Hi, Ed. Dr. Friedman provided some useful analysis, especially regarding the motives and options that Hussein might be considering right now, and noting SH's being a risk-taker. However, the analysis also refers to US post-war strategy being built upon memories of the Japan occupation after WW2, the so-called Japan model. I am particularly concerned that the US advisors don't seem to acknowledge that the military occupation of a defeated Japan under MacArthur was successful 1) because the natives were about to starve and 2) because their beloved Emperor took to the radio and told them to submit to the victors. Two nuclear bombs may have added to their willingness to be subdued; also, they fought for country, not jihad. Additionally, as almost everyone on the planet knows by now, the Japanese are a homogenous people with tremendous group affiliation and strong sense of a long-lived shared culture. From everything I've learned of Iraq in all this, the several religious sects and tribal entities that comprise a cobbled together Iraq might be at each other's throat left to their own devices. I would not even compare an occupied Iraq to a post-war South Korea. Secondly, the premise that Japan's occupation and remodeling were successful because it allowed the second-tier bureaucracy to stay in power is superficial at best. Yes, the top-tier leadership was eliminated and their underlings used to facilitate the reforms. However, as soon as the occupation ended, the bureaucracy so long dominated by imperialists returned, not even having been supplanted by fresh faces. This is a gross cultural arrogance to presume that because bodies took orders well during a limited occupation that the cultural and political climate really changed beyond the prescription. Yes, significant paper reforms eventually were transplanted into Japanese culture, forcing the civil system and government to enact Western values and concepts of democracy. But this was enforced by strong sense of defeat coupled by the overwhelming shock and dismay that the Emperor mythology had been renounced. It also was reinforced by a growing US military presence in the form of the US Seventh Fleet and bases, but more so by the Japanese redirecting their nationalism into economic goals. Some still argue that Japan has yet to make peace with its new peacemaker identity, as do the suppressed seismic rumblings in Germany and Austria. On the other side of the nationalism equation, there is a still active struggle in Japan to reconcile her self-image as the liberator of Asian colonies by Western and Chinese forces with the hidden reality of Hirohito's and Tojo's empire-building. By recent accounts, Pres. Bush and his war team are now considering an abbreviated overwhelming force, quick military occupation, massive privatization of the oil fields (probably with US and allied silent partners, as with power plants over the border with Mexico) and a superficial withdrawal, hopefully before the US economy is devastated by a prolonged war/occupation and Just in Time for the 2004 campaign season. In this shallow game plan, lots of munitions and other military industrial complex sales are supposed to boost the stock market long enough to distract the American public. This will serve a US domestic political function, but it will not serve foreign policy, which is why we keep having the same problems come back to the table. Maybe Karl Rove plans to take that up later. Karen Watters Cole East of Portland, West of Mt Hood Outgoing mail scanned by NAV 2002
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