November 6, 2007 at 23:17:12
Pakistan and the Collapse of the Bush Administration's Freedom Agenda
The invasion and botched occupation of Iraq will probably go down in history as one of the greatest strategic blunders in all of military history. It remains to be seen of course, whether or not the Bush administration’s misjudgment will end up instigating a regional conflagration, or even WWIII. What is clear, however, is that the U.S. invasion has succeeded in making the most volatile region of the planet even more unstable.Will Turkey invade Iraq? Will the United States strike Iran? Will Pakistan explode? And what happens if Musharaff falls and extremists get their hands on the Bomb? You can be sure that U.S. contingency plans include the possibility Special Forces operations inside Pakistan to try and prevent that nightmare scenario from happening.
All of this falls on the heels of Israel’s apparently successful raid on a Syrian nuclear facility.No doubt, hawks in the administration, especially Dick Cheney, will tout the Israeli operation as proof that preemption still works. The problem, of course, is no one can calculate how a preemptive military strike against Iran (which would be the Bush administration’s second unprovoked attack against a Muslim country) will complicate American interests in Iraq, Pakistan, and the wider Middle East. An attack could set back Iran’s nuclear program months or even years, but at the cost of destabilizing Pakistan to the point where extremists get their hands on nuclear weapons. Read more ...
No comments:
Post a Comment