Nik's Laws: Don't Arm your Future Enemy

Hey world (and Barack and the useless heap of Congress) are you listening?

Five Rules to Guide Syria Policy

1. Don't let Iran win the Syrian civil war
2. Don't fall into the trap of being the World Police. Athens, Constantinople, Rome, and England already tried that
3. No matter which Syrian faction you choose to ally with, 75% of the country will hate and resent and fight you. Don't pick sides
4. Because of #2, the only acceptable justification for intervention is on humanitarian grounds
5. Syrian peace is not a vital US interest. It IS a vital interest of Syria's neighbors: Lebanon, Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and (gasp) Israel. They are getting flooded with refugees. They are at risk of receiving SCUDs. They are at risk of spill-over instability. They should lead any intervention. They should build humanitarian supply/evacuation lines. They should host any refugees (humanely). To the extent they don't want to participate, they should fund intervention. If they lack specific technical capabilities, they should request US assistance. The UN, thanks to Russia and China is useless. Don't waste your time with that

It may very well be that the best response is, until five-way peace agreements are signed, a total economic, commercial, and travel embargo of the country, supplemented by an oil-for-food style humanitarian plan, led and executed by Syria's neighbors.

Turkey, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia in particular are vying for recognition that they have "turned a corner" from their insular, murky, iron-fisted past into first-world regional powers. They should view the current situation as a grand opportunity to demonstrate they are world-class by acting world-class.

Rule #3 aside, and broader than the Syrian civil war, is the Kurd issue. Creating a Kurdish state or independent self-administered region would create stability and solve numerous simmering conflicts all at once. Kurdish regions of Turkey, Syria, and Iraq have proven largely stable, predictable, and trustworthy. They are able to generate relatively stable governance structures and effective economic activity even under very poor circumstances. Turkey, Iraq, and Syria need to mature their approach from current passive-aggressiveness to acknowledging that current borders simply don't reflect the cultural and national landscape. There is something for each of them to gain by ceding political control, economic control, and even territory in the interest of furthering regional peace and stability. While any mideastern solution seems to cause 20 new mideastern conflicts, this one might be a risk worth taking.

Yeah, What HE Said: Obama on Israel and Palestine

Per the Guardian:

"In what was billed as the most important public speech ever made by an American leader on the issue, Obama delivered a tough message to Israel."

Which basically was :

"Put yourself in their shoes - look at the world through their eyes. "

Which is what I've tried to advocate in countless debates on the issue. Understand your opponent's motivation. Find common ground. What seems self-evident to me, and I dare say most Americans, is all too frequently mocked and dismissed as psychobabble by people close to the issue. This makes me struggle to put myself in their shoes. I just don't get it. Mutually-assured misery seems like the least-best alternative, yet it is the de-facto choice by virtue of inaction. 

Obama is just as guilty as the leaders in the region and the lobbyists on the Hill. As I argued in a prior blog, lack of leadership is akin to murder in this situation. 

"Hey Bibi, Hill, Abu! Hey nationalists! Hey settlers! Hey martyrs! Hey donors-to-the-cause! Hey talking heads! You're all wrong. You're all culpable. You're all criminally negligent. Let history reflect that as your true legacy."

Perhaps he finally read my blog, because what Obama said this week was real leadership:

"You can be the generation that permanently secures the Zionist dream, or you can face growing challenges to its future … The only way for Israel to endure and thrive as a Jewish and democratic state is through the realisation of an independent and viable Palestine ... Israelis must recognise that continued settlement activity is counterproductive to the cause of peace"

Talking People to Death

From this week's NY Times:

"[Netanyahu's offer to freeze colonization of contested Palestinian territories] was aimed either at keeping talks with the Palestinians alive and his right-wing coalition partners in check, or at seeking to shift the burden of failure to the Palestinians and escape blame should the talks wither and die. - NY Times 10/12/10

They said "should" but clearly they meant "when." Why the hell did they re-start colonization anyway?? Oh, yeah, so they could offer to stop ... again.

This, to me, summarizes the whole problem. The involved parties, including the Israeli, Palestinian, and US governments as well as the Jewish diaspora, the militant mullahs, the Syrian and Iranian militaries, the arab-royals, the money-siphoning nonprofit organizations, and all the other agents provocateurs have no intention of saving the patient. They just want to make sure they're not blamed for it's death.

Lest they forget among all their strategic positioning (in soft chairs at fancy resort hotels), ego-stroking (whilst sipping tea on private jet they didn't pay for), and diplomatically chortling (while enjoying 5-star cuisine on finer china), there are people dying because of their delays. Some of those people are starving in camps. Others are getting blown to bits during their daily commute. Others are so hopeless and angry about their future that they're letting Bin Laden's clowns whip them into homicidal/suicidal furies. Others still are dying atop Humvees.

Yet everyone just continues talking. One step left, then one step right. Never moving forward lest they accidentally resolve the issue and lose their relevance. If that happened, who would pay for their fancy limos and massive security detail? Who would fund their next European vacation?

Hey Bibi, Hill, Abu! Hey nationalists! Hey settlers! Hey martyrs! Hey donors-to-the-cause! Hey talking heads! You're all wrong. You're all culpable. You're all criminally negligent. Let history reflect that as your true legacy.

Take THAT Paranoid Saudi/UAE/India

(ad placed by the government of Bahrain in the August 19th Economist)

And I Suppose People Were Not Expecting This ...

From the FT today:

Dubai shockwave hits global markets

Tremors from the shock request by Dubai’s flagship government-owned holding company for a debt standstill spread through global equity markets on Friday, triggering a sell-off in Asia and heavy losses on Wall Street.

While European markets staged a modest but nervous
rally after heavy sell-offs this week, investor sentiment remained jittery amid
a scramble to assess the broader fallout of the problems of Dubai World.
In depth: Dubai in turmoil - Jul-06
Editorial Comment: Dubai reveals the fragility of finance - Nov-27
Lex: Banks’ Dubai exposures - Nov-27
Opinion: Reality catches up with the Gulf’s model global city - Nov-27
Nakheel’s creditors dash to minimise damage - Nov-27
Abu Dhabi expected to prop up smaller brother - Nov-27

Hmm ... a scrap of the most inhospitable, useless land on the planet somehow convinces the world that it's rich simply by fiat. It goes on a spending spree to prove it. It falls flat on its face. I suppose that won't stop people from being shocked and awed.

Merriam-Webster defines a Mirage as:

... 2 : something illusory and unattainable like a mirage
synonyms: see delusion

Get it? A mirage? In the desert?

How's this for a rule, space cadets: nothing times any amount of leverage is still nothing. Remember that next time you are considering what to do with your kids' inheritance.

Re: Talk Amongst Yourselves ... Colombia is the new Israel

I just have to laugh about this one. I apparently have a very infamous reader.

On 3/27/2007, I posted a blog saying "Talk Amongst Yourselves ... Colombia is the new Israel"

On 3/2/2008, the unoriginal pig Hugo Chavez stole my line in a press conference, saying "The Colombian government has become the Israel of Latin America."

What should I make of this? Imitation the highest form of flattery? Great minds think alike?

PS: he's not a pig for being unoriginal. It's his populism that gets my goat.

Photo Credit: AP

Iranians vs. Iran ... Rick Steves and the Shahab-3

As I've said before, I really appreciate Rick Steves' European shows on PBS. When I found out he also maintained a blog (who doesn't these days?) I was instantly hooked! He gives hidden insights and sneak previews, but also shows the entertaining soft underbelly of his job (grumpy tourist office in England, stupid rules in Turkey). When he mentioned he would be going to Iran to separate the real from the rhetoric ... well, honestly I was nervous. This has been used frequently by the peaceniks among us as a euphemism for their peace-at-all-costs world view.

All told, it was a courageous and a valuable thing he did. We'll all be better off if we can humanize this conflict a bit. I agree with him that individual-to-individual contact can lead us all to greater understanding of each other. I share his hope that understanding breeds compassion and even solidarity.

But Rick showed his liberal underpants a bit. While his aim was to present an "even view" of the country, his result was to give glibly cursory coverage to the hate-mongering propaganda spewed forth by the insaniac Iranian government. Does he really mean to suggest that "Death to America" is just a cute figure of speech? I give him kudos for covering every smile and "we love America" he observed from the Iranian citizens. However, by over-emphasizing these, he showed he could not resist the temptation to counter-balance the White House's predilection for fear mongering. with opposite-but-unfortunately-equal myopia.

Here's my take on the Iran:

• To quote Reagan, "People do not make wars; governments do." In this context, the meaning is that the conflict does not really involve the common citizens of either country. On both sides, they're more interested in living their lives comfortably and being left alone than geopolitics. He went on to say, "A people free to choose will always choose peace." I saw this firsthand in the early 1990's in the former USSR - the people never did hate Americans. Had no reason to, except the fear preached them by their government. And they were just as afraid of their own government as ours. Rick did a good job of demonstrating that (many) Iranians are no exception.
  
• To repeat Reagan: "People do not make wars; governments do." His statement has a second meaning: Governments do, indeed, make wars on behalf of their countries. Acknowledging my first point (and Rick's) does not repudiate the fact that the Ayatollah Insane-y and the rabid Ahmadi-nejad army could cause great harm to life and limb in the US, Iran, and most likely anyone else who has the misfortune of getting their attention. Sanctions, containment, diplomacy, saber rattling, and outright aggression may well be necessary in response to their actions.

The fact that an American can traipse around Iran (with government minders) gathering smiles and hugs from children and grandmas alike calls attention not to the power of peace or the senselessness of war ... but to the tragedy of it. I'm quite sure the average middle-class, non-fundamentalist Iranian (if there are any left in that place) is as anti-war as his American counterpart.

However, that (mythical ?) average Iranian does not have his finger on the "launch" button of the new Shahab-3 nuclear-capable intermediate range missile. Nor does he have the key to the national purse. He has no vote on whether his own dire, hopless, poverty-stricken existence is worth the billions being wasted by the government on their nuclear program.

It is FOR, not AGAINST these people that aggression against their government may be necessary.

I'll let Reagan wrap up my argument: "We can not play innocents abroad in a world that is not innocent." We must engage Iran with respect, but from a position of strength. We don't need to be the world's daddy, but we do need to ensure our own safety.

If we can serve as a global role model of freedom and respectability, we achieve dual success of furthering our own self-interests while at the same time elevating the world's lowliest and most suppressed. To that end, we should be willing to expend our own treasure and flex our own muscle. It's a long-term proposition, which makes it politically dificult. Greatness is not for the short-sighted.

Photo credits:
Rick Steves in Iran: Rick Steves Blog (http://www.ricksteves.com/blog/index.cfm?fuseaction=archives&month=6&year=2008)
Iranian Missiles: Sepah News (http://www.daylife.com/words/Sepah_News) via AFP

United States of Iraq

It is a matter of inevitability that Iraq will become a federation of 3 states: shia, sunni, and kurd. Oil revenues should be pooled. National military and (minimal) federal govt costs should be deducted. Then the balance should be split equally. They will all think this is unfair. They are all perpetual whiners.