Friday, July 28, 2006

Not sure I agree

Greg is pessimistic about a peace-making mission to Lebanon. I'm not saying he's wrong, but I'm not sure it's hopeless, either.

The trick, it seems, is to find a force that is a) not by definition seen as a tool of the international Zionist conspiracy of whatever, and b) is competent. (I return to China.)

If we can muster such a force - and by no means do I think that's a certainty - and if Canada can play a role without violating condition A (something our PM has almost certainly ruined) then I say we go in. Of course, this is all conditional on my usual two rules for the use of Canadian force:

1) Can military force help?

2) Can Canadian military force help?

As always, if either of those answer is no, then we don't have any reason being there.

All of that being said, we need to remember that in the early days of this war - before Operation "Piss off all of Lebanon" got in to full swing - Hezbollah was not welcome in Lebanon. Israel's arsenal and accuracy have taken care of that for now, but eventually the Lebanese are going to want their country back. If we can get the stamp of approval from the Lebanese government, then I think we can play a meaningful role.

Of course, re-reading this post, I'm looking at a whole bunch of pre-requisites, all of which have to come together. So maybe Greg's right - we're doomed! DOOOOOOMED!!!

1 comment:

Greg said...

The devil is in the details, my friend. I can't believe the Americans will settle for anything less than a "robust mandate" for the force (meaning protecting Israel at all costs, no questions asked). That is a recipe for disaster. We are best left out of it. The international system is destroyed and we will have to wait for sanity to break out in Washington for it to be rebuilt.