Allies
Matthew Yglesias comments on Donald Rumsfeld's warm relations with the president of Uzbekistan. Uzbekistan allows the U.S. to maintain airfields in a country adjacent to Afghanistan. Unfortunately, like so many of the former Soviet Republics it has a president for life who's human rights record is...well there is none.
"The kinds of Faustian bargains the Bush administration is gleefully entering into in the name of fighting the "Global War on Terror" is, writes Yglesias, It's a classic example of what Jeffrey Record's brilliant critique of the Bush administration's pursuit of the Global War on Terror for the Army War College is talking about when he says Bush 'may have set the United States on a course of open-ended and gratuitous conflict with states and nonstate entities that pose no serious threat to the United States.'"
And then there's Pakistan.
Seymor Hersh has another disturbing report on why "Washington [is] going easy on Pakistan's nuclear black marketers."
The deal: Give Musharraf cover for outing the "father of the Islamic bomb," by letting him pardon him. In return, U.S. troops will be allowed to infiltrate Pakistani territory in search of al Qaeda.
"The former senior American intelligence official was equally blunt. He told me, Khan was willing to sell blueprints, centrifuges, and the latest in weaponry. He was the worst nuclear-arms proliferator in the world and he's pardoned -- and not a squeak from the White House.'"
Just a reminder, as one diplomat says in the story, that "Iraq is laughable in comparison with [Pakistani nuclear proliferation]. The Bush Administration was hunting the shadows instead of the prey."
Hersh concludes, "Robert Gallucci, a former United Nations weapons inspector who is now dean of the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, calls A. Q. Khan 'the Johnny Appleseed' of the nuclear-arms race. Gallucci, who is a consultant to the C.I.A. on proliferation issues, told me, 'Bad as it is with Iran, North Korea, and Libya having nuclear-weapons material, the worst part is that they could transfer it to a non-state group. That’s the biggest concern, and the scariest thing about all this—that Pakistan could work with the worst terrorist groups on earth to build nuclear weapons. There’s nothing more important than stopping terrorist groups from getting nuclear weapons. The most dangerous country for the United States now is Pakistan, and second is Iran.' Gallucci went on, 'We haven’t been this vulnerable since the British burned Washington in 1814.'”
As Bush's ads say, "strong, steady leadership in changing times." Yeah.
"The kinds of Faustian bargains the Bush administration is gleefully entering into in the name of fighting the "Global War on Terror" is, writes Yglesias, It's a classic example of what Jeffrey Record's brilliant critique of the Bush administration's pursuit of the Global War on Terror for the Army War College is talking about when he says Bush 'may have set the United States on a course of open-ended and gratuitous conflict with states and nonstate entities that pose no serious threat to the United States.'"
And then there's Pakistan.
Seymor Hersh has another disturbing report on why "Washington [is] going easy on Pakistan's nuclear black marketers."
The deal: Give Musharraf cover for outing the "father of the Islamic bomb," by letting him pardon him. In return, U.S. troops will be allowed to infiltrate Pakistani territory in search of al Qaeda.
"The former senior American intelligence official was equally blunt. He told me, Khan was willing to sell blueprints, centrifuges, and the latest in weaponry. He was the worst nuclear-arms proliferator in the world and he's pardoned -- and not a squeak from the White House.'"
Just a reminder, as one diplomat says in the story, that "Iraq is laughable in comparison with [Pakistani nuclear proliferation]. The Bush Administration was hunting the shadows instead of the prey."
Hersh concludes, "Robert Gallucci, a former United Nations weapons inspector who is now dean of the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, calls A. Q. Khan 'the Johnny Appleseed' of the nuclear-arms race. Gallucci, who is a consultant to the C.I.A. on proliferation issues, told me, 'Bad as it is with Iran, North Korea, and Libya having nuclear-weapons material, the worst part is that they could transfer it to a non-state group. That’s the biggest concern, and the scariest thing about all this—that Pakistan could work with the worst terrorist groups on earth to build nuclear weapons. There’s nothing more important than stopping terrorist groups from getting nuclear weapons. The most dangerous country for the United States now is Pakistan, and second is Iran.' Gallucci went on, 'We haven’t been this vulnerable since the British burned Washington in 1814.'”
As Bush's ads say, "strong, steady leadership in changing times." Yeah.
posted by John at 6:52 PM
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