http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/02/magazine/02IRAQ.html
My friend George Packer has a very good article in the NYTimes Magazine on the prospects for a democratic Iraq after the war (not that good, is a short version of his conclusion). It's very good - I think everyone on both sides of the debate should read it. George is a good guy, although we're very far apart politically, he definitely has something to say. Incidentally, this sort of touches on what is, I think, the best reason for doing this. No one has asked me what I think the most likely outcome of the war in Iraq will be. The answer is that I think the most likely outcome is that the reconstruction effort will not, in fact, be successful. In fact, I think it'll probably be something of a mess. I would be mildly shocked if Iraq is a liberal democratic country 10 years from now. I just don't think we have any other choice. The Middle East is in a very bad place right now - combining a pathological, Nazi-like hatred of Jews and Americans with the total failure of every (non-Israel) society in the region. Being human, the inhabitants of the region aren't looking in the mirror for an explanation for these problems - they're blaming outsiders. Of course. But the consequence of that is that, inevitably, someone there is going to get nuclear weapons. And if they do, then someday a mushroom cloud is going to sprout up over New York. And DC. And London. And, eventually, Paris and Berlin. The only way to stop that is to: 1. Transform the Middle East into something less screwed-up and 2. Delay the moment of the acquisition of nuclear weapons for as long as possible until that transformation does take place A war to topple Saddam is the only thing I can think of that might possibly help both those things along. The question is not - will this go well? The question is - are the likely outcomes of doing this better than the likely outcomes of doing nothing? A few days after 9/11 a friend of mine who is a Prof. at the Kennedy School of Government commented that _eventually_ people were going to be building suitcase size nuclear weapons in small labs, or bioengineering Black Plague level bugs in basements. That's virtually certain just because of the progress of technology. He thus wasn't sure if 9/11 would be remembered as a horrible terrorist attack - or the first event in the end of Western Civilization. That's a question that still hasn't been answered. It probably _won't_ be answered in any of our lifetimes - or if it is answered, that will be an answer that we very much don't want. But those are, I think, the stakes. Gautam __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Tax Center - forms, calculators, tips, more http://taxes.yahoo.com/ _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
