Iraq's WMD Factory

[bemildred]

As America?s civilian and military high command comes unglued, American actions in Iraq grow
more inchoate. The Marines did what needed to be done in Fallujah, turning the place over to one
of Saddam?s generals who might be able to run it, mainly because he comes from the tribe that
has always run it. The pathetic CPA, aka the Emerald City, bleated that they had not ?vetted?
him and named another Iraqi general in his place, forgetting that anyone the Americans ?vet? is
thereby labeled ?collaborator.? We continue to encircle Najaf, which is dumb, and the Iraqi
resistance has again cut the road from Baghdad to the airport, which is dangerous. One suspects
that a fly on the wall in meetings in the White House or in Baghdad?s Green Zone thinks it has
wandered into a low-budget production of Marat-Sade.

But what of the world beyond Iraq? That is where one sees the full effect of Iraq?s factory of
WMDs - Wars of Mass Destruction. The State Department has just told all Americans to leave
Saudi Arabia, while they can still get out alive. Over a hundred people are dead in Thailand,
where local Islamics are waging a new jihad. Moslems and Christians are going at it again in
Indonesia and Nigeria. The Israelis, beaten in Gaza as they were beaten in Lebanon, find it
impossible to move either forward or back. Pakistan, whose army got it?s a-- handed to it by
tribesmen on the old Northwest Frontier, is turning a deaf ear to increasingly desperate demands
from America?s generals in Afghanistan for ?tough action.? President Mubarak of Egypt warns
from his tottering throne that America has never been so hated in the Middle East as it is now.

---

It is however, somewhat unfair to blame the whole bloody mess on George II. The entire
Establishment is in this together. All Mr. Kerry can do is say ?stay the course;? Congress is silent
on the whole business; few in the media have the courage to state the obvious, which is that we
need to bring the troops home, now. Only old Ralph Nader, playing the crocodile to Kerry?s
Captain Hook, has the guts to call for an American withdrawal from Iraq. In an election where
the choice may be between Tweedledumb and Tweedlephony, Ralph is starting to look pretty
good, even to Russell Kirk conservatives like myself.

When the full scope of America?s defeat in the Wars of Mass Destruction ignited by Iraq
becomes apparent, the political result is likely to go far beyond any election, especially an election
in America?s one-party Republicrat state (you get two candidates, but they both represent the
same thing.) We are likely to see that interesting time known by historians as ?change of
dynasty,? where a defective and corrupt Establishment is all swept away.

Now that could be fun to watch.

d-n-i.net

[struggle4progress]

1. I agree that the "defective and corrupt Establishment" ...

may be in trouble, but I have some doubts about whether its demise will be "fun to watch": a crisis affecting America's prestige and economy could produce an increasingly militaristic posture abroad and an increasingly vicious repression at home.

[bemildred]

2. The "tree of liberty" and "the blood of patriots" and all that?

Yeah, it could. Last Civil War we had was pretty bloody.
But I'm not that pessimistic yet. Once the imperial circus
folds its tent, I don't think the present arrangements will
last long. Either of the two major parties goes and they will
have to re-write the whole political script, and the citizenry,
to the extent they think about things is way to the left of
where most of the political dialog takes place these days.

[struggle4progress]

3. Well, I'd certainly like to see a more militant party ...

that had a better connection to grass-roots movements and a real commitment to workers, the environment, etc. Such a party might effectively resist the totalitarian ambitions of the current ruling political class. I don't yet see enough sophisticated civic involvement by citizens to build it, though.

[bemildred]

4. Grass roots is the key, it is supposed to be a democratic republic. nt