Don’t you feel better now?

Oh please tell me this is satire.

Also, what UM said.

Seth, I don’t think that your analysis is off, but I also think that our ability to dramatically influence world events is minimal at this point. The kind of world events that we would like to influence, we simply can’t (as Iraq has shown). We are no longer really a superpower. The window for being one is long closed.

Instead, we need to be seen as a country that tries to honor its agreements and a country that does not abandon causes simply because they have become (or always were) unpopular. Or, if nothing else, we need to be a country that doesn’t leave lambs surrounded by wolves to fend for themselves.

It’s a catch-22 really and I can’t tell you how angry I am at our administration for putting us in this position.

Too many things in our global system depend on continued US hegemony. US military, economic, and diplomatic clout is vital for preserving countless interests across the globe.

We’ve already seen hints of it.

1. N. Korea’s recent posturing is largely possible because they know the US is too weak to even contemplate increased military pressure, they also know that diplomatically we’ve lost a lot of the credibility that we might otherwise have used to influence Korea’s neighbors effectively.

2. Iran is the exact same problem. We have so little credibility left in the Middle East that the EU gets jumpy if we even so much as suggest looking at Iran funny.

3. We have estanged ourselves diplomatically from one of our most important economic allies (the EU) such that when we call for economic sanctions, it’s no longer certain that we’ll get them. When we need forward airbases and military supply depots in Germany, we now can’t have them. When we wish to present a united front of opposition to bad behavior in Iran, we have a hard time getting it.

4. Russia has been reasserting its dominance throughout the Caucasus, Central Asia, Ukraine, and elsewhere. The recent belligerence of Russia in blackmailing the EU and Ukraine by shutting off its gas pipelines has been made largely possible by the lack of options the US now has to pressure Putin to behave himself. His strength today is largely due to the power vacuum left by a crippled US.

5. China can pretty much dictate terms and do whatever it damn well pleases right now. The US has so little prestige, diplomatic clout, or yes, even military pressure available that China has much more free range of action. If China were to start blockading Taiwan today and militarily posturing, do you think we would have half as much room for response as we did in the 1990s?

By the way, with an absence of US power in the region, China has been moving to establish political and economic power throughout Africa. The US has, at present, no real response to this.

6. Japan is rearming because of our weakened troop presence in the Korean peninsula. Our diplomatic and military influence over that situation has been severely weakened and troops have been pulled out to compensate for Iraq. Japanese nationalists are becoming increasingly vocal and challenging half a century of pacifism. Japan already has the most modernized and powerful navy in the Pacific Rim outside of the US. What do you think China thinks about that? What if both countries enter an arms race? What are we going to do about it?

When the policeman is absent, the neighbors start eying each other much more cautiously and suspiciously.

7. Peace between Pakistan and India is largely premised on the coercive and diplomatic clout of the US. Whatever trust both countries have for each other is largely made possible by the knowledge that if their neighbor started something, the US would drop the hammer.

8. The triangle of power between Russia, China, and India is not as stable as you’d think. China and Russia are historical enemies and share a very long border, jam packed with unstable ethnic groups. India and China are also historical enemies, economic rivals for dominance in Asia. And all three are nuclear-armed.

9. Afghanistan could be stabilized if we were to dedicate the troops we have in Iraq toward the effort.

10. We have set back our prospects of a prosperous trading pact with South America back 10 years through our neglect and global humiliation. And forget about doing anything with Cuba and Venezuela.

11. We don’t do anything about Darfur, Sudan because, frankly we can’t do anything about it. A military adventure is out of the question (financially and manpower-wise). And since China feels comfortable thumbing its nose at a weakened US while economically supporting the Sudanese government, a meaningful Security Council resolution is unlikely, as are effective economic sanctions.

12. Our ability to fight transnational organized crime has been completely undermined by our incredibly stupid rendition programs. Now our most valuable partners are too suspicious of us to cooperate fully.

13. Turkey and Iran are increasingly nervous about the instability in Iraq. Both share a border with Kurdistan and have angry, oppressed, Kurdish minorities within their countries. Incredibly unstable situation. I’m just waiting to see who invades who first. Once again, the US will be largely powerless to say “stop.”

You see how this is interconnected?

The problem we have right now is so much bigger than Iraq. The potential for violence within a vacuum of US power globally is so much greater than what we are seeing in Iraq. Continued involvement in Iraq is crippling us and we need to pull out and start paying attention to a very dangerous world that we have been utterly neglecting for the past 7 years.

1. Keeping the Kurds out of it–they seem interested enough in stability; and
2. Minimizing the influence of Al-Qaeda and Iran in the resulting fight. A bloody civil war will be tragic, but a bloody regional war between Sunni and Shiite fanatics would be disastrous.