The End of the Bush-Mush Affair

Opinion Watch

The New York Times editorial board writes: "For seven years, the Bush administration enabled Mr. Musharraf -- believing that he was the best ally for the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. He never delivered on that promise. And Pakistan's people deeply resent Washington for propping up the dictator.

"With Mr. Musharraf finally out of the picture, it is time to focus American policy on his dangerous and dangerously neglected country."

Juan Cole writes for Salon: "It is a measure of the Bush administration's broken foreign policy that the departure of Pervez Musharraf, the corrupt, longtime military dictator of Pakistan, is provoking fears in Washington of 'instability.' Despite Bush's warm embrace, Musharraf gutted the rule of law in Pakistan over the previous year and a half, including sacking its Supreme Court. He attempted to do away with press freedom, failed to provide security for campaigning politicians and strove to postpone elections indefinitely.

"The Bush administration has made a regular practice of undermining democracy in places where local politics don't play out to its liking, and in that, at least, Musharraf was a true partner. But stability derives not from a tyrannical brake on popular aspirations; it derives from the free play of the political process. Musharraf's resignation from office, in fact, marks Pakistan's first chance for a decent political future since 1977."

Russia Watch

Paul Richter writes in the Los Angeles Times: "Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Monday condemned Russia for what she said was a growing reliance on military power as she headed for Europe to increase allied pressure for Moscow to withdraw its forces from Georgia.

"Rice, in her toughest criticism of the Kremlin to date, said Russia's incursion into Georgia was part of a pattern in which the government has increasingly turned to its military to assert its influence. . . .

"Rice and President Bush have been intensifying their criticism of Russia in recent days over the fighting in Georgia."

Tracy Wilkinson writes in the Los Angeles Times: "Signing a missile-defense deal with its good friend the United States has earned Poland nothing less than the threat of nuclear attack from Russia -- a threat that might not sound so empty these days, given Moscow's bloody battle with Georgia.

"That conflict has plunged Europe into crisis, sending waves of jitters through Poland and other eastern nations, once-occupied parts of a Soviet empire that some fear Russia may want to reconstruct. Moscow's actions have also succeeded in driving deeper the wedge between Europe's East and West. . . .

"Ukraine and Moldova are worried that they could be Russia's next targets. The Czech Republic, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of a Soviet invasion that crushed the Prague Spring reform movement, is fretting about history repeating itself. Many Eastern European nations, Poland chief among them, are eager to find safe haven, and have turned to Washington for guidance and reassurance and partnership.

"But the fact that the distracted and overly stretched Bush administration took little concrete action to protect Georgia from Russia's wrath must also give pause to nations that would throw their lot completely with the U.S. Is the strategic alliance that many Eastern European countries have been building with the U.S. since the fall of communism nearly two decades ago still worth the risks?"

Over at NiemanWatchdog.org, where I am deputy editor, I talk to international law professor Richard Falk, who warns that the Georgian conflict could be the first significant collision between the U.S.'s new global conception of security and the more traditional sphere-of-influence view. He suggests it's time to consider the adverse consequences of antagonizing Russia.