On Mon, Oct 29, 2001 at 11:35:24PM -0500, Michael Pollak wrote:
>
> destroy air defenses and concentrate minds, followed by a winter of
> political maneuvering to produce a legitimate interim government. Followed
> by a spring with a military component that was still up in the air, but
> which would be pursued after long preparation.
>
> One could plausibly argue that fourteen days of bombing was a variation on
> that plan. But continuous bombing since then and extended indefinately
> into the future suggests a very different script -- the "air power is
> magic and can do everything on its own" script. If that's what the US is
> following, then it's an anti-UN, anti-political, and anti-coalition
> script. Every muslim member of the coalition, as well as the UN, has
> called for an end to the bombing, for reason that are both politically and
> strategically cogent. Even Britain has voiced its opposition, in a firm
> low cough, which is the most they ever oppose us in time of war. If the
> US continues to ignore them all, as well as the feedback of results, then
> a coalition doesn't exist except as an illusion. An illusion that will be
> soon be torn apart. And perhaps even some of the countries in it.
>
> There is still time for the US to stop the bombing for any of a number of
> readily available look-good reasons -- famine prevention, ramadan, winter,
> the respectful request of our allies -- and go back to pursuing the war
> primarily along the political front. But if what US officials are saying
> now isn't bluff, if they really mean to just keep on bombing until
> something turns up, then they really are fighting the war from 40 years
> ago, with the same ideas, if one can call feckless optimism and
> monomaniacal madness ideas. And the protestors who protested it from the
> first were prescient. And people like me who thought who thought they
> must have a subtler grasp than that by now were over-clever morons.
>
> It could conceivably be that what we are seeing is a see-sawing of the
> much bruited Rumsfeld/Powell split. In which case perhaps there is still
> time for Powell to re-prevail. But if he can't prevail with the entire
> coalition on his side, and counterproductive reports coming in, then he
> can't prevail. Or he never really represented an alternative approach.
>
> There is also perhaps a third option lying between the two: that both
> sides are convinced that air power plus Northern Alliance forces at their
> present strength are enough to accomplish what they consider an important
> intermediate military victory -- taking Mazar, investing Kabul -- and they
> are undeterred by the reports so far of negative results. But that hinge
> swings both ways. And it still provides no explanation for the bombing of
> Kandahar, near which there have never been any opposition troops.
>
> Michael
> __________________________________________________________________________
> Michael Pollak................New York City..............mpollak at panix.com
>
>
>
-- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929
Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu