November 2006

Titans square up for clash in Iraq
Signs of a more assertive anti-occupation stance by Iraqi Shi'ites point to a realization that the best way to avert a civil war might be to form common cause with Sunni insurgents. The Shi'ites are thus poised to challenge US power directly, with assistance from Iran, should the US refuse to set a timetable for withdrawing its forces. - Kaveh L Afrasiabi (Nov 30, '06)

Bush holds his course
Far from being accommodating, as many expected President George W Bush to be in the supposed new mood sweeping the corridors of power in Washington, he appears as determined as ever to ignore Baghdad's two key neighbors - Iran and Syria - as long as possible. It doesn't bode well for the Iraq Study Group. - Jim Lobe (Nov 30, '06)

WAR OF THE IMAGINATION, Part 2
The third act in Iraq
The Iraq war is entering its third and final act. Though the plans and ideas now will come apace, all of them directed toward answering the single, dominant question of how the US gets out of Iraq, none of the plans is likely to supply a means of departure that does not carry a very high cost. And it need not have been so. - Mark Danner (Nov 30, '06)

This is the conclusion of a two-part article.

 PART 1: How a war of unbound fantasies happened

The world according to Ahmadinejad
Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad is adept at grabbing the world's attention, as with his latest letter to the American people. But on the home front, his plans for a "new revolution" and for the world to become "Ahmadinejadized" are beginning to rally critics. (Nov 30, '06)

Dog eats dog in fractured Iraq
As the sectarian death toll spirals, a serious divide is emerging among the Shi'ites in Iraq over Iran's influence in the country. At the same time, Ba'athists and al-Qaeda loyalists are trading deadly blows in al-Anbar province. Things can only get worse, as long as Syria and Saudi Arabia remain at odds. The US, meanwhile, is chasing shadows in this labyrinth. - Sami Moubayed (Nov 29, '06)

Australia's warped visions
During his recent visit to Vietnam, Australian Prime Minister John Howard not only endorsed his country's support of the US in Iraq, but also reaffirmed his support for Australian participation in the Vietnam War, which many of his countrymen now view as a moral and strategic mistake. Australia seems doomed to repeat that mistake in Iraq and Afghanistan. - Minh Bui Jones (Nov 29, '06)

Politics and the pontiff in a Muslim land
As Pope Benedict XVI heard the muezzin's airy call to prayer after arriving in the Turkish capital, he may have been hearing the sound of a new Europe. And for the pope, that's a problem, even as he tries to patch up relations between the Vatican and Muslims in a country where he is apparently unwelcome, for political reasons as well as religious. (Nov 29, '06)

WAR OF THE IMAGINATION, Part 1
How a war of unbound fantasies happened
Since the invasion of Iraq, the Bush administration has steadily moved from soaring rhetoric (not to speak of lies and manipulations), and from planet-encompassing dreams of domination, to the most singularly chaotic situation imaginable - with the possibility of worse ahead. - Mark Danner (Nov 29, '06)

THE ROVING EYE
Bury my heart in the Green Zone
With President Mahmud Ahmadinejad hosting his Iraqi counterpart in Iran (minus Syria) and President George W Bush due to meet Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, the scramble for solutions to the Iraqi debacle continues. In the meantime, all options remain open - from a return of the Ba'athists to an attack on the US heart in Iraq, the Green Zone. - Pepe Escobar (Nov 28, '06)

Radical US approach for radical leaders
President Mahmud Ahmadinejad of Iran, Hassan Nasrallah of Lebanon's Hezbollah and Muqtada al-Sadr in Iraq represent a new breed of Shi'ite leader committed to the supremacy of Islam in political systems. They see the US as an obstacle to this. The US, as long as the situation in the Middle East worsens, will have to accommodate these leaders. - Ehsan Ahrari (Nov 28, '06)

The Saudis strike back at Iran
Saudi Arabia views with disquiet the rapid ascendancy of Iranian influence in Iraq, and the Shi'ite claim of political empowerment in the region haunts Riyadh. This latent Saudi-Iranian rivalry is likely to play out in Lebanon, where, unlike Iraq, there is a convergence of Saudi and US interests. - M K Bhadrakumar (Nov 27, '06)

Playing with death in Lebanon
Even though Syria has previously been linked to assassinations in Lebanon, it is difficult to see what Damascus - or Hezbollah - would gain from the killing of Christian leader Pierre Gemayel. The only party that benefits from Gemayel's death is Israel. - Mark LeVine (Nov 27, '06)

SPEAKING FREELY
Rhetoric and reality on Iran
The worst thing the US could do would be to bomb Iran. The better course is to engage constructively with Tehran by bringing to bear a form of capitalism that more closely reflects Islamic values and that will genuinely improve the lives of the Iranian people. - Chris Cook (Nov 27, '06)

Iraq: Kissinger's 'decent interval', take two
The prospect of seeing Henry Kissinger's principles and methods of realpolitik applied to the mess in the Middle East makes one shudder, yet at age 83 he seems determined to recapture former glory - or ignominy. This is the statesman who was able to give South Vietnam to the communists after a "decent interval". In the present Middle East, there's unlikely to be a decent interval to provide the illusion of achieving "peace with honor". - Marc Erikson (Nov 22, '06)

Iraq's fate hanging on a new axis
With two of the original members of the United States' "axis of evil" - Iran and Iraq - joining with another of Washington's pariahs, Syria, a strategic alliance of startling significance is emerging. The catalyst for the new grouping is the realistic fear of the "Iraqization" of Lebanon and the "Lebanonization" of Iraq. The overriding concern, though, is Iraq, which is where the US and the new axis could find common cause. - Kaveh L Afrasiabi (Nov 22, '06)

Iran's defensive posturing 
Iran has just completed its third major military exercise this year. Aimed at delivering a strong external deterrence message, it involved air, land and naval maneuvers spread over 14 of the country's 30 provinces. All very impressive, but just how well defended is the Islamic Republic? - Neda Bolourchi (Nov 22, '06)

BOOK REVIEW
A primer for a transforming West
A Brief Guide to Islam by Paul Grieve
The West has found Islam problematic because recent inflows of Muslim immigrants have failed to assimilate Western culture. But Muslims watch the economic deterioration of the West and see no reason to assimilate; on the contrary, they believe they should be the guides, not the guided. That is why this book, as the West slowly recognizes the inevitable, is valuable. - Dmitry Shlapentokh (Nov 22, '06)

The rise and decline of the neo-cons
Because their agenda is global in scale, US neo-conservatives remain important players - albeit increasingly isolated - within the US foreign policy elite. Understanding the neo-cons and how they achieved their power is critical in divining the course of the world's last remaining superpower. - Jim Lobe and Michael Flynn (Nov 21, '06)

Iraqis rally to under-fire Sunni leader
The Iraqi government has issued an arrest warrant for Harith al-Dhari, a leading Sunni religious leader in exile in Jordan, for inciting terrorism. The move has angered Sunnis and Shi'ites, who see the victimization of Dhari, who has steadfastly opposed the US-led occupation, as further discrediting the government. - Dahr Jamail and Ali al-Fadhily (Nov 21, '06)

SPENGLER
Jihadis and whores
A nation is never really defeated until it sells its women, and Iran is doing that in great numbers, at least abroad and probably within the Islamic Republic as well (thanks to penny-a-marriage mullahs). Prostitution is a form of collective suicide, and indeed, prostitutes are sometimes used as suicide bombers. Trafficking of women and trans-migration of jihadis go hand in hand. (Nov 20, '06)

DISPATCHES FROM AMERICA
The danger of a 'dignified' exit from Iraq
In a Washington of suddenly lowered expectations, the catchword is finding an "exit strategy" for Iraq that will provide the US peace with "dignity". And for that dignity the United States' top movers and shakers (including Daddy's Boys - James Baker and Robert Gates) will monkey around for months creating and implementing plans that will only ensure further catastrophe. - Tom Engelhardt (Nov 20, '06)

CUT AND RUN, Part 1
Fleeing self-destruction is common sense
Disastrous policy is disastrous policy, no matter how long and how shrilly neo-conservatives and their true believers in the Bush administration wish to fantasize otherwise. The US public this month voted for a change of course in Iraq, and such a change is already in the works. It's just a question of how, and how long. - Henry C K Liu (Nov 20, '06)

Iraqi education under siege
Teachers and students in Iraq battle life-threatening chaos just to get to their classrooms, which might just be occupied by a US sniper or a member of a death squad. Then there is the danger of abduction, and even assassination. Nowadays, only 30% of 3.5 million students attend school - down from 100% in pre-invasion days. - Dahr Jamail and Ali al-Fadhily (Nov 20, '06)

EMBRACING THE NETTLES
The US is under increasing pressure to talk to Iran and Syria if it wants to salvage something from the wreckage of Iraq and its broader Middle East policy. This would suit Tehran, even though its influence in Iraq is overstated, as the Iranians are deeply fearful of the sectarian slaughter that is tearing the country apart, writes Mahan Abedin. Damascus, on the other hand, wants something in return for playing peacemaker, but its price might be too high, reports Sami Moubayed. (Nov 17, '06)

 Managing Iraq's collapse - Mahan Abedin

 Syria also wants carrots - Sami Moubayed

Bush is no lame duck for Moscow
On the face of it, the nomination of Robert ("Gorbachev is a fake") Gates as the new US defense secretary, and the specter of harsh Russia critic Tom Lantos heading the Committee on International Relations in the House, are worrying developments for Moscow. But the Russians are far from gloomy. They see opportunities arising from the US political shake up - accession to the World Trade Organization is one, and the coming "multipolar chaos" will provide others. - M K Bhadrakumar (Nov 16, '06)

US goes from imperial offense to defense
The nomination of former CIA director Robert Gates as Pentagon chief signals a momentous shift in America's global posture - from rough-and-tumble imperial offense to defense. This move has little to do with Iraq - that mission is already lost - and a lot to do with Iran. - Michael T Klare (Nov 16, '06)

Some plain truths about Iraq
The US government is conducting endless appraisals of its failed policy in Iraq, independent of the bipartisan Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group. But how many more reviews and commissions will the US need before it faces the ugly possibility that it simply will have to withdraw from Iraq and face the consequences of defeat? - Ehsan Ahrari (Nov 16, '06)

COMMENT
Democrats have no good options on Iraq
The Democrats have the moral weight of the US electorate behind them with regard to Iraq, and the opportunity to eliminate a foreign policy millstone from around the United States' neck. But the best they can do is take the least bad route - immediate withdrawal. And they are unlikely even to do this. - Walden Bello (Nov 15, '06)

Incoherence stymies US's Iran policy
Increasingly, the US seems to be caught between the need for engagement with Tehran on its Iraq quagmire, and its support of Israel, which is beating the drums for war against the "Islamo-fascists" in Iran. Russia remains uncooperative about any serious UN action, while Britain is urging that the US talk with Tehran. - Kaveh L Afrasiabi (Nov 15, '06)

PREPARING FOR A NEW COLD WAR, Part 2
Asymmetric challenge to the US colossus
Inordinate US global dominance exercised in greedy, overly-muscular fashion and a growing determination on the part of the rising East to bring in a more equitable world order are fundamental forces fueling an inevitable neo-Cold War between the East and West. All it will take is a spark, such as over Iran or North Korea, to bring this asymmetric war into the open. - W Joseph Stroupe (Nov 14, '06)
This is the conclusion of a two-part report.

Argentina's Iranian nuke connection
Prosecutors are seeking the arrest of Iranian ex-president Ali Akbar Rafsanjani and six other former top officials for the 1994 bombing of a Buenos Aires Jewish center. The case hinges on Tehran's alleged anger over supposedly terminated nuclear cooperation with Argentina, but a new report indicates serious nuke talks between the two countries were ongoing. The prosecutors' case could bomb. - Gareth Porter (Nov 14, '06)

Maliki on a path to self-destruction
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has promised a major shakeup of his cabinet. This could help matters, provided the posts are filled with officials free of sectarian bias. Ultimately, though, the appalling security situation cannot improve as long as Maliki refuses to tackle militias. - Sami Moubayed (Nov 14, '06)

Another 'axis of evil' candidate
Much has been written about Russia's emerging status as a rival to US global dominance, but Moscow does not want to alienate the US, or Europe, too much. Far less worried about such things is former Soviet republic Belarus, which could have serious implications for the US-Iran standoff. - Dmitry Shlapentokh (Nov 14, '06)

SPENGLER
Halloween came late in Washington
President George W Bush has conjured up the undead in the form of the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group and new defense secretary Robert M Gates. Like all ghosts, they are condemned to reenact the delinquencies of their past lives, and just as they got it hopelessly wrong about the Soviet Union, they will do the same about Iran. (Nov 13, '06)

Iraq calls for bitter medicine
The Democrats are already on the Bush administration's case over Iraq, with some even demanding a quick withdrawal. This won't happen, but President George W Bush will certainly have to consider some previously unpalatable measures (such as talking to Iran) to bring about his touted "fresh approach". - Ehsan Ahrari (Nov 13, '06)

PREPARING FOR A NEW COLD WAR, Part 1
A war the West can't win
The US need not be destroyed or suffer a collapse as did the Soviet Union in order to lose its top global position. It could well come about with a sufficient and permanent loss of US global political, economic and military leverage. This is already happening as the rising East is playing its energy, economic, ideological, diplomatic and geopolitical cards very smartly. - W Joseph Stroupe (Nov 13, '06)
This is the first part of a two-part report

Iran the key in US change on Iraq
A Democratic Congress and a pragmatist in charge of the Pentagon pave the way for a new approach toward the United States' vexing problems with Iraq and Iran. First, though, President George W Bush has to accept that without Tehran, the US cannot win in Iraq. And as important, any Iranian help must be linked to its nuclear program. - Trita Parsi (Nov 10, '06)

COMMENT
Regime-change blowback
For at least 50 years, the US has pursued a policy of belligerent regime change in the Middle East that time and again has suffered from unforeseen consequences, or "blowback". The results of the US mid-term elections indicate that the American people have realized that this has happened in Iraq and in Afghanistan. The result: regime change at home. - Henry C K Liu (Nov 10, '06)

Why the world loves Syria
It seems like everybody is beating a path to Damascus, breaking the isolation Washington imposed after the Iraq invasion. The Europeans understand that they must either live with an uncompromising Hamas and Hezbollah or talk with Syria. Even the US is beginning to see the light. - Sami Moubayed (Nov 10, '06)

The deconstruction of Iraq
In those heady early days after the invasion of Iraq, Washington handed Bechtel a contract to help reconstruct the country. At the same time it created a security force, the Facilities Protection Service, to guard the projects as well as existing ministries. Dahr Jamail and Ali al-Fadhily describe how Bechtel is slinking away after having accomplished nothing, while the security guards have morphed into cold-blooded killers. (Nov 9, '06)

 Bechtel's billions down the drain

 How security guards became killers

All change at the Pentagon
"Stay the course" Donald Rumsfeld is the first casualty of the Republicans' drubbing in the US mid-term elections. Robert F Ellsworth explains how the neo-conservatism Rumsfeld adopted while defense secretary made "planning for any difficulty ideologically unacceptable" on Iraq. Rumsfeld's successor, Robert Gates, however, is unlikely to implement any change of strategy unless President George W Bush says so, writes Fritz W Ermarth. (Nov 9, '06)

 Knowing Rumsfeld - Robert F Ellsworth

 Knowing Gates - Fritz W Ermarth

Rumsfeld takes a hit for Bush
Although mooted for some time, Donald Rumsfeld's resignation as US defense secretary is no doubt designed in part as a sacrificial offering to victorious Democrats. This will buy President George W Bush time to add some "realism" to Middle East and other policies. Should he not do so, there will be calls for more blood. - Jim Lobe (Nov 9, '06)

DISPATCHES FROM AMERICA
Plebiscite on an Outlaw Empire
Tuesday's electoral "wave" of repudiation against the Republicans and the George W Bush administration is hardly a US phenomenon. It's global, and shows how Bush, lacking an "Evil Empire" to fight, has instead pursued "rogue states" and non-state terror groups, a policy that has turned the US into an Outlaw Empire. - Tom Engelhardt (Nov 9, '06)

Afghanistan strikes back at Pakistan
Islamabad is pointing the finger at foreign-assisted Afghan intelligence for several recent attacks in Pakistan, including Wednesday's suicide bombing that killed 35 soldiers. This development comes as Pakistan's top brass try once and for all to define the country's role in the region. With the US pressing from one side, and militants from the other, their decision will have a defining effect on the "war on terror". - Syed Saleem Shahzad (Nov 8, '06)

Britain faces a new terrorist Gunpowder Plot
The jailing of a 34-year-old British Muslim terrorist on Tuesday for plotting to commit acts of "indiscriminate carnage, bloodshed and butchery" in the US and the UK has resonances that go back 400 years to the Gunpowder Plot, when another religious-minority group reacted similarly to its government's policies. - Ronan Thomas (Nov 8, '06)

COMMENT
Rumsfeld not the only one to blame
The rising calls for the ousting of US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld do not go far enough. Also to blame for the Iraq debacle are his boss, President Bush, the generals who advise the advise the administration, and Congress, for its conspicuous failure to exercise its oversight responsibilities. (Nov 8, '06)

US ready to face the world anew
Regardless of the outcome of the United States mid-term elections, there is likely to be significant change in the way Washington operates in the Middle East; change brought about by the need to stem hemorrhaging prestige, budget and power. It will be along the lines of "let's make a deal" - in Iraq, and with Syria and Iran. - Stephen Julias and Max Fraad Wolff (Nov 7, '06)

SPEAKING FREELY
Victor's justice: The trial of Saddam
The guilty verdict on Saddam Hussein turned on an obscure event that happened 25 years ago when 148 Iraqis were executed for sedition. Whether that trial was fair is lost in the mists of time. But any fair reading of the illegal trial of Saddam would show that it amounted to victor's justice, writes Paul Wolf, a lawyer who worked on Saddam's defense.  (Nov 7, '06)

A vote on the Iraq war
Tuesday's mid-term US elections are a referendum on Bush administration policies in which unhappiness over the Iraq war comes first, second and third. This is why if the Democrats prevail, however narrowly, amid a massive gerrymandering of seats, US and world public opinion will interpret it as a repudiation of Bush's war policy. - Michael Schwartz (Nov 6, '06)

Hollow victory: The hanging of Saddam
So Saddam Hussein is going to be hanged. That is now an empty victory for US President George W Bush, when even his former neo-con supporters are turning against him. And executing Iraq's former dictator isn't going to make the place more livable or resolve the internal strife that is tearing it apart. - Ehsan Ahrari (Nov 6, '06)

NATO fighting the wrong Afghan war
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization wants more troops in Afghanistan. It is extending its fight with the Taliban to Pakistani soil. It wants to create secure "inkspots" from which to consolidate its authority. But winning on the battlefield is not the real issue: it is increasingly apparent that a political accommodation of the Taliban is necessary if any hope of enduring peace is to be established. - M K Bhadrakumar (Nov 3, '06)

CHAN AKYA
Love your children, those little terrors
It's all very well for Islamic societies to deny any broad confluence of interests between terrorists and the large majority of Muslims, but economic trends will force this eventuality. An inability to employ its legions of youth characterizes the key difference between Islamic societies and those of China and India. (Nov 3, '06)

BOOK REVIEW
Mercenaries or 'contractors'?
Licensed to Kill by Robert Young Pelton
A writer who has spent much of his adult life in war zones and other places most of us would prefer to avoid guides the reader deep into the murky world of private military and security companies. With precision not seen before, he examines a world of private operatives who have filled a void since the end of the Cold War. - David Isenberg (Nov 3, '06)

NATO takes the fight to Pakistan
The flow of jihadis from Pakistan's tribal areas into Afghanistan has long been acknowledged as a prime reason for the Taliban's resurgence. Monday's bombing of suspected militants in Bajour was an attempt by North Atlantic Treaty Organization-led forces to do something about it. Pakistan's back yard is in danger of becoming a new front in the "war on terror". - Syed Saleem Shahzad (Nov 1, '06)
 

US ELECTIONS: THE WORLD WATCHES Foreign misadventures hit home North Korea's Dear Leader Kim Jong-il may have inadvertently won the US mid-term elections for the Democrats with his nuclear explosion. The shambles over Iraq, too, has certainly not helped the Bush administration cause. Clearly, foreign policy is now a determining issue. - Ian Williams (Nov 1, '06) Hillary goes against the tide US Democratic senator and (undeclared) presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton has spelled out a grand new vision for her country's foreign policy. Her "sea change" involves engagement with Syria, Iran and North Korea and a "bipartisan consensus" on national security. - Jim Lobe (Nov 1, '06)

October 2006