> Do Dennis Redmond and Chris Doss see this merely as a
> humanitarian gesture, or can we admit that Germany
> might have great power interests?
Analyzing German foreign policy is like analyzing the Playstation 3. Peel the brand name off, and inside you find multinational capitalism.
My own feeling is that the EU deployment in Lebanon is as much of an epochal power-shift as Hezbollah's defeat of Israel -- its second act, as it were. The US is losing influence and friends in the region, while the EU and Russia are moving in. Russia handles security and energy, the EU deals with trade and peacekeeping, and Eurocapital makes a bundle by selling machine-tools and Nokia phones to everyone.
Which puts the US Empire and its satraps in a bind. They're caught between the might of a rising EU and the volcanic eruption of the Shiite crescent.
-- DRR