Fascinating article in the Washington Post. Richard Perle, one of the chief architects of the Iraq War, defends what he did and argues for
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/25/AR2008062501943_pf.html">more of the same for Iran:
For their part, the Iranians, undeterred by Rice's "successful multilateral coalition," are relentlessly building a nuclear weapons program while supporting terrorism and subversion in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Israel. The mullahs took only scornful notice of President Bush's appeals to an even larger coalition, "the world," when he said, on May 18, "To allow the world's leading sponsor of terror to gain the world's deadliest weapon would be an unforgivable betrayal of future generations. For the sake of peace, the world must not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon." But allow it does.
There are lessons here. Soon after taking office, President Bush rejected several previously negotiated international agreements, including the Kyoto treaty, the treaty establishing the International Criminal Court, a protocol to the biological weapons convention and, in 2002, the treaty banning ballistic missile defenses. The reaction was angry and immediate: The United States, critics charged, had abandoned the multilateralism of the Clinton years for a high-handed "unilateral" approach that alienated our allies and undermined the alliances on which our security was said to depend.
This idea became a centerpiece of John Kerry's presidential campaign. He called for "a bold, progressive internationalism that stands in stark contrast to the too often belligerent and myopic unilateralism of the Bush administration," the conventional wisdom echoed by countless politicians, commentators and opinion polls these past seven and a half years. We are certain to hear more of the same in this year's presidential election.
Most often, "multilateral" has referred to policies that were either established in multilateral agreements or blessed by the United Nations, our European allies or both. Left implicit among those preaching multilateralism was the idea that a multilateral solution was always available, if only the administration had been willing to adopt it. It has often been said, wrongly, that the Bush administration opposed working with allies and preferred to go it alone. But a preference for going it alone never was the problem.
Calvin Trillian
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20030414/trillin">wrote the following poem in The Nation about Richard Perle on April 14,2003
On Richard Perle, Lobbyist, Businessman And, Perhaps Not Coincidentally, Chairman of the Defense Policy Board
The plans to start this war were laid
Within the Sissy Hawk Brigade--
A band of Vietnam evaders
All puffed up now as tough crusaders.
Yes, now, as then, they love inciting
A war that others will be fighting.
In recent weeks, there's been much talk
Of Richard Perle, a sissy hawk.
There've been some articles about
Just whether Perle has used his clout,
While fighting evil hell for leather,
To profit. (Hawks have nests to feather.)
A pity that some lads who fought
In Vietnam were later brought
Back home again in body bags
Adorned with battle stars and flags:
They missed the fruits that dedication
Can bring to those who serve their nation.
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