The surest way to turn people against you is to demand that they do as you say. Like it or not. " You are either with us or against us." That is Bush diplomacy in a nutshell. If you ever had a child you would know that never works. It leads to a rebellious child. Are nations any different?
Sorry, fishin' but I did read the article. My comment still stands.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To me, the impending war is ill-advised for many reasons; most importantly, diplomacy as we know it will be seriously damaged.
Practically, the war will it make America and the world LESS safe, not MORE safe. This war will be played as "western", anti-Muslim imperialism, and that message will sell around the world. Moderates will be more likely recruited by fanatics, and the terrorism movement will be strengthened. Even if we agree that Saddam should go, it should happen internally and/or covertly.
Morally, the US is fooling no one. We are not in this to "free the opressed iraqis". Please. The iraquis have been "opressed" for decades, and that never bothered us enough before, especially when we were in bed with Saddam against the Iranians, or against the russiand in Afghanistan. No one is buying this "we care" BS.
While the practical and moral implications of the impending war are extremely worrisome, it may be that the most significant damage will be to diplomacy as we know it. The Bush administration is, with shocking speed, destroying whatever vehicles the world has worked painstakingly to build post WWII . Yes, these vehicles don't always work perfectly, but they are necessary to prevent complete chaos. As the only superpower still standing, we are in-your-face-ing it to the rest of the world with the "whether you're on board or not, we're going in" attitude. This dismissive, insulting stance will bring nothing but years of resentment. During the cold war, there were two superpowers, and they kept each other in check. The US would never have thought of behaving as it is now. This arrogance will unquestionable come back to haunt us.
----------------------
People all around the world are asking valid questions. Who is America to decide which countries will be permitted to have particular weapons and which wont ? Who is America to dictate which leaders of sovereign countries should be allowed to remain in power, and which should not ?
Is it any wonder that world leaders are upset with this unabashededly arrogant stance ?
This war is a bad idea all around. Bush (IMO) is too limited and narrow-sighted to understand this.
Let's hope the sheer numbers of protesters worldwide jog those around him into a better sense of reality.
nations are as banal as humans.
But Usa's behaviour in Iraq is barbarism pure.
Back to the title of this thread.
none of the A2K members are responsible for this bad prdicament.
