We’re on our way to Spain for a few days, hoping that the spaniards have figured out a way to stop planes from crashing in Madrid and Malaga. But I didn’t want to leave before muttering a few words about the “new Cold War.”
As so often in these cases, it isn’t new and it isn’t cold. The new “challenge” comes from a strategic alliance involving Russia, Syria and Iran. You can fill in all the empty boxes: from the nuclear program(s) to the desire to be able to strangle the West by getting control over the pipelines, the yearning for the West to kneel before Zod, etc. etc.
If you look at this situation in full context, it’s immediately obvious that it’s very hot, there is a lot of fighting going on (Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia) with more in the offing (Lebanon, Israel, and in all likelihood some terrorist attacks against European targets).
This comes as no surprise to readers of this blog, many of whom have seen it coming for a long time. It is what happens when you ignore Iran for thirty years, and convince yourself that Putin is really a good person. The basic rule is that if you don’t move forcefully and effectively against the smaller threats, all of a sudden you find yourself in a big mess, which is our current plight.
This is not helped at all by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff announcing that we really can’t cope with threats in a “third area,” while it’s actually a single area, and we’ve got plenty of options. I don’t think Secretary Gates has been nearly as effective as he should be, and our various signals–cutting off or cutting back on shipments to Israel, for example, or failure to openly demand a fast track into NATO for Georgia and Ukraine, or moving against the terrorist training camps in Syria and Iran (the former should have been done twenty five years ago, during the Reagan presidency). A lot could, and should have been done politically, but the window for those options is closing. Failure of strategic vision has a very high price, sadly.
So I am unhappy, because the war clouds are right there, shutting down the sunlight that democratic revolution could provide, and I do not see a Western leader who has both the wit to understand it and the will to engage it.
Did the cold war ever end, or did we just allow the communists to have a respite and called it a decade?
Churchill was voted out because he wasn’t needed. Now where’s reagan when we needed him. It’s like Russia waited for him to die before acting again.
I feel like a loyal subject mourning for an old king that shall never return.
When it comes is when you have no idea what you are talking about.
Come on Bill, you really expect us to believe
that this current Georgian regime is at fault; not the Ossetians (the Gamzakurdia
era is something else). You think that Saakashvili his Defense and Foreign Minister;
would have been on vacation, if they were actually going after the Ossetians;unlikely. So the Russians are sending the Kutneznov from Murmansk; shows a real sense of urgency; doesn’t it,Vladivostok, we know why they won’t try to move from Sevastapol; which would really indicate they mean
business. So you think Israel is going to strike Hezbollah or even Iran any time soon; that would seem to be the main argument
Daniel Benjamin; that mossback Clinton apparatchik still raises his head, and doesn’t bring up how this operation; much like the Second Chechen War; does nothing to further anti-Islamist operations in the Pankisi Gorge, or even Chechnya proper. I forgot only Bush gets into quagmires.
Why would the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs disseminate our military capabilities to the whole world? I didn’t see a similar press release from Russia’s millitary leadership.
You are also right to say that those who should understand these matters still don’t realize after all this time that all this fighting is conjoined and all in the same theater of action. They don’t even have a handle on that much of it, which is disturbing.
This Russia problem is the liberal’s fault. If they hadn’t kept making us go to the U.N. a thousand times to kneel before the Russians and beg them not to wield their veto, their heads wouldn’t have gotten so big. They FEEL like a superpower, supercharged with oil money, and they forget that it was us who saved their economy and their currency after the collapse of their empire.
Now I hear that idiotic governments want to abandon NATO. That’s Europe’s and the liberals’ collective fault also. The Europeans proved to the world how hollow they are when they invoked Article 5 then ignored it and refuse send troops to Afghanistan.
We made the Europeans rich, and somehow we’re the enemy. Classic jealousy–this happens in some families also.
If the terrorists who hate the Europeans don’t destroy them, then they will be eaten alive by the bear. The worst part of it is that they themselves don’t even know it. The bear is already gnawing at their legs and they can’t feel it.
One of the best ways to undermine the Russians is to help overthrow the governments of Iran and Syria. A democratic, empowered and free Iran will stand with the rest of the world against the Ruskies and their illegal demands. A free Iran or Syria will help the world greatly.
“So I am unhappy, because the war clouds are right there, shutting down the sunlight that democratic revolution could provide, and I do not see a Western leader who has both the wit to understand it and the will to engage it.”
Maybe by mid to late January there will be a Western leader who has the wit to understand and the will to engage it…..
I cannot agre with Winstom more on what he said above — absolutely right.
Unfortunately, we’ve got a weak and unable lame duck President who has all but let go of the Iran policy rudder into the incompetent hands of Condi Rice & Robert Gates; both mullah-appeasers and too yellow to confront our major enemies in Iran and Syria.
It’s a shame that this Administration should go down in histroy as one of the worst in its pure garbage Iran policy. And where is VP Cheney and Elizabeth Cheney in all this? Unseen, and unheard. The silence is deafening on Iran.
Lastly, throwing Georgia at Russia to consume would have been a good bargain if we could get Iran regime toppled in return and the Rooskies inert about it; but it appears that analysis was wishful thinking. So, back to the sad reality with Iran mullahs firmly in power and getting bolder every day.
Hell, we can’t even use the eager MEK waiting in Iraq for effective assassination and bombing targets inside Iran. Bush has become totally useless and spineless in his last year.
With Biden now aboard, oh God! He is the ultimate mullah-Appeaser with ties to Euro-mullah Khatami. God help us when only a war can save us all!
Addednum: Good Article on Bush & Iran: http://www.forward.com/articles/14051/
Michael,
You obviously have not heard that Iran has to import 5 million tons of US wheat due to failure of the Iranian crop with no other suppliers available.
Their economy is failing and net oil exports declining. If we can keep them from getting the bomb the day will come when we can knock them over with a feather.
The screw up came in 2006 when the Israelis lost their nerve re: Syria. Now we will just have to be patient and hope. Not the best policy but probably the only politically feasible one for now.
Hunger Stalks Iran
Please leave a comment if you have an opinion.