' Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.
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Jewish World Review Nov. 4, 2002 / 29 Mar-Cheshvan, 5763

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

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Against us


http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | For months now, President Bush has been making clear his view that nations around the world had a choice to make. Either they would be with us or with the terrorists. Some believed, or at least hoped, that this was empty rhetoric. If that perception is not to be proven correct -- with potentially debilitating repercussions for Mr. Bush's credibility and American security interests in the years ahead -- those who are now showing themselves to be against, rather than with, us must be held to account.

Topping the list, of course, are the three veto-wielding nations that have long supported Saddam Hussein in the UN Security Council, and who are doing so now. France, Russia and China appear determined to block the adoption of a new resolution that would enable the United States to move without delay to compel Iraq's disarmament when (not if) Saddam once again thwarts UN inspectors. Unless actually forced to choose, each would prefer to maintain cordial diplomatic and lucrative trade relations with the United States, while preserving a valued client in Baghdad.

It could be that these fair-weather (if not actually false) friends have been encouraged in their intransigence by State Department interlocutors -- many of whom appear to share Franco- Russian-Chinese hostility to the Bush goal of regime change in Iraq -- to believe that the President will accede to efforts to dumb-down the U.S.-drafted resolution. They clearly fancy a diplomatic endgame that will have the UN's chief sleuth, Hans Blix, going through the motions of inspection over at least the next six-months.

Officials in Paris, Moscow and Beijing well know that if such delay would not completely foreclose American military action, it would certainly defer it until late next year. They may even succeed at last in their efforts to terminate sanctions on Iraq once it is certified (however unjustifiably) to be free of weapons of mass destruction. It is a safe bet that, as soon as sanctions are gone, they will be among the foreign suppliers willing to provide Saddam whatever additional lethal technology and weaponry he desires.

There is a similar risk that Russia and China -- and even more reliable "friends," like South Korea and Japan -- may perceive Mr. Bush's temperate stance towards North Korea's nuclear weapons program as an invitation to try to have it both ways: Suffering no costs in their relationship with us even as they continue to prop up and reward the malfeasance of one of the planet's most dangerous regimes.

Then there is the emerging danger emanating from our own hemisphere. The election this weekend of a radical socialist as president of Brazil may further catalyze trends with the potential to transform a region we have generally taken for granted as comprised almost entirely of democratic friends of the United States into one hostile towards us and hospitable to our international terrorist foes.

A warning about this dangerous prospect was communicated last week to President Bush by one of the most distinguished and respected members of the U.S. House of Representatives and chairman of its International Relations Committee, Rep. Henry Hyde. In particular, Mr. Hyde called attention to what he called a possible "axis of evil in the Americas" forged by Cuba's Fidel Castro, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and Brazil's Lula da Siva.

Of particular concern is the possibility that the enthusiasm "Lula" has declared for resuscitating Brazil's long-dormant nuclear program could put atomic weapons and ballistic missiles into the hands of this axis and its unsavory friends (for example, Chavez has established close ties with virtually every terrorist-sponsoring regime and several terrorist organizations, notably Colombia's FARC and the IRA). Rep. Hyde correctly points out that the United States can begin to counter this metastasizing danger by working with those who are against Chavez, and with us, in the Venezuelan opposition.

Among the other nations who are making known where they stand are Egypt and Saudi Arabia. The true colors of the former are on display as Egyptian state-controlled television broadcasts nightly during Ramadan 41-segments of a series loosely based on the Russian blood- libel known as the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion." Such incitement to hatred of and violence against our ally, Israel, is incompatible with being a true friend of the United States -- to say nothing of the enjoying the status of peacemaker and "moderate Arab state" that garners for Egypt billions each year in U.S. tax dollars and advanced weapons.

Saudi Arabia's alignment with America's enemies extends far beyond the anti-U.S. and anti-Western propaganda that is also ceaselessly disseminated by the kingdom's government-run media. In fact, for some fifty years, Saudi official, royal family and what passes for private sector institutions have been expending untold sums to promote the state religion -- a virulently intolerant strain of Islam known as Wahhabism. Washington has long ignored the individual and cumulative effects of such spending on Wahhabi proselytizing, recruiting, indoctrination, training and equipping of adherents who embrace the sect's injunction to convert or kill infidels.

In the wake of terrorism made possible -- or at least abetted -- at home and abroad by such Saudi-connected activities, the United States can no longer afford to turn a blind eye to this profoundly unfriendly behavior. That is particularly true insofar as there is reason to believe that Wahhabi enterprises are giving rise to perhaps the most insidious enemy of all: an Islamist Fifth Column operating within this country.

Fortunately, the United States does have friends, nations that are genuinely "with us" in the war on terror. They include Great Britain, Israel, Australia, India and Turkey. Each shares, at a fundamental level, our values. Like us, all are, to varying degrees, under assault from terrorist enemies. Like the United States, all face domestic pressure to accommodate -- rather than confront -- it.

Still, such nations constitute the core of a coalition of the willing that President Bush has resolved to mobilize to address the threats posed by terrorists like Saddam Hussein and his friends. The time has come to do so and, in the process, to make clear who is truly with us and who is prepared, instead, to be with our enemies.

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JWR contributor Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. heads the Center for Security Policy. Send your comments to him by clicking here.

Up

10/22/02: Too clever by half?
10/17/02: 'Drain the swamps'
10/08/02: The temptations of George Bush
10/01/02: Return of the San Francisco Dems
09/24/02: The next crusader?
09/17/02: It is no accident that advocates of coercive inspections have opposed prez's goal of regime change
09/10/02: A model for Iraq
08/27/02: Beware 'consensus leadership'
08/20/02: To Iraq or not to Iraq?
08/13/02: Trading with the 'enemy'
07/30/02: Who's trashing Ashcroft?
07/23/02: Wall Street's 'poisoned apples'
07/16/02: Back on the China front
07/09/02: See no evil?
07/02/02: Rethinking peacekeeping
06/25/02: Political moment of truth on defense
06/19/02: Inviting losses on two fronts
06/12/02: Make missile defense happen
06/04/02: The next 'Day of Infamy'?
05/29/02: Bush's Russian gamble
05/21/02: The 'next war'
05/15/02: Ex-presidential misconduct
05/07/02: When 'what if' is no game
05/02/02: Careful what we wish for
04/24/02: The real 'root cause' of terror
04/02/02: First principles in the Mideast
03/26/02: 'Renounce this map'
03/20/02: The inconvenient ally
03/12/02: Adults address the 'unthinkable'
03/05/02: The Saudi scam
02/26/02: Rumsfeld's 'now hear this'
02/19/02: Where's the outrage?
02/12/02: Post-mortem on 'Pearl Harbor II'
02/05/02: Spinning on the 'Evil Axis'
01/29/02: A challenge for the history books
01/22/02: Who pulled the plug on the Chinese 'bugs'?
01/15/02: No 'need to know'
01/08/02: Sentenced to de-nuclearize?
12/18/01: Missile defense mismanagement?
12/11/01: Is the Cold War 'over'?
12/04/01: A moment for truth
11/29/01: Send in the marines -- with the planes they need
11/27/01: 'Now Hear This': Does the President Mean What He Says?
11/20/01: Mideast 'vision thing'
11/13/01: The leitmotif of the next three days
11/06/01: Bush's Reykjavik Moment
10/30/01: Say it ain't true, 'W.
10/23/01: Getting history, and the future, right
10/16/01: Farewell to arms control
10/05/01: A time to choose
09/25/01: Don't drink the 'lemonade'
09/11/01: Sudan envoy an exercise in futility?
09/05/01: Strategy of a thousand cuts
08/28/01: Rummy's back
08/21/01: Prepare for 'two wars'
08/14/01: Why does the Bush Administration make a moral equivalence between terrorist attacks and Israel's restrained defensive responses?
08/07/01: A New bipartisanship in security policy?
07/31/01: Don't go there
07/17/01: The 'end of the beginning'
07/10/01: Testing President Bush
07/03/01: Market transparency works
06/27/01: Which Bush will it be on missile defense?
06/19/01: Don't politicize military matters
06/05/01: It's called leadership
06/05/01: With friends like these ...
05/31/01: Which way on missile defense?
05/23/01: Pearl Harbor, all over again
05/15/01: A tale of two Horatios
05/08/01: The real debate about missile defense
04/24/01: Sell aegis ships to Taiwan
04/17/01: The 'hi-tech for China' bill
04/10/01: Deal on China's hostages -- then what?
04/03/01: Defense fire sale redux
03/28/01: The defense we need
03/21/01: Critical mass
03/13/01: The Bush doctrine
03/08/01: Self-Deterred from Defending America
02/27/01: Truth and consequences for Saddam
02/21/01: Defense fire sale
02/13/01: Dubya's Marshall Plan
02/05/01: Doing the right thing on an 'Arab-Arab dispute'
01/30/01: The missile defense decision
01/23/01: The Osprey as Phoenix
01/17/01: Clinton's Parting Shot at Religious Freedom
01/09/01: Wake-up call on space
01/02/01: Secretary Rumsfeld
12/27/00: Redefining our Ukraine policy
12/19/00: Deploy missile defense now
12/12/00: Sabotaging space power
12/05/00: Preempting Bush
11/28/00: What Clinton hath wrought
11/21/00: HE'S BAAAACK
11/14/00: The world won't wait

© 2001, Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.