Free Republic

After a brief, almost bloodless war we have an ethnically and religiously divided nation. Mischievous neighbors on all sides can claim common cause with one or more of the major ethnic and religious groups vying for power. The largest ethnic faction has strong cultural ties to a powerful and expansionist neighbor, and is feared by other great powers nearby. Certain groups within the country are taking orders from religious authorities outside their borders in an attempt to impose a state reflecting their theology. Other nationalist radicals and many minorities are determined not to allow the creation of anything other than...

Having been forced to recognize that our soldiers won a brilliant military victory in Iraq, media commentators are trying to minimize that achievement by loudly proclaiming how much more difficult it will be to "win the peace" by establishing a stable and benevolent new government in Iraq. What Iraq needs is a much more radical reform: not the sharing of political power but the limiting of political power--a focus, not on the prerogatives of ethnic groups, but on the rights of the individual.

We ought to let the United Nations decide the future of Iraq. The [Iraq] war is a good thing if done right." -- Former President Bill "I Didn't Do It" Clinton Unfortunately, the president who couldn't recall much during his impeachment depositions has also forgotten about the dramatic failure of the United Nations following his own military adventurism in Haiti. President Clinton sent troops into Haiti a decade ago in order to remove Raoul Cedras, the leader of a military coup, and restore power to Jean Bertrand Aristide, a leftist tyrant. Subsequently, Clinton called in the U.N. to take over...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's collapsed infrastructure means the re-establishment of basic services and civil authorities are more urgent priorities than food aid, humanitarian workers said on Saturday. The U.S.-led war on Iraq has left many cities without power or water supplies, government buildings burned and looted and a security situation so bad that many essential workers are too frightened to report for duty. "This country has collapsed. Nothing works -- no phones, no electricity, no schools, no proper medical care, no transportation, nothing," said Roland Huguenin-Benjamin of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Baghdad. "It's more than...

President Bush, who was oh-so-sneery about the idea of “nation-building” during the 2000 campaign, is now nation-building with a vengeance. He plans to spend $60 billion or more over the next three years rebuilding Iraq. The agenda includes everything from repairing the oil fields to rewriting the elementary-school textbooks. Like the Clinton administration he ridiculed, he now realizes that you cannot pour soldiers and bombs into a country, declare it liberated, and come home. BUT THIS IS nation-building Republican-style, with huge contracts awarded in secret to politically connected companies. They now say that the “emergency” oil-field contract to Halliburton, formerly...

WASHINGTON, April 17 (AFP) - The United States, which wants to establish democracy in post-war Iraq, has succeeded in that endeavor in Germany and Japan but failed to reach its goal in other cases, from Vietnam to many Latin American countries. To create a law-abiding state in Iraq, Washington will have to show patience, resist the temptation to set up a surrogate government and involve the international community in the reform process, according to US analysts who look back at lessons of history. The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, one of the leading US foreign policy think tanks, has just...

As "Coalition of the Willing" forces put the finishing touches on a spectacular military triumph in Iraq without U.N. assistance, Secretary-General Kofi Annan and leaders of the three anti-war countries are plotting ways for the U.N. to play the "central role" in post-war Iraq. President Bush should ignore their shameless effort. Global ideologues and U.S. liberals try to paint the U.N. as a credible and moral force in keeping the peace, protecting human rights, and serving as an effective instrument to promote worldwide freedom and democracy. But facts do not justify this level of support for the U.N.--and the distorted...

<p>EMPIRE IS A DIRTY word in the American political lexicon. Just last summer, President Bush told West Point graduates that ''America has no empire to extend or utopia to establish.'' In this view, the power of the United States is not exercised for imperial purposes, but for the benefit of mankind.</p>

<p>The United States should exclude the United Nations from any non-humanitarian nation-building role in post-liberated Iraq. We fought the war. We won the war. And only we hold both the capacity and incentive to fashion Iraq into a civilized nation unthreatening to neighbors.</p>

The first sunrise that brings an Iraq free of Saddam Hussein could, as President Bush has said, mark the dawn of freedom for the Middle East. The hope is that liberty for Iraq will start a domino reaction of democratic change, and, as Mr. Bush stressed again on Monday, set "an example to all the Middle East of a vital and peaceful and self-governing nation." For those who believe nothing is more important in global affairs than taking potshots at Mr. Bush, or preserving the so-called stability of the status quo, this is a vision easy to deride. Certainly there...

Two decades ago a heated controversy erupted in the Arab world over the relationship between intellectuals and ruling authorities. In the course of the debate, some participants proclaimed the need to "bridge the gap" between the two parties -- the "thinker" and the "prince". Proponents of this goal argued that it would be advantageous to both sides: for the intellectual it would keep wolves of hunger and fear at bay, while the prince would feel secure from the spectres of intrigue and revolution. Some intellectuals were against it, maintaining that they should dedicate themselves solely to the pursuit of truth...

<p>PRISTINA, Serbia - Montenegro, March 8 (UPI) -- Those of you who believe that a milder, kinder Islam is not possible, allow me to paraphrase John F. Kennedy by saying, "let them come to Pristina."</p> <p>Kennedy, of course, delivered his famous speech at the height of the Cold War from the shadows of the Berlin Wall when he said, "Those of you who believe that communism is the way of the future, let them come to Berlin."</p>

n my column on Wednesday I laid out why I believe that liberals underestimate how ousting Saddam Hussein could help spur positive political change in the Arab world. Today's column explores why conservative advocates of ousting Saddam underestimate the risks, and where we should strike the balance.Let's start with one simple fact: Iraq is a black box that has been sealed shut since Saddam came to dominate Iraqi politics in the late 1960's. Therefore, one needs to have a great deal of humility when it comes to predicting what sorts of bats and demons may fly out if the U.S....

When he became mayor of the sleepy village of Taszar, a community of just 2,100 souls, Tibor Mercz did not think he was taking on an unmanageable task. But with the imminent arrival of up to 5,000 men of Arab origin at Taszar's military base, Mr Mercz has his work cut out. The men, most of them Iraqi exiles living in America and Britain, are to be trained over a six-week period as interpreters for the United States Army for use in the event of a war. Some will be used with Special Forces troops acting as artillery spotters and...

December 25, 2002 Afghans Mark Year of Slowly Growing StabilityBy CARLOTTA GALL KABUL, Afghanistan, Dec. 24 — It was a year ago that Hamid Karzai took over the business of governing Afghanistan, a ruin of a country he and his government inherited after the collapse of the Taliban and have tried to guide through its first year relatively free of war in two decades.A united Afghanistan with a functioning multiethnic army remains a desire, not a reality. Yet despite violent incidents — a narrow escape from assassination, the killing of two of his ministers and continued clashes among rival warlords...

The assassination of Afghan Vice President Abdul Qadir has produced a crescendo of calls for an intensified U.S. military effort in Afghanistan. Senators Bob Graham (D, Fla.) and Chuck Hagel (R, Neb.), and other influential members of Congress immediately called for a more robust and prolonged U.S.-led mission to stabilize the country. Even President Bush, who once scorned the nation-building ambitions of the Clinton administration, rushed to give assurances that the United States was committed to promoting long-term stability in Afghanistan.Such calls are dangerously misguided. Even if the task of nation-building in Afghanistan were feasible (and there are compelling...