of economic or other equally good reasons, it seems from a purely logical standpoint that a lack of planning with respect to to nation-build after Saddam is gone is not necessarily an insurmountble obstacle to invasion. There may be of course other considerations.

To: tekboy who wrote (49481)	10/7/2002 7:22:22 PM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

I think, bottom line, that if you really thought they'd bungle the aftermath, then there's grounds for opposing invasion while still respecting Pollack's arguments, even if he wouldn't necessarily agree... I meant to finish the book on my Texas trip. Didn't. Got too involved in reading a Greg Iles' novel. I assume the reason he argues for the "necessity" of a post invasion reconstruction is the fear of the consequences in the Arab street for regimes such as Jordan, etc. That's on the reading list for Wednesday forward this week. One of the more interesting moments on my Texas trip was to discover that one of my two brothers, the one who is a fairly serious economist at the University of Texas, had read the Kepel book. It's not one you would pick off the Barnes & Nobles book shelves. Turns out he was looking for stuff on these issues, spotted a Harvard University Press publication on the topic, thumbed through it in the bookstore, took it home and then simply read it right through. It was his introduction to "Islamism." That's a tough way to get started.