It's So Easy. Replace The "Q" With "N" And...

by tristero

Hooyah! Iran is now the new Iraq. Read all about it here. From the article:
The strategy document declares that American-led diplomacy to halt Iran's program to enrich nuclear fuel "must succeed if confrontation is to be avoided," a near final draft of the document says.
Fortunately, we've got the combined diplomatic genius of Condoleeza Rice and John Bolton spearheading the effort to avoid "confrontation."
China's leaders, it says, are "expanding trade, but acting as if they can somehow 'lock up' energy supplies around the world or seek to direct markets rather than opening them up — as if they can follow a mercantilism borrowed from a discredited era.
That sounds about right. Only America has the right to 'lock up' engergy supplies and follow a mercantilism from a discredited era. Where does China get off, anyhow?

Interestingly, the document includes the United States itself in its assessments:
"Recent trends regrettably point toward a diminishing commitment to democratic freedoms and institutions," the document reads.
Oops. They were talking about Russia. An understandable mistake on my part.

Moving right along, it's still the case that the worst ideas remain official American policy.
But chief among the sections that remain unchanged is the most controversial section of the 2002 strategy: the elevation of pre-emptive strikes to a central part of United States strategy.

"The world is better off if tyrants know that they pursue W.M.D. at their own peril," the strategy says.
Um, er...I think the lessons the world learned from Iraq is the critical importance of nuclear defense against the US - it's worked for NoKo, after all - and that the US is too overcommitted and unpopular to stop anyone else from acquiring them.

And the final sentence of the article notes a curious oversight in the National Security Strategy 2006:
It stays away from the subject of global warming.
But this is not the final draft. I'm sure the complete text will have a lot to say about global warming and what the Bush administration is doing to ameliorate its effects.