November 22, 2006
Regarding the Harriet Miers of Defense...
Yet another well-stated reason that Robert Gates should not be Secretary of Defense, from Hugh Hewitt's interview with Victor David Hanson (my bold):
HH: ...Does the President have the ability to wage aggressive war with a pacifist Congress?VDH: I think he does, but let's be candid, Hugh. The problem right now isn't...it may be the left wing Congress, but he's got another problem, and that is he's bringing in Robert Gates, and he's bringing in the Baker realism, and that doesn't have a good record. That's the people who said don't talk to Yeltsin. Let's stick with Gorbacev. Let's not go to Baghdad. Let the Shia and Kurds die. Let's arm the Islamisists to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan and then leave. It's not a good record. It's short-term expediency at the expense of long-term morality. And it's not in the interest of the United States to do that, to cut a deal with these countries.
To put it bluntly, "realists" like Robert Gates and James Baker did much to create the situation in the Middle East with which we are now faced.
There is a place in the world for Robert Gates, and that place is, and should remain, Texas A&M.
A buzzard won't drink from a watering hole surrounded by dead carcasses. Rats won't eat food that has other dead rats around it.
Even buzzards and rats with brains smaller than a marble have more common sense and intelligence than this administration and Congress.
Truly pathetic...
Posted by: WB at November 22, 2006 06:02 PMThat is to say that Bush and Congress keep going back and partaking of the same failed policies by the same failed people.
How utterly pathetic...
Posted by: WB at November 22, 2006 06:03 PMRubbish. The decision to not topple Saddam wasn't made in a vaccum; and it was forced on us by Syria, Saudi, Jordan, et al. Ref: The Gulf Conflict, Freedman and Karsh. Holding Gates responsible (who was CIA director at the time, and doesn't even make foreign policy) is just stupid.
Posted by: Dawnfire82 at November 22, 2006 07:29 PMI have to disagree with VDH on this. We live in a fluid society, people, if they are smart, don't necessarily make decisions based on categories, but on situations. Robert Gates has already come out and stated that the US needs to have dialogue with Iran. BTW, the decision to not go to Baghdad in 1991 is because of the time we were in, our population was not able to deal with this type of a situation.
http://www.cfr.org/publication/7195/
Also, as an Aggie, I will take an optimistic interpretation on your comment about staying at TAMU in that he needs to teach our young brains how to deal effectively with foreign nations. Cheers Pal!
Capt Jason Morris USAF
NATO Geilenkirchen, Germany
It's short-term expediency at the expense of long-term morality.
This is asinine. We shouldn't have a "moral" foreign policy if it'll blow up in our faces. The problem with the realists of the 80s wasn't that they weren't moral, it's that they were insufficiently focused on long-term expediency. Obviously it'd be nice if long-term expediency and morality converged, but if they don't, we should always take the former over the latter.
Posted by: jpe at November 23, 2006 03:35 PM
