Mid-East Omnibus, or I'm So Worried

In chronological order:

Story 1: Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte tried to spin al-Qaeda's resurgence in Afghanistan and Pakistan as a good thing.

NEGROPONTE: It’s getting better. It’s definitely getting better. And I’ve heard some people suggest, go so far as to suggest, that al-Qaeda is getting discouraged in Iraq and is thinking more of concentrating their efforts on Afghanistan and other areas.

ROSE: That good news or bad?

NEGROPONTE: Well, I think it’s at least good news that their wings have clipped somewhat in Iraq....

Negroponte’s assertions imply that al Qaeda is not being “crippled” in Iraq but is merely being displaced. Ironically, while the war in Iraq introduced al-Qaeda elements to Iraq, the war may now be directly increasing the threat that originated in Afghanistan.

Story 2: Speaking of Pakistan, the New York Times has a new article reviewing American policy toward the nation following the attempted assassination of Benazir Bhutto. It begins, "The scenes of carnage in Pakistan this week conjured what one senior administration official on Friday called 'the nightmare scenario' for President Bush’s last 15 months in office: Political meltdown in the one country where Al Qaeda, the Taliban, and nuclear weapons are all in play." The article criticizes Bush's attention-shift away from the region and his reliance on General Pervez Musharraf who has little political capital left to spend.

Story 3: This is an excellent article by Fareed Zakaria about Iran. Zakaria slams President Bush and pundits on the right who claim that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "has his finger on the button" and "will trigger World War III." In all actuality, Iran is years away from being able to build a nuclear weapon, and most of the Middle East is aligned against Iran. Zakaria also criticizes those, like Rudy Guiliani, who compare Ahmadinejad with Hitler, Stalin, and Mao. Firstly, Ahmadinejad is largely a figurehead in Iran--the ayatollah wields most of the power--and Hitler, Stalin, and Mao "casually ordered the deaths of millions of their own people, fomented insurgencies and revolutions, and starved whole regions that opposed them....One of the bizarre twists of the current Iran hysteria is that conservatives have become surprisingly charitable about two of history's greatest mass murderers." Zakaria ends with the little-known information that Iran was instrumental in forming our allegiance with the Northern Alliance in the war in Afghanistan and continued to offer cooperation with the U.S. even after being labeled as part of the Axis of Evil by President Bush.