Equilibrium

Nixon was a true anithesis in American foreign policy. Rather than pursue ideoogical foreing policies that had got the US involved in Vietnam, he believed in basing US foreign policy in the national interest.

As an example of US inconsistency, during the Indo-Pakistani war, his policy of "tilting" to wards Pakistan was undermined by Senator Henry Jackson, a traditional and very influential Democratic Senator who criticised Nixon for supporting totalitarian Pakistan against democratic India and witheld much funding for US operations in the region at the time. he also undermined the detente policy fo the Nixon and Ford Administrations by demanding humanitarian conditions to be linked to military and political agreements for example, linking Soviet emigration quotas of Jews to Strategic Arms Limitation Talks and compromising several US- Soviet agreements that resulted in failure.

Hussein did not realize that while he had nothing to do with the events of September 11, 2001 the Bush Administration saw him as part of a larger metaphysical problem that produced such incidents. That is why he believed according to his debriefing by US and allied officials that a limited strike was inevitable like in the previous decade, but not a full invasion with regime change as the goal.

As an avid follower of Indian foriegn policy, I can appreciate the strategic challenges India has faced almost since its independence. While terrorism has been a fact of life for India for almost 30 years, September 11, 2001 was the first time such a reality had presented itself to the US. As I mentioned previously, our idealistic tendencies coupled with our masive power and influence led us to declare a "War On Terror" as if winning a war against a tactic would end its use forever. This in my opinion is a shining example of idealism and naivete.

beka

See this is what I don't get. Saddam for all of his issues was not an Islamo facist. He's a secularist. I'm not sure why invading a Baathist country is in our best interests...It seems like the only thing we did was actually Encourage religious fundamentalism in Iraq...That's why I don't understand the need to go after Saddam or Syria. Yes, Saddam was wrong in the Iraq war, but you would think that after September 11, the US wouldn't be attacking Secular Muslim countries.

FullTank

Thats not right. Saddams killing of Shia muslims is well documented.

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Saddam Hussein formally charged

Thats not secular.

And the killing of Kurdis makes him what besides a murderer? a racist at the minimum?

Adux

Beka,

Saddam wasnt anything of that sort, but there were even worse people in middle east and south asia, Instead of going after them, we went after the small fish. Saddam was never an ally, and never can be. But then again if you can have Saudi arabia and Pakistan, makes you think?

Deltacamelately

Agreed..but he couldn't stop the Enterprise from entering Bay of Bengal, an unneccassary scar on the Indian psyche that pushed them closer to the Soviet Bloc, making them suspicious of even the noblest US moves.
Whenever I have said this, Col Sir always had a one liner for me....
"Geo-Politics". Period

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I am the DARK that Rise to Kill..And Soar to Redeem!

beka

Um...I never said that Saddam was a nice guy, but I might be wrong but it seemed to me like some of his killing of the Shia and the Kurds were do to the fact that they were rebelling against him... And not so much because Saddam wanted to install Sharia law...

In that area historically, strong men have kept the opposings factions together by force. It's politics as usually in the Middle East. Hopefully that will change, but the whole issue with Saddam needs to be taken in that context. And yeah he favored the Sunnis, but a Christian was his second in command. In fact the Baathist party was started by a CHRISTIAN. I don't think I ever called Saddam a nice, wonderful guy.
I don't think Saddam could be an ally at all. My point though was that the thing to fear was what would happen after Saddam left. And yes what would happen if Iraq was given democracy. Would ethnic strife happen, would the Shia (with their votes) go towards a close relationship with Iran... My point wasn't so much that Saddam is this great and wonderful guy. My point was that in the case of the War on Terror and Islamo facism, they keep on talking about, there was the possibility of far worse regimes developing than Saddam in Iraq. \

JAD_333

The reason you don't get it is that it that the premise is wrong. We didn't go into Iraq simply to rid the world of a vile dictator. Toppling Saddam was the popular justification for inserting ourselves smack in the middle of the ME from where we could deal better with a geopolitical threat represented by a long string of acts of terrorism against us.

You cite the usual counter-argument, that our presense has only encouraged Islamic fundamentalists. That's putting the cart before the horse. We didn't dream up the threat. The 'soldiers' of fundamentalism already existed. We had been their targets for a long time before 9/11. After 9/11 we moved the lightening rod from our embassies and homeland into their neighborhood where we're more inviting targets precisely so we could shoot back.

Keeping hands off secular ME regimes makes sense in general. But Iraq wasn't truly Baathist; it was Saddamistic. In any case, for the US, strategically, it is an area of the globe between the two major supporters of terrorism in the ME, Iran and Syria. Our being there complicates their goals no end.

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To be Truly ignorant, Man requires an Education. (Plato)

gamercube

Finally a honest and sensible answer. That makes much more sense even to us non-Americans (we still may not agree with it, but at least it indicates a logical thought process) than all the ridiculous excuses that have been thrown out like WMDs, Saddam-Al Qaeda nexus etc. Thank you for your honest answer.

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Hasta la Victoria siempre!

JAD_333

S-2

Your thinking is narrow. WMD WAS an issue of relevance. The Duelfer Report makes clear the existance of programs and Saddam's intentions to continue. His past willingness to use such weapons is documented. That is now an absolute non-issue for Iraq henceforth. So too the persecution of Kurds and shias by the baathists. So too Iraqi irredentism, twice demonstrated against Iran and Kuwait.

These reasons in addition to establishing a democratic arab nation and our conveniently nestled presence between Syria and Iran possess objectives of great nat'l value to America.

For a modest cost, we've accomplished a lot. Most of all, we've inexorably altered the prevailing paradigm of the middle east. The apple cart has been tipped and the dynamics are utterly changed. As previously conceived, they could no longer be tolerated.

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"This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski

beka

I get your point. But here's my deal . We first of all already have bases in the Middle East in Saudia Arabia, (don't we in Egypt as well). So why did we need one more base...

Besides it seems to me that this is far more about Israel's enemies than it is ours. Yes, Saddam sponsored Palestinian terrorism in Israel, as does Iran and Syria. (Along with Iran and Syria helping out Hezbollah.) But once again, quite frankly Hezbollah wasn't going after America. Yes they bombed our troops, but that was when we were in Lebanon. Once we left Lebanon, Hezbollah LEFT us alone. In fact there are reports that the head of Hezbollah I believe actually condemned 9/11, and said what the heck does the people in New York have to do with the Middle East...

The point I'm making is that if we stayed ouf of their issues with Israel, those specific groups would and HAVE left us a long. I basically look at the whole Palestinian/Israel conflict as a basic civil war. And the Israelis are hardly innocent in what's going on there...

I understand our issues with Iran, and I understand why Hezbollah isn't to popular with us. But Syria. Syria is a country that can be dealt with, they are not Islamic Facists, once again. For example they dealt very strongly with the Muslim Brotherhood.

It seems to me we would be much better served going after the terrorist groups that killed AMERICAN's, and sending a message there. Those terrorists were located in Afghanstan and Pakistan, mainly. NOT Iraq.

And I never bought the whole we are just going in their to get rid of the dictators.

As for Israel and her issues with the Palestinians. I'm happy to let both sides kill each other, until both are ready to accept peace. Quite frankly, I wish we'd stop arming Israel. I don't feel one bit sorry for Israel because I feel they have created their own mess. Of course I feel sorry for Israeli civilians who get hit by terrorist weapons, but I also feel sorry for the Palestinian civilians who get hit by Israeli weapons, and far more Palestinians are dying than Israelis.

I don't think it's necessarily correct to say that the Palestinian groups like Hamas and then Hezbollah necessarily have dreams of creating a grand Caliph. They mainly just have land issues with Israel. So why fighting this issue for Israel is more important than going after the groups that killed us, I will quite frankly never know.

JAD_333

Whatever bases we have in the ME do not give us the freedom of action that Iraq does. If one of our bases in the Persian Gulf region, for example. was attacked by fundamentalists who then slipped away into the general population, could we go after them? No, the host country would not allow it.

Israel's enemies are our enemies.

Saddam, gave money to families of Palestinian suicide bombers, but did not, as far as I know, sponsor the organizations behind them.

I fail to see the functional difference between terrorism directed at the US and that directed at our allies. If it's goal is to diminish our influence in the region, it is our business when Israel is attacked. We want is to eliminate state sponsored terrorism.

Of course they would like nothing better than for us to pack up and go home. Game, set, match. Our reward is no more 9/11s. Their's is no more Israel. Unrealistic and morally indefensible.

Look, if the Palestinians wanted to sit down with Israel and sincerely negotiate, I have no doubt a workable a two-state solution could be found. But the fact is that a sizeable number of Palestinians are committed to the eradication of Israel and will do all they can to prevent negotiations, and they've succeeded thus far.


Any number of terrorist organizations have offices in Damascus. But I take your point. Syrian middle class is tired of the constant threat of retaliation hanging over its head. Syria may simply evolve into moderate, secular state. But it will be a long time before it is in a position to moderate its position vis a vis Israel.

You're missing the point. The terrorists that killed Americans originally came from Saudi Arabia and other ME countries, not Afghanistan. The Taliban took the fall for refusing to turn OBL's people over to the US. Now they want to get their power back. That essentially is what the fight in Afghanistan is about today. Sure, we continue to look for OBL and AQ. But you have to realize that Islamic radicalism is not localized in any one ME country. It's spread out over all of them in varying degrees.


Fortunately for both sides, you are not in a position to allow that to happen.

JAD_333

The Duelfer Report notwithstanding, WMD's primary relavance was as a pretext for toppling Saddam. Injecting a neutralizing force into the region
was and is the primary objective. The means of doing that is to establish a democratic nation between Syria and Iran.

I wouldn't call 2-3 trillion dollars a modest cost, but a necessary one.

Spot on.

beka

That's crap. The state the Israeli's have offered the Palestinians have no water rights, no control over their air space etc The Israeli's don't really want to negotiate a fair solution, and why should they when we are giving them weapons.

Why is Israeli's enemies our enemies. I don't see us encouraging Britian to bomb away at Ireland becuase some Irish support terrorism. This is an issue between the Palestinians and the Israelis, and some of it's an issue of Israel's on making. If your going to go in and set up a country where there is a large native population, guess what your going to face resistance, and I don't feel sorry for you if you do.

Quite frankly, I'm not sure what our alliance with Israel has given us, oh right what they did to the US Liberty, and people who were there says that Israel did it deliberately. The Israelis are using us.

Here is an article about the US liberty from the Chicago Tribune which talks about new documents that have been released and interviews Survivors. The Survivors also mention that the ship had 3 US flags on it, so how they couldnt' see three US flags, no one knows.

New revelations in attack on American spy ship -- chicagotribune.com

I want to point ought that I don't really consider Israel any better or worse than any other country. The United States did some pretty terrible things to blacks and our Native Americans. I'm just pointing out that Israel always goes for her interests, it's time the US starts putting our own interests above Israel.

Equilibrium

At the time, it seemed to the Nixon Administration that the invasion of East Pakistan was an attempt to severly cripple Pakistan- a critical US ally in South Asia at the time- or a prelude to a final showdown to destabilize all of West Pakistan with Soviet support.

At the time, the Nixon Administration believed that if Pakistan went down the drain with the US standing by it would affect the rapprochement with China by demonstrating to Mao that in moments of crisis, especially with the Soviet Union or Soviet aligned (as it seemd) India, that the US could not be depended upon to fulfill its obligations to its allies.