Category: War – Peace – Foreign Affairs

Someone Who Understands

Unlike a hermetically sealed “strategic planner” who can bring a perfect world into being by imagining it, Mike Rappaport of The Right Coast actually understands the world:

Many people…have argued that Bush has been running the Wars on Terror and in Iraq incompetently and support Kerry on that basis. But what about the War in Afghanistan? The Bush Administration has been tremendously successful there, defeating the Taliban, forcing Pakistan to become an ally, and instituting the beginnings of democracy. See here.

If Bush is so incompetent, how has he been able to pull off these feats? Of course, it is sometimes said that Afghanistan was easy, but that is not how it was initially perceived. After all, war in Afghanistan had defeated the Soviets.

The Bush critics are selective in their focus. Here is my explanation for the success in Afghanistan and the relative difficulty in Iraq….Terrorists from other countries have chosen to focus on Iraq, so the job [t]here is much harder. Moreover, the difficulty in fighting such terrorists cannot solely or easily be attributed to the incompetence of the Bush Administration. The Israelis, who are experienced at this and are hardly incompetent, also have a difficult time fighting terrorists (in their own country). If the Israelis have a hard time and cannot easily stop terror, the critics of the Bush Administration expect too much.

It is not that the Bush Administration has not made mistakes. Of course it has. But it is important to recognize that this is a new type of war for the US and mistakes were inevitable. It is unrealistic to expect an Administration to display the competence of Kerry’s (or Andrew Sullivan’s) hindsight.

Can He Be Serious?

Thomas P.M. Barnett — self-styled strategic planner — has reacted to the latest bin Laden tape by posting this:

Not so much a warning as yet another offer of civilizational apartheid. Last spring Osama told Europeans they had 90 days to leave the Middle East or he promised to have all of them still there killed–one by one. This time he sounds a far softer note, in effect telling Americans it doesn’t matter who wins the election, there will be no peace until America “respects” the security of Muslim states in the region: “Any state that does not mess with our security, has naturally guaranteed its own security.”…

Take Osama’s offer, America. In your heart, you know he’s right . . . about us. We’re a selfish, greedy country, full of guns and self-hating polemicists. We’re not built for this long-haul conflict. We just got lucky on the Cold War because it was led by the Greatest Generation. We don’t have that leadership now because we don’t want that leadership now. Bush is the most polarizing president in anyone’s memory, beginning to eclipse Nixon with this campaign. Neither he nor Kerry could ever hope to rule over anything but a severely divided and self-doubting nation after this election.

Take Osama’s offer, America. Let the self-healing truly begin.

Is he serious? Perhaps. There’s this:

If Kerry wins, it’ll be put up or shut up on Iraq, and most European experts expect a booming silence from the Old Continent come 3 November if winner Kerry starts speed-dialing his chums across the pond.

I think the last prognosis is a bit gloomy, reelecting the European tendency to want to weasel out of any difficult job as quickly as possible (but understanding their reticence on this one because it’s completely our doing). I don’t think Europe stonewalls Kerry because it really would create a backlash–hence the depressive fear of a Kerry win (Mon Dieu! Now we must actually help the Americans!).

Plus, I don’t think the price tag the Europeans assume will be so hard for us to meet will actually be that hard to meet. Here’s the list from the editor of Die Zeit, the hugely influential German paper:

(1) After Abu Ghraib, we have to promise to the world that we’ll be more careful in following the Geneva Conventions [Hell, I’ll throw in an apology if they’d like]

(2) That we work to dramatically reduce our own nuclear stockpile at home and not just tell others to stay away from WMD [Wow, that one would be really hard, wouldn’t it?]

(3) That we enter into serious discussions on how to fix Kyoto [Easy, get India and China into the treaty]

(4) “a return to a less arrogant tone of conversation” [Again, not exactly stressing]

That’s it! That’s the entire list to get Europe to come to the aid of the US in Iraq!

Tell me any of those is hard for Kerry, then tell me Bush is capable of making any of them happen.

And this:

…My point is this: the strategic despair is on our side (our troops decry: “My God, there’s too many of them to kill, we’ll never get the job done!”), when it should be on our opponents’ side (“My Allah, there’s too many of them to kill, we’ll never get the job done!”). So guess who’s talking about pullout and who’s talking about jacking up the effort?

The only way we effectively jack up the effort is to internationalize the military occupation force dramatically, plussing up our total numbers hugely. That’s how we’ll create strategic despair on their side: filling our ranks with New Core troops who have a long and bloody history of killing Muslims. We can generate that strategic despair in the minds of the terrorists fielding a team of almost exclusively European-descent countries. We need to change the occidental skin tone of this force and fast. Otherwise the terrorists think all they need do is wait out the Americans just like they waited out the Sovs in Afghanistan.

Any other talk of getting more aggressive in Iraq is complete bullshit. Ask any knowledgeable military officer who’s been there: there is no military solution to this situation—only a political one.

The question of this election is—therefore—who will get you that solution fastest and at the lowest cost? A nuanced and deal-cutting Kerry or the steadfast and full-of-certitude Bush?

That may well be the choice between winning and losing in Iraq.

And this:

…Here’s the interesting conclusion on foreign policy from these two*: they see the neocons as being a spent force, so the real question for Bush II is who rules the roost: the social conservatives or the anti-gov types?

My point is this: either way it goes, this administration will be sorely restricted in its ability to continue this global war on terrorism. That’s why I know Kerry will do better: not just the change in his tone, but the leeway offered within his party.

There’s a brilliant, all-knowing “strategic” planner for you. The world and its workings can be explained in glib, assured — if defeatist — tones. Barnett must be hoping for a slot in a Kerry administration,** so that he can wave his magic wand and transform the world into a place where Americans are beloved by Euro-snobs and Islamofascists. It’s all so easy to do — just surrender.

__________

* “‘Bushism’: This president has remade the politics of the right,” op-ed by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge, Wall Street Journal, 27 October 2004, p. A16.

** Or as a script writer for “The West Wing” — where every problem, no matter how complex or irrelvant to the legitimate functions of government, can be solved in an hour (including commercials) by wise, all-knowing, all-seeing President Bartlett and his merry band of genii.

Osama Parrots Michael Moore

In the newly released videotape bin Laden also says (via Drudge):

[W]e never thought that the high commander of the US armies would leave 50 thousand of his citizens in both towers to face the horrors by themselves when they most needed him because it seemed to distract his attention from listening to the girl telling him about her goat butting was more important than paying attention to airplanes butting the towers which gave us three times the time to execute the operation thank god.

What was Bush supposed to do, don his Superman outfit, fly instantly to Metropolis, and perch all 50,000 (?) citizens on his shoulders? Or was he supposed to start barking orders left and right, without detailed knowledge of events on the ground and in the air? By the time he had learned all there was to know, it would have been too late to start giving orders.

In this country, we don’t wait for Allah or Premier Stalin to tell us what to do. We rely on free individuals and institutions to do the best they can do with the resources at their disposal.* That concept seems to be beyond the ken of religious and irreligious fanatics like bin Laden and Moore.

__________

* If the FAA and armed forces of the United States were less prepared for 9/11 than they might have been, the blame rests with Clinton as much as anyone. What was he doing on the morning of 9/11, and with whom was he doing it?

Bin Laden Threatens SUV Owners

That’s one of the implications of the newly released videotape made by bin Laden (or an actor), somewhere, sometime since the Dems nominated Kerry. Via Drudge, bin Laden says:

Your security is not in the hands of Kerry or Bush or Al Qaeda. Your security is in your hands. Each state that doesn’t mess with our security has automatically secured their security.

In other words, America should get out of the oil-pumping lands of the Middle East and al Qaida will leave America alone.

I’m sure there are many left-leaners and pseudo-pacifists out there who 1) are ready to believe bin Laden and 2) ready to do the deal. Before they consider it seriously, however, they ought to think of what would happen to the price of oil and the state of the U.S. economy if we were simply to abandon the Middle East to bin Laden and his thugs.

Hundred of billions for defense, not one cent for tribute.

Al Qaeda’s Candidate…

…isn’t Bush:

No, my fellow countrymen you are guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty. You are as guilty as Bush and Cheney. You’re as guilty as Rumsfeld and Ashcroft and Powell. After decades of American tyranny and oppression, now it’s your turn to die. Allah willing, the streets of America will run red with blood matching drop for drop the blood of America’s victims. [al Qaeda operative “Azzam the American”, via ABC News]

So it must be Kerry.

Peace in Our Time?

The European Union — an idea whose time has come and gone — is about to become as permanent as a modern marriage, with the signing of the EU constitution. Here’s the story from BBC News:

Heads of state from across the EU will be in Rome for the ceremony, to be held in the same room where Treaty of Rome was signed to establish the EU in 1957.

The ceremony will be held amid a row about the views of prospective Italian EU commissioner Rocco Buttiglione.

Incoming President Jose Manuel Barroso has withdrawn his entire proposed team and has hinted he may make changes….

A squadron of F-16 fighters is expected to enforce a no-fly zone over the city centre for the duration of the ceremony….

On Thursday Mr Barroso said he is considering making a number of changes to the commission, despite controversy focussing on Mr Buttiglione.

The Italian, a devout Catholic, has been widely scorned by MEPs unhappy at his views on a range of issues, including homosexuality and the role of women in society….

Although the constitution will be signed in Rome on Friday, member nations still have to ratify the document individually before it comes into effect.

Some clauses within the constitution have caused divisions in EU states, notably plans for an EU president and a change in voting systems.

Member states can choose to hold a referendum in order to ratify the treaty or to put the issue to a parliamentary vote.

A number of countries have chosen to hold a public vote, with the first scheduled for Spain in February 2005.

The memory of World War II — the impetus for the EU — was vivid at the EU’s inception in 1957. But thanks to Europe’s American-engineered peace and prosperity, a European war has become as likely as an outbreak of laissez-faire capitalism in France. The merger of European countries is no longer necessary to the future peace and prosperity of Europe, but the formalization of the EU will proceed because of pressure from the bureaucrats and politicians who stand to benefit from it.

I predict that the EU will dissolve — in fact if not in law — within 20 years. Moreover, I won’t be surprised if the union is dissolved by intra-EU disputes that lead to a European “civil war”. That would be the ultimate, tragic irony of Europe’s misguided attempt to secure a lasting internecine peace through an arranged marriage of incompatible partners.

The Ketchup Lady’s Twisted Logic

THK sez:

The perpetration of certain myths that diplomacy and alliances are a sign of weakness is Neanderthal. I never heard of teaching a child to make enemies so they can get along in the playground.

And I never heard of teaching a child to believe that someone who lies to him or betrays his trust is an ally. But I didn’t have the advantage of Ms. H-K’s “liberal” education.

Killing Two Birds…

…with one story, from The Washington Times:

Russian special forces troops moved many of Saddam Hussein’s weapons and related goods out of Iraq and into Syria in the weeks before the March 2003 U.S. military operation, The Washington Times has learned….

So much for Russia. So much for Kerry and the Democrat defeat-mongers.

Next.

Getting It All Wrong about the Risk of Terrorism

UPDATED



Gene Healy points approvingly to an article in Cato’s Regulation magazine about the risks of terrorism. According to Healy, the author of the article (one John Mueller)

collects the known knowns and the known unknowns about how much sleep we ought to be losing about dying in a terrorist attack. Mueller’s answer: not much. And we ought to spend more time worrying about the risks of overreaction.

Healy then quotes Mueller:

Until 2001, far fewer Americans were killed in any grouping of years by all forms of international terrorism than were killed by lightning, and almost none of those terrorist deaths occurred within the United States itself. Even with the September 11 attacks included in the count, the number of Americans killed by international terrorism since the late 1960s (which is when the State Department began counting) is about the same as the number of Americans killed over the same period by lightning, accident-causing deer, or severe allergic reaction to peanuts….

Although there have been many deadly terrorist incidents in the world since 2001, all (thus far, at least) have relied on conventional methods and have not remotely challenged September 11 quantitatively. If, as some purported experts repeatedly claim, chemical and biological attacks are so easy and attractive to terrorists, it is impressive that none have so far been used in Israel (where four times as many people die from automobile accidents as from terrorism)….

Accordingly, it would seem to be reasonable for those in charge of our safety to inform the public about how many airliners would have to crash before flying becomes as dangerous as driving the same distance in an automobile. It turns out that someone has made that calculation: University of Michigan transportation researchers Michael Sivak and Michael Flannagan, in an article last year in American Scientist, wrote that they determined there would have to be one set of September 11 crashes a month for the risks to balance out. More generally, they calculate that an American’s chance of being killed in one nonstop airline flight is about one in 13 million (even taking the September 11 crashes into account). To reach that same level of risk when driving on America’s safest roads–rural interstate highways–one would have to travel a mere 11.2 miles….

Why do we “seem” to be relatively safe from terrorism? Might it have something to do with diligent counter-terrorist activities since 9/11 — both here and abroad — such as rounding up a lot of illegal aliens and holding them indefinitely?

Does the record of domestic safety from terrorism since 9/11 mean that we’re out of the woods? By no means. Eight years elapsed between the first and second attacks on the World Trade Center. We made the mistake of letting down our guard after the first attack, which is why the second attack was successful — and catastrophic. Who knows what will happen next? Recent history proves that it’s idiotic to say that something is unlikely to happen because it hasn’t happened yet — which is precisely what Mueller is trying to say.

It’s similarly idiotic to compare the risk of terrorism to such activities as driving a car or flying on a schedule airlines. Terrorism isn’t a substitute for those activities — it’s an independent, unrelated act. Terrorism isn’t an accident with a fairly predictable probability of occurring. It’s a deliberate act committed by implacable enemies, against whom we must be on guard at all times. Being on guard isn’t hysteria — as Mueller would have it — it’s prudence.

If I were still the managing editor of Regulation, I would have resigned rather than abet the publication of Mueller’s fatuous analysis.

UPDATE:

Tom W. Bell at Agoraphilia has more to say; for example:

…Suppose that because devastating tornados strike your hometown only rarely, your $500,000 house faces a 1/5,000,000 chance of destruction by high winds each year. Although you could prevent that threat by extraordinary measures, such as building a concrete box around your house, you rationally calculate that you should spend no more than a dime a year on tornado protection ($500,000/5,000,000). Suppose further that your hometown faces a 1/5,000,000 chance each year of being devastated by a nomadic warrior tribe. Unlike tornados, however, nomads respond to incentives. Following one such raid, you might happily pay more than a dime towards your town’s Marauding Hoard Smackdown fund. You calculate that the temporary expense of chasing down and punishing the nomads will teach them a hard lesson, convincing them to take your town off their “to sack” list. The risk of further such attacks will thereafter drop, repaying your defense investment with future security….

I’m truly surprised that Peter VanDoren, the editor of Regulation, let Mueller’s shoddy analysis slip into the pages of his journal.

Just As Effective as Peace Negotiations

From an AP story:

Despite gaining their freedom by signing pledges to renounce violence, at least seven former prisoners of the United States at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have returned to terrorism, at times with deadly consequences.

Why waste the paper on “pledges”? We should know by now what they’re worth — especially peace pledges extracted by Jimmy (the Dupe) Carter.

War Can Be the Answer

“Israel proves there is a military solution to terrorism.” That’s the subhead on a piece at OpinionJournal by Bret Stephens (easy registration required). Some excerpts:

…[F]or most Israelis, and for many Palestinians too, the violence of the intifada–which entered its fifth year this month–seems to be in recession. Anyone who visits Jerusalem today will not see the ghost town it was in 2002, when Israel was absorbing an average of one suicide bombing a week. And anyone who visits Ramallah will find what is, by (non-Gulf state) Arab standards, a calm and economically prospering city, where the only Israeli-made ruin is the Palestinian Authority headquarters, deliberately kept that way as a monument of Arafatian agitprop.

How did things improve so dramatically, and so quickly, for Palestinians and Israelis alike? Begin by recalling Israel’s assassination, in late March, of Hamas spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. At the time, the action was all but universally condemned as reckless and counterproductive. “By granting Yassin the martyrdom he craved, the Israelis have provided a motive for new suicide attacks,” went an editorial in the normally pro-Israel Daily Telegraph of London. “More young Palestinians will fall in love with death, and more Israeli civilians will die with them.”

Yet what followed for Israel were nearly six consecutive terror-free months. This wasn’t because the Palestinian terror groups lacked for motivation to carry out attacks. It was because they lacked for means. The leaders of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Yasser Arafat’s own al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades had to spend their time figuring out how to survive, not on planning fresh attacks. The Israeli army incarcerated terror suspects in record numbers–some 6,000 now sit in Israeli prisons–which in turn helped yield information for future arrests. Most importantly, the security fence has begun to make the Israeli heartland nearly impenetrable to Palestinian infiltrators. (August’s double suicide bombing in Beersheba happened precisely because there is still no security fence separating that town from the Palestinian city of Hebron, from where the bombers were dispatched.)

Taken together, these measures prove what a legion of diplomats, pundits and reporters have striven to deny: that there is a military solution to the conflict….

As for Israel, these past four years have also brought its share of lessons. Tactically, Israeli security forces learned, after a shaky start, how to suppress a massive terrorist-guerrilla insurgency, a remarkable accomplishment U.S. military planners would do well to study. Strategically, a majority of Israelis concluded that while peace with this generation of Palestinian leaders is impossible, separation from them is essential. And morally, Israel learned that even the most fractious democracy can stand up to a prolonged terrorist assault, and choose not to yield.

It’s a choice made easier when you know there is no alternative.

We have no alternative, either. Let us hope that Americans — who feel more secure than Israelis — can grasp the lessons that flow from Israel’s experience.

None Dare Call It Terrorism?

Why do the media — and even the military in Iraq — insist on dignifying terrorism by calling it insurgency. Latest case in point, from the Times:

We’ve Seen the Enemy and They Are … Who, Exactly?

By EDWARD WONG

Published: October 17, 2004

BAGHDAD — To hear the American commanders in Iraq tell it, William Butler Yeats could well be the poet laureate of Iraq’s insurgency. If the guerrillas were to win this war with their suicide car bombs and televised beheadings, what would come next? Nothing, the commanders say, but a widening gyre, and things falling apart, and, finally, mere anarchy being loosed in the cradle of civilization.

“This is a negative insurgency,” Brig. Gen. Erwin Lessel, deputy director of operations for the multinational forces, said in an interview inside the fortified American headquarters here, near where two powerful bombs killed five people on Thursday and left the Americans bracing for more mayhem at the start of the holy month of Ramadan. “Unlike a classical insurgency, these groups don’t offer anything.”

“They’ve got differing goals, competing ideologies,” he continued, “and don’t offer anything positive for the government.”…

That’s because they’re g**d***** terrorists — nothing more. Let’s start calling a hand-held excavating tool a spade.

This Is Disturbing News from Iraq

What I don’t know is whether it’s disturbing news about the chain of command or about the unit that refused to conduct a mission:

Unit That Refused Iraq Duty Said Released

Sat Oct 16, 7:46 PM ET

By REBECCA YONKER, Associated Press Writer

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The grandfather of an Army Reserve soldier whose platoon refused to deliver supplies in Iraq said his grandson told him Saturday that he and other soldiers had been detained by military authorities but were later released. Meanwhile, military officials said commanders reassigned five members of the unit.

Some in the platoon had told relatives they refused to deliver tainted helicopter fuel in poorly maintained vehicles by traveling a dangerous supply route without an armed escort.

The Army is investigating up to 19 members of the platoon, which is part of the 343rd Quartermaster Company based in Rock Hill, S.C. The unit delivers food, water and fuel on trucks in combat zones. A criminal inquiry was expected….

A coalition spokesman in Baghdad said “a small number of the soldiers involved chose to express their concerns in an inappropriate manner, causing a temporary breakdown in discipline.”…

On Wednesday, 19 members of the platoon did not show up for a scheduled 7 a.m. meeting in Tallil, in southeastern Iraq, to prepare for the fuel convoy’s departure a few hours later, a military statement said.

The mission was carried out by other soldiers from the 343rd, which has at least 120 soldiers, the military said….

Stay tuned. This one is going to be demagogued, left and right, regardless of the truth of the matter.

But I do wonder how the mission could be carried out be other soldiers if it was a suicide mission.

For Libertarian Hawks

Tim Sandefur at Freespace skewers the (eponymous?) Libertarian Jackass:

The Ass is one of these Doughface Libertarians who believe that the only time the military should engage in anything is when the enemy is marching through the streets of Los Angeles (even then he would most likely accuse America of having instigated the attack by daring to refuel its Air Force planes over the Indian Ocean.)

Read the whole thing.

Who Said That?

The French are arrogant, rude and surly to foreign visitors, according to Bernard Plasait, a member of France’s upper house of parliament (from The Washington Times). The first paragraph of Plasait’s government-commissioned report reads thus:

Our bad image in this area, the arrogance we are accused of, our refusal to speak foreign languages, the sense we give that it’s a great honor to visit us are among the ugly facts of which we should not be proud.

Isn’t self-awareness the first step on the road to recovery from an addiction? It will take a lot more than twelve steps to overcome France’s addiction to its utterly delusional sense of importance.

(Thanks to my son for the tip.)

Spanish Schizophrenia

I guess Spain is still having a hard time deciding whether to be communist or fascist. BBC News reports:

Spain drops US troops from parade

Spain’s annual military parade has taken place in the capital Madrid to celebrate the country’s National Day.

The event has been overshadowed by controversy after the government left US troops out of the parade, and invited French soldiers instead….

Many Spaniards say they are furious about the inclusion of veterans who fought for Spain’s former military dictator, General Franco, alongside the Nazis in World War II….

Just think of the furore on the American left if Spain’s previous, moderate, government had invited fascists to the parade. I guess it’s okay if communists — er, socialists — do it.

The Will to Win

Arthur Chrenkoff reminds us why the will to win is all-important:

I’m currently reading Mark W Woodruff’s “Unheralded Victory: Who won the Vietnam War?”. Highly recommended for history and military buffs, this book makes it painfully clear that the American forces, together with South Vietnamese army and other allies…convincingly won every military engagement of the war,…in the process almost completely destroying Viet Cong and inflicting staggering casualties on the North Vietnamese Army….

…In Vietnam, for over 50 thousand Americans killed in action, 1.1 million North Vietnamese troops perished in fighting, the deadly ratio of some 20:1. This is quite similar to another American defeat, Mogadishu in 1993, where the engagement immortalised in “Black Hawk Down” cost the lives of less than 20 American soldiers but anywhere between 500 and 1,000 Somalis. Military actions in Iraq, both during the major combat operations phase as well as during significant anti-insurgency operations ever since, have resulted in similar ratios of enemy deaths….

When reading Woodruff’s book I was struck by how much the Vietnam War resembles the current conflict in Iraq – not in the way that the left says it is – a military quagmire – but in the way the left wants to make it so. What we have in both cases is a highly successful military operation conducted under restrictive rules of engagement, resulting in serious defeat of enemy forces but portrayed by the media as an inconclusive stalemate at best, while at the same time the public support for the action is being white-anted by a small but influential section of the elite….

…Let’s hope and pray that this time around the rush to disengage from the “quagmire” will not again live an Asian country at the mercy of the enemies of freedom.

It all comes down to November 2.

Too Gullible for Words

UPDATED

Left and right alike are trying to explain this (from the LA Times, no link because obnoxious registration is required):

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration will delay major assaults on rebel-held cities in Iraq until after U.S. elections in November, say administration officials, mindful that large-scale military offensives could affect the U.S. presidential race.

Although American commanders in Iraq have been buoyed by recent successes in insurgent-held towns such as Samarra and Tall Afar, administration and Pentagon officials say they will not try to retake cities such as Fallujah and Ramadi — where insurgents’ grip is strongest and U.S. military casualties could be the greatest — until after Americans vote in what is likely to be a close election.

“When this election’s over, you’ll see us move very vigorously,” said one senior administration official involved in strategic planning, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“Once you’re past the election, it changes the political ramifications” of a large-scale offensive, the official said. “We’re not on hold right now. We’re just not as aggressive.”

Seems to me we heard something like this just before U.S.-Iraqi forces went into Samarra and seriously kicked butt. It’s called disinformation. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s what’s at work here.

UPDATE:

I told you so. Here’s the AP story, via Yahoo! News:

U.S. Steps Up Attacks on Iraq Insurgents

By ALEXANDRA ZAVIS, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq – U.S. forces stepped up operations Tuesday across a wide swath of the Sunni insurgent strongholds northwest of the capital, pounding targets in two cities from the air and supporting Iraqi troops in raids on mosques suspected of harboring insurgents….

And there’s more, in the story and on the ground in Iraq.

With "Friends" Like France…

…who needed Saddam? Actually, it’s been evident for decades that the government and elite classes of France are unfriendly (to say the least) toward the United States. It all began with de Gaulle’s resentment of his exclusion from the inner circle during World War II, a resentment upon which he acted in the 1960s by withdrawing France from NATO’s military arm and kicking U.S. forces out of France. It’s been more of the same since then.

Now The Washington Times confirms what we’ve suspected about France’s position vis-a-vis Iraq, namely, that Saddam encouraged and rewarded the anti-Americanism of French officials and elites:

Saddam paid off French leaders

By Bill Gertz

THE WASHINGTON TIMES

Saddam Hussein used a U.N. humanitarian program to pay $1.78 billion to French government officials, businessmen and journalists in a bid to have sanctions removed and U.S. policies opposed, according to a CIA report made public yesterday.

The cash was part of $10.9 billion secretly skimmed from the U.N. oil-for-food program, which was used by Iraq to buy military goods, according to a 1,000-page report by the CIA-led Iraqi Survey Group.

According to a section of the report on Iraqi weapons procurement, the survey group identified long-standing ties between Saddam and the French government. One 1992 Iraqi intelligence service report revealed that Iraq’s ambassador to France paid $1 million to the French Socialist Party in 1988.

The CIA report stated that the Iraqi ambassador was instructed to “utilize [the $1 million] to remind French Defense Minister Pierre Joxe indirectly about Iraq’s previous positions toward France, in general, and the French Socialist party, in particular.”

In the late 1990s, Iraq also used an oil-purchasing voucher system through the U.N. oil-for-food program, which began in 1996 and ended in 2003, to influence the French to oppose U.S. initiatives at the United Nations and to work to lift sanctions, the report stated.

The Iraqi Intelligence Service paid off French nationals by dispensing vouchers that allowed the holders to make hundreds of thousands of dollars in commissions by selling them to oil buyers.

The payoffs help explain why the French government, along with Russia and China, opposed U.S. efforts in the United Nations in the months leading up to the March 2003 invasion, U.S. officials said.

Iraqi intelligence agents also targeted French President Jacques Chirac, by giving gifts to a spokesman, two of his aides and two French businessmen, the report said.

One Iraqi intelligence report stated that a French politician assured Saddam in a letter that France would use its veto in the U.N. Security Council against any U.S. effort to attack Iraq.

Iraqi intelligence documents recovered in Iraq showed that the French citizens linked to the influence operation were “ministers and politicians, journalists and business people.”

“These influential individuals often had little prior connection to the oil industry and generally engaged European oil companies to lift the oil, but were still in a position to extract a substantial profit for themselves,” the report said.

Former Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz told the Survey Group that he personally awarded several Frenchmen “substantial” oil allotments.

“According to Aziz, both parties understood that resale of the oil was to be reciprocated through efforts to lift U.N. sanctions or through opposition to American initiatives within the Security Council,” the report said.

The report named former French Interior Minister Charles Pascua as getting a voucher for 11 million barrels of oil, and Patrick Maugein, who received a voucher for 13 million barrels of oil. The report said Mr. Maugein, the chief executive officer of the SOCO oil company, was a “conduit” to Mr. Chirac.

Michel Grimard, the founder of the French-Iraqi Export Club, received a voucher for 5.5 million barrels, and the Iraqi-French Friendship Society received vouchers for more than 10 million barrels.

French oil companies Total and SOCAP were granted vouchers for 105 million and 93 million barrels of oil, respectively.

But France wasn’t alone:

The report stated that Iraq covertly purchased missiles and other military goods from Russia, Belarus, China, North Korea and South Korea.

According to the report, illegal goods used in making weapons of mass destruction were sold to Iraq by companies in Jordan, India, France, Italy, Romania and Turkey.

Conventional arms also were sold to Iraq by China, Jordan, India, South Korea, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Cyprus, Egypt, Lebanon, Georgia, France, Poland, Syria, Belarus, North Korea, Yugoslavia, Yemen, Russia, Romania and the Republic of China (Taiwan).

Then there’s the U.N.:

The report said Saddam’s regime obtained $1.5 billion from U.N. humanitarian contract kickbacks and $228.5 million in surcharges on U.N.-approved oil sales.

Other oil smuggling provided the regime with $8 billion in cash outside of U.N.-approved oil sales, the CIA report reveals.

Where did a lot of the money go? One guess:

Charles Duelfer, the director of the CIA survey group, told a congressional hearing yesterday that a “sizable portion” of Saddam’s cash obtained from the oil-for-food program were diverted to the military, specifically the government-run Military Industrial Commission.

“The funding for this organization, which had responsibility for many of the past [weapons of mass destruction] programs, went from approximately $7.8 million in 1998 to $350 million in 2001,” Mr. Duelfer told the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Mr. Duelfer said that during the period from 1998 to 2001, “many military programs were carried out — including many involving the willing export to Iraq of military items prohibited by the Security Council.”

Tell me again why we should consult with “allies” like France or defer to the United Nations on any issue.

More about Israel, and the Left

I wrote recently and approvingly about Israel’s Gaza offensive. Now, according to an AP story, Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has pledged to escalate a broad Israeli offensive in northern Gaza, saying troops will remain until Palestinian rocket attacks are halted. Sharon’s resolve is sure to invoke more wrath and scorn from the left, which reflexively hates Israel.

Why does the left hate Israel? Richard Baehr of The American Thinker spells it out:

1. It is an easy way to express one’s hatred for America.

2. Israel is viewed as an outpost of colonialism, and an active practitioner of it.

3. Israel is a western nation, and hence can be judged by the left. Israel is not protected by cultural relativism, as the Arabs are.

4. Leftist Christian churches can escape any lingering guilt about the Holocaust, by turning Israel into a villain. Some leftist churches hate Israel because they think this will help protect their members in the holy land — in other words they feel threatened.

5. Ferocious Muslim hatred of Israel and the Jews reinforces the natural cowardice of many on the left who go along with the Muslims to stay out of their line of fire.

6. Jewish leftists are prominent in the anti-Israel movement. This opens the floodgates for everybody else.

7. Israel is attacked because the secular left is appalled by the influence of religious settlers and their biblical connections to the land of Israel, and by the support for Israel by evangelical Christians, and Christian Zionists.

I think there’s a lot of merit in what Baehr says. I’m especially persuaded by the first three points, and the rest seem more than plausible.

Here’s my take: Israel owes its existence and strength, in large part, to the United States, which is Israel’s longtime benefactor. Israel and the United States are natural — if tacit — allies in the war on terror. The left hates America because America isn’t what the left wants it to be. In fact, the left’s hatred for America is so strong and deep that it’s fair to say that the left regards America as its main enemy. Israel — a staunch friend of the left’s main enemy — is therefore the left’s enemy, as well.