FOREIGN AFFAIRS- IRAQ                                                  

                          RETURN TO AMERICAN FOREIGN AFFAIRS

                          Specifically on the issue of WMD, go to IRAQ-WEAPONS of MASS DESTRUCTION 

06/20/07  Again it is time for the Mountain Observer to be blunt about Iraq.  Our activities in Iraq are central to the entire effort against IslamicFascism.  In the opinion of this observer, our efforts there have been successful way beyond the hopes and plans of the original authors of the policy of pre-emption against Saddam Hussein.  The original thinking was "better over there than in Central Park", and that was, and remains, the fundamental logic.  Far more successfully than many originally imagined, the IslamicFascists have taken the bait, and by their own admission have bought into the idea that Iraq is the focal point of the fight.  They recognize, and have openly acknowledged, that it is in Iraq that they will succeed or fail.  We have got them right where we want them.  There has been a steep learning curve on our part, and mistakes in tactical strategy have been made along the way, however the underling strategic logic has been correct all along.  Our primary problem today with the whole matter of confronting IslamicFascism is not Iraq, Iran, Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, or the French.  Our problem today is ourselves and our willingness to believe in ourselves and the legitimacy of our own American Purpose.  In our history we have been up against this wall before; again our national character is being tested.  We can either choose to prevail, which we most certainly can do, or slink back into the backwater of history with the condemnation and approbation of future generations that appeasement and surrender would most surely deserve.   I could go on.  General David Petraeus, carry on.  JES 

06/08/07   Finally, thankfully, the inside brokered deal in Congress over amnesty for illegal immigrants falls apart in the Senate.  We have just witnessed Congress at its worst.  In the opinion of this observer, passage of this legislative monstrosity would have been fatal to the continued existence of the nation.  George W. Bush, you are now on your own.  In the course of this process, you have stabbed us, your own base, in the back.  This came as no surprise; we have watched this storm approaching for a long time.  I do not doubt your honesty and sincerity, and never have.  Your recognition of the threat of the international threat against the West after 09/11, and your decision to preemptively target Afghanistan and Iraq as you did were absolutely correct.  However, in the execution department you are an absolute bumbler, both foreign and domestic.  I am too disgusted at the moment to write the list here now, and in any event I would just be repeating myself anyway.   This matter of your ideas about border security and amnesty for illegal aliens however, just pushes everything over the top.   General David Petraeus, who is now running the show, carry on.  I look forward to your forthcoming report  in September.   For Iraq, it will be determinative.  It is ironic that your boss in the White House, by his own actions and operational decisions, has done as much to undermine the War on IslamicFascism in several ways as all the Democrats and RINOs in Congress, and those Americans who elected them.  This observer fears that another 09/11 event, perhaps nuclear, will be necessary to get folk's heads on straight.  JES   

05/20/07  During World War II, George Orwell is quoted as observing that "The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve the possibility of victory.  The chief activity among left-wing writers is a rather pettifogging criticism which turns into a kind of dismay when England wins a victory, because this always falsifies their predictions." 

The Left will never change.  Today, with nuclear weapons falling into the hands of IslamicFascists determined to destroy us and who, at once, thrill to the prospect of 72 virgins in heaven, American Conservatives have a problem with the Leftists among us.  Existentially, most are Democrats.  It must also be said that none of this is helped by a GOP President caving into the current nonsense of "immigration reform", recognized by the rest of us as amnesty that is already provoking a mad rush for our southern border.  Our world is going nuts.  JES

05/01/07  The President vetoes the war spending authorization which was constructed by Democrats with a hard schedule to surrender in Iraq (read War on Terror).  An unacceptable policy choice, a stab in the back of the American military and a signal to the world of an American lack of resolve to confront IslamicFascism.  If Democrats truly wish to open up the floodgates of hell, they should simply defund the war now, without stretching timelines.  In fact they are cowards and appeasers, unable to round up enough simpleton GOP collaborators to over-ride a veto.  It is a pathetic sight to behold.  Stay tuned.  Meanwhile, General David Petraeus, carry on.  JES 

04/24/07   So Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid D-CA, using his official position, instructs President Bush, General David Petraeus, and the Nation that the war in Iraq (in the shriveled brains of the Left something apparently separate from IslamicFascism) has been lost and that the "surge" is not working.   Now the fact of the matter is that, at least since 1992, major elected Democrat officials have almost routinely engaged in what  Originalist Americans describe as treason.  In the present circumstances we are actually at war, and properly so, against evil forces whose clearly and credibly stated purpose is to destroy us.  In the opinion of the Mountain Observer, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid D-CA is a traitor, and ought to be dealt with accordingly according to the law, as originally understood, forthwith.  The Mountain Observer is absolutely beside himself with anger.  General David Petraeus, carry on.  JES

04/01/07 The Iraqi government has made a painful, and likely contentious, decision regarding the future of the city of Kirkuk in an attempt to untangle a knot tied by Saddam Hussein during the 1980's and 90's.  On the southern edge of the Kurdish autonomous region, Kirkuk historically was a Kurdish city.   Saddam's "Arabization" effort was an attempt to overwhelm and drive out Kurds with Sunni Arabs; the real issue being oil.  Today's Iraqi government, through the constitutional process, has decided to reverse the whole thing, intending not coercion but rather offering generous resettlement support to Arabs to their original home towns.  Returning Kurds are even now in the likely position of approving by referendum to reattach the city formally to the Kurdish region.  Whatever the wisdom of all this may be, the good news is that at a moment of its greatest apparent weakness, the Iraqi government has found the courage to make a truly tough decision on its own.  The significance of this fact is huge.  JES

04/01/07  April Fools Day.  Regarding the funding of the war, schedules for bringing the troops home, and as many unrelated ear marks as Congress can tack on.  We hope the President means it when he promises a veto.  This is one of those key moments in history when an entire culture teeters on the precipice of suicide or salvation, literally.  We are on the edge of a major confrontation with Iran, either which way.  It occurres to the Mountain Observer, as it has to Newt Gingrich, that Iran's only gasoline refinery is a very inviting target as the price we might expect of Iran for their continued meddling in Iraq, Lebanon and beyond.  This is, no doubt, a contingency option at a certain point.  Newt suggests following up with a naval blockade to shut down gasoline imports, this too an obvious contingency option.  However, sooner or later, we must end Iranian sophistry about a nuclear program for peaceful purposes.

As Margaret Thatcher  advised the President's father, "It's no time to go wobbly, George".  What is truly disturbing is that the Bush clan seems to need this sort of advice and council  from time to time.   General David Petraeus: carry on.  JES

03/24/07  Again the Chinese are wooing the Russians for Siberian oil.  Russian and Chinese foot dragging in the United Nations on really tough trade sanctions against Iran are running up against a wall as Iran's complicity in sabotaging Iraq become more widely exposed.  The pieces of the puzzle are as follows: The American "surge" in Iraq is showing signs of results, and in Congress, Democrats are stumbling in their efforts to sabotage the war effort.  The renewed credibility of American determination suggests the real possibility of a collision with Iran, not only over the issue of Iranian nuclear weapons ambition, buy also over Iranian hegemonic ambition in Iraq and the entire gulf state region.  The United States has pushed very hard in the Security Counsel for some really tough economic sanctions against Iran, and both the Russians and the Chinese have stood in the way.  Russia historically has had an interest in trade access to the south, many times frustrated.  The Chinese are rather desperate for oil to power their exploding economy; they have very little of their own.  While the Mountain Observer is generally skeptical concerning the effectiveness of trade sanctions and boycotts, in this situation with Iran the fact of the matter is that they are very vulnerable to some real damage if a genuine and tough boycott was applied and enforced.  Even so, boycotts have a limited lifespan of effectiveness; witness the post Gulf War experience with the boycott against Saddam's Iraq.   The appeal to our side (Democrats excluding themselves) to a tough boycott against Iran is that it might have sufficient short term effectiveness to force an internal political correction to the power of the mullahs and the policy ambitions of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad against many of his scared neighbors.  The Iranian economy today is on shaky legs, and ordinary Iranians are politically very restless. The Mountain Observer remains skeptical that all this diplomatic maneuvering will produce effective results, but at the same time recognizes the political need to run the trapline.  And I would suggest that both the Russians and the Chinese recognize that we are closing in on the end of that trapline, even if American Democrats don't.  If the Russians and the Chinese don't begin to cooperate more closely with the American efforts to utilize the boycott route, then the United States is really left with no options whatsoever but to confront the Iranians directly militarily, with negative implications both for the supply of Chinese oil and a spectrum of Russian (Putin) national priorities.  Thanks to Mitch McConnell, we may yet be able to stall off the desire of Democrats to run and hide under a pillow.  JES

03/13/07  The fatal flaw in the ideology of modern Liberalism is the complete absence of a central unifying political theory or principles around which they can all unite.  The closest they can come is that all problems are to be solved through and by the government, which also can provide the funds to do so at the point of a gun.  The central unifying political theory ends there; questions as to what the problems are, and what the solutions might be, fragment in thousands of directions according to the interests and agendas of specific constituencies and individuals.  In the absence of any actual central unifying political theory or principles, action is accomplished by the creation of a case by case consensus based on the raw political power of the coalition of the moment, always subject to change.

So it is that the Democrat majorities in both House of Congress are flailing away on the issue of Iraq.  The consequences, what ever specifically evolves, cannot be a positive for American national interests.  Should you be puzzling over how Liberals feel (they don't generally think), reflect upon this.  General David Petraeus: carry on.  JES

02/17/07  Pretending that only their favored constituents notice, a Democrat House of Representatives, joined by a handful of gutless Republicans, pass a "nonbinding" resolution against the "surge" of troop deployments to Iraq.  However, of course, the resolution is binding in the sense that our enemies are watching and taking inspiration, and those in Iraq, and the Middle East generally, who have supported us learn again that American resolve is not to be trusted.  So as a sequel to the outcome of the November elections, the American people, through their elected representatives, have virtually guaranteed defeat in Iraq, invited expanded terrorism directly upon us, propelled re-examination of the foreign policies of others worldwide premised on non-existent American resolve, and virtually guaranteed a world war, point future, with Iran as the flash point.  The Senate is likely to add to the disaster later today.  If belief that the President is so in error as to justify undercutting the troops, then the principled response should have been to defund the enterprise and get out now, but the cowards on the Left want no responsibility for the consequences militarily, politically, or morally.  What else could one expect of those who are intellectually and morally bankrupt.  As the refugees begin to stream, and the deaths and tortures accelerate, we on the Right will remember where responsibility really lies.  The fact of the matter is, and always has been, that the original decision to invade was correct, and in spite of the considerable government bungling that has occurred since, the enterprise was, and still is, winnable.  But this will not happen: Americans have become self-serving cowards.  Our real problem is not Shiites and Sunnis.  It is Iran, and it is the moral corruption of America.  Drunk with the personal chase for dollars and personal comfort, an obvious consequence of decades of immersion in Material Secularism, Americans, as this is written, are consumed with the intrigue of the death of a 39 year old bimbo who herself was a statement for everything wrong with our culture.  The values that informed the American Founding seem to have slid beneath the surface, and our entire political and social culture is complicit.   The only point in continuing the website is that at some point, a future generation will be rocked by reality, and begin to re-think the disgusting performance of their parents that caused the mess.  The process of correction will not be pretty. 

It is possible to make the case that our problem is that the French affliction, after centuries, has finally overwhelmed us.  I quote Jean Jacques Rousseau, arguably the father of all that has gone wrong in the western world since:  "Let us begin by setting aside all the facts, because they do not affect the question".  And so it has gone since.   JES

02/07/07  Three years too late, Lt. General David Petraeus replaces General George Casey as the top U.S. military commander in Iraq.  The significance of this is that Lt. General Petraeus wrote the U.S. military manual on counterinsurgency.   He represents a group within the military that has long pushed for a reorientation away from more traditional Army thinking focused on large formations consistent with European Cold War planning.  He has been handed a tough job at this point, and his biggest problem are matters over which he has little control: American public attitudes, an Army starved of sufficient size and strategic focus, not readily corrected as rapidly as may be necessary, and an Iraqi population that has perhaps lost faith in an American ability to establish credible security.  There is no doubt that from May 2003 forward the post war planning and execution was seriously flawed, and that issue comes to rest directly at the feet of President Bush; the failures falling across the responsibilities of several departments and agencies.  Within the bounds of respect for an Administration conducting a war, the Mountain Observer has raised questions all along.  Now the fact of the matter is that General Petraeus might succeed in his mission, and the entire American military establishment has the right to expect the support and respect of all Americans in accomplishing a victory in what history will come to recognize as a critical turning point in western resistance to IslamicFascism.  A failure to succeed will be devastating, in terms of both blood and treasure, for years to come.  It would seem that too many Americans do not yet comprehend the true nature of IslamicFascism, and what we are really up against.  JES

01/12/07  President Bush outlines some adjustments in policy and procedure for Iraq on 01/10/07.  For the complete text of his speech, and comments by the Mountain Observer, go to GEO. W. BUSH NEW LOOK AT IRAQ.  The President is finally headed off in the right direction.  In his defense, in the matter of combating IslamicFascism, we should all acknowledge that the nature of the challenge is without precedent in modern times; a learning curve for all has been at hand.  I repeat words from his speech: "And all involved  [with objections or new ideas] have a responsibility to explain how the path they propose would be more likely to succeed."   Whether you agree with the President, or not, overall, or in the details, the fact of the matter is that he is the first Commander-in-Chief to draw a line and stand up to IslamicFascism, decades in ascendancy.  It disturbs our comfort.  I will be more direct about it than he.  If you just think Bush is a liar, or are otherwise unable to say anything intelligent, then just shut up and go sit in the corner.  JES

12/30/06  Finally Saddam Hussein is history.  We now have more flexible options with respect to Iraq, and the challenge of IslamicFascism can also be addressed with greater flexibility.  As expected, we notice that Saddam's final appeals were to Allah, as were those of his Sunni mourners.   Our best wishes to the good people of Iraq; you still have a long way to go, and I wish you well.  It is an American national interest only that, no matter how the pie is sliced, no threat remains to ourselves.

12/07/06 Regarding the Iraq Study Group aka  How Best to Surrender Without Telling Anybody Group, up real close.  Click, and take a hard look yourself.  Analysis by the Mountain Observer currently a work in progress.  JES

11/19/06  Gen. John Abizaid,  top U.S. commander in the Middle East, has a little chat with the Senate Armed Services Committee, basically explaining that, in his professional opinion, both the President and his ex-boss Donald Rumsfeld have been right all along with "staying the course".  Under the current political circumstances in Washington, he had every opportunity to pull the plug on his political bosses.   He did not, clearly rejecting the cut and run appeasement arguments of the mob about to take over Congress in January.  One must decide if the General is speaking as a politician, or as a professional soldier, or is he just stupid as John Francois Kerry, the French looking guy, ex-pretender to the office des le roi des Etats Unis, who also served in Vietnam, would seem to have concluded.  The Mountain Observer, without a doubt, prefers the council of the professional soldier.  Remember this incident point future when, at some point in the opinion of this observer, the Republic finally collapses under the weight of the mob, and soldiers will need to step in.   JES

11/15/06  Within the orbit of Iraqi politics it has grown increasingly apparent that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is the weak link in the chain, and in a sensible world, should be removed.   Meanwhile, the so-called Baker- Iraq Study Group, an euphemism for How Best to Surrender Without Telling Anybody Group, emboldened by a voter decision to cut and run, like most committees, flounders around in its attempt to substitute defeat for victory.  What none of this motley bunch seems to realize is that we had the jihadists right where we wanted them: over there, not over here.  The war in Iraq had been more successful than originally anticipated in drawing IslamicFascists physically to a central point where they could have been dealt with in a terminal fashion.  But no, we have inverted victory into defeat, as will become apparent in the years ahead.  The likes of Osama bin Laden, and John Francois Kerry, the French looking guy, ex-pretender to the office des le roi des Etats Unis, who also served in Vietnam, seem to have prevailed.  Americans, be proud of yourselves.  What an absolute mess.   JES

11/06/06  Confession time.  Occasionally I am wrong, and I am not afraid to admit it when that happens.  So it is with the disposition of one Saddam Hussein.  I have strongly suggested on previous occasions that it might have been better for our forces to have simply dispatched him in his rat hole when he was originally discovered.  This was wrong, and a pleasant misreading of the determination, and incredible bravery, of the group of Iraqi judges charged with the task of Saddam's trial and the rendering of justice.  At a great cost of personal safety, which will be with them the rest of their lives, justice prevailed in a rough sort of Arab way, and we can all look forward to Saddam's eventually swinging by the neck from the end of a rope, an utter failure as a human being, not to take pleasure in the spectacle, but to take satisfaction in the accomplishment of justice at the hands of his former brethren who have suffered so much.  The rendering of justice in this matter, by Iraqis, is a tremendous building block in self respect for Iraqis at a time when they are greatly strained among themselves.  We do not know yet what the future holds yet for the Iraqi people, but some pride and self satisfaction has certainly taken a boost, most needed.  And with all of that, the US military can also take a bow.  Thank you, G.I.'s, and good luck, Iraqi democrats, in a very dangerous world.  JES

10/23/06  Regarding recently rising U.S. casualties in Iraq: while there are several possible reasons for this development, however the Mountain Observer dismisses the largely convenient explanation of Rahmadon.  There is no doubt in my mind that what is going on here is IslamicFascist participation in the American elections, with seeming success.  Clear-eyed objective observers should have little difficulty in gauging IslamicFascist preferences.  We pray that American voters are as astute.  JES

10/09/06  On Iraq, and the therapeutic war.  I was disturbed when 30 days in, the uniformed resistance melted away without our side seeming  to recognize the Sunni strategy of guerrilla resistance from the beginning.  Meanwhile, domestic American opposition, afraid of unkind words not to mention war as a policy, fixated on the WMD issue, distorting the good news that we able to verify more exactly what years of United Nations "inspections" had been unable to do.  Like the rookie football wide receiver who tries to run with the ball before he has caught it, we then proceeded to get too caught up in democratization schemes before we had crushed all opposition.  Fear of victory, it seems, is as sign of the times.

When we found Saddam Hussein in the rat hole and did not plug him on the spot, I was uneasy.  Now there are signs that Iraqi assets, having gone through the ritual of a trial, what passes as a jury of "judges" is freezing up on the political implications of doing what needs to be done, apparent from the beginning.

Our fundamental error in Iraq was the failure to go in and conduct a genuine "shock and awe" campaign, on the ground as well as from the air.  As with Germany and Japan, Iraq needed to be totally purged of effective resistance on the part of anyone.  Totally humbled.  The President relied too much on the advice of his Generals, a military generation perhaps to much traumatized by Vietnam memories and 8 years of OJ Billyboy politically correct civilian therapeutic management style.  What has been missing has been a General McArthur advising a President who understood that in the end he had to take responsibility; not blaming a new age General Staff for their advice.

The Administration's subsequent efforts to enable Iraqi democracy have been noble, meeting with many successes, only to be torpedoed by the original strategic military failures.  It was not an error, as the Presidents domestic political opposition contends, for us to invade Iraq.  Saddam Hussein needed to be removed from power as a prerequisite to eventual conversion of the Middle East to 21sr Century sanity essential to our own long term national security.  The President's vision, in this regard, has been long and forward thinking, and correct.  He has been betrayed by an ignorant and self-serving opposition, too much the product of post historical intellectual and moral relativism, and he has been betrayed by his own natural inclination of kindness to his political enemies, foreign and domestic.

Opposition within Iraq is fed by Iranian subterfuge among Iraqi Shia, setting up a tug of war between the commonality of Shia and the divisions between Arab and Persian cultures.  IslamicFascist al Qaida remains an effective influence among the secular Sunni, because, you see, the theological divisions are not what it's really all about, and never have been.  Our own domestic hate America political opposition led by the New York Times and their cronies, print and electronic, in the traditional mainstream press, have played directly into the manipulative hands of IslamicFascists everywhere, again, foreign and domestic.  IslamicFascists think they will do better against us with appease prone Democrats in office, and they are right.  Finally, the general cultural history of Mesopotamia does not look kindly on the artificial British colonial experiment known as Iraq. 

What to do?  Tough policy decisions need to be made, and "cut and run" is not an option.   It would appear that we might want to encourage a more federated arrangement between the three major groups in Iraq.  Such an approach is not without its own set of dangers.  For example, it would probably tend to fuel the dream among Kurds of an independent Kurdistan, to the consternation of Turkey, setting up a serious conflict between them which is not in our interest.  Otherwise, a truly Federated Iraq might be easier to manage in the future by virtue of a lessened danger of a Hussein style international threat.  Maybe so maybe not.  The original (current) Administration plan is the most desirable from our point of view, but we must be studying options, because it may not work.  The Mountain Observer advises great policy change caution, and patience, not historically among our national virtues.   With all the problems, there is a hell of a lot that is going right.  In the wake of 09/11, the President accepted an enormous challenge by forces determined to destroy us, and warned from the beginning that it would be a long hard battle.  He was right.  "Cut and run" appeasement is not an option.    JES

08/04/06  Shiites demonstrate in Baghdad in behalf of Hezbollah, raging against both Israelis (Jews) and Americans.   What are we to make of this?  To start with, we don't make out of it proof that Bush is a dunce and our intervention in Iraq was an error.   What we make out of it is that there are young hot heads of both Sunni and Shia persuasion, also willing to cut each others heads off.  Our presence and efforts in Iraq have been directed at drawing out the potential in Islamic culture for the political growth and survival of cooler heads of a more moderate temperament.  Much very tough love is called for, including such measures as Israel is currently delivering to Hezbollah.   Now the Iraqi government and people are free to disinvite our presence anytime they wish.  That is a calculated risk on our part, as it is on theirs.  The Mountain Observer makes no hard predictions in this regard.   However things work out eventually betwen Sunnis and Shia in Iraq, little notice is being given to our smashing success with the Kurds.  Is there a Kurdistan in the future? Possibly, however a very delicate matter on several levels.  Some forward thinking on our part is called for.  Meanwhile, the toughest political issue in the entire Middle East has to do with the acceptance of Israel by Islam.  That is an issue that we run away from at our peril.   The resolution of this issue demands our ongoing support of the moderately inclined of the muslim persuasion coupled with an unambiguous rejection of those who resort to violence and intimidation outside the parameters of civilization as we understand it.  No apologies or guilt trips are welcome here.

Repeating myself from 07/19,"during the 1930's, there were those who said of the Nazis that "first they went after the Jews, but it did not affect me.  Then they went after the Catholics, but if did not affect me.  Then they went after the Protestants, and the Liberals  and people of color, but it did not affect me.  Finally they came after me, and it was too late."  America, you really need to wake up."  JES

07/29/06  The fact of the matter is that things are not going well in Iraq.  For months, all kinds of criticisms have been hurled at the Bush Administration, and while errors have been made, most of the complaint falls wide of the mark.  The underling premise of most of the complaint is that our intervention in Iraq was an option ill chosen.  It was an option only in the sense that the alternative was to do nothing about the existence of the Saddam Hussein regime.  In the opinion of the Mountain Observer, that was not an option, and the President was correct to act.  Today our real problem, inclusive of Iraq, is the larger issue of Arab culture in the extended Islamic sense.  It was recently called to my attention that there is no direct translation in Arabic for the word, or concept of, "curiosity".   Think about that, and the implications.  Absent curiosity, one must be so self focused as to exclude consideration of others, and others ideas.  Invested heavily in an Islamic perspective, there is no room for openness or tolerance.   We are confronted by a culture never touched by the Enlightenment that so opened up the cultures of the West.  The Marines can't fix that.

The Mountain Observer has, at times, expressed our concern that our efforts in the Middle East have occasionally strayed from the priority of staying focused on matters of our own national security and tempted toward broader irrelevances.    I have been patient with the President's argument for regional "democracy" as a utility to serve our interests, and in theory he is correct decades in the future.  The learning curve for all of us has been to understand the practical limits of deploying this idea today in the face of the existentialist threats of terrorism, including WMD, against us.  Wading into the Iraqi thicket has been productive in forcing the IslamicFascist disease into the open.  Better there than here.  The destruction of Saddam destroyed the only credible center of Sunni military power, allowing attention to be focused on the more dangerous matter of Persian based Shia pretensions out of control.   Which is the point of the current distraction in Iraq.  We cannot "cut and run", but neither can we long afford the burden.  The Mountain Observer has no easy answers to this problem, other than perseverance and patience.   Pulling the plug on Iranian nukes would be helpful.  There is a Sunni (Wahabi) v. Shia death struggle to be exploited so as to distract.   Disarming Iranian nukes is a task that must be done sooner of latter anyway.  There are those who argue that there is a current opportunity to do so.  I would certainly agree with that.  To delay and wait could be fatal.   JES.

06/17/06  The President has had a good week on Iraq, and he deserves it.  Aside from the timely passing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a treasure trove of intelligence data was captured, enabling our team effort with the new Iraqi government to really run down trouble makers.  All indicators point toward a further collapse of al-Qaeda in Iraq. 

Our next problem in the "War on Terror", aka WW IV, is Iran.  The issue here is not whether to take out Iran's developing nuclear weapons program, but when, a largely political matter on several levels.  The military effort called for here would involve massive highly targeted air strikes, and aside from some very limited Special Ops assignments, no boots on the ground.  Post Nuke, Iranians can work through their own political problems, which are considerable, although we should be standing by to assist pro-democracy elements in their political battle from a distance.  The critical political challenge will be continuing good relations and cooperation with Iraqi Shia, now the dominate force in Iraq.  At play are the loyalties of Arab v. Persian, or common Shia v. new Iraqi national freedom.  We also need to be prepared to counter, from Iraq, any possible ground assaults from Iran against Iraq, but again, I would imagine this to be a largely tactical air problem.

Now it so happens that as this is written, reports are coming in that North Korea is possibly immanent with a long range missile test.   It occurs to the Mountain Observer that a highly targeted air strike on the launch pad would accrue a number of productive results politically, diplomatically and militarily, about the world.  It is sad that, perhaps, none of this discussion might have been necessary had The West been more alert and responsive to these threats years ago.  Left unattended, cancer spreads, ultimately requiring radical surgery.   JES

06/13/06 The President slips out the back door from Camp David and fly's to Baghdad to the surprise of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, and to cheer the troops.  The Left will call it grandstanding.  I call it an excellent leadership move, among other things making it clear that Iraq belongs again to Iraq, with the responsibility that goes with it.  With the termination of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the finalization of appointments for the Iraqi government, the liberation of Karl Rove and rising poll numbers, the President is having a good week.  So sorry about the border.  JES

06/10/06  Ministerial appointments completing formation of the new Iraqi government include Sherwan al-Waili, Shiite, as Minister of State for National Security, Gen. Abdul-Qader Mohammed Jassim al-Mifarji, Sunni, Minister of Defense, and Jawad al-Bolani, Shiite, Interior Minister.  These were the key posts to be filled, but Iraqi democrats finally did it.  Now their challenge is to pull together and build a nation, the key to a new era for the entire Middle East.  JES

06/08/06  Great day for democrats in Iraq: bad day for Democrats in America.  Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is gone, killed yesterday by a teaming up of Iraqi citizens and the American military.  Good job, however that's only half the good news.  New Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announces permanent ministerial appointments for the Defense and Interior posts.  Developing.    JES

05/21/06  Iraq's first real post Saddam government is launched, with Nouri al-Maliki , a Shi'ite, as Prime Minister.   Now all this may, or may not, hold together and work, however any decent person, anywhere, whatever your politics or religious orientation, should offer at least a silent prayer for the success of this effort.   It is a beginning, however tentative and delicate.  So it also was in Philadelphia in 1789, and it could have also gone either way right here.  With Iraq there is so much at stake; much much larger than Iraq itself.  There are certain moments in history that shape the direction of centuries, and I would submit to you that this is one such moment, however it goes.  Steady as she goes.   JES.    

04/24/06  The formation of a government in Iraq moves forward.  The Shi'ite Alliance's original candidate, interim Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari withdraws, apparently at virtually everyone else's request as being too weak and ineffective.  The new man in charge as Prime Minister will be Shi'ite Jawad al-Maliki, apparently acceptable to both Sunni Arabs and the Kurds, as well as Shi'ite Muslims.   Mr. al-Maliki is quoted as saying  "Arms should be in the hands of the government. There is a law that calls for the merging of militias with the armed forces.", and virtually everyone apparently agrees.     Mr. Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, will remain as President.   There are two vice-presidential spots which will go to Sunni Arab Tariq al-Hashimi and Shi'ite Adil Abdul-Mahdi.    Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, a Sunni, will be Speaker of the Parliament.   Khalid al-Attiyah, a Shi'ite, and Aref Tayfour, a Kurd, will be his deputies.   Can all this rise above the sectarian tensions?  They must, or Iraq has no future, and the Arab world will once again collapse upon itself.  That would not be in the best interests of the United States, which has been the point all along.   JES

04/08/06  It is obvious at this point, to the Mountain Observer, that the centrifugal politics of Iraq will be too much to overcome, and American policies must be adjusted accordingly.  (Ref. previous comments in AMERICAN FOREIGN AFFAIRS and 241 LETTER 05-07 ).  Again, there was no error in our pre-emptive intervention in the first place; for our own security it had to be done.  What has become apparent over time is that the experiment in nation building simply will not go anywhere in the face of regional nationalist  priorities long papered over by past western colonial experiments.  Call it Balkanization, Islamic style.  The root problem here is Islam itself; we cannot fix jihad inherent, but rather defend ourselves against the intended consequences.   The fact of the matter is that in the world of Islam, there are forces determined to wreck the West, and the United States in particular, regardless of the existential costs.  In the case of Iraq, this does not mean "cut and run".   It means let them do as they will so long as the result does not configure a threat against us, or Israel.  We need to stand by to assure that.  Yes Israel, the canary in the coal mine of middle eastern politics and the survival of western civilization matters huge.   The real freight train coming straight at us is the nuclear threat of Iran, and it must be dealt with, perhaps with nuclear weapons.  The United Nations, Europe, judges or Democrats won't save us; our Soldiers will.   A nuclear capable Iran simply must not be allowed to manifest itself, and that is the bottom line.   JES.

03/05/06  The time has come to make some adjustments to the War on IslamicFascism.   We are in the midst of a domestic political collapse for the President's strategies, to date, that at times have been confusing, inconsistent, and poorly presented.  At the core of these policy concerns is Iraq.  On the Bush side of the ledger the problem has been a mission creep, both forced by events on the ground, but also, and I would argue primarily, by unrelenting domestic political stabs in the back.   Simply put, al Qaeda has been successful in mining the politics of the American Left to subvert our efforts in Iraq.  There were also problems with our original assessment  as planned, (intelligence corrupted, partially by a longstanding internal policy war with ideological overtones) of the task to be faced post Saddam, whom, I must point out, is still a player.  The President's original assessment of the need to take out Saddam Hussein preemptively was correct in the opinion of the Mountain Observer.   Today, there is no reversal on my part in the wisdom of that decision.    I must also remind readers that the WMD problem remains to this day, not that WMD did not exist, but where did it go.  That remains an open issue. (Elsewhere for more detailed discussion).  Moreover the original list of justifications for our pre-emptive action was much larger, and most significantly included the now well established fact that the Saddam regime was very well hooked up with al Qaeda in a common goal to subvert the West in general, and the United States in particular irrespective of their mutual differences.  (Elsewhere for more detailed discussion).  It is on this basis, as a direct threat to our national security, that this American Nationalist Conservative has always supported this President, not the grander goals of neo-conservatives more exercised with nation building in a Western image.  (e.g. Go to Letter 241 05-07 then go to 09/25/05.)   I have never objected to the idea of building republican democracy in Iraq in principle, except that my residual skepticism has been muted by a priority of supporting a President in the face of outlandish, and I believe actionably subversive speech and activity on the part of the American Left.  Selling freedom is not a bad idea, within the practical limits of the moment, and unfortunately for our side those practical limits have been defined by domestic political duplicity and ignorance, willful or otherwise, and otherwise subject to the Patty Hearst Syndrome of falling for your would be captors.

So it is in the opinion of this writer, that two issues have arisen at the moment that give immediate pause concerning the Presidents current strategy which has come to lean too much on carrots which IslamicFascists regard as weakness, and incomprehensible in their world view of  God's call for jihad against the West without compromise.   Weakness, real or imagined, is provocative to the thug mentality with which we are at war.   

The first has to do with the Dubai Ports World deal, which in my judgment, at this point, may or may not be the right thing to do, but in the apparent political untenability of a very poorly presented proposal, incoherent opposition has been aroused.  (Elsewhere for more detailed discussion).  The second issue has to do with the rapidly approaching need to attack Iranian nuclear war waging capacity.   There is not much time left, and in the opinion of the Mountain Observer, all other options have been exhausted.   There is no issue with our own military capacity for the job; our military is entirely capable of taking on the assignment right now, save for the fact that our bunker busting bomb technology is not quite as far along as it could have been had Congress acted on additional Bush funding requests in this area in 2002.  Now we are faced with the reality of the need to act, not only to neuter Iranian capability and pretense, but to re-establish internationally American seriousness about defeating the greater theater of IslamicFascism as a threat to ourselves.

No small part of the President's political problem has been the accumulation over time of a series of matters, exaggerated, distorted and pushed to the political limits by an arguably subversive MSP (main stream press, also arguably no longer mainstream in the red states).  Specifically this includes, at a minimum, The New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, ABC, CNN, and their children about the country.  The matters of grave concern to the Leftist ideologs include "domestic spying"  (the President is on very firm legal and Constitutional ground), Guantanamo Bay, where our only error has been to be too nice and not beat the crap out of people, and  the "mis-handling" of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, blown all out of proportion.  Of graver concern to most of the political spectrum has been the lack of seriousness about correcting our own border problems, held hostage, in part, by the perceived priority for cheap labor.  The President has also hurt his cause by a failure to think twice about the issue of profiling, a necessary tool of intelligence and security administration.  All of this, justified or not, has built to such a level of distraction from our real priorities that rational dialog among ourselves is in a near terminal state.

I am with the President on the War on IslamicFascism, however, I think we need to review policies and make some adjustments that re-prioritize our own national security and curtail the impulses of coddling that can only be misinterpreted as weakness by our enemies and invite dependency by our friends.    JES

02/24/06  In Iraq a Shiite Shrine gets blown up, generating much turmoil.   Bad stuff, and dangerous.  Our Administration has worked vigorously to promote the republican concept in the ordering of a post Saddam Iraq, and nobody I know has ever been under any illusions about the political risks.  It might not work.  We are getting close to the point where our best option may be to stand back and just let a civil war happen.   Sooner or later, one way or the other, Iraqis are going to have to work this out for themselves.  Our primary national interest is to stand by those who support a non threatening result to ourselves, and to oppose those who do, and they are numerous.  I believe one of our errors was to not plug Saddam in to top of his head while he was still down in his rat hole.  His presence today is, in no small measure, a major encouragement to much of the disruption and chaos that continues to occur.  Much more to say than I've got time for now.   JES

02/05/06   Since 09/11 the Western World, aka Christendom too many years ago, has been walking on eggs around what has by now become clearly evident.  Radical fundamentalist elements of the worldwide Muslim "community" (I really hate this use of the word) for over 100 years have been slowly advancing an aggressive agenda of subverting the West.  Contrary to the fevered imaginations of the political Left, it is not George Bush's fault, nor did he start it, nor has our policy against Saddam Hussein and Iraqi Baathism been an error.  The President himself has done his best to characterize our response to 09/11 as a "War on Terror", when he himself has since admitted that a "war on IslamicFascism" might be a more correct characterization of the effort.   He has always followed up quickly with the caveat that the "extremists" are a minority of the world wide Muslim "community", without every explaining his sources of measurement.  While it is true that most Muslims are not (yet) throwing bombs, there is no accurate or reliable yardstick concerning the quiet thinking and dispositions of these folks regarding their preferred desires for the future of the West, aka "Crusaders".  Truth is that the entire Western World has been more than cautious about drawing conclusions as to what is really going on here, and properly so, for the implications are enormous, and peace is at stake.

So it is that the current worldwide Muslim "community" outrage over some Danish cartoons directed at the Prophet Muhammad throws new relief on the discussion.  Similar cartoons directed at the Pope would draw cheers, not only from Muslims, but also the still dominate Western Secular Left.  Conservatives such as myself would prefer that cartoons inspired by actual hate should not be directed at anyone, while at the same time recognizing a distinction between malice and necessary hard edged political commentary.  Freedom of the press in the Western World, aka Christendom too many years ago, is a generally recognized political and social value, conflicting directly with the fundamental interpretation of Islamic Law which forbids any depictions of the Prophet Muhammad for fear they could lead to idolatry.  So it is that Denmark's Jyllands-Posten has found itself in trouble with "millions" of Muslims, and certain Westerners fearful of defending their own values in the face of Muslim threats.  Like the recent rebellions in France (sorry, but there was more to that than finding a job) the worldwide Muslim "community" may be edging closer to a more open and honest display of their agenda with this current set of tantrums, perhaps displaying a frustration with their own failures to find traction.   (Sort of like the histrionics of the Massachusetts KKK (Kennedy Kerry Klan) over the elevation of United States Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.)   Now there is Iran, not only threatening Israel, get real, but the entire Western World, aka Christendom too many years ago.  They take these matters very seriously.  So to, do we need to also.  JES

01/21/06  Osama bin Laden offers the U.S. a "truce" in Iraq and Afghanistan.  This is not worth the President's time.   Vice President Dick Cheney says "We don't negotiate with terrorists, I think you have to destroy them", and he is absolutely correct.  The only problem here is the fact that the Vice President found it necessary to respond at all, standing as testimony to the effectiveness of al-Qaeda's intellectual penetration of the American Democratic Party and American "Liberalism".  And that is a real problem.  Those who legitimize this as a discussion are arguably giving aid and comfort to the enemy.  That a "truce" has been offered is a sign of their weakness, whoever "they" are.  Has Osama bin Laden registered as a Democrat, or has Dick Durban signed up with al Qaeda; which way is it?  It's getting hard to tell the difference.  Are Democrats renting rooms to would be al-Qaeda terrorists?  Is that their real fear of the NSA?  Real Americans will press forward.  JES

12/15/05  It's been a tough day for Democrats in the United States.  It seems that the Iraqi elections have been very successful in terms of turnout.   Early reports indicate a 70% turnout of registered voters indicating a level of enthusiasm rarely seen in Chicago, or even Boston; a lot of purple fingers held aloft.  The American "mainstream" Leftwing press is already nitpicking, and drawing absurd conclusions: just pick up any edition of the New York or Los Angeles Times for all the gloom and doom.  History will write that American Conservatives brought the idea of liberal democracy to the middle east, as American Liberals worked feverishly to sabotage the effort.  Now, of course, it is too early to predict where this experiment will wind up leading.  Democrats have become emotionally invested in defeat, while Conservatives are intellectually invested in success.  More on Iraq later as details of the story unfold.  JES

12/06/05  Incidentally, for anyone who is interested, go to the most recent manifestation of Paul Volcker's UN investigation: a work in progress: www.iic-offp.org , the Independent Inquiry Committee into the United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme.  The only difficulty here is that, by training and education, Volcker is a bean counter, not a persecutor, opps, sorry, prosecutor.  JES

12/06/05  Democrats are absolutely obsessed with making an analogy between Vietnam and Iraq, and they could not be more wrong.  Yesterday, Democratic National Chairman Howard Dean predicted that the "idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong.  I've seen this before in my life. This is the same situation we had in Vietnam."   Well it absolutely is not.

1).  In the case of Vietnam, the North Vietnamese were never guilty of a direct attack on the United States, the disputed facts surrounding the incident in the Gulf of Tonkin not withstanding.  On September 11, 2001, a whole series of attacks on the United States by IslamicFascists over a number of years, culminated in the deaths of 3000 American civilians on American soil.  Iraq, at least so far, has never been linked directly to the execution, or specific pre-knowledge, of the 09/11 event, and no one in the Administration has ever claimed so.  However, what had been clearly established is the direct and ongoing linkage between the Saddam regime and al-Qaeda through-out the nineties in a marriage of convenience and collaboration against us.  Details indisputable, widely available, and still being un-earthed.  That Democrats are so obsessed on re-writing history on this point betrays their recognition of its significance.

2}.  Our decision to engage Iraq was endorsed by today's very same Democrat "leadership" in 1998, and earlier, when George W. Bush was still in Texas, OJ Billyboy was otherwise distracted in the Oval Office, and the United Nations was presiding over the greatest fraud in history, otherwise known as the Oil for Food program, France and Germany complicit.  In Vietnam, which was started by JFK, D-MA, and escalated by Lyndon Johnson, D-TX, who otherwise kept his pecker in his pants, there was no United Nations program of subterfuge of any kind.   At its best, the United Nations has always been useless; today it is worse.

3)  We are about to see our 3rd election this year in Iraq, and we are being praised by an overwhelming number of Iraqi's for making this possible, as the polling over there, such as it is, consistently reveals.  Do they look forward to the day when we are gone?  Of course.  Do we look forward to the day when we no longer need to be there?  Of course, and that has been the plan all along.   Howard Dean also proposes that all our forces need to be withdrawn "within two years", conveniently consistent with Administration efforts.

4).  Unlike Vietnam, under the draft, our military today is an all volunteer force, with a generally very different attitude about what they have been asked to do, are doing and why.  In Vietnam we had deployed upwards of 500,000 personnel, and suffered over 50,000 casualties.  In Iraq we have deployed up to 160,000 personnel, and so far have suffered 2100 casualties.

5).  Vietnam took place in the context of the Cold War against international Communism, and was physically contiguous with Communist suppliers of material and various sorts of support.   Iraq is contiguous with Syria and Iran, not to be compared to Communist China and the USSR, yet.   Syria and Iran can be dealt with.

6).  Our direct national security interests in Vietnam were always subject to debate.  Our national security interests in the outcome of the current struggle are beyond discussion.

The fact of the matter is that the American Democrat Party has been taken over by cowards, so obsessed with themselves that they are willing to sacrifice everything, including their own country, to re-gain political power.   Some of us are willing to call it what it is: treason.  It has come to this.  The 1960's have a hold on these people that they will not let go; they must simply be defeated.   It is a matter of national security that Conservatives do so.   JES

12/05/05  So now it seems that the Democrat Party has actually joined the Saddam Hussein defense team.  After the 1970's and '80's, and the collapse of the Soviet Union, I could not understand how anyone with their heads screwed on straight could have ever voted for OJ Billyboy.  In 1996 I was flummoxed.  In 2000, surely something was amiss that the race was so close.  Now in 2005 we have a major national party actively engaged in treasonable activity.  There is no other way to put it.  Don't give me this crap about how Ramsey Clark is representing the principle of law in a Middle East distorted by Theocracy.   Ramsey Clark is inserting himself, and the American Left, into the business of an Iraqi people too long starved of law and civil decency, and it is the ultimate condescension to assert that Iraqis need instruction in justice.   For narrow partisan political gain, Democrat party leaders are running away from their own documented words uttered in 1998.   Will Saddam Hussein be their candidate in 2008?  Perhaps so, but it is more likely that by then he will be history, perhaps joining the Democrats, and Idi Amin.   JES

12/04/05  On this matter of getting the troops home from Iraq, I sense that the Democrat "leadership" may be setting up a little game.   It has always been the intention of the Administration to bring the troops home, as conditions in Iraq allow.  Those conditions are beginning to emerge, albeit later than we would have preferred.   So as that scenario begins to unfold, watch for Democrats to take "credit" for "pressuring" the Administration in its moves, and to continue to criticize the slowness of the process.  Unfortunately, this discussion will be interpreted by the IslamicFascist as an endorsement and encouragement of their own strategy of wearing us down, which is exactly why our domestic critics are dancing dangerously close to the "T" word.  I would suggest that one criteria that must be met prior to any significant American troop withdrawal would be the application of terminal justice to one Saddam Hussein.  JES

12/04/05  One of the positive developments forthcoming in the years ahead, as a consequence of events in the Middle East, will have been the incubation of a new generation of American political leadership forged in the fire of the military conflict.  This generation will be conversant, first hand, with the nature of our IslamicFascist antagonists.  Capital Hill today is very short of such experience.   JES

12/03/05  I want to repeat here, verbatim, what I said about John Murtha D-PA on November 18th in the 05-07 Letter:            

"Rep. John P. Murtha D-PA, a retired Marine Corps colonel, calls for a pull out from Iraq, saying our military mission is over, that our forces have become the prime target (wrong), and that our continued presence is counter productive (wrong).  With all sincerely due respect to the colonel for his service to our country, he is wrong on several counts.  Given that in the most narrow sense of traditional definition, our military purpose has been completed, today we are fighting a different enemy and a different kind of war.  This is not Korea, misnamed a "police action", or Vietnam, purpose never clearly defined.   The problem in Iraq, as we knew going in, was initially military in the narrow sense of the word, but always political, from stem to stern.  In the current phase, the term "police action" would be partially correct, and our defense preparedness efforts have been, and are, making rapid adjustments to a challenge unprecedented in our history.  Our military has done, and is continuing to do, one hell of a good job as a necessary part of a much larger equation.  There are a lot of excellently credentialed military people, active and retired, who will disagree sharply with Rep. Murtha.  Perhaps the world has moved beyond his personal frame of reference, which, to take it even a step further, may have even gotten in the way.  There is an old truism that says that generals are prone to prepare for yesterday's wars, which is one reason they are under civilian leadership.  The fact of the matter is that Rep. John P. Murtha D-PA is playing directly into the hands of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.   Time to retire."

It is sad to see raw partisanship overwhelm good judgment and a fine record of service to the country, and it is sad to see an entire national political party sink into complicity with our enemies.  At what point does the "T" word become relevant?  JES

                                                                                                    RETURN TO AMERICAN FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

11/22/05  The very fact that the Administration, Conservatives in general, and this website, have been forced to defend the truthfulness and intentions of the Administration's pre-war assessments, prerequisite to the on the "War on Terror", is itself corrosive to the effort.  It hurts us to be forced to do so, and will never forget or forgive those who have forced the discussion in the midst of war.  To those of you deployed, and who are actually witnessing our progress while being stabbed in the back by the Left, be advised that you have a further assignment.  When you return stateside and eventually return to civilian life, we need all the help we can get at purging the body politic of shaky politicians, "cut and run" fakers, and outright traitors.  You are especially qualified to this end.  Meanwhile, we will continue to make the case for the unconditional surrender of  Iraqi insurgents, foreign terrorists, and our domestic Left.  Go to DISSEMBLERS.   JES

11/22/05  I guess it still needs to be pointed out that the WMD's remain unaccounted for.  The available evidence points to Syria, if not by now far beyond, or both, perhaps with the complicity of Russian resources.  Clear photographic evidence of the truck convoys in the last 30 days prior to our attack is on hand.  The puzzle is not complete without understanding the linkage of motives and behavior of those with a stake in covering up their participation in the Oil for Food scandal.   Follow the WMD's; follow the money.   Analysts are still plowing through mountains of captured documentation in a warehouse in Iraq.  For security reasons there is much that is known that has either not been released, or has been withheld over concern of mis-representation by those with hostile intentions toward our efforts.  Such is the price of the civil war here at home.  In spite of the best efforts  of the New York Times, eventually the truth will surface; we hope not too late.  JES

11/21/05   Our problem with Iraq is not in Iraq, it is here at home.  It appears that decades of wear and tear on the culture may be finally catching up with our traditional ability to stand together through adversity and challenge.  The American people appear to be losing their backbones, and good judgment, and the price that will be paid in the end may be the country itself.   After witnessing the nineties, I am neither surprised or shocked; just profoundly sad.  At some point we will need to pick up the pieces, of what is left.  Our President, George W. Bush, has had the matter of international terrorism, and Iraq's place in it, generally well diagnosed from the beginning.  We can quibble about details and tactics, but the pre-emptive response against Iraq was absolutely correct, and the WMD issue is beside the point.   If they have their way, the critics will have oceans of blood on their hands, and no, it will not be Bush's fault.  It will be the fault of those who press today for us to cut and run, and the consequences will dominate the Century ahead.  Who will be the next Pol Pot?  Yes, our own Civil War is back on the table.  At stake is the very future and existence of our country and civilization.  So it appears from the mountain top. JES

11/18/05   To drive home the point, and to clarify the issue with our enemies both at home and abroad, the House today voted 403-3 to reject a non-binding resolution calling for the immediate withdrawal of our troops.  This was an absolutely necessary move by Republicans to re-assure our deployed troops and our friends abroad, and to signal to our enemies at home and abroad that all this talk of "cut and run" was not in the cards.  Clarification of this point, by forcing individual politicians to either put up or shut up was a fundamental issue of national security.  The Republicans finally do something right.  JES

11/18/05   Rep. John P. Murtha D-PA, a retired Marine Corps colonel, calls for a pull out from Iraq, saying our military mission is over, that our forces have become the prime target (wrong), and that our continued presence is counter productive (wrong).  With all sincerely due respect to the colonel for his service to our country, he is wrong on several counts.  Given that in the most narrow sense of traditional definition, our military purpose has been completed, today we are fighting a different enemy and a different kind of war.  This is not Korea, misnamed a "police action", or Vietnam, purpose never clearly defined.   The problem in Iraq, as we knew going in, was initially military in the narrow sense of the word, but always political, from stem to stern.  In the current phase, the term "police action" would be partially correct, and our defense preparedness efforts have been, and are, making rapid adjustments to a challenge unprecedented in our history.  Our military has done, and is continuing to do, one hell of a good job as a necessary part of a much larger equation.  There are a lot of excellently credentialed military people, active and retired, who will disagree sharply with Rep. Murtha.  Perhaps the world has moved beyond his personal frame of reference, which, to take it even a step further, may have even gotten in the way.  There is an old truism that says that generals are prone to prepare for yesterday's wars, which is one reason they are under civilian leadership.  The fact of the matter is that Rep. John P. Murtha D-PA is playing directly into the hands of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.   Time to retire.   JES

11/13/05  Following in Condoleezza Rice's footsteps, Kofi Klatch Annan visits Iraqi to urge participation in the upcoming (December) elections.  Well, Kofi, this is the third round of elections that you and your UN pals did everything in your power to prevent from ever happening in the first place, convenient little oil deals with Saddam interrupted by American soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines.  If things are going as badly in Iraq as your pals on the American Left claim, why are you now wiggling onto the scene to insert yourself in behalf of decent people?  You worthless sniveling sorry sack of buffalo dung; you should go back to Ghana and count cocoa beans.   You are a totally disgusting person.   JES

 11/05/05   Mithal al-Alusi   Follow him.  He, and his Iraqi Nation party, is the right guy and party to lead Iraq.  We will be watching closely on December 15th.   JES 

10/29/05  Regarding the United Nations Oil for Food Scandal, former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul A. Volcker, appointed by the United Nations to investigate the matter,  has finally released a 623 page report.  It is not pretty: "there was a failure of diligence by U.N. officials", perhaps the kindest news contained.  Among the many fingered, we find DaimlerChrysler AG.  Perhaps some thought should be given next time you consider the purchase of a DaimlerChrysler, or Mercedes Benz product.  Such is the spider web of consequences of unqualified globalization.  In any event, the United Nations itself has been clearly documented as useless and dangerous to be around. The Mountain Observer’s longstanding recommendation has been to pack the entire outfit off to Iceland.  We should loan them 2 carfloat barges to do so, nothing jestful intended.  JES

10/27/05  The Iraqi Election Commission certifies the vote on the constitution and most Iraqis turn toward December 15, date of the National Assembly elections, including Sunni leaders trying so hard to keep their nose above water.  They have a problem with the federal structure of the constitution as just approved, and still wish to make some changes.  Given the results of the October vote, many Sunnis now recognize that their best interests lie with pursuing their concerns within the structure of the democratic process.  The October vote saw a 78% voter approval overall, with 21% against the constitution.  In the 3 critical Sunni provinces, 2 tallied over 2/3rds rejection, and 1 rejected by 55%, so under the rules the matter passed.  But the extremes were significant.  in Sunni Anbar, the vote to reject was 97%.  In Shiite and Kurdish provinces, approval ran as high as 99%.  Clearly this is a dangerous split that will require further attention.  But the fact of the matter is that Iraq has moved a long way in less than 3 years, made possible only by Americans, and Iraqis, of great vision.  JES

10/18/05  At last, Saddam Hussein is about to enter an Iraqi court room, on trial, as it ought to be.  This is an Iraqi thing, among Iraqis, as it ought to be.  Expect Iraqi justice; they need to purge themselves of years of burden to be truly free.  JES

10/16/05  Iraqi voters appear to have approved the new constitution, although cross checking and verification procedures may take several days. Expect charges of fraud and other claims of calumny, much like Chicago.  The violence will also continue, only to be expected in a region of the world without cultural and institutional precedents for democracy.   Of course, that is the issue at test.  What is important here is that another milestone has been successfully achieved, in spite of the best efforts of our own Liberal Establishment at sabotage.   Stay tuned.  JES

10/13/05  The Iraqi National Assembly buys into some last minute changes to the draft constitution that better structure an amendment process intended to allay Sunni fears about the federal structure.  I am reminded of the post Constitutional Convention struggle in 1789 when certain of our own states made ratification contingent upon adoption of what came to be known as a Bill of Rights.  Yes, politics can be a rough business, especially in lands that have no precedent.   JES

10/09/05  In the long view of things, which is really what this website is more generally about, an election is coming up in Iraq on 10/15 which is likely to prove to be a major milestone in our own history, as well as theirs.  At stake is the acceptance or rejection of the draft constitution by the Iraqi electorate at large.  With a major investment in blood and treasure, we are interested sideline spectators.  It would appear that the results will be a “yes”, but it remains to be determined by how much, and by whom.  It matters.  Perhaps it would be well, at this point, to engage in a review of certain features of our involvement.

George W. Bush won the presidential election in 2000, fair, square and legally, a fact still not yet absorbed by the American Left.  The context of his victory included the fact that over a period of years, and several presidents of both parties, a certain rage has been building in the Middle East towards all things Western, or Islam perceived to have been corrupted by the West, by a disaffected segment of Islamic culture.  Again, in context, the election of 2000 also occurred at a time of unappreciated and growing domestic division within our own country concerning the direction of our own heart and soul as a nation.  So it came to pass that on September 11, 2001 our nation was attacked with great loss of life and treasure by Middle Eastern elements grown convinced of the weaknesses, and vulnerabilities of our culture, as it appeared to them, and smug in the righteousness of their complaints.

Now our President has a Constitutional responsibility, as most Presidents of the Republic have also understood, until recently, which is to defend the nation from attack and to respond appropriately if attack occurs.   This was not understood in 1993 or on certain subsequent occasions.   It was understood in 2001, as it was in 1941.

The disaffected segment of Islamic culture, upon examination, turns out to be remarkably Fascist in mindset, a Western Statist political tool of Secular intimidation grafted on to a religious perspective always ambivalent about itself and how to proceed in a world of others.  But our President is not concerned about the excuses of cause, but rather about the fact of attack, and the needs of our current and future security.  It was not a time to appreciate “diversity”, but rather, a time to pull the plug on IslamicFascist terrorism.

The problem with Iraq was it’s centrality to the developing IslamicFascist network of terrorism in terms of funding, training, arming and using its own oil resources, also, to hold a willing Europe, and others, hostage.  Much was made at the time of the secularity of a Baathist regime in contrast to the alleged theological fuel of Al-Qaeda, supposedly rendering cooperation impossible.  This was a cute intellectual cop out that failed close examination from the beginning.  The error in this thesis is two-fold: It would appear that Al-Qaeda, and its many copy-cat manifestations, fail to inspire theologically the Muslim world (however defined) as a whole, and secondly, in their world the worldly clash of Islamic based culture with the West trumps arguments over God.  There is no moral equivalency between thugs and true men of God.  Furthermore, an on-the-ground examination of the facts of close cooperation and coordination were abundant, and eventually confirmed by the Duelfer Report, (Able Danger waits in the wings).    In this IslamicFascist kettle of soup, Iraq, specifically Saddam Hussein, stood tall and vulnerable.   Like the single log in a river log jam that has got a mountain of logs plugged up, our President imagined the consequences across the entire Middle East, and beyond, if this single log got yanked to be replaced, not by Uday and Qusay Saddam, but by western democracy, in the Burkean republican sense of the word.  A long shot; daring and audacious?  Absolutely.  Wilsonian?  Hardly.  Wilson was an internationalist, and Bush acted preemptively and unilaterally from the perspective of American national interest.  A so-called “realist”, in the fashionable East Coast academic sense of the day?  Hardly.  The President has acted in the Heartland sense of realism; action, not “stability”, East Coast code for passivism.  We are at war over these issues, and ought to be.  You do not negotiate with an enemy of this type.  You kill them.  As this may inspire further hatred, one constructively draws out the infection as if with a poultice, and drains the swamp, over there, rather than in Central Park.

Thankfully, Americans have never liked war on foreign shores.  But neither do Real Americans like to be pushed around, or see others so abused.  Politically it becomes a discussion of national interest and national security.  The President has played his cards, so far, correctly, in the opinion of the Mountain Observer.  It is perhaps an error by the President to fail to stress more than he does the necessary republican dimension of the democracy he wishes to promote, an important distinction lost in the complaints of some of his critics, and supporters.  In the overall “War on Terror”, what is at stake is the very survival of Western culture in its traditional dimensions, or its collapse before Wahabi inspired thugs and short sighted Left Wing American appeasement.    Curiously, it appears too frequently that numerous domestic Left Wing critics fall into the category of aiding and giving comfort to this enemy for reasons, it seems, of a mutual hatred of Western (American) Tradition.  They need to be reminded, especially in time of war, that our Constitution does address the issue of aiding and giving comfort in Article III, Section 3, and that more caution is advised.  There is plenty of room for reasoned discussion about the best way to proceed in these matters, within the context of defense of our national security.  However, one would be wise to recognize that attacks on the President, and his Administration, are frequently politically motivated complaints disguising the domestic tensions between Modernist Secularist Elites, and a more traditional American culture that respects Founding Principles, separate from foreign challenges.   The domestic Balkanization continues apace.    JES

09/25/05.  The future of Iraq is best understood by observing the process of negotiating the new constitution, and the Mountain Observer has alluded to this before.  A possible long-range outcome will be an independent Kurdistan, an attachment of Sunni Iraq to Syria and an attachment of Shiite Iraq to Iran.   Nationalism trumps ideology every time, and Iraqi nationalism may prove to be a stillborn idea.  The splintering would not necessarily be a negative for American foreign policy in the region, properly managed.  On the contrary, Iraqi Shia are Arab, Iranians are Persian, Iraqi Shia seem well instructed on the errors of the mullahs in Iran, and Iranian democrats will have their day.  Iraqi Kurds are not Arabs, and in the long view, Kurdistan in some form will happen.  Turkey has made its choices, and is now boxed in by the unfolding politics of Europe, and has no where else to go.  Baathist Syria is a house of cards inviting a nudge.  A new King in Saudi Arabia has already tipped his hand in the right direction of reform, subject to his physical survival among his brothers in the House of Saud.

The real objective of the Bush foreign policy all along has been the break-up of middle eastern autocracy and the promotion of middle eastern democracy as a way out of the swamp of IslamicFacism (my term- not his) and it’s consequences.  The choice to take on Iraq was not only good, but brilliant.  The pretext of 09/11, while valid, served as a catalyst unnecessary, and the pretext of a WMD threat, if somewhat premature, real and responsible.

Overall, the Bush policies have been excellent so far, but we are moving into a tricky period where it would be too easy to lose sight of what is really in our national interest, mistaking an obsession with the permanency of an Iraq that may wind up looking much different than we originally imagined.  Our real national interest lies with genuine peace in the region, and in his promotion of democratic ideals in a region obsessed with hate, the President has been right all along, whatever configurations emerge.  JES

NOTE: It would be useful for the reader to open BUSH 43 2ND TERM NOTES-SPEECHES and read the Presidents speech before the National Endowment for Democracy on 10/06/05.

08/05/05  At some point Iraq will have to assume full responsibility for its own security and political destiny.  Completion of the Constitution is supposed to happen by August 15 in preparation for submission to the general electorate this fall.  These are, perhaps, the most critical and delicate steps in the overall process of the democracy experiment in Iraq, and for that matter, the whole Middle East.  Our stake in the outcome is enormous, however the stake in these matters of the Iraqi people is even larger; life or death for many.  There are those who have criticized our entire effort from the beginning, choosing to be blind to the comprehensive nature of an IslamoFascist movement, decades in the building.  There are those who continue to argue that we had a choice in our decision to go into Iraq.   They were, and are correct: we had a choice.  That choice was to continue to ignore the problem and continue to persuade IslamoFascist thugs of our weakness, lack of resolve and complicity with the evil nature of their behavior, or to choose to take the issue to their own doorstep.  Thank God for the leadership of President George W. Bush, for regardless of how the new day in Iraq eventually resolves itself, a message has been sent to the entire world, and that message is, that with regard to thuggery, enough is enough.

We are properly pressing the Iraqis hard on the timelines for this summer, fall and winter.   We need to relieve our own forces in anticipation of looming trouble elsewhere (see 08/03/05 on China just below, for just one item on the list of concerns), but more importantly all Iraqis need to be disabused of the temptation of dependency, and the luxury of having an excuse not to act and resolve among themselves some very difficult issues at an early date.

It would seem that IslamoFascist thugs, and many American Democrats, are working very hard to witness our failure.   So it goes.   JES

04/29/05  Progress continues to unfold in the political development of an Iraqi government as the Parliamentary Assembly approves the proposed Cabinet, still short a couple of portfolios.  They are not working to the clock, as their detractors would prescribe, but to a standard of effective results, as they should.  Critics should remember that once upon a time, we stumbled through our own experience with the Articles of Confederation.  JES

03/31/05  During the course of last year's election campaign Congress, and the press, engaged in much political showboating over intelligence failures, which had less to do with discovery and more to do with invention in support of narrow political agendas.    I pointed out at the time that the President had appointed an Independent Intelligence Commission to report  in March 2005, after the election and allowing more time for a more professional investigation.   It has been apparent for some time that there were failures, but we really need to understand what happed, which is what this Commission was really all about.   That report was released this morning.  JES 

03/24/05   After the Iraqi elections in January, the Mountain Observer has noticed a disturbing trend in the literature by neo-conservatives in their analysis of the American political scene.  While it is obvious to objective observers that Democrats have their problems, it is apparently less obvious to neo-cons that they do not own the discussion on the Right.  I have written before on a number of occasions concerning the fractures to be found just below the surface of the American Right.  At this point in time, a number of policy issues are on the table and unfolding that contain the ingredients of a "perfect storm" and collapse of GOP/Conservative "unity".   Neo-cons need to cool their jets and back off an implied assumption that they are completely in charge of anything.

The Bush foreign policy program is generally moving ahead in the right direction, except for Mexico.   The domestic situation is a very different story.    The heart and soul of the country is torn, at the bottom, by the secularist vision of man's self-directed "reason" vs. those who recognize the existence of a Higher Authority, and neo-cons are not always on the right side of that discussion, or the discussion about our borders.   JES

03/20/05  George W. Bush, in addition to whatever else he may accomplish, has already earned his place in history as a great statesman.  That landmark was accomplished on January 30, 2005, in a place once known as Mesopotamia, the cradle of civilization.  It has come to pass that the idea of the vote, with purple fingers held aloft, and freedom, has ignited a firestorm in the Middle East, and elsewhere, possibly including France.   The President would be the first to deflect the praise rather to the American people, and our Founding Fathers.    JES

03/13/05   Rumor has it that the Ayatollah Sistani, who has proven himself, so far, to be a key figure in a Free Iraq, has taken up a serious interest in the American Constitution, especially the various provisions that allow us to change it, with difficulty.    Yes, for some, it is difficult to admit that that stupid cowboy from Texas might have had a good idea.   JES 

PS: Of course, this old goat roper is anxious to understand the Ayatollah's thoughts concerning the 1st Amendment.

03/01/05  Iraqi Sunni leaders are having 2nd thoughts about participating in the new representative processes that are unfolding; they want in.  But that was the whole idea to begin with.  The future of the Baathist Party is bleak indeed.   Hungry horses head for the barn.   JES

03/01/05  Notice that Free Iraq now faces violent opposition whose tactics bear an uncanny resemblance to that faced for years by Israel.  Suicide bombers in an attempt to intimidate, harass, extort and displace.  So it is that Palestinian apologists should, perhaps, re-examine their embedded anti-semantic premise of Zionist illegitimacy.   There are few Jews in Iraq; there is emergent freedom.   Tough to admit for some, but consider the possibility that the terrorists are the ones who are actually guilty of the terror.  It seems that Free Iraq and Israel share another thing in common: elected government.    Free Iraq and Israel share 2 other problems: Syria and Iran, enemies of both.  However, with both, there enters another component to the equation: raw American military power.  Syria is beginning to cough up truant Baathists and retreat into eastern Lebanon.  The story in Lebanon is actively unfolding.   Iran faces increasing internal political opposition, encouraged by the words and actions of a re-elected American President who they all know is equipped with bunker buster bombs.  And you know, American "cowboys" have this habit of following through on what they say, unimpressed by the tantrums of mullahs.   What the American Left does not understand is that diplomats, and diplomacy, are ineffective and useless in the absence of credible military power just over the horizon, which is why France, Germany and the UN are a joke.  Nations, and stateless powers, do not respond to calls for tea, crumpets and kumbaya.   There is evidence that Russia's Putin, and the Chinese, understand this.  Freedom is a fragile commodity, dependant on the credible deployment of popular military muscle, and the Grace of God.  Do we dare foresee the possibility that someday a Free Iraq and Israel may get to know each other?   The underlying premise of the "War on Terror" is that our actions and purpose in this regard are to extend and protect our own national security.  Otherwise, we would be meddling.    JES

MO 05 01  The oil embargo is now officially off Iraq, and Europe will now have to bargain anew.   Yes, in many ways the decisions about how the international "community" should have responded to Hussein's Iraq was about oil.  European oil supply providers, and the pockets of those with personal investments in the UN oil for food program, preferred the opportunities of corruption, and to ignore the torture.  No better case can be made for the termination of the United Nations, an organization totally useless and corrupt.  France and Germany still need oil.  Let them now bargain with a Free Iraq, and a people who they tried to screw.   JES

MO 05 01  The Shia will come to dominate Iraq, not a tough call to make.  Less clear will be establishment of republican democracy.  The best barometer of this experiment will be the actions of the Kurds; already Christian Iraqis are taking flight.  Under any circumstances, Sunnis will face a tough period of redemption, if that is even possible.  The Shia relationship with Iran (mullahs or reformers?) will be the key, and this may turn on the fact that the United States will not allow Iran to deploy a nuclear armed missile.  How this will actually work out is too tough to call, but we need to do our best.

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FMOWEB 110-041 FOREIGN AFFAIRS- IRAQ