The Early Days of a Better Nation

Tuesday, May 04, 2004


De Te Fabula Naratur

William Madsen documents a high-level debate over sending troops into Afghanistan, showing how the level-headed, lucid and (in the event) wholly vindicated warnings of intelligence chiefs, diplomats and old foreign policy hands were eventually brushed aside by a doctrinally blinkered President and military hard-liners.

So much for the Soviet Politburo in 1979. Madsen goes on to ask:
As the neo-conservatives lead the United States into deeper involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, possible future military forays into Iran, Gaza, Syria, and North Korea, withdrawal of the United States from the United Nations system, and a policy of ruthless assassination of its enemies, how long will it take for future historians to be scanning documents from the CIA, National Security Council, and the Republican Party documenting the in-fighting within the last American presidency ­ a second term of George W. Bush? The Soviet Union collapsed practically overnight. The Roman Empire took a number of years to fall, but it was inevitable. Nazi Germany's fate became known in a matter of a few years. The United States will not last forever, but the Bush administration may be speeding up the process for its ultimate fall. How long will it be before U.S. twenty and fifty dollar bills are sold as cheap souvenirs at street bazaars in the former United States like Soviet ruble notes are sold today on the streets of Moscow? The Soviet leaders were unable to stop their country's march to war in Afghanistan. Recent revelations from Bush administration officials show that several key players were unable to stop Bush and Cheney's determined march to war in Iraq. One world superpower went down in flames in 1990. Will the other last until 2010?

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