Unicycle Afghanistan

As TPM notes, it seems like the London bombings were based on ideas developed in Iraq. As we’ve seen, it doesn’t match up exactly because the devices were crude with little chance of causing mass casualties had they gone off, thankfully they didn’t. Here’s my question, why did Afghanistan stay local? Why did the mujahidin stay in Afghanistan and not export themselves to the Soviet Union? Or, to put it another way, why is Iraq flowing past its borders? Is this simply Al-Qaeda ideology? Strike at the infidel? It just seems so ineffective if you want freedom for you Muslim…

A friend and mentor pointed out this article from the International Herald Tribune on splitting up Iraq. I thought with the recent capture of Saddam, now might be a good time to talk about the implications of our long-term strategy in Iraq. Broadly speaking we either keep the country whole, or we divide it. If we keep it whole, we have a few different approaches to keeping it together: Impose our rule, like the IGC; let loose a real representative democracy, putting the Shi’ah in charge; set-up a power sharing scheme, like Lebanon; some confederation of autonomous regions.

Last night was a good night for me. I was flipping channels because the Law and Order episode on TNT was one that I had previously seen. As a was bypassing all of the reality shows (Are people really this shallow? If there is to be a clash of civilisations as the both the Bush administration and Osama and his bearded minstrels seem to be taking all of us toward, the current state of American television, would lead one to conclude that it may be a fair fight.) Anyway back to the matter at hand. As I was flipping channels,…