What to do
 

If by dismay, you mean a conflict that may very well grow into WWIII, then I think we're positing the same thing.

The scenario I'm looking at is potential war between Iran, Iraq, and Turkey simultaneously against the Kurds. Add in fighting between the Pashtuns and the Urdu in Afghanstan, several of the former Soviet Republics, and Turkey. Then consider a religious struggle between the Wahhabist Saudis and the largely non-citizen Shiite migrant worker population triggering a similar conflict across the Arab states.

Mind you, I'm not predicting all this happening for certain or happening this week. But I do see these potential conflicts keeping the US, and eventually a few other unwanted foreign peacekeeping forces in the ME for the indefinite future.

I was opposed to the invasion of Iraq for the very complicated reason that I fear we have stuck our thimb in a hole in the dike and rather than stopping the leak, we have weakened the whole wall.

What to do
 

See my post above. My bottom line is I see us investing a lot of money, years, and lives keeping the Middle East from lowing us all up, and I blame the invasion of Iraq for being the straw that will eventually break the camel's back if we aren't very careful.

My uninformed Opinion........
 

Exactly. And for some reason they are awful sensitive to criticism and as you can tell from this board, I am not the most diplomatic person.

What to do
 

I share your dismay at the scenario, but think that this is going to occur. I can't see any other eventual outcome. I don't know if it will be sooner or later, but I can't make the leap that we should not have liberated Iraq because its newly-liberated peoples will now be empowered to start to reform boundaries that were arbitrarily and inelegantly imposed upon them.

What to do
 

I saw Saddam Hussein (besides being a sadistic genocidal murderer) as being a major force in reinforcing the Kettle. As long as he was there we were going to get no closer to the ethnic rearrangement. The US by kicking Saddam Hussein out and installing a democracy has let out a lot of steam. Now the people can realize their dreams. It was a huge step in the right direction. However, we can screw up what we have accomplished by trying to stop the Kurds from leaving.

What to do
 

I'm guessing that the admin's lack of support for a Kurdish separation to date has more to do with keeping Turkey happy while we're there than with any long-term philosophy. Once we start seriously pulling out, I think we hear Rice speaking in terms of peoples' rights of self-determination.

What to do
 

Stability? In some ways maybe so. But you then will have the danger of a bunch of ethnically-unified states with serious grudges against neighboring states composed of folks with differing ethnicities.

Also dangerous -- even if they are democracies.

S_A_M

My uninformed Opinion........
 

He is viewed as disloyal to the administration, not necessarily the GOP. Some social conservatives probably think of him as a RINO.

Spanky has the temerity to publicly criticize the Maximum Leader and some of his policies and allies. This is not well-tolerated.

S_A_M

My uninformed Opinion........
 

No problem. Send $5 to Ken Mehlman. I did in 2003 on a whim and now they won't leave me alone. I'm sure it would work for anyone. Next letter I get I'm gonna tape two pennies to the card and send it back.

What to do
 

I hope you are right but I am not hopeful. I told Dr. Rice that even though I supported Gulf War I, I was a little leary about it because I think Kuwait and the Arab part of Iraq will eventually unite. My problem wasn't the absorbtion of Kuwait by Iraq, it was that Saddam Hussein now had control of Kuwait so a psychotic dictator had more territory which was bad.

She told me she thought the future was in establishing the current states in the the middle east and Africa as stable nation states. She also told me that the idea of an Greater Arabia, was crazy, would never happen, and was clearly not in the US's or Isreal's interest. She said that the current lines should not be messed with and as long as there is prosperity the ethnic divisions would die down. I tried to point out that Belgium, which is prosperous, is on the verge of falling apart and same with Canada. And the ethnic divisioins are not nearly as strong in those countrys.

She still thought my idea of national boundaries having to reflect ethnic identities in order to have stability was pretty stupid and crazy.

Although I admit she is ten times smarter than me and infinitely more knowledgeable about the world, I am still arrogant enough to think she is wrong, and think her views if followed, could spell disaster.

What to do
 

You just described Europe. Once the national boundaries are established and you have growth then they should get along. It is world wide depression that creates things like WWII. In my opinion the only way to get stability is ethnic nation states, democracy and prosperity (which requires free market systems).

What to do
 

True, but, absent ethnic cleansing, the only two possibilities in that region are that, or the mixed-bag unnatural "states" that can only be ruled through power or coercion. At least with side-by-side natural groupings, the internal structures of the states can be run democratically, or at least in a less authoritarian fashion.

Mussolini made the trains run on time, but, still, he was problematic.

What to do
 

Don't know about Belgium, but as for Canada, we had this discussion earlier in the year based on a survey that showed an appparently surprisingly high percentage of western Canada was ready to go it alone. I completed my own independent nonscientific survey of my western Canadian relatives, who told me that survey is meaningless. Basically, they said it is an expression of a basal level of grumbling about Ottawa, which has been going on in the prairies since there was a Canada. Canada most certainly is not falling apart.

As I said, the Belgians may be at each other's throats.

What to do
 

Didn't the separist vote in Quebec get like 48%. And Quebec is like thirty percent Anglo?

And these two ethnic groups don't really have a long traditional ethnic tradition and culture (unless you count that they are part of France and England).

What to do
 

My people (the Irish) do very well at living with other cultures. We take the bars, and let the others have the rest. If you look around every major American (and Canadian) city, I think you'll see this is true.

The exception, of course, being Northern Ireland, but those bloody Scots seems to want the bars, too.