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An American Hajj - Charles A. Krohn, Washington Post
Muslims are obliged to make at least one trip to the holy city of Mecca during their lifetime. This pilgrimage is known as the hajj. It is mandatory for men, voluntary but encouraged for women. A basic dress code ensures that there's no visible difference between rich and poor, weak and powerful. This simple requirement unites the faithful. I started thinking about the hajj in the spring, when my wife and I visited nine American military cemeteries in Europe. With the exception of the Normandy American Cemetery, which attracts thousands, others are virtually devoid of visitors, especially American visitors. I wondered: What if every American who is able to do so made an effort to visit at least one American military cemetery overseas during his or her lifetime?
Wars within Wars – Richard Engel, Los Angeles Times
Despite what you may have heard, there is no "war" in Iraq. Rather, there are many wars raging through the Shiite, Kurdish and Sunni territories. These wars are complicated and deep-seated, with roots that, in some cases, go back centuries. But this is not what Americans are often led to believe. The perception portrayed by the White House and the Iraqi government in Baghdad -- and all too often reflected, I'm sorry to say, in the news media -- is that the violence in Iraq is the result of a straightforward struggle between two opposing teams: the Freedom Lovers and the Freedom Haters.
‘Doing the Right Thing’ – Oliver North, Washington Times
For three years, politicians and pundits challenged the president's policy of spreading democracy around the world. Can't be done — particularly in the Middle East, they tell us. Won't help to make us safer, they claim. It has become a mantra of the Left. To support their assertion that democracy has reached inevitable limits, they cite problems in Afghanistan with a resurgent Taliban and, of course, "the U.S. failure" in Iraq. Both issues were raised repeatedly with President Bush at his press conference on the economy last week. Despite evidence of progress on the ground in Iraq, the masters of the media — and the majority in Congress appear unwilling to desist in their attacks — and intend to continue their barrage of defeatism. The mainstream media all but ignored press releases from Iraqi and coalition commands on successes against both Iranian-backed terror cells in Baghdad's Sadr City and al Qaeda's network in northern Iraq, Salahadin, Diyala and Al Anbar provinces. Instead of covering these stories with in-depth reporting from the front, the potentates of the press launched a "shock and awe" campaign of their own. The target? The Iraqi parliament — for taking a month-long recess in the midst of a war.
The Simple Basra Truth: Our Troops Must Get Out Quickly – Michael Portillo, London Times
Gordon Brown is receiving lessons in what it is like to be American. Whatever you think of our allies in Washington, they bear a burden for the world that lesser powers like Britain rarely experience fully. For example, they have attracted global opprobrium for locking up without trial in Guantanamo Bay some very dangerous men who might otherwise wreak mayhem in our cities. Also, Americans have for years had to watch mournfully as the star-spangled coffins returned home. Now our government has agreed to take five former UK residents from Guantanamo. It must wrestle with the no-win problem of how to handle men against whom it may be impossible to bring a charge, but who could nonetheless be dangerous. Also, the focus has now shifted from the rate of attrition among American servicemen to the slaughter of British soldiers in southern Iraq. It may, after all, be British public opinion rather than American that cannot stand the flow of body bags. Brown, who has emerged enhanced by his handling of thwarted terror plots, floods and foot and mouth disease, may yet be pinioned by the loss of young British lives in Basra.
The Troops will Leave, But Should we Cheer? – Sean Rayment, London Daily Telegraph
Doubtless, in some quarters, the final withdrawal will lead to renewed claims - similar to those which appeared in the American press last week -that Britain has been defeated in southern Iraq. This is not the case. True, our armed forces have suffered many casualties but, from the five years I spent in the Parachute Regiment, two of them fighting terrorists in Northern Ireland, soldiers expect to sustain losses on operations and increasing casualty rates do not amount to mission failure. Instead British troops are being bombed out of Iraq because the whole military strategy has been fatally undermined by flawed political decision-making based on incorrect military assumptions. Britain is effectively being forced to withdraw because it is locked into another conflict in Afghanistan, to which it has committed long-term military support. Our armed forces have neither the personnel nor equipment to fight two wars on two fronts.
The Refuge Crisis – Washington Post editorial
As many as 110,000 Iraqis may be targeted as collaborators for helping U.S., coalition or foreign reconstruction efforts. These Iraqis and their families are frequently at risk of kidnapping, murder and persecution. At least 257 translators have already been killed, according to Human Rights First. As a result, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has referred more than 8,000 Iraqis to the United States for resettlement this year alone. Yet fewer than 200 have been admitted. This embarrassingly slow trickle of resettled refugees -- Sweden takes more than 1,000 each month -- motivated Ryan C. Crocker, the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad, to write a cable last month urging the administration to guarantee visas for all Iraqis helping the United States. The obstacles Iraqis face to be recommended by the UNHCR make these low resettlement rates all the more astonishing. Iraqis cannot apply for refugee status from within Iraq; they must first brave the dangers of crossing a border.
What Is This Man Thinking? - William Cohen, Washington Post
When Robert M. Gates, one of our nation's most dedicated and competent public servants, agreed to serve as Donald Rumsfeld's successor as secretary of defense last November, he seemed to do so more out of a sense of duty than out of desire. And why not? His tenure would be short and his mission nearly impossible. As one who once had the honor of leading the Defense Department, I've tried to imagine the thoughts that might have passed through his mind during the past nine months. The following interior monologue is purely fictional and should not be attributed in whole or in part to Gates's views.
The Dangers of ‘Peace’ Making – Dore Gold, Wall Street Journal
The U.S. and other Western powers are pushing for a new Israeli-Palestinian breakthrough, to help contain Iran and undercut the appeal of al Qaeda and radical Islam. A grand-scale Middle East peace conference is planned for this fall. The underlying assumption is that radical Islam has something do to with Israel-related political grievances. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair has made this argument repeatedly. If he and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice roll up their sleeves and work toward a permanent settlement of the Palestinian issue, so the logic goes, they will be providing a powerful diplomatic antidote to the jihadism threatening the security of the entire Western alliance. But is this really the case?
Musharraf's State of Emergency - Ahmed Rashid, Washington Post
President Pervez Musharraf was on the verge of imposing a state of emergency in Pakistan last week before being stopped by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and civilian advisers. It is clear to all in this extremely tense country that power is rapidly flowing away from Musharraf, even as he desperately tries to find a way out of an impossible political impasse. Declaring a state of emergency would have suspended fundamental rights, placed restrictions on the Supreme Court and delayed this year's elections. It is unlikely that an already angry and mobilized public would have accepted new restrictions, even those imposed by the army, which Musharraf heads. Massive street protests and further mayhem might have ensued.
An Atrocity That Needs No Exaggeration – Sam Dealey, New York Times
Just last month, the House of Representatives passed the Darfur Accountability and Divestment Act and the United Nations Security Council decided to deploy up to 26,000 peacekeepers to Sudan. Both actions were due in no small way to the work of the Save Darfur Coalition. Through aggressive advertising campaigns, this group has done more than any other to focus world attention on the conflict in the Sudanese region. But with a ruling Wednesday from Britain’s Advertising Standards Authority, Save Darfur now finds itself in the spotlight. Siding with a business group allied with the Sudanese government in Khartoum, the authority ruled that the high death tolls Save Darfur cites in its advertisements breached standards of truthfulness. The ruling is more than just a minor public relations victory for Khartoum.
Zimbabwe’s Horrors – Jeff Jacoby, Boston Globe
No one is surprised when a Roman Catholic bishop condemns the violence of war. But when was the last time you heard of one pleading for a military invasion? Zimbabwe's leading cleric has been doing just that in recent weeks, imploring Great Britain to invade its former colony and oust Robert Mugabe, the dictator whose brutal misrule has reduced a once-flourishing country to desperation, starvation, and death. Given the "massive risk to life" the regime poses, says Pius Ncube, the archbishop of Bulawayo, "I think it is justified for Britain to raid Zimbabwe and remove Mugabe. We should do it ourselves but there's too much fear. I'm ready to lead the people, guns blazing, but the people are not ready."
Another Kosovo Crisis? - Matthew Kaminski, Wall Street Journal
Remember Kosovo? "Madeleine's war," Slobodan Milosevic's ethnic cleansers, a million displaced Albanians and NATO's 78 days of bombing? So much history in the eight summers since has pushed this dusty Balkan plot off the map. But a relic of 1990s geopolitics is back in the headlines. Caught between a pushy Kremlin, weak-kneed Europe and otherwise-occupied Washington, the Kosovars are being denied their happy ending. Unless the U.S. forcefully steps in to usher this province of two million to independence without any messy compromises, Southeast Europe could fall off track again, with nasty repercussions for everyone.
Nuclear Tipped Summitry – Richard Halloran, Washington Times
The wily leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-il, appears to have taken a giant step toward getting his nation accepted as a nuclear weapons state. When the North and South Koreans announced last week that South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun was granted a summit meeting in Pyongyang late this month, immediate speculation held Mr. Roh would try to persuade Mr. Kim to abandon his nuclear ambitions. Skeptical South Koreans, Americans, and Japanese experienced in analyzing North Korea contended that, instead, Mr. Kim would urge Mr. Roh to acknowledge that North Korea had become a nuclear weapons state, like India and Pakistan.
They Can Hear You Now – Jacob Sullum, Washington Times
When you talk to your mother on the phone, do you have a reasonable expectation of privacy? I thought I did, but apparently I don't — at least, not anymore, because my mother lives in Jerusalem. Under the inaptly named Protect America Act of 2007, which President Bush signed into law on Sunday, the federal government no longer needs a warrant to eavesdrop on phone calls or read e-mail messages between people in the U.S. and people in other countries. Unless the courts overturn this law or Congress declines to renew it when it expires in six months, Americans will have no legally enforceable privacy rights that protect the content of their international communications.
Russia Tries to Ignore Succession – Paul Ablesky, Toronto Star
"Backsliding on democracy" is the charge most often made in the West about Vladimir Putin's Russia. But the term hardly captures the country's faltering movement toward a strained political consensus, an amalgam of 21st-century spin doctoring and Byzantine court intrigue. During the course of Putin's charismatic but overbearing reign, many formerly robust political reflexes and functions – parliament, gubernatorial elections, a viable opposition – have atrophied from lack of use. With the 2008 presidential elections fast approaching, a system that depends on the president's personal clout and seeming infallibility has visibly stiffened. The Russian constitution bars Putin from running for a consecutive third term, and he has steadily and stridently vowed to step aside. Early in his tenure, the president famously proclaimed the "dictatorship of the law" to be one of his guiding principles. And more than other previous Soviet and Russian leaders, Putin is particularly mindful both of his legacy at home and his reputation abroad.
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