tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1039691356741479566.post-54729496441050327632008-07-31T10:59:00.005+01:002008-07-31T11:23:37.717+01:002008-07-31T11:23:37.717+01:00<div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/07/what_if_iraq_works.html">Victor Davis Hanson</a> with another interesting piece on Iraq and what victory will mean. Also, I like how he tackles the now common argument about how our focus on Iraq has led to trouble elsewhere</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">:</span></span></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 13px; "></span></div></span><blockquote><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 13px; ">For over four years, war critics insisted that we took our eye off Afghanistan, empowered Iran, allowed other rogue nations to run amuck and soured our allies while we were mired in an unnecessary war. But how true is all that?</span><br /></div></span><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 13px; ">The continuing violence in Afghanistan can be largely attributed to Pakistan, whose tribal wild lands serve as a safe haven for Taliban operations across the border. To the extent the war in Iraq has affected Afghanistan, it may well prove to have been positive for the U.S.: Many Afghan and Pakistani jihadists have been killed in Iraq, the war has discredited al-Qaida, and the U.S. military has gained crucial expertise on tribal counterinsurgency.</span><br /></div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 13px; ">Iran in the short-term may have been strengthened by a weakened Iraq, U.S. losses and acrimony over the war. Yet a constitutional Iraq of free Sunnis and Shiites may soon prove as destabilizing to Iran as Iranian subversion once was to Iraq. Nearby American troops, freed from daily fighting in Iraq, should appear to Iran as seasoned rather than exhausted. If Iraq is deemed successful rather than a quagmire, it is also likely that our allies in Europe and the surrounding region will be more likely to pressure Iran.</span><br /></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 13px; ">These shifting realities may explain both the shrill pronouncements emanating from a worried Iran and its desire for diplomatic talks with American representatives.</span><br /></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Other rogue nations -- North Korea, Venezuela, Cuba (not to mention al-Qaida itself) -- also do not, for all their bluster, think that or act like an impotent U.S military is mired in defeat in Iraq.</span></span></span></span></div></blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></span></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 13px; ">Very true...it's funny (more sad, actually) how people get so consumed with trying to blame the war in Iraq for the problems of the entire world.</span><br /></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">And what about the future of Iraq:</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"></div></span></span></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"></span></span></div><blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Meanwhile, surrounding Arab countries may soon strengthen ties with Iraq. After all, military success creates friends as much as defeat loses them. In the past, Iraq's neighbors worried either about Saddam Hussein's aggression or subsequent Shiite/Sunni sectarianism. Now a constitutional Iraq offers them some reassurance that neither Iraqi conventional nor terrorist forces will attack.<br /></span></span></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">None of this means that a secure future for Iraq is certain. After all, there are no constitutional oil-producing states in the Middle East. Instead, we usually see two pathologies: either a state like Iran where petrodollars are recycled to fund terrorist groups and centrifuges, or the Gulf autocracies where vast profits result in artificial islands, indoor ski runs and radical Islamic propaganda.<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Iraq could still degenerate into one of those models. But for now, Iraq -- with an elected government and free press -- is not investing its wealth in subsidizing terrorists outside its borders, spreading abroad fundamentalist madrassas, building centrifuges or allowing a few thousand royal first cousins to squander its oil profits.<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Iraq for the last 20 years was the worst place in the Middle East. The irony is that it may now have the most promising future in the entire region.</span></span></div></span></blockquote><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"></span></span><br /></div></span></span><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Yeah, I wish we could start looking at Iraq with some hope and optimism. President Hope and Change ought to be the champion of that cause...no?</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">Incidentally</span>, for a good example of 'royal cousins' wasting precious petrodollars then look no further. This is from <a href="http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1493291.ece">The Sun</a></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">:</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center; "><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp1.blogger.com/_hB_IOL431Kc/SJGQuEzOE8I/AAAAAAAAAGw/kVS3LPAg_Uo/s1600-h/lamborghini.JPG"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><img src="http://bp1.blogger.com/_hB_IOL431Kc/SJGQuEzOE8I/AAAAAAAAAGw/kVS3LPAg_Uo/s320/lamborghini.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5229119763590812610" style="cursor: pointer; " /></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span></span></span></span><blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; ">A RICH Arab sent his Lamborghini on a 6,500-mile round trip to Britain for a service</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; ">.</span></span></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">The £190,000 supercar was put on a scheduled flight from Qatar to Heathrow – then flown </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">BACK</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> after the oil check.</span></span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 13px; ">The overall cost of sending the Lamborghini to London for the oil change would have cost more than £23,000.</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">His black-and-gold supercar costs £3,552 to service at an approved dealer – on top of the £20,000 to freight from Qatar to Britain.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">The Murciélago LP640 – driven by Batman in movie The Dark Knight – arrived from the Middle Eastern country on Friday.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">It cleared customs and was trucked to specialist mechanics in London for the service.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">On Monday it was flown back 3,250 miles to the oil-rich state where it was collected by the owner.</span></span></div></blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">C</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">razy, sure, but it's a pretty sweet car.</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><br /></span></div></div>Gary Bowmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07654707005519818804noreply@blogger.com0