The Washington Times

The Senate voted earlier this month to approve admission of seven Central and Eastern European countries from the former Soviet bloc into NATO, the transatlantic alliance. The vote was 96-0, which was testimony not only to the strength of the political case that has been laid out over the years in behalf of a whole, free and secure Europe, but also, no one doubts, to the diplomatic support the United States received from the aspirant countries in the debate that preceded the Iraq war.

Continue reading →

The Washington Times

We have now had the first shakeup in postwar Iraq reconstruction, key changes of top officials mere weeks after they began their tasks. The critical question has always been whether the United States is committed to genuine liberalization in Iraq. That’s because liberalization offers the only hope for a Greater Middle East free of such menaces to the United States and the West as al Qaeda, the Taliban and Saddam Hussein.

Continue reading →

The Washington Times

Let’s go over the possibilities on the question of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Their supposed existence constituted the principal legal rationale for going to war [to disarm Saddam in accordance with U.N. Security Council resolutions] and a major part [but not all] of the strategic case. What would be the implications of failing to turn any up?

Continue reading →

The Washington Times

I never quite agreed with George F. Will’s famous line that if there had been television at the time of the Civil War, America would be two countries today. Nevertheless, he perfectly captured a sentiment that is all the more pronounced now that there are not just three television networks, but multiple 24-hour cable channels, talk radio, as well as near-infinite Internet Web sites offering nearly simultaneous discussion of current events. The sentiment is his own exasperation, and in the case of Iraq and before that, Afghanistan and Kosovo, I share it.

Continue reading →

The Washington Times

Down at the bottom of the front pages over the past few weeks, well below the war news, was the ongoing story of how President Bush’s tax cut proposal was faring on Capitol Hill. The administration, the story line ran, did fairly well in the House but ran into serious trouble in the Senate, where the defection of a couple Republicans enabled Democrats to cut the size of the tax cut essentially in half.

Continue reading →

The Washington Times

Three weeks from the onset of hostilities until the fall of Baghdad has to come as a relief. The reason to pursue “regime change” in Iraq was never that it would be an easy target for regime change, even though some people thought the military action would proceed swiftly to a certain conclusion, namely victory. But, even forecasts of victory made room for any number of nasty sideshow scenarios, from hundreds of burning oil wells, to chemical attacks by Scud on Israel, to a shooting war between Turkey and the Kurds in Northern Iraq to terror attacks in the region and beyond [i.e., in Europe or the United States] by Saddam’s covert operatives. Very rational but unmaterialized fears, all of them. If it wouldn’t upset the Europeans so, one might even be tempted to say “thank God.”

Continue reading →

The Washington Times

When the war started, an acquaintance asked me if I was going to be busy during the course of it thinking of the possibility, no doubt, that I might be doing commentary of one kind or another. No, I said, for what it’s worth, I didn’t think I’d be busy at all, which suited me fine. U.S. strategy, national security and high politics, yes, but I don’t do military operations. I’m happy, I said, to leave that to the generals for the duration. I’d be glad to come back when we are doing politics again, but not until we are done with the continuation of politics by other means, namely, the fighting, which I am not qualified to address.

Continue reading →

The Washington Times

In this space last week, I published a statement I signed along with 22 others, roughly equally divided between Democrats and Republicans, calling for a U.S. commitment to “the establishment of a peaceful, stable, united, prosperous, and democratic Iraq free of all weapons of mass destruction.”

Continue reading →