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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsFrank Rich Even Neocons Disagree on Mideast Intervention
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/08/frank-rich-even-neocons-disagree-on-mideast.htmlThis has been another historically terrible week for the remnants of the Arab Spring. In Egypt, the military-appointed government released the totalitarian former president Hosni Mubarak from prison to house arrest even as it continues to hold Mubaraks democratically chosen successor, Mohamed Morsi. In Syria, rebels reported that the government had attacked them with chemical weapons. With the exception of Libya, the Obama administration has remained on the sidelines during the Middle East upheavals of the last two years. Is it time for the U.S. to get more involved?
Its easy to say we should get more involved, and almost everyone does. But there is zero agreement as to how, and you cant act on an impulse as opposed to a plan. Do we add serious support to the Syrian rebels assuming, no doubt correctly, that Assads government is indeed guilty of the latest round of slaughter and risk empowering our Islamist enemies? (It was particularly galling to hear John McCain say this week that such an intervention would come at very little cost essentially the same prediction he made about the war in Iraq.) Do we stand up against the murderous military regime in Egypt and call its coup by its rightful name, a coup? Its morally the right thing to do but it also means going against the express lobbying of our ally Israel, which abhors the Muslim Brotherhood and wants the generals to stay in place. Its a measure of how little American consensus there is about these and other questions that both political parties are divided on what to do and how to do it.
In the GOP, for instance, its not just the neocon interventionists versus the neo-isolationists, but now neocon versus neocon, with Elliott Abrams and John Bolton taking diametrically opposite positions in dueling Wall Street Journal op-ed pieces this week. As for the centrist Establishment, we have the sage Thomas Friedman, who is essentially praying in print for some Third Way compromise to materialize in the midst of this chaos. Meanwhile, the American public that would have to pay in blood and treasure for any intervention isnt engaged at all. We all know what happens when America pushes into foreign intervention without public support or, in this case, even knowledge. For those who fault Obamas passive leadership on these issues and often with reason where are the alternative leaders in either party or in Congress who might rally American action?
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Frank Rich Even Neocons Disagree on Mideast Intervention (Original Post)
eridani
Aug 2013
OP
kelliekat44
(7,759 posts)1. Unless our intervention changes things for the better...and that is very doubtful...we should stay
out of this fight and pay more attention to our own economic and social house...which seems to be what the President is doing.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)2. Recommend
eridani
(51,907 posts)3. Rather looks like the US is going to intervene
I predict Al Qaeda will benfit a lot.