To Germans, U.S. motives now suspect

[Flagg]

To Germans, U.S. motives now suspect
Iraq war brings a role reversal that may not fade quickly

By Michael Moran
Senior correspondent
MSNBC
Updated: 11:44 a.m. ET Jan. 26, 2004BERLIN - Years ago, the comedian John Cleese, playing the role of the misanthropic provincial English inn keeper Basil Fawlty, finds himself hosting a family of German tourists, and to ensure nothing goes wrong, he admonishes the staff: “Whatever you do, don’t mention the war.” He fails miserably to practice what he preaches, and the results are hilarious to everyone involved. Everyone, of course, except the Germans.


An American in Germany right now might sympathize a bit with Basil’s hapless guests.

“We’ve gone from the lighthouse on the hill to an image of an aggressive imperial force that wants to control the world that uses everything from ICBMs to Starbucks coffee to get people to tow the line,” says John Kornblum, a former American assistant secretary of state who now heads the Berlin office of the international investment bank Lazard. “Our brand is very damaged, more damaged that I ever thought it would be.”

Christian Hingst, who works as a speechwriter for Germany’s health minister, says he views America differently in the wake the Iraq crisis.

“I think our reaction is natural,” he says. “Many of us don’t accept the American way of doing this, that you ask the world’s opinion and when you get an answer you don’t like, you say ‘to hell with the world.’ I think we trust America less

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4007898/

[ixion]

1. Here is the crux of the problem...

“During the 1990s, when military operations mostly were about stopping conflicts in failed states, it made a lot of sense to build coalitions and make sure the U.S. and Europe were on the same page,” says a senior defense department official, who requested anonymity. “But September 11 changes the game. Now it’s a war, and we’re in the trenches. And when you see something coming at you, you don’t wait around for the fat lazy kid at the back to decide to go over the top. You move now and take questions later.”

It is precisely this kind of rhetoric – softened only a bit when administration officials are on camera – that has rankled Europe so.



And again, we see the neocons and their cronies arrogance and lies.
The fat lazy kid at the back?

If any country can be anthropomorphicized into a fat lazy kid, IT IS THE US!!

The hypocrisy is astounding.

[legin]

2. LOL

I've been collecting these insults over the last few months, now I got a bit more to add to it.

"legin the very anti-Semitic, cultural imperialist, ex-Stalinist, report-burying, garbage-loving, fat, lazy cockroach".

Mmmmm.... "fat, lazy cockroach." That's got a bit of zing I have to admit.

I AM going to get even.

[kskiska]

4. Here's another for you

The European (French) response to Bush’s space strategy
by Taylor Dinerman
Monday, January 26, 2004

The initial response of the French chattering classes to the news that the Americans were headed back to the Moon and then to Mars was bon debarras, “good riddance.” Once they realized that most of the US population was not going to move off the planet, their enthusiasm for the project was somewhat diminished. In any event, the head of the European Space Agency (ESA), Jean-Jacques Dordain, said that he “dreamed of the day when the President of Europe would come to ESA headquarters and make a similar policy declaration.”

more…
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/89/1

[legin]

5. Exellent kskiska

:evilgrin:

[denverbill]

3. Yep. That's where Bush fucked up royally.

If Bush had presented all the evidence to the UN, and the UN looked at the evidence, and, by and large, everyone said 'Yep, that's damning stuff. He's gotta go.', then I woulda said OK, count me in too. But when France, Germany, Russia, China, Mexico, Brazil, and many, many others said NO, we should have either kept working til they were convinced, or given up. At least if the other nations had also believed he was a threat, now, they would at least share some of the blame for the war. Instead, it's all on our heads.


We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. The coalition would instantly have collapsed, the Arabs deserting it in anger and other allies pulling out as well. Under those circumstances, furthermore, we had been self-consciously trying to set a pattern for handling aggression in the post-cold war world. Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the U.N.'s mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the U.S. could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land. It would have been a dramatically different--and perhaps barren--outcome.

George HW Bush, 1998