micah holmquist's irregular thoughts and links |
|
|
Welcome to the musings and notes of a Cadillac, Michigan based writer named Micah Holmquist, who is bothered by his own sarcasm. Please send him email at micahth@chartermi.net. Holmquist's full archives are listed here.
Archives
Sites Holmquist trys, and often fails, to go no more than a couple of days without visiting (some of which Holmquist regularly swipes links from without attribution) Aljazeera.Net English Blogs that for one reason or another Holmquist would like to read on at least something of a regular basis (always in development) Thivai Abhor |
Thursday, September 04, 2003
More game Although the game had previous been pronounced "over," United States Secretary of State Colin Powell announced yesterday that the U.S. was now circulating a draft resolution to amount to "putting the [United Nations] Security Council into the game," a move that marks of the beginning of "a new effort with respect to our diplomatic efforts to generate international support for Iraq." The rough translation of this is, "Send money and/or troops." While working with the Security Council would most likely mean some concessions in terms of control, Powell made it clear that the U.S. would still be in charge, even if has less than specific on the details. "[T]he U.S. will remain the commander of the unified command and there will be an element in the resolution that calls upon the United States as the leader of the military coalition to report on a regular basis to the United Nations, since it is a United Nations-authorized multinational force, if the resolution passes," Powell said. "Certainly, the United States will continue to play a dominant role, a dominant political role through the work of Ambassador Bremer and his coalition colleagues, and a dominant role because of the size of the U.S. force presence that is there and the leadership we are providing to the effort." The response to this proposal from France and Germany was less than enthusiastic. *** Powell also said: ...the draft resolution will invite the Iraqi Governing Council to submit a plan, a program and a timetable, for its political evolution through the writing of a constitution, putting in place the necessary institutions of government and the conduct of free elections so that they can determine how they will be led in the future; and, and at that point, after free elections, you have the conditions for sovereignty so that they can assume sovereignty over their own country once again, and the Coalition Provisional Authority and the military presence would be a matter of partnership between the new Iraqi government, an Iraqi government led by Iraqis for Iraqis, and whatever partners they wish to continue to help them in that process.While the Iraqi Governing Council is likely to compliant to act in this manner, it would be interesting to see what would happen if they did decide to push for Iraqis being in control of Iraq before all of the "Core Principles for a Free Iraq" had been achieved or even were clearly on the way to being achieved. Ultimately, I suspect, the answer would depend on how much the Bush Administration values being able to put forth the case that the “war on terror” is not about the U.S. dominating other countries. |