How to deepen a widening quagmire in one easy step: Just think like the Bush administration

Just one morning I'd like to get up and discover the Bush administration hasn't gone and done something incredibly stupid, again. So far, little luck.

This morning's anti-treat waiting to greet me was headlined, "U.S. Hopes to Arm Pakistani Tribes Against Al Qaeda." Yes, that's just what that region needed, assuming one believes the Middle East powder keg isn't yet packed fully, tightly, or impressively enough.

The "plan," as outlined by "planners," is to introduce $350 million of American military training and all manner of things that go boom into Pakistan's volatile periphery that is already heating up the volcanic interior. It's modeled on our Sunni-insurgency aid in Iraq's Anbar province, a ticking time bomb of an idea that will see all those U.S. weapons and all that U.S. training pointed right back at us, just as soon as the assisted locals clear out their unwanted hombres and then remember they're not that fond of the Great Satan, either.

But at least both fighting fronts will be less "asymmetric" by then, that undesirable state of military conflict in which the U.S. can't figure out how to whip an enemy armed only with the modern equivalent of sticks, stones and slingshots. The enemy will, instead, possess the latest in military know-how and toys, and therefore be more easily subdued. And if you follow that logic, there's a high-level planning job for you at the United States Special Operations Command headquarters in Tampa, Fla., where counterterrorism mavens devise such incomprehensible humbug.

Some Western military minds are a trifle skittish at the idea of arming those already "blamed ... for aiding and abetting Taliban insurgents mounting cross-border attacks" into Afghanistan, not to mention that "the assistance to develop a counterinsurgency force is too little, too late." What these minds fail to appreciate, however, is that the best quagmires -- the ones, that is, that offer mounting arguments for the mounting presence of permanent U.S. forces -- are indeed the ones initially created with assistance provided in quantities too little and timed too late.

Those are the dream quagmires -- the ever-escalating, stay-the-course swamps that keep the ravenous military-industrial complex and imperialist bumpkins content.

But I have to admit, yesterday's headline was a bit of a break. It wasn't so much about some incredibly stupid thing the Bush administration is doing; it was, rather, merely about how incredibly stupid the Bush administration has been. It was, to be somewhat more precise, one of those "This is news?" headlines, to wit: "Bush Failed to See Musharraf’s Faults, Critics Contend."

In brief, the story was a concentrated saga of the incredibly stupid spread over time, first noting that 2000 presidential candidate Bush "didn’t even know General Musharraf’s name; he couldn’t identify the leader of Pakistan." But from this deplorable lack of knowledge that failed to rise even to the level of shallowness, Mr. Bush quickly and lastingly determined that Musharraf was a "friend," a "courageous leader," a man of "vision."

The reality that the generalissimo was the one holding and pulling the strings, rather than the White House, seems to have never occurred to Mr. Bush, who, simply, counted on his crack intuition to make the geopolitical calls.

Now -- speaking of too little, too late -- "critics are asking whether the president misread his Pakistani counterpart."

"He didn’t ask the hard questions, and frankly, neither did the people working for him," said Pakistan expert and Bhutto-advisor Husain Haqqani. "They bought the P.R. image of Musharraf as the reasonable general. Bush bought the line -- hook, line and sinker."

Other "experts in United States-Pakistan relations said General Musharraf has played the union masterfully, by convincing Mr. Bush that he alone can keep Pakistan stable."

And, of course, we see that stability re-flowering today, as we prepare to shove hundreds of millions in military hardware into the hands of Pakistani tribal leaders who possess absolutely no love for the United States, nor share its preposterous vision of a more peaceful Middle East through greater firepower.

What next? I can promise only one thing: It'll be incredibly stupid.

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Comments

[Helen Rainier]

PM, this makes perfect sense in Bushian Logic. If we arm ALL of them they will spend all their time killing each other so that when the Bushies decide to invade we'll really win when Bush stands on the aircraft carrier and says "Mission Accomplished."

I'm surprised you didn't connect the dots on this! ;-)

[chanceny]

Between Putin's mesmerizing eyes and the dictator who used his military to overthrow Pakistan's elected government, Pervez the visionary, Bush's man-crushes have been quite lacking in good taste. Seems that our own codpiece wearing Connecticut faux cowboy, our own dearly demented delusional dictator wannabe, has as much wisdom choosing his pals as he does in what it takes to protect and defend America. Whatta guy! Too bad, for ALL of us, his vision thingy ain't up to the job.

[beamer]

oh, his vision thingy works alright.. just don't share his twisted morals...i am comfortably confident that whatever bush likes,values or believes- i do not...