Is the Neocon Agenda for Pax Americana Losing Steam?

[dudeness]

President George W. Bush's speech to the nation last night was notable in many ways, most critically for marking what appears to be a weakening of the steep unilateralist trajectory on which neoconservative and right-wing hawks set U.S. foreign policy two years ago. Who would have thought it would lose momentum so quickly after Washington's stunning military victory in Iraq in early April and plummet back to earth?

Now, just a week before the second anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon, the Bush administration appears to have decided that Washington really cannot run Iraq, let alone the entire Middle East, by itself and must rely on others--even the much-despised United Nations--to help out.

Whether the UN will agree to do so--and on what conditions--remains to be determined, but, for the first time in two years, it appears that the administration's more multilaterally inclined, led by Secretary of State Colin Powell, may actually be moving into the driver's seat. While the battle for control is far from over, the signs of what is being euphemistically called a "policy adjustment'' have already emerged.....snip

http://www.presentdanger.org/commentary/2003/0309neocon.html

[lcordero]

1. lemme see

The freepers were willing to throw away soldiers's lives for cheap gas====>They aren't getting their cheap gas.

Freepers thought that they were getting let into a sweetheart of a deal===>Freepers are seeing no improvement in their quality of life.

[izzie]

3. Did my heart good to read free rep on Bush wanting 87B

Even they see we do not have that money. Russia said we would fall because we would spend our sells out and it looks like we will.

[FloridaPat]

2. If it weren't for the election next year, the draft would probably

be back and we'd be on our way to the next war by now.

[DarkPhenyx]

4. It proably isn't stalling.

Think of it more as a pause to reconstitute forces and decide which direction to jump next. You can't charge forward all the time w/o risking running off a cliff. I think we can expect to see another surge along the path, prehaps just before the election, but it might come a few eyars down the road. I would say that we are falling into a trap here. Thinking in terms if lifetimes and immediate gratification. Good plans, in the political arena, can take years to plan and longer to execute. You need to be willing to think in generations.

[ixion]

5. yeah, I agree...

It's probably too early to say that it's stalling. Bush's current deal is not a good deal for the UN. If they take it, the neocons will have won. It will free up troops so they can begin the build up to attack Iran, IMHO.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

6. I love how a war has been redefined.

You see, in the "old days" winning a war meant that the enemy stopped fighting. Nowadays it means going on an aircraft carrier and declaring "major combat operations" over, regardless of whether the fighting has stopped or not.

It's like Bush and the media want to have it both ways, the war is OVER, but the enemy is still fighting us. Either the attacks going on now are being carried out by Saddam Hussein followers and thus the war was never over, or the attacks are NOT being carried out by Saddam Hussein followers and thus ANOTHER war has begun.

In other words, what I am asking is: What "stunning military victory"?

[Cocoa]

7. we're always talking about a "Rove trap"

this almost looks like a "UN trap."

All the neocon imperalists have been lured out into the open, everyone knows about PNAC, a lot of embarrassing and revealing statements are now on record, and the limitations of our military capability have also been exposed.

[ameriphile]

8. Don't underestimate this administration's capabilities

None of us have a clue what Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and others are currently planning to further the goals of the neoconservatives who dictate foreign and domestic White House policy. And let's not forget how Colin Powell knuckled under to this crowd during their mad rush to wage war in Iraq.

That said, I am relieved to hear about increasing dissent from top brass, and from high-level Pentagon civilians. I'm just extremely wary of developing a false sense of hope that this administration will ever act in a way that might not appease the hard right.