Yeah, well. All this loose talk about "democracy," and our imposing it upon the invaded and conquered peoples of Iraq, those we haven't yet killed, makes for sad reading.
Democracy is very much on the decline in the U.S.; indeed, democracy "content" has fallen to about the same level of qualification in our political institutions that the pork in a can of "pork" and beans provides. (Make sure every damn can gets one tiny, fatty little piece!)
As for someone's absurd conjecture that so often in life the choice is not between good and evil but instead between what's bad and very bad, I will point out that this is a very tainted if not actually evil version of human choice making. Most children I talk to wouldn't buy it.

Thank you for you very well thought out remarks. Hard to quarrel with most of what you said.

Couple of things though:

-In the world in which we now live: democracy, to my mind, is the the most representative and workable form of government. You gotta start somewhere. India did not have a tradition of democracy either. And the functional anarchy that we have in India did work reasonably well (considering the circumstances) at least for the first few decades. So, to give up on the idea of democracy altogether in the middle east is slightly defeatist. I dont have great tolerance for cultural relativism when it comes to basic human rights. To me, right to vote is one of them. However, to argue whether a US backed democracy in a middle eastern country is feasible without first tackling the Palestine problem is a valid argument. I guess we would find out ...

- For a very long time during the cold war era, US interventions in other countries were almost always driven by realpolitic. Both US and USSR supported and kept in power the most loathsome thugs in human history. It was widely anticipated that the end of cold war would change that. And it did start changing. US intervention in Serbia / Kosovo / Bosnia have not been driven by calculations of political or economic advantage. (And to answer an earlier question: No, US did not get the approval of UN before getting into Kosovo. That approval came after the fact).

However, this administration seems to have gone back to the cold war era thinking of you are either for us or against us and if you are for us, we would overlook your human rights records and if you are not for us, none of that matters. Islamic fundamentalism has become the new enemy and you can almost feel sigh of relief in various quarters in having found a new enemy.

- There is also a convergence of interest between those who call themselves 'neo-conservatives' and dedicated hawks, older 'let's nuke them to stone age' crowd. The neocons (people like Bill Kristol of Weekly Standard, Robert Kagan etc. weild huge influence on this government's foreign policy. They also genuinely seem to believe that US can bring its power to make positive change in the world. The last time these people exerted so much influence was during the first presidency of Reagn. That particular 'revolution' did not work out so well for this crowd. But this time they seem to actually have a great deal of power and have staked a lot in this conflict. Many of these people would like to see democracy in the middle east. They think (I think correctly), if only they can get the Arabs to taste the forbidden fruit of a capitalist democracy, they would not be so much against US.

Then, there is the state department. The state department is, as everyone knows, more conservative, more reality oriented compared to the wild eyed optimists in the think tanks.

I think there is a small possibility that between the tugs and pressures of these various competing factions, some good may actually come out of it.

-I grant you the depressing ground that at some level the war is about creating a more grounded US political and military umbrella over middle east. But keep in mind that Iraq is also different ball game than Afghanistan. A lot, lot, lot more visible. The Arab world is not going to foget what happened there in a hurry. If the crowd in Baghdad embraces US and if US can give Iraq a functionl, representative democracy where everyone gets 3 squre meals a day, kids go to school, girls can dance and newspapers can write about their governmental corruptions, the neocons think (and I tend to agree) that political Islam in middle east will have a hard time sustaining their attack against US.

Now it is also possible that Iraqis get all that and US benefits a lot more from this conflict. Jason Kottke in this depressing post about the possible causes and outcomes of war described that. You know what? Even if that happens, Iraqis will be substantially better off than where they are now.

Where they are now is also because of the sanctions instituted by US But the sanctions are a direct result of Saddam's moves. Saddam also moved because it expected US to turn a blind eye ....It is a vicious cycle.

I was on mefi the other day. And someone said something very prescient to a kid. He said that you would eventually learn that a lot of times in life the choice is not so much between good and evil, it is between bad and very bad.

Hi Kaushik,

Sorry to disturb the train of thoughts on Iraq. Just wanted to tell Sriporna and you that I'm back from Bangkok and Saigon, and into the 3rd week of my school here. Should you feel like driving down to D.C, please feel free to. Just make sure you let me know in advance :)

The 2 coming weekends are good coz it's Cherry Blossom season!

Ciao!
Java

>"I would like to believe that democracy in Iraq >is on the agenda.

Well, most of us would like to believe that.

However I feel its quite unlikely. Iraq has no democratic tradition at all and no political parties other than the Baath party worth talking about. Of course there are exiled "leaders" and the kurds. But all of them are interested in their pound of flesh instead of building a country. The kurds want their own country and the Shiaas with Iranian links will probably be an anathema to Americans anyways. So installing democracy in Iraq is difficult. Its really another Afganistan. Whoever comes to power will come by the power of American military support instead of popular mandate. There will be periodic assaassination attempts on him and his cabinet, once in a while an "important" cabinet member will die by a bomb blast.

However by that time the western media attention will go somewhere else (just like it has happened in Afganistan) and as long as the government is friendly to American interests no one will really care all that much about democracy in Iraq. There will of course be another American millitary base in Iraq.

Its idiotic (and unfair too) for us to believe that US is ready to get its troops killed to install democracy in any country. Its ready to get its troops killed to protect its interest and if that interest is served by a non democratic government so be it.Good examples will be -

Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Quatar, UAE, Pakistan, Afganistan, South Korea (until 1980s I believe), Chile (where it toppled the democratically elected Allende government to install a millitary regime) , phillipines (till marcos ) , ... the list goes on.

I think the funniest thing will be that they try to install democracy and the Baath party wins - like it happened in the first election in Japan after second world war where an anti american party won. Then they had to remove him and call for another election ;-)